Page 53 of Angels Don’t Date

I shook my head and lowered my eyes so I wouldn’t stare at him. “I know. You spent years hiding your baking skills behind a fake name. But now you can shine for all the world to see.”

“But I only want you to see that side of me,” he said with a slight smile. “I can only have one best friend forever, and you’re it.”

My heart warmed and my heart soared. Somehow I managed to not throw myself into his arms and proclaim my undying love. I really must be growing up. Look at all this restraint. “I take it you don’t want to open a restaurant and feed the world. Poor, poor, neglected world.” I tugged on his hand. “Let’s hurry before all the cake is gone.”

The cakes were untouched. The scene was set in an orchard garden, like the song, with great lighting and elaborate fake greenery.

We sang the song in different positions and wardrobes, beginning with a waltz in our formal clothes, and then the next eating cake and figs, and drinking pomegranate wine, in a clothing change that was basically my over-corset off and my skirt pulled up so it ballooned out. Richard only wore his breast plate so his muscular arms were bare. The next change was the most intimate without any armor. We were lying on a bed wrapped in leaves and flowers. I could have sworn it was the bed from his room, but I’d never admit to being there, particularly while he was in the bath. I was wearing a white dress that could have doubled for a slip, and Richard wore Mitt’s loose white shirt and Banus’s pants. I guess stolen clothes were romantic to him.

I leaned over him while he gazed up at me as I sang the final chorus and tried to look in love but remember that I wasn’t, and then he rolled so I was the one beneath him as he sang down to me, the final line, so sweet, so devastating with the lighting crew making it look like dawn just outside our leafy bower.

And then he bent down like a narcissus above the water, and bit my neck.

For a moment I forgot to breathe. Finally, his jaws unclenched around my throat and then he looked into my eyes with this burning intensity that didn’t match the music’s vibe. We stared at each other for a long moment, while the feel of his teeth in my neck throbbed through me with every beat of my heart. And then he lowered slow, slow, eyes on my mouth. His lids drifted shut and then his lips were on mine, a soft kiss of absolute sweetness and purity.

He raised his head and smiled softly. “That was the best⁠—"

Between the bite and the music, I lost my mind. Words weren’t happening right now, not when I was still burning from his bite.

I pulled him down and kissed him while I tangled my legs with his, fingers pulling his hair.

Mine.

Every inch of him belonged to me, and I’d never, ever let him go.

His lips curved against mine in a smile. Happiness bubbled up and the world was singing its love song duet to my soaring heart.

And then my wings flexed under my skin, wanting to join in the madness.

My wings didn’t belong in this scene. Then again, kissing like this, on a bed with an angel? What was I thinking?

I held him tight for one more beat and then dissolved into smoke and escaped his grasp, flowing through the orchard until I got to the edge and came together. I ran, but I was only halfway to the cottage when my wings burst through. Then I was dragging them, heavy, holding me down.

Was I crying? Laughing? Both? Probably both.

“It’s fine,” I gasped, sounding hysterical even to myself. “We’re best friends forever. It’s perfectly fine.”

Somehow I made it to the cottage, and then I collapsed in a heap inside the door, shivering and still full of so much agonizing longing, I thought I’d die. My kittens found me, and it was the best death, a kiss from my prince burning on my lips, a bite searing through my neck, and pattering toe beans on my skin.

Chapter

Eighteen

Iwoke up to someone trying to open the door. My body was blocking it. Okay, mostly my wings.

I tensed up to try to move and then gave up and collapsed back under their weight.

A swirl of smoke brushed around me and then coalesced into the Scholar, my guardian.

“Katriana, what are you doing? Never mind. Libby found a marvelous text that has depictions of wings strikingly similar to yours. Do you mind if I turn on the light? Have you been lying here in the dark all night? Interesting choice.”

“My wings are too heavy.”

“Or you’re too weak to lift them. I’m thinking the latter is more likely. When is the last time you drank blood? You know there is a direct correlation.”

I rolled my eyes and then summoned the will to push myself to my feet. I dragged myself and my wings over to the adorable kitchen and got a blood bag out, drinking it without looking at him. I was old enough to take care of myself. Except sometimes I wasn’t. I collapsed at the table and he sat down beside me, pulling out an excellent ancient tome that smelled dusty and emoted rotting corpse. Some books were like that.

He opened it up to a page that depicted a truly horrific beast, with enormous eyes like a giant fly, and wings he had wrapped around himself like a cloak. The wing claws were as large as his head, and his mouth was very wide, with sharp teeth.