Page 6 of Angel Of Darkness

That was when the wind hit him with the force of an avalanche, slamming into his body, lifting him up, and tossing him in the air, higher, higher. The wind took him away from the woman who fought so valiantly below.

The night sky whipped past him as the whisper of a thousand voices filled his ears. A dim light appeared, growing brighter, brighter—beckoning him upward, then blinding him when he got too close.

Darkness.

Keenan blinked and found himself on his knees. He’d been tossed onto a gleaming marble floor. Keenan knew who would stand before him even before he allowed his gaze to lift.

Azrael. The leader of the death angels.

“What have you done?” Azrael—Az—demanded.

Keenan closed his eyes and saw a woman bleeding out in an empty alley. Shivering with cold. “She still lives.” He rose to his feet and let his wings spread behind his back.

Az shook his head. “No.”

Fear gripped him. “What? I didn’t touch her, I didn’t?—”

“You confess to disobeying your orders.” Az’s face tensed. “You disobey?—”

She was dead? Determined to get back to Nicole, Keenan spun away from Az. No one else would take her, not after what he’d risked.

“You knew the penalty for such an act.” Az’s words froze him.

Yes, Keenan knew he had to answer for taking the vampire’s soul, but?—

“I’m sorry, Keenan. You...you were a good angel.”

Wait. Keenan whirled back around to face the blond angel. “I didn’t?—”

“No, you did not. That’s the problem.” And there was sadness cloaking the words, when there was never any emotion in the other angel’s voice. Never much emotion in any of them.

No love. No fear. No hate. Only duty. That was the way it should have been.

Except when I looked at her, I...felt.

“Temptation can destroy us all.” Az’s all-seeing, bright blue gaze raked him. “You had the chance to obey. You knew when the moment of her death was at hand, but instead you killed one not on your list.”

“He was a vampire!” The rage was new. Something that had developed only when he saw the pain Nicole suffered. “He was torturing, killing. He deserved?—”

“We all get what we deserve.” Az’s chin lifted. “Beware, my friend, this will hurt.”

What?

“I’ve heard it’s the fire that makes you scream the loudest.”

There was no fire?—

The wind hit Keenan again, wrapping around him, but this time, its grasp felt like the edge of a hundred blades.

Az watched him with a hard stare. No more emotion. Maybe it had never been there. “Did you think we did not know the lust you held in your heart?”

What would angels know of lust? What would they know of anything but following orders, protecting the weak, living in that vast, blank world of nothing?

“Why do you think she was given to you?” Az asked.

And Keenan finally understood. A test. One he’d failed because he hadn’t been able to watch Nicole slip away.

“You broke our rules. You took a life that was not yours to extinguish.” Az’s cold voice floated to him. “And you failed in your duty.”

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