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  It was astonishing. His whole body rigid as he filled her, emptied into her, unable to think of anything but the joy of filling her with his essence, with his seed, her body wrapped tightly around him.

  She came again as he poured into her, clenching around him as he bathed her pussy with his cum and she shuddered, clung to him through the storm of emotion, of pleasure.

  Asmodeus wrapped his arms around her, held her as they both came slowly back down to earth. He cradled her close in the curve of his arm, her head on his shoulder, her leg wrapped around his.

  With a sigh, Gabriel curled into him, brushed her mouth over the strong curve of his chest as she slid her hand over his waist to run it over the ripples of his abs.

  She looked up into Asmodeus’ beautiful long-lashed ruby eyes, the swirling gold in them nearly still and smiled as she ran her fingers over one perfect cheekbone, brushed his hair back with a flick of her fingers, and then skimmed them over the curve of his ear again. He quivered just a little and smiled.

  “So beautiful,” she said, running her hand over him. “I do love to touch you.”

  As her hands glided over him, sent shivers through him that she could feel, Asmodeus said, “I cannot say that I mind. In fact, I would not be averse if you never stopped.”

  She smiled. He was so handsome, strong, aristocratic.

  Which brought up another matter.

  “Is there something you forgot to tell me, by the way?” she asked and arched a brow at him.

  Puzzled, he shook his head. “I don’t think so.”

  “Ba’al called you his prince,” she said.

  “Ah.” With a shrug, Asmodeus said, “Someone must lead, so I do.”

  With the death of his father at the hands of the church, it had fallen to him. The responsibility was heavy sometimes. She was an ease to that. Just her touch soothed him. It also reminded him that this time must come to an end. As he had his duty, she had hers.

  He sighed.

  As much as he wanted her at his side, he knew he could not ask her to join him here. What she did on her plane was important and important to her. She was good at what she did, he understood that much from Templeton’s fear of her and it was clear she was needed there. Whether it was the battle against evil with a capital E or the lowercase type of evil, that battle still had to be fought.

  Nor could he leave his people to join her.

  “What’s wrong?” she asked as she sensed his sudden shift.

  “As much as I do not want you to go, how soon must I send you back to your plane of existence? How soon before you’re missed?” he asked, his heart already heavy at the thought of being separated from her but he needed to know how much time they had left.

  He did not know how they would manage, only that somehow they would. Settling his hands on her hips, he brushed his thumbs over her belly and wondered if his seed had already been planted there.

  He felt Gabriel close her mind to him, quite deliberately, even as she brushed her fingers over his mouth to reassure him.

  “Asmodeus, will you trust me again? There’s something I’d like to show you.”

  That puzzled him. There was no question in his mind. She was his mate. “Always.”

  “Can you take me to a place you have only seen in my mind?”

  He nodded. “I can.”

  “Take us here,” she said and showed him just a glimmer.

  It was enough.

  With only a thought, a shift between the planes, they were there.

  Asmodeus’ breath caught.

  For a moment he could only stand and stare in simple wonder.

  It was breathtakingly beautiful, a deep valley between mountains, so peaceful and so astonishingly green. It nearly hurt his eyes, so long accustomed to the barren and sere redness of the escarpments of that other plane.

  The sun shone brilliantly out of a clear and cloudless blue sky. Above and around them the thickly treed mountains rose steeply to create the small cup of a valley between them, dotted with pockets of meadow. A narrow stream cut through the center. Beams of sunlight speared between the trees. A soft breeze blew to rustle the thick long grasses.

  With the mountains to block, no human sounds drowned out the susurrus of the breeze through that grass, the whisper of leaves rustling or the sweet songs of the birds.

  Sounds such as Asmodeus had not heard since he and his had passed over to the other plane. Templeton had not been much for places like it.

  In wonder he looked around.

  Clover grew to wave its thick purple heads and he smelled something sweet—summer flowers, honeysuckle and lavender. Bees hummed contentedly.

  Tucked away beneath the trees was a small cabin, neatly kept.

  It was too easy for Asmodeus to imagine his wings filled with air as he flew to catch the thermals high above that would carry him up, soaring into that brilliant blue to bask in the sunlight as it warmed his skin.

  Nestled between the mountains, the secluded little valley was a small pocket of paradise.

  Asmodeus drew Gabriel close, wrapped his arms around her shoulders to stand and look as contentment filled him.

  “What is this place?” he asked, almost reverently.

  Gabriel looked at him over her shoulder, her hands curled around his powerful wrists where they encircled her.

  His voice was a soft rumble she could feel throughout her entire body. She loved the sensation of it.

  “It’s home,” she said simply.

  “Home?” he echoed, not quite comprehending.

  Gabriel’s heart ached for him, for what he and the others had lost—Ashtoreth and Ba’al, the others of his brothers she had met—but she smiled and nodded.

  “Home.”

  His hands tightened on her, his breath going still as she sensed understanding dawn.

  “Yours?”

  A little lightly, she said, “Yes. Mine and the bank’s, but it’s my name on the deed.”

