LITMIR.BIZ

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again Zacharel found himself alone with the girl. He stepped from his shelter.

      “I thought you weren’t going to save me,” she whispered, still looking somewhere outside the room. What did she see with those eyes?

      Beautiful eyes, if he cared about that kind of thing—which he did not. “You asked if I had come to save you, and I had not. I came for another reason.”

      “Oh.” She cleared her throat, swallowed. “Well, thank you anyway. For sending him away, I mean.”

      Huh. Zacharel liked hearing thank-you from her lips. As rusty as her tone had been, he suspected she had not uttered those words very often. Perhaps she simply hadn’t had reason to—and why was his chest aching again? “What would he have done to you?”

      Silence.

      “Hurt you, then.” That, Zacharel had already guessed. “Has he hurt you before?”

      More silence.

      “That’s a yes.” Killing humans wasn’t something Zacharel usually enjoyed, but it wasn’t something he detested, either. He would do anything to anyone and never experience a moment of remorse. However, ripping the doctor’s heart out of his chest might have given him a small thrill. “Correct?”

      And even more silence.

      I’m being purposely ignored. Never before had he been disregarded. Not even by his men! Feral as they were, even they listened to him—before blatantly disobeying him. And his former leader, Lysander, had taken his every word under advisement. What’s more, the only beings outside of his race that he counted as… what? Not friends, but not potential targets for elimination, either. The demon-possessed immortals known as the Lords of the Underworld had fought beside him and earned his respect for resisting the evil of their demons so forcefully. They had always watched him with rapt fascination. The few humans to see him throughout the centuries had been utterly mesmerized.

      That this tiny fluff of nothing so easily dismissed him was baffling.

      Before he could decide how best to handle this, Thane walked through the far wall. Fury crackled over his expression the moment he spotted the girl. He did not question Zacharel, however. A small blessing.

      “The demons have been eliminated, Majesty, and the one you requested has been taken to your cloud. Alive.” His smoky voice contained the same treacherous crackles.

      Slowly the female turned her head, hunks of that tangled hair falling over her forehead and shielding her eyes. She blew the strands away and studied Thane.

      “I’m certainly popular tonight. Are you an angel, too?” she asked, her gaze stroking over the man’s still-black wings.

      Zacharel noticed Thane did not elicit the doubt that he had. Why?

      “Yes.” Thane sniffed the air, frowned and whipped his gaze to Zacharel. “You plan to free her?”

      “No.” Why would he think that?

      The frown deepened. “But why… Never mind. If you have changed your mind about her, I will take her with me.”

      When they did not know why she was here or what she had done? “No,” he repeated.

      Thane bowed, as though he were a slave humbled by his master. “Of course not, Majesty. How dare I entertain such a silly desire. No one in such a place as this deserves compassion, correct?”

      Would his men ever simply obey him without question? “Were any humans harmed during the battle?” he asked. The girl was not the only one whose queries he would disregard.

      Head held high, Thane replied through clenched teeth, “One of the guards. A sword of fire sliced through his middle.”

      Zacharel found his hands tightening into fists for the second time that day. Direct disobedience—again. “A sword of fire does not slice through a human by accident.” While angels operated on the spiritual plane, not even their weapons could be sensed—or felt—by the humans. Therefore, the angel who’d done this deed had deliberately entered the mortal realm.

      “The guard was demon possessed and needed to die,” Thane said.

      “And yet he was still human. Who disobeyed my orders?”

      Thane ran his tongue over his teeth. “Perhaps it was I.”

      Familiar with the tricks that could be used to circumvent the ring of truth, Zacharel knew Thane was not the culprit. “Who? You will tell me or you will watch me penalize Bjorn and Xerxes.” Truth. He would do it without a single qualm.

      Another pause, this one several beats longer. “Jamila.”

      Jamila. One of four females in his army, but the one he had trusted most. She was the only one who had never challenged his authority. Yet now, because of her, he would receive another whipping.

      “You,” the female on the bed said, her timbre shaded with irritation. “New guy. Angel Boy. Colonel Curls, or whatever you want to be called. I’m done asking, so now I’m commanding. Free me.”

      Zacharel actually had to fight an urge not to smile. Him. Smile. The absurdity was staggering. But she’d just called his warrior by several insulting names, the same way that warrior often called Zacharel by insulting names.

      Thane relaxed, a soft chuckle escaping him. “Colonel Curls. I like that. But, my beautiful human, you asked me to save you, not to free you.”

      “Same thing,” she said, exasperated.

      “They are quite different, I assure you. But what will you do if I fail to heed your command, hmm?”

      She uttered a silky, “Believe me, you don’t want to know.”

      Zacharel pursed his lips, no longer amused. Was this flirting? This had better not be flirting. He and Thane were on a mission.

      “Because knowing will not deter me?” Thane asked just as silkily.

      “Because it’s so horrible even hearing it will make you puke.”

      Thane coughed—or covered up a snort. It was too difficult to tell. “Did you hear that?” he asked Zacharel, speaking to him as if they were friends for the first time in their acquaintance, as if they were sharing a moment of understanding. “She just ordered me to obey her will, then threatened to hurt me if I failed to comply.”

      “I have ears,” he replied drily. “I heard.” But why hadn’t she done the same to Zacharel?

      “And she actually believes in her success,” Thane continued, bewildered.

      “You do not have to sound so impressed,” Zacharel said, not liking the idea on any level. Impressed, Thane would desire the female… perhaps stop at nothing to have her.

      Thane frowned at him. “I’m simply curious. And, very well, I will ask what is not my business. Why have you claimed her as your own if you plan to leave her here?”

      “I have not claimed her.” Zacharel could not get the words out fast enough.

      “Then why have you spread your essentia all over her?”

      “I have not touched her.”

      “And yet her skin bears your tinge.”

      “Not mine.” Essentia, a substance that swirled inside each of their bodies, sometimes seeping through the pores of their hands to become a fine powder, allowing them to claim any object they considered their exclusive property. Demons produced a similar substance, only theirs was tainted.

      Zacharel’s attention whipped to the female. “I have never claimed a human.” He’d never had so much as a yearning to do so. “She does not glow.” He saw nothing out of the ordinary about her skin.

      She watched him unabashedly, and he nearly shifted on his feet. Him. Shifting. Inconceivable!

      “I

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