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I push the thoughts away, firmly and deliberately, and follow Lucifer through the maze of a palace to our room.
Chapter19
Lucifer
It’sthe last council meeting before we go to battle, and something has been bothering me about the whole thing. I’m examining the map as the others give updates on the troops under their supervision. “What is it?” Cephalus asks me once everyone has said their piece.
“We intend to arrive here,” I reply, pointing at the map. “Where the ley lines cross.”
“Yes. We’ll be most powerful there, you know this.”
“Yes. Tell me, have the angels updated their approach in the last fifty years?”
He scowls. “In what way?”
I pick up a pair of square-shaped paperweights. “This is us,” I tell him. I place the square on the map. “This is the angels.” I place that square on the map just across from the first. “Last I remember, battles were fought head to head—like this. Two battalions arrive, face off, and mow each other down front to back.”
“Correct,” Cephalus says. “That’s the traditional way of things.”
“Maybe it’s just my overexposure to a rapidly adapting species,” I say, taking the wind out of his inevitable argument with a twist of sarcasm. “But if we’re here—” I grab a length of chain off the end of the table. “It makes more sense for them to be here.” I wrap the chain around the square. The angels surrounding our troops.
Cephalus scowls at the map for a moment. “Humans are adaptable, Lucifer. They’re quick to adapt, even. They evolve, it’s how they function. We, however, are not human and neither are the angels. This battle will be fought as every battle before it. Head to head.”
I can’t help but feel uneasy about the battle, but Cephalus’s words do make me feel a little better about leaving Sophia behind.
Humans are quick to adapt. The thought keeps me sane as we walk through our final preparations.Humans evolve.
Humans have a colorful history filled with people who are uprooted from their homes and transplanted in wild, unfamiliar places, and survive. They learn the rules, and they play by those rules until they’re ready to break them—to make their new environments adapt to them.
I hold tight to these thoughts as the battle plans progress, as we discuss how to account for whatever secret weapon the angels have in store for us. Abaddon and Cephalus come to blows over small, stupid disagreements and I can almost smell mother’s influence on them whenever they lock horns. They’ve been dealing with her for thousands of years, yet somehow they still haven’t learned to guard their relationship from her meddlesome influence.
It only took Sophia a few weeks to learn that, and she never made the mistake of leaving herself emotionally vulnerable to my mother’s insidious words. She dealt with Diana, on her own, and bore no visible lasting damage from it.
Humans adapt. Humans overcome.
It’s what I’m telling myself as I lie in bed beside her two days later, watching the silver dawn bleed away the black of night. Just a few more hours before I return to Earth—just a few more hours before I leave Sophia behind to do the one thing I swore I would never do again.
I’m holding her from behind, her small form curved into mine so perfectly. At first, I think she’s asleep, but a subtle shift in her breathing tells me she’s awoken.
“Do you have to go already?” she whispers, a note of dread coloring her sleep-roughened voice.
“No.” I swallow against the dozens of emotions fighting their way up my throat. “Not yet. Soon, but not yet.”
“Good.”
There’s something vulnerable in that single word, and she nestles deeper against me as she speaks, laying her small arm over mine where it’s wrapped around her waist. I tug her close, burying my face in her hair and inhaling.
I don’t want to think about what the rest of the day will bring. I only want to focus on this moment, here with her.
As if she can hear my thoughts, Sophia shifts slightly in my arms, looking over her shoulder to peer up at me. Love sparks in her beautiful green eyes as she rests a soft hand on my cheek and cranes her neck for a kiss. Her lips are full and warm, and she opens easily when I lick at the seam of them, allowing me to slide my tongue into her mouth and deepen the kiss.
She tastes perfect, like the antidote to every horrible thought that’s plaguing me. Like the remedy to every wound and scar I carry in my ancient, battered heart.
“Lucifer,” she whispers, delving her fingers into my hair and pulling me closer.
She doesn’t say more than that one word, my name, but it’s all I need. I understand what she wants, because it’s all I want too.
Lifting her leg and draping it backward over my hip, I slide a hand between her legs and drag my fingers through the damp folds of her pussy. She’s already wet for me, which ignites my own need.
