My head tipped onto the angel’s chest where I felt the rise and fall of breath that might as well have been mercy.
CHAPTER
THIRTY-FOUR
Beck
The short trek down the street took gumption, but not nearly as much as entering the Basilica’s den of divinity. Gilded, sacred, and permeated with holy rot—it was everything I loathed. I was relieved when Colette didn’t bow out of my impromptu rescue mission. She stayed close as we traversed the casino floor, located an isolated elevator, then rode up in tense silence.
I hadn’t seen Stefano Rossetti in over a century, but I kept aware of his comings and goings. Decades of skillful avoidance would not have been possible without a bit of insider knowledge.
Colette called it stalking.
I preferred “preventative measures.”
Regardless, it came in handy to know that my asshole of an ex hosted high-stakes poker games on the Basilica’s twenty-first floor.
But I was not prepared for what I found when I got there.
There were pillars and paintings and gold slathered over everything, even the refreshments. A large table was occupied by suits more impressive than the men who wore them and flanked by a small flock of angels. Among them were two of Antonella’s bastard sons and her brother, Stefano. Maslow was there too, looking like something scraped from the underside of a boot, desperate to seem important and failing miserably.
But it was Stefano who stopped me cold.
He looked the same as the day he sent me away.
Colette said it would be sad if I hadn’t changed in the last hundred years. I may not have, but Stefano hadn’t either. His smooth silver hair and patrician features were practically stolen from my memory, and I imagined the same was true for other parts of his body currently wrapped in a svelte Devore suit.
The lap ornament was new, though.
My incubus sagged against Stefano looking drugged. Or drained.
He was bare from the waist up, a feast for the eyes of this sordid crowd. His arms hung around Stefano’s neck, and Stefano’s hand curled possessively around his hip. Thumb denting his skin. Chin resting on the crown of Zephyr’s head. I couldn’t decide what was worse: seeing my ex with someone else or that the someone else was Zephyr.
No one had spoken since Colette’s and my arrival, but tension thickened the air.
Zephyr shifted enough to stir the sleek line of Stefano’s arm across his waist. Then his eyes opened, glassy and disoriented, but searching.
They found me, and through whatever haze clouded him, recognition sparked.
It hit me like a blow.
Something possessive twisted inside me, fast and violent and alive. I stepped forward before I thought to stop myself, driven by a gut-deep need that didn’t wait for permission.
Three of the men around the table rose. Hands hovered near inner pockets. Wrists rolled and jackets smoothed, each gesture a rehearsal for violence. The older of Antonella’s sons pushed back and stood.
“Who the hell are you?” he demanded. “And what do you think you’re doing here?”
I was an intruder. Worse, I was one of the damned. A contract demon in a room full of sanctimony. My kind were outliers in most circles and especially unwelcome in company that fancied itselfpolite.
Colette’s presence bolstered me, but only just. Her revolver might put one or two of them down, but she didn’t have enough ammunition to clear the room, and she wasn’t the only hired gun here. The Rossettis weren’t fools; they kept their muscle close and well equipped.
If this turned into a fight—or worse, a firefight—things would get messy. Bloodstains on brocade. Bodies slumped between wine glasses… No one would walk away clean.
I didn’t answer the ill-bred brat currently glaring me down.
Stefano spoke up in my stead.
“Lucas always has a seat at my table.” His voice resonated, stymying the threat of conflict. “He knows that.”
