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"You expect me to leave you here alone?" The words came out rougher than intended.

She finally met his gaze. The power in those green eyes hit him like a physical force. "I've been training for this my whole life. My grandmother made damn sure I could handle myself."

The last threads of his control snapped. His hand cupped her face before he could stop himself. "You know that's not why I want to stay."

The air between them thickened until breathing became optional. Her pulse jumped beneath his palm. For one endless moment, he thought she might pull away. Instead, she leaned into his touch.

"This is a terrible idea," she informed him at the same time her hands were reaching for him.

"The worst," he agreed. Without another word, he lowered his mouth and claimed hers.

When their tongues tangled together, power exploded between them. It was like someone had crossed divine wires with mortal flame. Her taste was salt air, sunshine, and coffee. It flooded his system like the most addictive drug. His wings curled forward and wrapped around her as he gave himself up to his desire for her.

The kiss lasted somewhere between seconds and centuries. When they finally broke apart, her eyes had gone storm-dark with possibilities. They had nothing to do with their current problems and everything to do with the electricity still crackling between them. Another pulse of energy rocked the city's spiritual bedrock. Their moment shattered like spun glass.

"We have to stop this," she breathed against his mouth.

"We will." He forced himself to step back. Everything in him screamed to keep her close, but he had a duty to fulfill. "But first, I need to help my brothers at the port. Then we figure out exactly what's trying to wake up and how to put it back to sleep."

"And after that?"

His smile held promises. "After that, we're having several conversations. About your power. Your family history. And exactly what this is between us."

"Assuming we survive," she countered as she wrapped her arms over her chest.

"Oh, we'll survive." He stalked to the door and paused just outside. "I've got too many questions that need answering. And you, Sarah Morgan, are the most interesting puzzle I've encountered in centuries."

He was airborne before she could respond, but her laugh followed him into the pre-dawn sky. His brothers needed him, but every instinct screamed to go back. To protect. To claim. She wasn't part of the mission. That didn’t stop how much he wanted her. His existence had just become infinitely more complicated. And he wouldn't have it any other way.

CHAPTER 2

SARAH

"Tell me the magic I caught on the ley line a minute ago wasn't what I think it was." Amelia's voice came down the phone dry as month-old beignets.

Sarah held the thing away from her ear and stared at her own reflection in the dark front window of Crescent City Arcane, where a woman with a swollen mouth and a bat still in her fist looked back at her like a stranger who'd done something reckless. The bell over the door had stopped swinging. The street outside had swallowed her red-winged warrior whole, yet the heat from his mouth lingered on hers. Now the one witch in this city with the nerve to call at the ass-end of night wanted to talk about what was happening.

"It's four in the morning, Amelia." Sarah set the Louisville Slugger against the counter where she could reach it just in case. Not that she needed it. She had magic at her disposal, but she was off her game at the moment. The floor under her feet was still doing the slow, sick shudder it had been doing since the Codex woke. "Whatever you felt, blame the Codex. It's been throwing a tantrum all night."

"Mm-hmm." Amelia made the sound a woman makes when she wasn’t buying it. "Except the Codex tastes like old paper and cold iron. What rolled across the Quarter a minute ago tasted like a thunderhead with wings. Camael felt it from the war room. Half of his angels felt it with him. You want to try that lie again? Or do you want to tell me why one of Heaven's heavy hitters lit up my radar standing inside your shop?"

"He was doing a security sweep." The words came out too fast. Sarah knew it, and so did the witch on the other end of the line. She pressed two fingers to her lips. They came away with a thin smear of blood she didn't remember earning. "The male is looking for Lucifer. It's what he does. He patrolled the area and left. End of riveting story."

"Sweetheart, I have a bonded angel. He sleeps with his wing thrown over me like I'm going to float off, so don't try and sell me it was a security sweep." There was no cruelty in Amelia's voice. Only the worn-soft humor of a woman who'd walked the same plank six weeks back and remembered every splinter. "I'm not calling to rib you, though God knows you've earned it. I'm calling because the spike scared me. When my power came in, it came in loud and fast and nearly took the roof off Nana's old house. If yours is going through a second waking, I don't want you to go through it alone over a stack of cursed grimoires. Come to the mansion. Tonight. The wards here will hold whatever's coming."

Her words stopped her. Was this a second waking? Sarah set her hip against the counter and made herself breathe, because Amelia had mentioned an idea crawling around inside her grey matter. She hadn’t given it a voice, didn't want to.

"My power's been steady since I was nine years old, and I like it that way," she countered. "What you felt was the Codex and one hell of a bad night. I'm a Guardian, Amelia. I don't run to the mansion when things get tough. I go down into the basement after the monster."

"You’re the most stubborn woman I have met in this realm or the next." Amelia sighed, and somewhere behind her voice, a coffee maker gurgled to life, which meant the witch was up for the duration. "Fine. Be a hero. But you call me if it changes. I mean it. The thing that scares me isn't Lucifer. And it isn't the Old Ones. It's how quiet your line went after you swore you didn't have power. Quiet like that always costs something, sugar, and the bill comes due when you can least afford it."

"Goodnight, Amelia." Sarah ended the call before Amelia could get the rest of it out, and the silence that rushed in made her twitchy.

She set the phone face down on the counter and stood in the dark with her pulse loud in her ears. The smart move. The one Nana would have made was to pour a cup of last night's coffee, sit with the cards, and wait for dawn to make the world reasonable again.

Sarah had spent thirty-one years making the smart move. She’d come up empty-handed for it. Down to the soles of her bare feet, she was tired of the smart move. The floor pulled at her like a tide going out. It wanted her in the basement. It wasn’t the Codex this time. The hum had changed. She practically leaped down the stairs and realized it was coming from a piece of furniture she'd never feared in her life.

Her grandmother's cabinet stood against the far wall of the basement. It was oak and banded in iron. Behind its warded doors lived the part of her inheritance Sarah had spent her whole life treating as set dressing. It was full of relics her family had called the Watch-pieces. Instruments her ancestors forged to feel the Old Ones. Nana used to swear with one you could feel one of them turning in their sleep, similar to the way an arthritic feels weather coming in her knees.