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“Come to us, Raven. Please. You’d have to cross through it to reach your devils, and all it would have to do is touch you to take a host,” Zade adds.
I step back again, watching as the shadow continues to grow, creating a thick barrier too wide to cross. “I can’t,” I whisper. “You’ll kill me.”
“Raven!” Dante shouts, stretching his arms out to me.
“No!” Cassius launches from his spot, but Dante spits venom at him, burning his chest and face.
Locking his hands to my hair, Dante flaps his wings, propelling backward from the ground. My feet drag across the grass, an icy sensation engulfing my toes. I tremble as it slides up my calves, swallowing me inch by inch as Dante gathers me in his arms.
I open and close my mouth, struggling to form thoughts. “Dante...something’s wrong.”
Dante lifts me up in front of him, his eyes widening. “Fuck!”
He descends so fast that I can’t do anything—not speak, scream, move, maybe even breathe. My heart pounds in my ears, the world exploding in utter and complete chaos as my very being screams.
Dante’s quick movements aren’t what incapacitate me.
It’s something else. Something dark and deadly.
“Hello, sweet thing,” a deep voice says, swirling through my mind. My eyes blink out of my control and I stare in frozen horror as I carve something with a discarded dagger into my arm. “If you try to shove me out, I’ll stick a knife right through this fragile beating heart racing out of control for me.”
Holy fuck.
The edges of my vision shadow. I’m being possessed. I can’t believe it.
The strange shadow fills up my very being, restraining me with dozens of invisible knots and chains I can’t fight. I can’t do anything.
And then an unrecognizable language hums through the air and fire explodes at my feet.
“Do something!” Micah shouts.
“I can’t. The fucker carved an anchoring mark on her arm,” Kase snaps.
“Someone’s summoning the bastard.” Dante shakes my body, peering into my eyes. “Raven? Fight. I know you can hear me. You need to resist.”
But I can’t.
Flames swallow me whole.
***
I gasp as my world turns from a fiery abyss to shadows, only to be spit out in the middle of...Heaven? No, this can’t be. If I die, Lucian would drag me to Hell. There will be no saving me from a tortured eternity for failing. This place, this breathtaking, colorful world belongs to Andre. It’s his Heaven. I know it because I’ve seen it, a crazy-ass reaction to swallowing his angelic cum—or maybe just getting nearly drowned in his sweet, sugary ecstasy, tasting like my favorite coconut cream pie I used to order from Blue’s Diner on Cherub Drive in Angel Canyon when I thought I had finally had my shit together before losing my job.
Damn. What I wouldn’t give to have one last meal there before whatever fucking being stealing my willpower sends me flying straight down to bend over Lucian’s knee and beg him to let me call him master and do what he wants. I’m not against groveling. Hell, at least Lucian is hot when he’s not all asshole Satan.
“It pains me to hear you plan such an eternity, little hellion. I thought you had way more fight than that.” A bright light engulfs the sunset-colored clouds stretching out before me and Andre materializes into view. “What do I have to do to remind you that just because a soul managed to bargain with a demon to drag him back from Hell to do his bidding doesn’t mean it’s over for you? Have faith in your devils. I know they’ll come.”
Rushing forward, I jump into Andre’s arms, praying with everything in me that this moment is as real as when Micah took me to his home away from Heaven. Tingles explode through me at Andre’s touch, warming my very being as his light dances with mine.
I groan and rest my head on his shoulder. “Fuck. You’re not here. This is a dream.”
“You’re not sleeping, but you’re in a state of unconsciousness. And I am here for you. Just not physically. The hunters have warded the place against angels and demons.” Andre strokes his cool hand along the length of my back. “This is all that I can do until either your devils or Cassius figure it out. Either way, no matter who gets to you first, you’ll be okay. I will protect you.”
“Wait, Cassius is trying to find me?” I search his gold-rimmed, brown eyes for answers he’s not rushing to give. “Is that why he sent the hunters? He wanted to use them to get to me? Is that why you weren’t there?”
Andre’s grimace hardens his face, stealing the light shining in his eyes. “It is my fault, Raven. I—I have found it impossible to stay away from you, and Cassius grew concerned. I made a mistake by sharing with him how you confronted Lucian. He thinks you might be persuaded to help the Higher Power and sacrifice your soul to do so.”
“What the actual fuck, Andre!” I exclaim, my whole soul releasing my fear only to fill up with anger. “I was only threatening Lucian to try to save my ass from getting whipped into oblivion. I’m not sacrificing my damn soul for the ones who already declared me a lost cause and unredeemable.”
