Masculine laughter, strong hands throwing her into the air.
Elena staggered under the impact of the memory, then brushed it aside-it was nothing more than wishful thinking. Her father had always been a stern disciplinarian who didn't know how to forgive. But, she was forced to admit, he had felt something for his Parisian wife-there had been that huge allowance, gifts of jewels on every occasion. Where had all those treasures gone? To Beth?
Elena didn't particularly care about their monetary value, but she would've liked to have just one thing that had once belonged to her mother. All she knew was that she'd come home one summer from boarding school and found every trace of Marguerite, Mirabelle, and Ariel gone from the house-including the quilt Elena had treasured since her fifth birthday. It was as if she'd imagined her mother, her older sisters.
Someone smashed into her shoulder. "Hey, lady! Get out of the f**king way!" The lanky student turned to give her the finger.
She returned the gesture automatically, glad he'd broken her paralysis. A quick glance at her watch confirmed she still had some breathing room. Deciding to take care of things then and there, she made her way to the bank branch specified in the letter. Luckily, it was fairly close. She'd completed the paperwork and was rising to leave when the bank manager said, "Would you like to see the contents of the safe-deposit box, Ms. Deveraux?"
She stared into his puffy face, the probable result of too much good food and not enough exercise. "A safe-deposit box?"
He nodded, straightening his tie. "Yes."
"Don't I need a key and"-she frowned-"my signature on the access card?" She knew that only because she'd had to look it up during a particularly complicated hunt.
"Normally, yes." He straightened his tie for the second time. "Yours is a somewhat unusual situation."
Translation: her father had pulled any number of strings for God alone knew what reasons of his own. "All right."
Five minutes later, she'd had her signature witnessed and was handed a key. "If you'll follow me to the vault-we use a dual-step system here. I have the key to the vault; you have the one to the box itself." The bank manager turned and led her through the hushed confines of the solid old building and through to the back.
The safe-deposit boxes were hidden behind several electronic doors that appeared incongruous in the belly of the historic structure.
Elena.
She knew she hadn't imagined that dark whisper in her head. "Get out."
The man she was following gave her a startled look over his shoulder. She pretended to be engrossed in her nails.
You're late.
Narrowing her eyes, she gritted her teeth and wondered if it was worth the headache to keep him out of her head.
A car will meet you when you exit the bank.
She halted, stared at the back of the manager's jacket, able to smell his fear. "Who exactly did you call a few minutes ago?"
When he glanced at her, his eyes were panicked, a rabbit's. "No one, Ms. Deveraux."
She gave him a cold smile that made it clear he'd pissed her off well and good. "Show me the box."
Clearly surprised by the reprieve, he did as ordered. She waited until he'd placed the long, metal box on a viewing table before waving him off. He was nothing, an ant in Raphael's army. Alone, she stared at the opposite wall. "Raphael?"
Nothing.
Lips pressed tightly together, she unlocked the box and took off the lid, expecting . . . she didn't know what she was expecting, but it wasn't what she found. Jewelry boxes, letters bound with ribbon, photos, a receipt for a small storage locker. On top of it all was a black leather notebook, the edges embossed gold. She reached out her finger, touched, then drew back and slammed the box closed. She couldn't do this. Not today. Calling the bank manager back after she'd relocked it, she had him return the box to its place in the vault. "How long has this been here?"
He glanced at the file in his hand. "It looks like it was opened almost fifteen years ago."
She grabbed the file before he could stop her, staring at the signature on the bottom of the first page.
Jeffrey Parker Deveraux.
Fifteen years ago. The summer he'd wiped her mother and older sisters from the face of the earth. Except this box told another story. Damn him! Shoving the papers back at the manager, she strode out through the moneyed opulence of the bank and toward heavy glass doors a security guard reached out to open. "Thanks."
His smile turned into shock an instant later. Elena followed the direction of his gaze to find an amazingly beautiful man with blue wings leaning nonchalantly against a lamppost directly outside. The stream of traffic had disappeared from this side of the street, but the other side was so full, it was as if the entire population of New York had decided to walk by.
She stepped out onto the sidewalk. "Illium."
"At your service." He waved his hand at the low-slung Ferrari behind him. It was fire-engine red. Of course.
She raised an eyebrow. "How do you fit the wings inside?"
"Alas, I can only watch." He threw her the keys.
Catching them reflexively, she scowled. "Whose million-dollar car is that and what did he do to you?"
"Dmitri's. And just because."
It almost made her laugh and that, she couldn't have predicted. "The map?"
His eyes-a vivid, shimmering gold, startling against black hair dipped in blue-shifted to the car. "In the glove box."
Not that she wouldn't enjoy needling Dmitri by taking his prized possession out for a run, but . . . "I need a vehicle that won't stand out."
"There's an underground garage two blocks east. Pull into it and switch." He stepped away from the post, flared out his wings.
"Showing off?"
"Oui, oui." A smile full of pure male charm.
"Is the hair real?"
A nod. "So are the eyes. In case you were wondering." Another teasing smile.
She saw a single feather drift to the curb. "You'll cause a riot if you don't pick that up."
He followed her gaze. "I'll take it and drop it from the sky. Someone will find magic."
Snorting, but oddly touched by the idea, she unlocked the car and got in. Across the street, camera phones continued to snap at insane speed. She rolled her eyes. "Fly off before they mug you."
"I may look pretty, Elena, but I'm rather dangerous." The finest hint of a British accent whispered through.
"That," she said, "I never doubted." Starting the engine, she pulled out and away, aware of him taking off behind her. He might be dangerous but he was no archangel. And what the hell had Raphael been thinking, sending her such a-