Jegudiel (Deadly Virtues 2)

“What were those backgrounds?” Diel asked, completely focused on what she was saying.

Noa sighed. “Priscilla is a Romani traveler. They took her from her family too. A gypsy, some would say. That’s what the Brethren called her, alongside ‘heretic.’”

“And Dinah?”

“Her family were from New Orleans originally. They moved to Boston when she was young. The matriarchal side of her family stemmed from a long line of voodoo queens.” Noa felt the rage on behalf of her sisters, at how they were all robbed of their families, their beliefs, traditions and practices, all because the Brethren believed them to be sinners. They thought they had the fucked-up God-given right to destroy them because their doctored scripture told them so.

“And the others?” Diel asked.

Noa shook her head. “Those are my sisters’ stories. I shouldn’t have said anything about Priscilla and Dinah. I just …” The lump moved back into her throat. She startled when Diel’s hand cupped her cheek. She closed her eyes as the warmth of his touch traveled through her body, a balm, a calming tincture. “We were all segregated from society and homeschooled. When they took us, no one noticed.”

“What did they do with your family’s bodies?” Diel asked. Noa tried her best to block out the memory of her loved ones on the ground of their sacred circle. It was a blood sacrifice no element, triple-headed goddess or horned god had ever, or would ever, ask of them.

Noa leaned into Diel’s hand. She didn’t overthink how much strength this man she had just met brought to her broken soul, how much peace the simplicity of his touch brought to her warmongering heart. “When we left … when we had escaped the Witch Finders, I researched that night. I never knew what they had done with them all.” Noa breathed deeply to stop herself from losing it. “A man had been arrested and charged with the murders.”

Diel frowned. “What man?”

Noa shrugged. “Some murderer they pinned our deaths on.”

“Our?”

“I was mentioned in the newspaper write-up. It claimed he confessed to killing me too. They never found the body, of course.” Noa closed her eyes. “They said he had stumbled upon the Samhain ritual and killed them—us—through insanity.”

“Fuckers,” Diel spat. Noa nodded. When she opened her eyes, Diel was sitting right in front of her. He searched her eyes. In that moment, she felt completely vulnerable. She felt weak.

She couldn’t tolerate feeling weak.

“I never tell anybody this. About my past,” Noa whispered, her voice trembling.

Diel was silent for a second, then said, “I’m not just anybody.”

Noa’s heart flipped in her chest. Because he wasn’t. She had known that from the minute he had held her up against the wall in the priest’s home, the collar around his neck a beacon to her darkness. Diel pulled Noa across his lap and pushed inside her. Noa’s breathing stuttered as he entered her again.

“I’m Jegudiel, a Fallen,” he said, voice low and rough and thick with honesty and lust. “And you are Noa, a witch of the Coven.”

Noa stilled, pressing her hands down on Diel’s shoulders to halt his thrusts. “I can’t be a witch,” she hissed. His words had struck her as harshly as a cat-o’-nine-tails lashing at her back.

Diel pulled her closer. She felt his heart racing against hers as their skin kissed. “You can.” His cock pulsed inside her. “That’s your heritage, your birthright. They can’t ever take it from you.”

Noa went to argue, to refute his claim. She wanted to move away from him, give herself space from too much emotion, from a past and a legacy she had tried to remain distant from. But as she did, she heard the fire crackle and pop behind her, heard the thrashing wind rattle the windows, heard the rain pouring down outside … and then she felt something else, something that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand on end.

As Diel held her close, skin to skin, brand to brand, scars against scars, she felt a deep sense of completion. Not in the sexual sense, but as though some missing part of her had been found, some aspect of her wounded soul had been patched over, the beginning phases of healing set in motion. And as she looked into Diel’s eyes, sapphire eyes that were no longer tormented by two halves of one warring soul, she knew he had been that missing piece.

Noa took hold of Diel’s hand and entwined his fingers with hers. She felt an invisible cord wrap around their tightly clasped hands, creating a sacred bond. A flood of light seared through her, cleansing and reviving.

And as she looked up at Diel, she saw it mirrored in his gaze too. The invisible cord pulled tighter, as if it was their very own handfasting ceremony. Noa closed her eyes. She could almost see her grandma dancing around the fire in celebration, arms stretched out, long gray hair whipping high with the wind as she sent the elements to her surviving granddaughter. Her granddaughter who had met someone who both shared and understood the heavy burdens of her soul. Someone to lighten to the load.