Page 26 of Secrets in the Shadow

“Are…are you okay?” Cody should be running away instead of standing there with someone who could be lying to him. Although he’d seen Zymore’s memories, who was to say he hadn’t hidden parts to mask his true motive?

“I’ve found Raziel, but so has Bashar.” Zymore lowered his head. Cody inhaled sharply, staring at the same swirling eyes Raziel had had. “A Nephilim has been discovered,” he said in an ominous tone.

“A what?”

The side of Zymore’s mouth curled upward. “It seems Raziel broke a very strict rule when he escaped three years ago.”

Cody was getting really sick of asking what the guy was talking about. It wasn’t as if he wanted Zymore in his home to begin with. Not after he’d seen the torture Raziel had suffered, and this asshat had simply stood by and watched. He didn’t care if Zymore would have suffered if he’d interfered. Seeing what Raziel had gone through… Cody’s heart hurt for… his mate.

When he had been told about mates, about their deep connection, he couldn’t comprehend just how deep it went. No one could unless they experienced it firsthand.

And Cody felt it. That was how he knew Zymore wasn’t lying as far as Raziel and him being mates. But everything else was debatable.

“Are you going to tell me what in the blue blazes you’re talking about or just stand there looking impressed by whatever Raziel did?”

“He had sex.” Zymore chuckled.

That wasn’t something Cody cared to hear. “I get that some guys high-five each other over it, but—”

“Angels are supposed to remain chaste,” Zymore said, cutting him off. His smile slipped away, replaced with a somber expression.

If that was true, Raziel sure as hell hadn’t acted pure. He had rocked Cody’s world. If it was that intense with only a muscular thigh between his legs, he wasn’t sure he would survive the full menu.

“Are you saying Raziel is in trouble for having sex?”

Zymore shook his head, eyeing him. “It’s what happened afterward.”

“I swear…” Cody gritted his teeth. “Just spit it out already.”

A headache started to form in the back of his skull. Didn’t the guy know how to give explanations without constantly taking breaks?

“Raziel had sex three years ago, apparently right before he was recaptured because, if he had known, I know he would have fought harder to free himself before now.”

“I have a spatula, and I’m not afraid to use it,” he threatened. “Stop pausing and give me the full goddamn explanation!”

Zymore looked him over. “You’re just a pint of feistiness, aren’t you?”

Cody glared at him as a thought struck. “How does Raziel have a mate if he can’t have sex?”

“The million-dollar question no one can answer, but we have our theories.” Zymore shrugged. “Anyway, Raziel’s fun-filled night resulted in a child. A Nephilim. Half angel, half human. They are seen as an abomination, though I personally think they’re adorable. As soon as Raziel and the child came into physical contact, their bond resonated, alerting our pantheon of the child’s existence and Raziel’s whereabouts. Honestly, most angels these days don’t give a rat’s ass about a Nephilim, but Bashar and his zealots are heading there now to recapture Raziel and kill the child. Is that a thorough enough explanation for you?”

Was that why Raziel had left earlier, to see his child? “How do we help them?”

Cody knew how to fight about as well as he knew how to keep a bacon-stealing angel out of his kitchen. But he couldn’t just stand by while his mate was about to be dragged back to that cell to be beaten and a toddler killed.

The more he learned about angels, the more Cody decided he didn’t like them. He wasn’t a religious guy, but what Bashar and his cronies were doing was just flat-out wrong.

“Trust me. You don’t want to get mixed up in a celestial battle, human,” Zymore said. “There’s a lot of powers and bad attitudes involved.”

He stepped to Zymore, glaring at him, although he was too short to get in the guy’s face. “I’m Raziel’s mate, so I have every right to be there. Now take me to him!”

The angel curled his lip. “And if Bashar figures out that you’re Raziel’s mate, you’ll be killed as well because you’re proof the no-sex decree was not given by our Father but some prude with intimacy issues.”

None of that mattered to him. Cody didn’t care about decrees and battles. He just wanted to get to Raziel, to help in any way he could. “Then keep your mouth shut about it. Now take me to him,” Cody snapped.

“This is not the suicide mission I had in mind,” Zymore grumbled. “Sure, give Bashar another person to smite.”

Cody yelped when the guy gripped his arm in a tight hold. One minute they’d been standing in his living room, and the next, he found himself inside a child’s bedroom.

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