Chapter 25 #2
I look like someone who belongs in this world. Someone who could stand beside an angel and not seem out of place.
The servant fades into nothing before I can thank it. Or question it. Or ask what the hell is happening.
I fix the jewelry, the thin chains at my throat, the delicate cuffs at my wrists. They catch the light alongside the silver dress, warm against cool, and somehow it works. I slip into the heels, wobbling only slightly.
Then I walk out to the bedroom.
And stop breathing.
Seraph is standing by the fireplace, his back to me, and he's in a tuxedo.
Black. Perfectly tailored. The jacket cuts across his shoulders in a way that emphasizes their breadth, and the trousers fit in ways I really should not be noticing. His platinum hair has been french braided, intricate and elegant, pulled over one shoulder. And his wings are gone.
Not hidden beneath glamour, because I can usually still sense them when he does that. Actually gone. Tucked away into whatever dimension fallen angels store their extra appendages.
Without them, he looks almost human. Almost approachable.
And devastatingly, unfairly beautiful.
He turns, and I watch his expression shift. His silver eyes travel from my face down to the dress, down to the heels, back up again. Slowly. Hungrily.
Something hot coils in my stomach.
"You clean up adequately," I manage. Because my mouth has a death wish.
His lips curve. "Adequate. I'm wounded."
"You'll survive."
"Will I?" He moves toward me, that predatory grace I've become so familiar with, and stops when we're barely a foot apart. This close, I can see the way his jaw tightens. The slight flare of his nostrils. The pulse jumping in his throat.
He's affected. Good. At least I'm not the only one.
"I have something for you," he says.
"If it's another lecture on posture—"
He produces a box from nowhere. Small, velvet, midnight blue. The kind of box that usually contains—
"If that's a ring, I'm going to need you to buy me dinner first."
"It's not a ring." He opens it.
Inside, nestled against dark silk, is an anklet. Platinum chain, fine as spider silk, with a single stone dangling from its center. Not a diamond, or not just a diamond. It's red. Deep, bloody red, faceted in a way I've never seen before. It catches the light and seems to glow from within.
"That's impractical," I say, because my brain has apparently stopped working.
"Extremely."
"I'll lose it."
"You won't."
"It'll catch on things."
"It won't."
"Seraph—"
He kneels.
The Angel of Pride, the one who demands perfection, who criticizes and corrects and never, never shows submission, kneels at my feet.
My breath catches. My heart stutters. And lower, something clenches with sudden, desperate want.
His fingers are warm as he lifts the hem of my dress, and the touch sends sparks racing up my leg.
He doesn't rush. His palm skims my calf as he raises the fabric, and I feel every point of contact like a brand.
His thumb traces the curve of my ankle, circling slowly, and my thighs clench involuntarily.
He notices. Of course, he notices. The corner of his mouth curves, just slightly, as he clasps the chain around my ankle with deliberate slowness.
The red diamond settles against my skin, cool and strangely heavy.
But he doesn't let go.
His hand lingers on my ankle, fingers brushing the sensitive skin there, and then he tilts his head back to look up at me. The Angel of Pride, on his knees, looking up at me like I'm something worth worshipping.
"What is it?" I whisper.
"A gift." His voice is low, rough. "Because you asked me to see you. And I wanted you to know that I do."
His thumb strokes once across my anklebone, and I have to lock my knees to keep from swaying.
"Seraph—"
"Don't." He rises in one fluid motion, all grace restored, but he's standing closer now. Close enough that I can feel the heat radiating from his body. "Don't make it into something. Just let me have this."
I nod, because I don't trust my voice.
He offers his arm, old-fashioned and oddly charming, and I take it. We walk to the massive mirror that dominates one wall of the bedroom, the same mirror I've watched Croesus appear in.
"Where are we going?" I ask.
"You'll see."
He presses his palm to the glass, and it ripples like water. Then we're stepping through, and we emerge from a window.
Not into a room, but onto a narrow ledge overlooking a downtown street. City lights glitter below us, cars streaming past like rivers of red and white. The air is sharp, cold, smelling of exhaust and winter and possibility.
I shiver, and Seraph's arm tightens around me.
"This way."
We climb down a fire escape hidden in shadow, and then we're on the street, just two people walking through the evening crowds.
Except we're not just two people. I'm a sin eater in a silver gown, and he's a fallen angel who looks like he stepped out of a dream, and somehow, impossibly, no one seems to notice.
"Glamour?" I ask.
"Minor. They see us, but we don't register as unusual."
"That's a neat trick."
"I have many."
He steers me around a corner, down a quieter street, and stops in front of a restaurant I've never seen before. The building is old brick, covered in ivy that shouldn't be green in this weather. A single lamp glows above the door. No sign. No indication of what's inside.
"This looks like the kind of place where people get murdered," I observe.
"What a lovely thing to say about our date."
Date.
The word hits me harder than it should.
Seraph pushes open the door, and warmth spills out.
I step inside and the entire restaurant is empty, except for dozens of candles.
