Chapter Twenty-Six
The darkness made anything seem possible.
And in that darkness, for the first time in his unnaturally long existence, Gabriel allowed himself to believe that maybe—just maybe—this could be his life.
Shecould be his life.
He lay on the bearskin rug beneath a down comforter, the woman he loved wrapped around him in a tangle of limbs and long silver curls and soft, contented sighs that caressed his bare chest. His body was exhausted from all the things they’d done to each other, but already, he couldn’t wait to do them again. If she wasn’t sleeping so peacefully beside him, he’d have her on all fours, her hair wrapped around his fist…
That’s all it took. He was fucking hard for her again.
And with the image of her perfect arse in his mind, he finally drifted off to sleep.
* * *
“Wake up,” she whispered against the back of his neck, making the fine hairs stand on end. “You have a visitor, sweetness. Wake up.”
Gabriel sat up with a start, shocked to find he was alone at Obsidian again, hunched over the bar and nursing a bottle of bourbon. He could’ve sworn something had disturbed him—a whisper? A woman?—but when he glanced around, he saw no one.
He tipped the bottle against his lips, but it wasn’t his beloved bourbon. Not anymore.
Ash coated his mouth, and a deep cough rattled through his chest. He spit it out violently, wet, black ash splattering across the bar.
From the furthest recesses of his mind, something stirred to life. A voice he couldn’t understand. A gnawing persistence that felt like a warning, but…
The doors to Obsidian blew open, and a woman entered on a cold, acrid breeze. Behind her, St. Mark’s Place was a wasteland, as if the entire city had been leveled by a volcano. A bomb.
Hellfire.
When had it happened? He couldn’t recall. Just knew that ithadhappened.
“We’re closed,” he said, but the woman wasn’t deterred. She took the barstool next to him, shaking out long hair the color of a raven’s wing.
“Do I… Do I know you?” he asked, scrutinizing her face.
“I’m quite sure you do, sweetness.” She flashed a blood-red smile, then leaned in to kiss him.
The instant her lips touched his, a blinding pain split Gabriel’s skull, shattering something inside. It felt as if a dam had broken, all the old memories flooding into his awareness.
He’d been here before. This moment, this scene.
It wasn’t real.
It was a dream. A nightmare.
The succubus was trying to control him again.
“You can’t hide from me,” she said, stroking his face. “Not for long.”
“Get out of my fucking head!” he roared, shoving her away. She vanished in a cloud of black smoke, and when Gabriel turned back around, he found Jacinda behind the bar, her eyes full of terror.
Two demons crowded around her.
He remembered this moment, too. Kostya and He Who Likes to Watch.
Kostya ran his hand down her curves. “You have missed me, butterfly.”
Dream or not, Gabriel blurred into them, taking down both demons in a flash of torn throats and severed limbs. They fell at his feet, blood spilling across the floor.