  Asmodeus let out the breath he held and pressed his cheek to her hair.

  Stroking his forearms, held within the circle of them, Gabriel spoke quietly, uncharacteristically diffidently, her throat tight.

  “I have an apartment in the city, in D.C. but when I can, I come here,” she said, and looked around at the quiet beauty, “to escape. When I need to remind myself what it’s all about, when I need to ground myself, to be around green and growing things. No one wanted it, the ground is too stony to grow much, so the land was cheap. I didn’t know when I bought it why I bought it.”

  She looked back over her shoulder at him, at his strong handsome face, at the peace in his eyes, and the longing there.

  “I think I do now. Is it big enough, Asmodeus, for all of you? For all the Daemonae?”

  Asmodeus looked around and his heart went still.

  A home. And not just for him, but all of his people. All of the Daemonae. It was there in her mind, opened now to him. She was offering them a home and so much more.

  A return to this plane, this world. Not just that, but a place to fly, to be unobserved, where they would not have to hide their true nature as they had in the past.

  Asmodeus looked around at the pretty, little valley and brushed his cheek against his mate’s silvery hair, seeing in his mind’s eye the sky above them filled with Daemonae wings. If ever he had loved her, he loved her more now for what she gave him and his people.

  He turned, looked back toward the entrance to the valley, to the world that waited for them out there.

  “Templeton,” Gabriel said, following his gaze.

  Nodding, Asmodeus took a breath. “Does he know we survived? We know he knows about my brothers. It’s unlikely he has given up.”

  Around him birds chirped and the air smelled sweetly of grass and trees.

  “We have to know.”

  Chapter Ten

  Around the room, keyboards went still, voices stopped talking on telephones and cell phones, and, an unusual enough occurrence there, silence fell. In th
is place that was striking.

  Gabriel saw heads turn, women—and one or two men—sighed while others broke into smiles.

  There were only a few people she knew who could provoke that reaction among some of these cynical hard cases. She turned in her chair to watch with pleasure and admire the man who walked down the aisle between the desks, her small office cubicle clearly his destination.

  He moved like a cat, lithe and graceful.

  To all appearances he was a handsome man—tall, beautifully built, with high, sharp cheekbones and slanted dark eyes, his silvered dark hair drawn back at the nape of his neck. He made his way toward her with long, easy strides. The deep curves of his pecs were limned beneath a tight, thin silk tee shirt. The short sleeves revealed strongly muscled arms while his jeans hung comfortably on narrow hips. The man practically radiated sex. Looking at him, you knew he could wear a designer suit as if he’d been born to it. He lifted a hand to some of those watching in easy greeting.

  Like all his kind, he was astonishingly beautiful but surprisingly he roused little envy in those who looked at him.

  She smiled to see the warmth of those greeting him in return and as he smiled at her, his grin changed his face completely, making him appear much less daunting.

  Planting a hand on each arm of her chair, he bent and laid a hot kiss on her that would have rocked anyone’s world, his mouth moving over hers slow and easy.

  Grinning, she curled a hand around his head and slid her fingers into hair like black silk, sinking into the kiss as warmth filled her.

  A hard hand clamped on his shoulder to pull him back and away.

  With a grin Gabriel let him go.

  “Five minutes to park the car and he’s trying to steal my woman. Get your own, Ash,” Asmodeus complained with a smile and a shake of his head, nudging his brother aside to yank Gabriel up out of her chair and into his arms.

  The kiss he planted on her did more than rock her world, it blanked it out completely. There was nothing for her except his mouth and his strong, hard body against hers as he lifted her off her feet as if she were nothing.

  Gabriel smiled, savoring the taste of him as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders, slightly broader and more solid than Ash’s leaner frame. She loved the feel of the massive size of Asmodeus beneath her hands, within her arms. Ash was just that little bit leaner.

  And, of course, Asmodeus was hers.

  “I’m working on it,” Ashtoreth said complacently, grinned and folded his arms to lean back against the door.

  He just liked to tweak Asmodeus’ chain now and then. Gabriel knew because he’d told her.

  Getting out into this world was quite an experiment for all the Daemonae. Like the others, Ash hadn’t yet found anyone he felt safe enough to reveal himself to or to feed from much, but as long as he didn’t use magic often he didn’t need to, yet.

  In fact most of the brothers were enjoying themselves and their return to this plane quite thoroughly as far as Gabriel could tell. Most were rarely home on Friday nights, changing to human form to visit the local bars.

  There had been a few adjustments all the way around.

  Coming to terms with the idea that she was Asmodeus’ fated mate hadn’t been that difficult. For years she had longed for someone who could understand her as Asmodeus did.

  Finding his fated mate though, had elevated Asmodeus from prince to king.

  Finding out that by making love to Asmodeus she’d suddenly become queen of the Daemonae had been a bit more of a shock.

  Finding that she could read the minds of all of the Daemonae because of it?

  That had been a revelation.

  Not all the Daemonae could read minds, and of them all, only two could read all their minds—Asmodeus as their king, and now Gabriel. That was how she had been able to summon Ash. No other than Asmodeus’ mishea, his beloved, could call them as she could.