They cover every surface, tables, windowsills, the bar along one wall.
Their light flickers and dances, casting shadows that make the room feel intimate, magical, like something from another time.
White tablecloths. Crystal glasses. Fresh flowers. And not a single other patron.
"Did you buy out the whole restaurant?" I whisper.
"I own it."
"Of course you do."
A man appears from somewhere in the back, middle-aged, impeccably dressed, with a face like someone who has seen things and learned to be unimpressed by most of them. But when he sees Seraph, he bows. Deep and reverent, the kind of bow you give to kings. To gods.
"My Lord," the man says. "Everything is prepared."
My Lord.
I glance at Seraph. He can make people see him however he wants, I know that much from the other angels. He could be appearing as anyone right now. A businessman. A celebrity. A mortal in a nice suit.
But this man is in awe. The kind of awe that comes from knowing what you're looking at. From understanding exactly how far above you the being in front of you truly is.
He knows. He knows what Seraph is, and he's still here, serving him.
"Thank you," Seraph says, and there's something almost gentle in his voice. "We'll be in the private room."
The man bows again and leads us through the main dining area, past all those empty tables with their flickering candles, to a door at the very back. He opens it, reveals a smaller room with a large table set for two, and steps aside.
Seraph pulls out my chair. I sit, feeling like I've stepped into someone else's life.
This isn't me. I don't do candlelit dinners in exclusive restaurants. I don't wear silver gowns and platinum anklets. I don't let fallen angels pamper me while the world burns.
But tonight, apparently, I do.
The manager—or whatever he is—leaves. A moment later, a server appears, young, dark-haired, moving with an efficiency that suggests either supernatural assistance or really excellent training. When he turns to pour the wine, I catch sight of his eyes.
Red flecks scattered through the brown like scattered coins.
Demon-blooded.
I raise an eyebrow at Seraph.
"I employ many beings," he says mildly. "Equal opportunity corrupting."
"That's not actually comforting."
"Wasn't meant to be."
The wine is deep red, smelling of blackberries and something darker. I take a sip and feel warmth bloom through my chest immediately.
"Good?" Seraph asks.
"Suspiciously good. Is it drugged?"
"No."
"Cursed?"
"No."
"Going to steal my soul?"
"Raven." He sounds almost pained. "It's wine. Just wine."
"Sorry. Occupational paranoia."
I take another sip. Then another. The tension in my shoulders starts to loosen. The constant knot of anxiety in my chest, the one that's been there since grandmother's notes, since the missing pages, since this whole conspiracy started weighing on me, begins to unknot.
One night, I tell myself. One night without the world ending.
I can do that.
Seraph orders for both of us, something in French that I don't catch, and the server disappears. We're alone in the candlelit room, two people who probably shouldn't be here together, trying to pretend the world outside doesn't exist.
"Tell me something," I say, the wine making me bold.
"What would you like to know?"
"Why this? Why tonight?"
He's quiet for a moment. "Because you looked tired.
And because—" He stops. Starts again. "Because I wanted to see you like this.
In the candlelight. Without the weight of everything on your shoulders.
" His fingers trace the stem of his wine glass.
"Because you deserve to be seen as more than just a sin eater. "
The words settle into my chest and make themselves at home.
"That might be the nicest thing you've ever said to me."
"Don't get used to it."
"I wouldn't dream of it."
He almost smiles. I almost smile back. And for a moment, everything is simple.
The food arrives, something delicate and artistic, the kind of thing that looks too pretty to eat but tastes like heaven when you do. We eat in comfortable silence, and I feel something I haven't felt in weeks.
Peace.
Just for a moment. Just for this night. Peace.
I'm halfway through my second glass of wine, pleasantly warm and surprisingly happy, when the door opens.
I expect the server. I expect the owner.
I do not expect the man who walks through, dragging a chair behind him with absolutely no regard for the atmosphere or the moment.
Croesus.
My breath catches for entirely different reasons.
He's in a tuxedo as well, because apparently the universe has decided I need to be tortured tonight.
Black, immaculately tailored, with gold cufflinks that catch the candlelight and a gold pocket square that matches his eyes.
Those eyes, molten gold without white or pupil, find me immediately, and I feel the weight of his presence like a physical touch.
He looks like sin incarnate. He looks like every dark fantasy I've ever had made flesh.
The tuxedo fits him like it was sewn onto his body, emphasizing the breadth of his shoulders, the narrow cut of his waist, the long lines of his legs.
His black hair gleams in the candlelight, shot through with those veins of literal gold, and his bronze skin seems to glow against the stark white of his shirt.
I want to touch him. I want to climb him like a tree. I want to mess up that perfect hair and rumple that perfect suit and—
The bond between us pulses, hot and wanting, and I know he feels everything I'm feeling. His jaw tightens. His nostrils flare.
He drags the chair right up to our table. Positions it at the third side, like it was always meant to be there. And sits.
"Hello, little sin eater," he says, his voice smooth as aged whiskey and twice as intoxicating. "I hope I'm not interrupting."