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“You,” she whispered, licking her lips nervously as she gazed up at him. Toniella was barefoot, her small, delicate feet, with crimson toes expertly painted, peeked from beneath the folds of her gown.
Azaiel gazed down at the woman. Her eyes were as luminous as he remembered and her scent just as sweet. Generous, ruby red lips were wet from a nervous tongue, and they were parted . . . just so. As always.
But there was uncertainty in the depths of her eyes, fear and . . . something else.
“Azaiel.” His name was a whisper on her lips. “I never thought to see you again.” She smiled, though the frost that she emitted was as cold as the arctic. “At least not like this. I assumed the next time I saw your pretty face it would be mounted upon the gates. Something for the guards to use as target practice . . . for the next thousand years or so.”
He shrugged. “Sorry to disappoint.”
“I’m not disappointed.” She took a step forward. “I’m impressed.”
Azaiel watched her carefully. “That would be a first.”
She moistened her lips once more—when there was no need—and took one more step until he could reach out and touch her.
“Azaiel, I was always impressed by you. Don’t you remember?” She stood on her tiptoes and reached for him. He let her slide her body alongside his, press her breasts to his chest, and wrap her arms around her neck. Azaiel watched through h
ooded eyes as she reached for him, as her mouth opened, and she pressed her lips onto his.
And still he felt nothing for her. This woman who’d tempted him from the very heights of the upper realm, who’d used her body, her voice, and her mind to lure him from his brothers. This blond viper who carried the sun in her eyes, heaven between her legs, and darkness in her heart.
He’d been damned the moment his gaze had rested upon her. There beneath the sun in the jungles of Belize and Mexico. He should feel anger. Hatred. Pain and vengeance.
And yet he felt nothing but the need to get this done. To get the grimoire back and see Rowan James again.
His hands slid along her shoulders, and the distaste he felt as she trembled against him wasn’t hidden. He gripped her tightly, his fingers digging deep, until she hissed in pain.
“What’s this? You like it rough these days? Has the heart of the warrior I fell in love with returned to me?”
“I need you to do me a favor,” he said as he peeled Toniella from his body and took a step back. Time was running out, and they needed to get to the treasury. She gazed up at him, and something shifted there in the depths of her eyes. No longer were they the clear blue of a Caribbean sea. They had grown dark, fully black, and the expression on her face was one of confusion.
“What game are you playing Azaiel?” She glanced at Kellen, her face shifting once more as the sex kitten came out to play. “And you’ve brought me a present?” She licked her lips and ran her hands across puckered nipples that strained against the silken material of her robes.
Kellen made a sound of irritation. “Seriously?” He turned to Azaiel. “This is all we have?”
“I don’t care for your tone,” Toniella muttered, a petulant tone creeping into her voice.
“Listen carefully, betrayer.”
“And I will not tolerate that name, Azaiel.” Her tone was harder, her eyes a glint of obsidian in the flickering candlelight.
“Is whore a better choice for you?”
The golden glow fled as her cheeks burned red. She glanced at Kellen, but his gaze was as unrelenting as Azaiel’s.
“What do you want?” she asked finally, hands clenched into small fists at her sides.
“As I said earlier. I’ve come to collect a debt owed.”
“A debt? Since when do I owe you anything?
“Since I shall reconsider killing you if you give me what I want.”
Toniella snorted, a perfect, dark blond eyebrow raised as she glared at him. “Nothing can die down here. You know that.”
Azaiel watched her closely, the charmed dagger in one hand, the modified Glock in his other. “I’ve not forgotten. But I’ve got it on pretty good authority that it still hurts like hell and”—he pointed the gun at her—“if maimed, that pretty head of yours might not heal the way you want it. Then where would you be? Still a whore, yes but an ugly, deformed whore, and who exactly down here is going to want to fuck that?”
Her golden skin paled even more until it was as fragile as rice paper. She stared up at him and opened her mouth but had no chance to speak.
