Page 26 of Angel's Vengeance

Was she ...Did she actuallylikethis?His mouth exploring hers?His body providing a shell of protection that, for any sane female, should have been viewed more as a cell than a sanctuary?

But those questing fingers traveled lower still, curiously circling the outside of his thighs.Then, they froze, as if they’d forgotten their place, and quickly spirited away back to their normal handholds.

And he’d never regretted the retreat more in his life.

“No,” he growled into her mouth.“More.”

Rhode had no earthly idea what to do with his hands, but he sure as hell couldn’t keep them fisted at the sides of Neela’s head any longer.Missing the feel of her on his thighs, he grabbed one of hers and settled it on the outside of his hip, anchoring it there with his large hand.

It was all the encouragement both of them needed to bask in whatever reprieve the mages were offering them for a little while longer.Once the flames died out and Rhode had to open his eyes to the carnage that was and always would be his reality, this wouldn’t be allowed to happen again.

Things always looked different in daylight, didn’t they?Even being starved of the stuff for so long, he knew what the illumination always revealed.Ugly cracks and raw crevices that made perfect homes for any manner of nightmares to settle in and fester.

Terrors didn’t need spacious living accommodations, after all.They only needed one single opening.

But not here.Not now.

Neela shifted her head and, to Rhode’s great delight, sheepishly searched out more of him with her tongue, embarking on a quiet answering expedition.Somewhere beneath the fire, their unspoken dance had flourished beneath a grand orchestration.There was a hesitant intent, a slow and steady drip that harmonized their movements.

A marvel, really, considering that Neela was engulfed by his fire as well.That was what happened among soul-bonded pairs in the beginning, before the fire was firmly under the sole control of the angel wielding it.

The mate was the one who had to first ignite it, and the experience was far different for mortals than other beings, as he’d been told.Human central nervous systems initially used their pain receptors to conceptualize the fire around them, even though they were never actually being burned.It was a shock type reaction.

Not so with others.Still, the possibility of Neela in pain, however unlikely, snuck its way into their intimacy and stung him with a brutal sharpness.Was she hurt?Was he harming her?Why he cared at all was a question that had been drowned out by action.

Rhode lifted off her with a growl.But as soon as he flung his eyes wide, a different sort of worried wonder greeted him.

A halo.

Neela lay beneath him, her lips kiss-swollen and her eyes bright with a pleased shock that he had put there.But beyond her brilliant eyes was another sort of brilliance.All that finely coiled hair that seemed to claim everything it touched was adorned with the final wisps of angel fire.Hisangel fire.A gift that their oddity of a connection had, for reasons he had yet to discover, made him the only seraph able to command the power.

Able to command it because of her and only once she called it forth.

“Are you all right?”His eyes thirsted over her, timing each flutter of her lashes to the dying licks of the flames that had begun to extinguish.

“I’m breathing.That’s a plus.”

“Yes,” he acknowledged.

She cleared her throat but made no move to rise.“I think I was on fire.”

“You called it forth.Of course you were on fire.”

“You told me to.”

Yes, he had told her to do that, hadn’t he?The words made sense in so much as they didn’t.

“You should get up,” he said, still focusing on the flames.

“Um.You need to get off me first.”

Rhode blinked, barely hearing her words.He was far too busy tracking the last line of blue embers as they outlined the farthest tendrils above her head.Mages, her hair was lovely, adorned in a fire he had no claim to, which was already receding within him, despite how urgently he tried to tug it back.Not yet at full strength, then.

Oh, what he wouldn’t give to experience it again with this woman.It was a power unlike any he’d ever known.One that offered not only immense protection and offensive might but privacy as well.

Privacy that allowed him to kiss Neela and not hate himself for the betrayal of his body.To, dare he say,enjoythe touch of another.Ofhertouch.

“Uh-huh,” he remarked, enraptured by the final flame as it flickered out, taking all it represented with it.But beyond the arc of her hair, a strange shadow on the snow in the distance caught his eye.

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