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She had become something new to him, wondrous, surprising, extraordinary. “Grace,” he whispered.
She shifted her head, then looked up at him. She smiled. “You’re so beautiful, Leto. Have I told you that?”
“I can feel your body everywhere, the way we’re connected, the feel of the sheet beneath your head, your arms, your bottom.”
She lifted a hand and rubbed her thumb across her lower lip. He turned and kissed her thumb. “Do you think it’s possible we’ll never leave this bed again?” she asked.
He laughed. “So this is what it’s like. It’s so strange.”
“It is. I can feel what it’s like for you to be inside me.”
He pressed a finger between her brows. “I can feel that frown, how it pinches together. What’s wrong?”
“I’m not sure. This has been wonderful, but I’m uneasy, even afraid. Leto, we weren’t really ready.”
“I know. But we both agreed it had to be done.”
She nodded. “This was amazing.”
He kissed her again, and she kissed him back. He felt her tension leave.
After a long moment, he withdrew from her body and was surprised at how empty she felt when he left her. He’d never imagined what that must be like for a woman, to be so filled up, then so empty.
He rolled onto his back and lay looking up at the arch of branches overhead. Grace turned on her side, lifted his arm, and settled her head on his shoulder. He wrapped his arm around her. It was heaven to have her so close.
“I wish this moment would never end,” he said.
He felt her sigh.
A well-trained army
Can overcome astonishing odds.
—Collected Proverbs, Beatrice of Fourth
Chapter 8
As dawn crested the McDowell Mountains in the east, Greaves stood on the round patio located in the middle of his famous peach orchard. The microclimates he had created in order to grow and ripen peaches every month of the year had won numerous horticultural awards. He had been pleased at the time to have been so honored.
Right now, however, he could not have cared less. What good was an award-winning peach orchard when his kingdom hung in the balance?
He moved in a slow circle, pondering the nightmare that, in a matter of just hours, had become his life.
His spies had observed Alison, during the previous day, in flight over White Lake, her emerald wings glinting beneath the sun. Her breh, Warrior Kerrick, had flown with her, instructing her, protecting her, eventually surrounding her with a dense mist.
The portal to Third Earth was over White Lake, and Greaves had learned from his Seers Fortresses that Alison was destined to open the portal to Third sometime in the next few days.
In the next few days.
His mind still reeled. As far as he knew, no one on Second Earth was aware of the truth about his dealings with Third Earth and what he had done to the portal. A year ago, he’d created a breach that had allowed him to bring Third Earth death vampires through the Borderland to his Estrella Complex without anyone knowing.
But over the past week, he’d succeeded in widening the breach, which would make it possible to bring a large contingent through on command, at least a hundred Third Earth pretty-boys.
If Alison opened the portal, the breach would be discovered and closed. He was a vampire who liked known outcomes, and a regiment made up of primarily Third Earth death vampires would have ensured his success because, in sufficient numbers, they’d be able to wipe the Warriors of the Blood off the face of Second Earth.
Worse, of course, was that the portal and Alison weren’t even his largest concern. Alison was only a wedge of this shit-pie.
Casimir had returned to serve as Leto’s f**king Guardian of Ascension. Leto, that two-faced traitor, who should be strung up by his balls for eternity. Of course having a guardian meant only one thing: Leto was ascending. And yet Greaves had an uncomfortable knot at the center of his stomach that told him this would not be an ordinary ascension to Third Earth.
He pressed his hands to his face and breathed deeply. The orchard had just been watered so that the air was humid and cool as it entered his lungs.
He moved to sit down on one of the stone benches that bordered the patio. Then there was Grace’s abrupt return to the arms of her other breh, Leto. And if what he felt was true, she was the real source of his every concern. She had returned to take up her place as the third key to obsidian flame. It was almost as though her decision had somehow triggered Alison’s wings and Leto’s ascension.
If his recent plan to eliminate Leto at Nazca had succeeded, he would have been able to unravel this terrible synchronicity of events. But Casimir had shown up, fresh from his baptismal rites, and had met his own powerful hand-blasts with equal, if not stronger, skills.
As Greaves pondered his situation, he knew he had only one hope of coming out of this a victor: He must attain pure vision in which the absolute future was laid out before him and he could prepare and act accordingly. But would Stannett be able to curtail his pleasures sufficiently to get him the information he needed?
* * *
Casimir sat in a very comfortable recliner. He’d changed to jeans and a T-shirt, but the shirt was pretty snug. He smiled. One advantage of having participated in Beatrice’s redemption program was the absolute requirement of regular exercise, in a gym, including weight lifting. He was looking better than he had most of his life. And the truth was he felt better.
He even munched on an apple.
The suite came with a full bar, and he had been tempted, just for the hell of it, to make a peach blow, that absurd drink he’d made a few months ago in an attempt to seduce Greaves. He’d even pulled out the fresh peach and the soda water and was hunting around for the cream when he realized he’d lost interest. All he wanted was an apple and to cruise some Mortal Earth TV channels. He liked watching The View just to keep up.
Yes, he really had changed.
He took another bite of apple and was trying to figure out how to DVR Criminal Minds when he heard the steel gate in the observation room glide open.
His heart set up a racket. James had said a female Militia Warrior often came to the portal to do some work for him. He hoped to hell that was her.
He set his apple down and went invisible. If this wasn’t the woman, then he’d fold the hell out of there. Third Earth had some strange goings-on, and he wasn’t a warrior, not by a long shot. He also didn’t know what one of his powerful hand-blasts would do to the portal to Third if he had to use that skill to defend himself.
The door opened, and a woman crossed the threshold, a very beautiful, curvaceous woman.
