Silence held their audience in thrall, their awe now licked with dread.
“They’re only curious.” She saw the danger in his eyes, knew he had the capacity to execute every human on the street. “I should’ve considered it. I just ... forgot that nothing’s the same anymore.”
Raphael’s hair lifted in the wind as he put his hands on her hips. Sliding away her knife, she placed one hand on his shoulder, holding the box in her other arm. She expected him to rise, but instead he turned his head to run his gaze over the assembled crowd. From the whimpers and the rapid urge everyone had to disperse, she had a good idea of what they’d glimpsed.
When Raphael and Elena did lift, it was with a slow, powerful grace meant to stun.
Only when they were high in the air did she say, “This is going to sound so ungrateful—but I hate that you had to rescue me.” Her sense of loss was acid in her gut, harsh and corrosive. “I’m not a woman who needs rescue. That’s not who I am.” Not who he’d taken as his consort.
“I’ll speak to Illium—your vertical takeoff training must take priority over all else.” Pragmatic words, his hands warm on her. “Once you master that, it will be impossible to trap you in such a way.”
A painful burst of sensation inside her chest. Unable to say anything, she let him see her heart in her eyes. Thank you. Not just for giving her city, her home, back to her . . . but for stilling her hidden terror that he wouldn’t want her anymore.
The tender ferocity of Elena’s parting kiss imprinted in his skin, Raphael was on his way to the Tower when Dmitri’s mind touched his. Sire, Favashi wishes to speak to you. It was a toneless statement.
I’ll be there in a few minutes.
The Persian archangel’s face was on the view-screen when he entered, and for the first time, he glimpsed a crack in the serenity of her countenance. “Favashi. Does this concern Neha?”
“No. She appears busy within her own territory at present.” Favashi’s tone was distracted, her attention clearly on another topic. “We have a problem, Raphael.”
Unlike some of the others on the Cadre, he’d never underestimated the Archangel of Persia. Though she ruled with a velvet glove, there was still a steel hand within it. “Who?”
“Elijah. His behavior has turned erratic.”
That was a development he’d never expected. “How erratic?” Elijah was one of the most stable members of the Cadre.
“Reports are, he’s become violent. That would be no surprise with Charisemnon or Titus, but Elijah?”
Raphael frowned. “Has he harmed Hannah?” Elijah hurting Hannah was as impossible a thought as Raphael laying a hand on Elena. If the archangel had crossed that line, then Caliane had to be even closer to waking than anyone believed—her power, too, was stretching awake. The impact on the rest of the Cadre could be an unintended consequence, her immense abilities not yet under conscious control . . . or it could be an insane archangel’s vicious game.
“There are no reports of him touching Hannah,” Favashi said, her elegant voice breaking into his thoughts. “But all I have are rumors and innuendo. Your sources are better than mine.”
It was an implied request. “Jockeying for power, Favashi?”
“In all honesty, Raphael, I enjoy being queen of my territory. It’s large and I am treated as a goddess.” A thick fringe of lashes came down over her soft brown eyes as she shook her head. “More land would, at present, cause me nothing but problems.”
Raphael wasn’t certain he believed her, but he gave a small nod. “I’ll let you know if I hear anything of note about Elijah.” Ending the call, he turned to the vampire who’d stood out of sight in the corner. “What do you think?”
“I think she is sweet poison.” Dmitri stepped closer, his face set in brutal lines. “Power is what she is and what she knows.”
“You are hardly an impartial judge when it comes to Favashi.”
A tic beat in Dmitri’s jaw. “I was a young fool and she played me. But you can’t say I don’t learn my lessons.”
“She’s a beautiful woman. And apparently you are a great lover.”
The vampire shot him a dark glance. “I believe your hunter is rubbing off on you. It is not a compliment.”
Raphael felt his lips curve. “Find out if any of Jason’s people know what’s happening with Elijah.” Raphael intended to talk to the other archangel himself, but honorable as he seemed, Elijah was Cadre, well tutored in the art of deception.
Dmitri was already pulling out his cell phone. “Favashi . . . I once saw her rip a vampire’s still-beating heart out of his chest and hold it in front of him until he died because the male dared disobey an order. She’s no vulnerable princess, for all she likes to use that image to her advantage.”
“The vampire challenged her power, Dmitri. You know as well as I that she could not let it go.”
Dmitri’s phone rang at that moment, and he brought it to his ear. Like all men, the leader of his Seven had a past. Even Raphael did not know everything of what had passed between Favashi and the vampire just over five hundred years ago, centuries before Favashi became Cadre.
What he did know was that Dmitri had come to him with a request that he be released from Raphael’s service. Raphael, a new archangel himself, hadn’t been able to afford to lose him at that stage and had asked the male to wait another year. He had not decreed it so—Dmitri had earned what he asked for—but the vampire had been agreeable.