Chapter 48
Wyatt
Tacita barely makes it through the last few lines.
How she is reading this aloud, I have no idea.
My own vision is blurring with tears as I hold Milo against me.
I’d pulled him into my arms not long after Tacita had begun reading his letter.
The warmth of his back against my chest is the only reason I’m still standing right now. He’s safe, warm in my embrace.
Part of me wants to rip a portal open back to the human world and annihilate all of those that wronged him in his life. Each person who let him down deserves to die in the most painful ways possible.
Other parts of me bleed for all that he’s endured. How is he still breathing after surviving all of that? I want to keep my arms locked around him and never let him go. Never let him go through another second of pain or loss because he’s already suffered too much.
Tacita puts the letter down on the cushion beside her, and stands as she wipes the tears from her eyes. She strides to us and stops in front of Milo, putting her hands on his biceps.
“I love you,” she says, kissing his cheek, before moving to my side and facing the Lord of the Underworld. “Please don’t take him.”
“I wasn’t intending to.” Hades’s face makes his statement seem sincere, but I don’t fully trust him. “And after that speech, his story lines up with our own investigations. That’s the main reason we came today. He is a victim, caught in the vindictive agenda the Angels have against us, against me.”
“Please tell me you know how to rid them from his head, permanently,” Tacita says.
“Yes, we do. But I don’t think you’re going to like what I have to say.”
“Say it.” Tacita moves in closer to us, linking her fingers through Milo’s.
Hades addresses my boyfriend. “Milo, there is a reason your mind is hazy over the days where the fire occurred. We have reason to believe that you were burned in the blaze. We found crime scene photographs of your body.”
Milo stiffens in my hold. Garrick also stands and moves closer to us. “Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”
“Hades, you better be sure of this,” Tacita says through a clenched jaw, her tail swishing.
Hades ignores them both. “It was covered up well, but Milo, you did die that night. The Angels reincarnated you as one of their own.” Milo starts shaking in my arms, my own head is denying what I’m hearing. “Milo, you’re an Angel. At least partially.”
“No,” I say firmly. From all I’ve learned, all I’ve seen of these supernatural realms, I know that the Angels and the Demons do not mix on the same plane. For whatever reasons, they each have their own realms and process souls in their own ways.
Milo’s breathing gets rapidly sharper, until he’s nearly hyperventilating. Tacita jumps in front of him again and places the hand not holding his in a vice-like grip against his cheek.
“It’s okay. We’ve still got you. They can’t have you.
” She attempts to soothe him, but it’s not working on me, so I can’t imagine he’s feeling any calmer.
“You’re mine, remember? Mine and Wyatt’s and that isn’t changing.
” She brings her forehead to his and gets him to copy her breathing.
I simply hold him upright, but I do look across to Hades, meeting his eyes and seeing sheer power radiating from his pupils.
“You can fix him,” I tell him rather than ask. “He doesn’t want to be an Angel. You gave him a panther, he’s a panther shifter.”
“I didn’t give him a panther, if we are born with a demonic side, the form chooses us. Humans simply can’t access it until they enter a realm that allows the magic to flow.”
“Fine. Whatever, but he’s not an Angel.”
“Technically, he is. But he also isn’t. I don’t think they ever took him to the Heaven realm.
We’d have seen his wings emerge in the weeks he’s been in the compound if that were the case.
But they seem to have found a way to reincarnate him enough that they can share some of their magical abilities with him, which makes him some kind of half-breed.
We’re still trying to figure out the details. ”
“Well, take it away? You can do that, right? You must be powerful enough.”
“There is a way. Although, it might be risky as he isn’t fully one thing or another.”
“What. Is. The. Way.” I’m losing my patience now, my eyes shifting to their reptilian slits.
“He has to fall,” Garrick supplies.
“What does that mean?”
“You’re aware of the Dark Angels. Some of them were on my guard team at the compound.”
“Yeah, so?”
“They were Angels once. They chose to become fallen.” It's Khaos that speaks this time.
“Is it possible for supernaturals to change forms? Switch realms?”
“Only the Angels as far as we can tell,” Khaos explains.
“And only from the Heaven to the Hell realm. An Angel can cross the Styx and emerge as a Dark Angel. They lose their elemental magic, and most of their memories, but they re-emerge a demon. They get to keep their wings and the supernatural abilities we all share; the heightened senses, strength etc. But they lose everything else.”
“But you said, Milo doesn’t have those anyway. And he’s a panther.”
“Indeed. Which is why I said it was risky. We don’t know of any Dark Angels with shifter forms. We’ve been searching the records. There are certainly none alive currently,” Hades says.
