brushed Alex’s arm in passing. “Thank you. For the shirt.”
Lailah scowled at the door as it swung shut. “You’ve picked dangerous company to keep,” she said when the latch clicked. “Keep going and you’ll become one of the messes I have to mop up.”
“All we want to do is help our friend,” Liz said.
Lailah’s frown softened as she studied them. Pity, Alex decided, was worse than threats. “Go home. That’s all you can do—go home while you still can.” And she followed Antja out the door.
Alex shot the deadbolt behind her and fastened the chain. The locks offered little comfort.
10
Touch
BY THE TIME the cab stopped in front of Antja’s building, the icy rain was a welcome relief from the blasting heater and the chatter she couldn’t reply to. Her throat burned inside and out, limbs stiffening with adrenaline aftermath—she wasn’t sure if she shook from nerves or anger or grief or all three. As soon as she was inside, she promised herself, safe in her own condo, then she could collapse. Scream and shake to her heart’s content.
She pulled her filthy coat closer as she hurried down the sidewalk. The sky was the color of tarnished pewter and the rain promised to become sleet. It stung her face and dripped cold through her hair, warming by the time it trickled under her collar. She drew glances as she neared the lobby. She knew what she looked like: tangled hair and torn stockings; a swollen lip; a man’s shirt. At least the doorman would have something to gossip about.
A tattered curtain of water poured off the awning; she gasped as she stepped through it, and regretted the breath as soon as her throat expanded. When she wiped her eyes, she saw a man leaning against the sheltered wall.
“Excuse me, Miss—”
Drowning out his question, a too-familiar voice filled her head.
Don’t let him touch you .
A perfectly ordinary man, dark-haired and well dressed, the sort she passed a dozen times on the street every day. Black-gloved hands left his pockets, reaching as if to catch her attention. Not leather, those gloves—rubber. Rubber shimmering with moisture. The smell of honey wafted through the air.
Seconds passed between the warning and his touch, but she was too slow and befuddled to react. His hands closed on hers, wrapped around her wrist. Cool, but warmer than her own winterchilled flesh.
“What—” She jerked away, but he held on.
Warmth seeped through her skin, and a sharp, stinging taste filled her mouth, pungent as raw garlic. She shuddered and might have fallen, but the man caught her elbow and held her up.
“Miss?” She read the word on his lips, but the sound drowned in her rushing pulse. “Are you all right?”
I did warn you.
Poison. Her knees buckled, but the man didn’t let go. His hand burned on her bare skin. Heat flooded her, surging in time with her heart. She recognized that liquid fire, like a summer sky in her veins. Mania. Morpheus.
She hadn’t taken it in years, not since Berlin. Lovely languid warmth, clarity of senses, an intoxicating amplification of her own magic. But it wasn’t worth the visions and nightmares that came after. Something was wrong, though. This was too fast, too strong.
Augmented. Not just the drug, but sorcery with it. The fire would scorch her from the inside out, turn her brain to cinders. And the assassin would hold her as she died, his dark eyes wide with concern.
The world sharpened. Rain fell like steel shot against the pavement. Tires shrieked loud as baboons, and her pulse roared in her ears. Colors deepened, shone like sunlit cathedral glass. The wind whipped razors through her flesh, while inside she burned.
The stained glass world shattered and fell away.
Not the assassin before her now but Rainer, his hands in hers, her name on his lips. She wanted to cry, to fall into his arms and let him make everything all right again. But darkness stood behind him, his angel wrought of leather and bone, enfolding him in winding-shroud wings and the stench of tombs.
:He is ours: said the angel, and its eyes were full of stars. :He has always been ours. You can never touch the oaths he has sworn us, or replace us in his heart. He is Chosen, and he can never choose you:
As she watched, Rainer’s forget-me-not eyes ran black. Ink spread under his skin, filling every vein. In the darkness that was his eyes, pinpricks of light began to burn. Wings the color of decay unfurled