Page 86 of Vanish Into Light

He remembered every moment of that night – the initial fear, the terror, really, the shame, the sense that his own body was betraying them. He hadn’t wanted to like it, or want it – hadn’t wanted to likeBeck. But then he’d melted, and even when fear had spiked in his belly, when Beck was behind him, he’d thoughtoh, andyes, andplease, and hadn’t known how to ask.Yet, Beck had said.Not yet.

The fear that flared to life inside him now had nothing to do with Beck – his proximity, his weight, the sharpness in his claws – and everything to do with Rose’s hand squeezing his neck, the desperation in her grip, and the sense of impending loss.

“I remember,” he said, helpless to do anything about the soft, raw sound of his voice.

“And?” Beck settled more solidly over him, hips pressed in tight to Lance’s ass.

Lance sucked in a shallow breath, and rocked back against him. “Consider this me begging.”

Beck growled, low and pleased, echoed by the thunder that shook the house around them.

Beck kept growling, a low, constant vibration that sounded like want and aggression – but his clawed hands were oh-so-gentle as he undressed Beck in the pitch dark, as he prepped him, slowly, slowly, the claw on his thumb dragging over the swell of his ass, while Lance pressed his face into Rose’s thigh and fought not to come too quickly.

When Beck finally pressed inside with his cock, Lance saw stars. He didn’t last long. Beck bit at the side of his throat, and even that was almost gentle, and Lance thoughtstay, stay, stay, and tears filled his eyes, slipped silently down his cheeks, his nose – and Rose wiped them away with careful fingers.

The storm screamed around the house, and it felt like the end…of so many things.

He came hard, and then he slept, warm, and sweaty, and surrounded by the heat and scent of both of them.

~*~

When Beck reached the first floor, his boot soles landed in a quarter inch of water. “The flood, hm?” he murmured, grinning to himself. “Poetic.”

He splashed quietly down the hallway, all the way down to the great hall. All the rooms were dark – the only light the blue-white fire of lightning as it flashed, every second, a constant strobing that revealed the restless, shifting bodies of the things moving across the lawn. Slow, aimless. Demons, angel-born things; they could have been either. The back of his neck crawled with awareness as he walked, walked.

A shutter blew off the house with a clatter, and the floors above him groaned and creaked.

A candle flickered in the kitchen, a single flame that limned the profiles of the three frightened Knights huddled around it. Gallo rested his head on Tris’s shoulder. Gavin chewed at his nails.

When he reached the great hall, Michael was already there. He stood on the dais, just before the throne, in his frail-looking, borrowed body. The rain had stopped – the eye was upon them – and his eyes glowed bright as blue neon in the gloom of the vast space. His newly-reforged sword rested over one shoulder, but the length of it couldn’t look comical against the conduit’s form; Beck’s smile fell away, and a lump formed in his throat.

“This is it, then.” His voice came out less steady than he’d hoped.

Morgan’s expression was grave. “I would give you more time, if I could.” A pause. “I know this is difficult.”

Beck bared his teeth as he walked forward, footsteps splashing. “Would you? You would offer that grace?”

“I would – but it’s not within my power.”

“No,” Beck agreed, drawing closer. “You don’t grant anything, do you? You’re nothing but a sword. A blunt instrument.” The next flash of lightning glinted along the blade’s edge. “Or, rather a sharp one, I suppose.”

Morgan stared at him evenly, without blinking – without malice. “I don’t hate you, Lucifer. I never have.”

“And yet here we are again, after all this time. You with your sword, and me all in black.” He stretched his wings out as wide as they would go, and his chestached. He still smelled of Rose. Of Lance. Of his lovers, good, and sweet, and violent, and bloodthirsty – so very human. So mortal and fallible andperfect. He’d left them tangled, and sleeping. Had touched their faces, pressed his love into their skin with the pads of his clawed fingers.

He said, “I thought it could be different this time.”

She cocked her head to one side. “Hasn’t it been?”

Beck gestured between them. Forget Adam and Eve,thiswas the tale as old as time. The sinner, and the savior. The angel beloved…and the angel fallen.

Morgan said, “You wanted a chance to live a mortal life. To know love, and passion. To read, and to learn, and to know what it was like to live freely – an expected, accepted sinner.”

“And then I went to hell.”

“You lost sight of what mattered – what truly mattered. Even as a mortal, you couldn’t stop reaching.” Her lips curved faintly upward, a hint of a smile touched with sympathy. “You had the thing – the person – who made you happy. But you were always terrible at being happy.”

His eyes and throat stung. He swallowed with difficulty. “It’s my nature, I suppose. It can’t change.”

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