“But it would sever his connection to them?”
“Again, that is speculation. But from all the Dark Angels we’ve tracked down in the last day since we learned this information none of them have retained any ability to reach out to the Angels.
The telepathy we’ve seen in recent weeks wasn’t a power we were aware of that they had.
None of the Dark Angels we’ve questioned can recall it either, although as their memories get affected with the change they might not.
It’s all a little unknown at the moment but if the Styx severs the rest of their powers, it is a legit theory that it would break this connection as well. ”
Tacita and Milo, whose breathing has returned to near normal, turn to join in the conversation once more.
“I won’t risk him on a hunch,” Tacita says.
“It’ll be Milo’s choice,” Hades replies. “Did you hear all that was just said, Milo?”
He nods before moving his hands so he can sign. “I want to get rid of them. I want to be here, in this realm.”
“Milo, are you sure?” Tacita asks him. “I don’t care if you’re half Angel, or whatever.”
“I want my mind to be free of them.”
Tacita searches his eyes, the two of them doing that thing where they have an entire conversation without speaking or signing before she eventually concedes. “Fine. But when can we do this?” The question is aimed at Hades.
“If you can wait a couple of weeks, I think it’s best that Milo goes through the Styx with the rest of the contestants.
This way it’ll raise the least suspicions about his current nature.
I don’t want to cause any rumours that might affect his life here.
I’ve already spoken to Charon, and he said it's the same route for the humans that are converting as the one the falling Angels take.”
After some back and forth we agree, and ultimately, it’s Milo’s decision. He is worried about the Angels trying to contact him in the meantime but agrees that crossing with everyone else, including me, is the best solution.
Hades and Khaos stay a while longer, and we all find ourselves relaxing onto the sofas again as conversations move onto lighter topics.
Whilst the power Hades emanates is a bit unnerving at times, he and Khaos are a fun couple.
I guess I’ll have to get used to hanging out with them if they’re my girlfriend’s best friends.
Much later, after Hades and Khaos had left and the four of us had been hanging out and eating a massive take out of noodles and meat dishes, I pull Milo up and tell Tacita and Garrick to stay put. They seem happy to get some time alone as I drag a confused looking Milo down the stairs.
As soon as we’re in the bedroom, I pull him into my arms and kiss him deeply. Entwining our tongues together, I savour the taste of him and the fizzy drink he’d been sipping all evening. I keep kissing him longer than I intended but eventually have to break it to breathe.
“I love you,” I tell him. Those three words have been said a lot today, but I need him to hear them again. “And I never want another letter from you to sound like a goodbye, ever again.”
His face falls as a sadness creeps across his features. “I would have,” he whispers. “Said goodbye, that is. To keep you safe.”
His voice sounds like a miracle to my ears, I’ll never get used to his sweet and slightly husky tone. But I bristle as the words themselves.
“Never,” I tell him more firmly. I understand his sentiment, really, I do, but I also know that if he were ever to protect me that way, I’d jump straight into whatever the danger was, rip it from reality, and then get back to his side.
He smiles then, like he’s read my thoughts, before leaning forward and kissing me again. He lifts the t-shirt I’d pulled on earlier before we ate, and I lift my arms so he can remove it. He then lets me unbutton his shirt and rids himself of his shorts too.
Before long we’re naked and writhing together on the bed, me pinning him down into the mattress.
“Can I fuck you?” I pant between kisses, and I’m met with an enthusiastic nod.
It doesn’t take me long to locate the lube bottle and get my fingers inside him.
I nearly drive myself insane by taking my time to open him up, but I’m glad for my patience when my cock slides with ease into his body and I’m swallowing down his little breathy moans as I rock into him again and again, claiming him, and giving myself to him.
A feminine groan echoes from upstairs, followed by the sounds of slapping skin.
Milo and I lock eyes as we realise our girl is getting railed above us.
It spurs me on, and I move my own hips a little harder and faster until Milo is crying out with the pleasure my Jacob’s Ladder is delivering to his prostate.
Touching, groping, licking and sucking any and all areas of skin that I can get my hands and lips, I fuck Milo into oblivion.
Keeping my weight over him, but leaning on one elbow to not crush him, our bodies are so close that his dick gets stimulated between our stomachs.
The precum he’s leaking is enough lubricant to ease the friction of our skin enough for him to find pleasure.
He comes without either of us having to use a hand on him, and I follow him soon after, filling him with my cum as his paints our chests.
I wish I could have it on me permanently, a way to show the entire damn world, every single realm that may exist, that he is mine. And no one is going to change that.