Zoe brought me some magically-enhanced concealer yesterday, but I can’t stand to touch the raised skin. Every time I try, I feel the void rushing toward me.
According to the Bureau’s healer, Anastasia, the magic in the power chain is gone. It couldn’t survive without Hannah and Calista. But I can still feel it long after Gabriel used Lucifer’s axe to chop the thing into tiny pieces and Killian magicked them into dust.
Nights are the worst. Gabriel holds me when I wake up screaming, and the helplessness in his eyes is almost too much to bear.
My angel knocks on the bathroom door. “Willow? Are you ready,deliciae?”
Am I? This wasmyidea. But now that the day is finally here, all I want to do is burrow under the blankets and hide away from the whole world.
As appealing as that sounds, it won’t help me protect the Blade—or myself.
He’s pacing the hall when I finally work up the courage to join him. Shit. His shoulders are hiked up halfway to his ears. He’s no more ready than I am.
“Hey, stud.” I slide my arms around his neck. The delicious scent clinging to him—something angelic and powerful andmine—calms me, and I take my first steady breath since I woke up. “We’re going to be okay. All the whispers will be there. Sin and Zoe too.”
A muscle in his jaw clenches. Once. Twice. “Sinclair and Zoe caught a case this morning. They may be a few minutes late. Something about Sinfinallygetting to witness the aftermath of a vampire orgy.”
All the blood drains from my face. I don’t want to know what a vampire orgy looks like. Not after having Hannah root aroundin my headand force me to drive the Blade through Gabriel’s heart.
A shudder wracks my entire body. I barely manage to stifle my sob.
“Fuck, Willow. I am sorry.” Gabriel touches his forehead to mine. “I did not think?—“
I silence him with a kiss. When my darkest memories threaten to drown me, Gabriel’s touch, his warmth, and hisverytalented mouth pull me from the depths.
He saved me. And he keeps saving me over and over again.
Too soon, we have to come up for air. Licking my lips, I savor the taste of him. “I’m okay, Gabriel. Or…I’m getting there.”
“We both are.” He keeps me tucked against his side as he guides me down the hall to our living room.
“I will never get used to this view,” I say. The floor-to-ceiling windows look out over the city, giving us a viewalmostas good as the penthouse one floor up. I almost fell off the couch when Sinclair offered us this place basically for free.
“Without Gabriel, Zoe and I would be trapped in Hell for eternity. I owe him much more than an apartment. You will be safe here. I own the entire building, and my wards will protect you until Killian can show you how to create wards of your own.”
Gabriel plucks Lucifer’s axe from the counter. “When we return, I will make you come pressed up against those windows,deliciae.Privacy glass is a wondrous invention.”
This shudder is very different from the last one. “Promises, promises,” I tease.
He pulls me against him so quickly, I gasp. “I am still an angel, Willow. You know I do not lie. When I make a promise, I keep it.”
The antechamber holds a bone-deep chill.Someone—Sinclair, probably—set up floodlights to chase the shadows away, but they’ve done nothing to dispel the overwhelming sense of foreboding I feel being back in this room.
“Are you certain about this?” Gabriel asks. “We can go back home right now.”
Am I? No. I’m still not sure aboutanything.Except the love we share.
I press my hands to the sealed vault door. “I have to do this. Putting it off isn’t going to make it any easier. The grimoire killeddozens. It could have killed me, too. I won’t let it hurt anyone else ever again.”
The whispers of all the ones who came before surround me.Mywhisper offers me her hand. I can sense her unease, but it’s nothing compared to her determination.
“You know how to get me out of there,” I say, meeting Gabriel’s worried gaze. “You’ll feel me the whole time.”
He wraps his arms around me, one hand cupping the back of my head. “Come back to me,deliciae.”
“Always.” I reach for my whisper, and as soon as our fingers brush, the world goes quiet and dark. A moment later, the first hints of blue flame start to glow.
We’ve been practicing for the past week, and I send all my power flowing into our connection.