  Wrapping her arms around Asmodeus’ waist as he set her back down, Gabriel looked up into his beautiful long-lashed dark eyes and saw the hidden glints of red and gold that sparked whenever he looked at her.

  She loved him more than life itself.

  “You just do that to drive me crazy,” Asmodeus said fondly, smiling as he brushed her hair back from her face.

  Mind to mind, he knew her heart and he had no fear. Still, she was kissing another man, if only Ash, his brother and friend. It was enough to spark a little jealousy and to spur him to prove his claim to her.

  With a laugh, she said, eyes sparkling, “No, Ash does it to drive you crazy. I just go along for the ride and the side benefits.”

  Asmodeus chuckled. “Like the side benefits, do you?”

  He projected his intentions for later.

  Heat shot through her as Gabriel caught the images from his mind.

  “Is that even anatomically possible?” she asked curiously and tilted her head to look at him with amusement.

  Red sparks flared in his eyes as he ground his hips against hers, his hardening erection pressed against her.

  “It will be fun trying.”

  “It will,” she said with a grin before she sobered and stepped back a little.

  Asmodeus and Ash were here for a reason and time was tight.

  “That’s something to keep in mind for later.”

  It was something to look forward to once they had this little chore done.

  She took a deep breath and reached for her weapon, clipped it to her belt, looking first to Asmodeus and then to Ash.

  “All right, let’s do this.”

  Indeed. Asmodeus watched her transform into the professional FBI agent that she was in her prim suit, with its proper white shirt and dark skirt. Unlike many of her compatriots among the women agents, she didn’t wear slacks, thankfully, unless she was doing a duty that required action. He liked looking at her legs and it gave him much easier access.

  For now though, what they were about to do had its dangers. It would be akin to stirring the hornet’s nest but it had to be done.

  He didn’t like the idea that she would be alone and vulnerable for even a few seconds but that was how it had to be. She was human and they were not. It was likely that the building would be warded against demons.

  “Are you ready?” Gabriel asked, looking at him. She reached up to touch his face. “I’ll be fine, Asmodeus.”

  Asmodeus was concerned. It was a very real fear, as she’d be alone in Templeton’s office long enough to be at risk.

  Reaching out, Asmodeus brushed her hair back from her face. “This I know. We’ll be close, my angel, only a thought away.”

  “I know,” she said, softly, “I’ll meet you there.”

  Asmodeus nodded and looked at Ash. “We will see you later.”

  Following them out, Gabriel glanced at two of her fellow agents, who each gave her sharp nods as they picked up their suit jackets from the backs of their chairs.

  This would be an official visit.

  As the three of them strode out of the room, two more picked up their jackets and followed them, as if on errands of their own. Backup. They knew Templeton had his people everywhere. Even in the Bureau.

  None of them said anything. All four were agents Gabriel had worked with in the past, people she knew and trusted.

  Ahead of her, Asmodeus and Ash stepped into the stairwell to vanish in a quick flash, leaving a small drift of smoke and the smell of brimstone to dissipate behind the now-closed door.

  * * * * *

  The office building Gabriel entered sometime later was prime real estate in midtown Manhattan.

  Leaving one of the agents with the car, they moved quickly.

  Gabriel breezed past the doorman and the guard at the door with a wave of her unfolded ID. Inside, security was silenced too, with a glance and a wave of identification as her people spread out and secured them.

  Nothing else was needed. There was no search warrant as this was to be a “friendly” visit only.

  With a nod to one of
the agents, Gabriel said, “No phone calls. I don’t want there to be any warning.”

  He nodded.

  The other two agents fell in beside her as she strode to the elevators and flanked her when she stepped out on the penthouse floor.

  Seeing them step out of the elevators and seeing where they were heading—the massive and impressive stainless steel doors to the executive suite—the secretary, or whatever she was, trotted out from behind her desk on ridiculously high heels and tried to intercept them.

  Gabriel gave her a single warning glance and stuck her badge in the woman’s face. “FBI. I need to talk to your boss. Alone. Sit down.”

  The woman teetered to a halt, clearly uncertain.

  Gabriel looked at her companions.

  “Stay here,” she said without breaking stride, “if I’m not out in fifteen minutes, raise the alarm.”

  The two men glanced at each other and nodded.

  One said, “You got it, Gabriel.”

  Both of them knew what the score was. Plausible deniability. Whatever went down inside, they could simply say they weren’t there.

  Nervously Gabriel fingered the rubber-capped vials in her pockets, thumbed the tops off as she walked toward the doors. As she hit the doors, she tipped the vials to spill their contents of blessed water, laced with copper flakes and herbs, across the threshold. She thought she saw a small flash and caught the sharp tang of ozone above the faint scent of the herbs but it might have been her imagination. Asmodeus and Ash had been concerned that the office would be warded against them. They hadn’t been certain the water would work at breaking those wards.

  She still wasn’t. What she had seen might have been her imagination.

  It was important to keep moving. Hopefully the surprise and shock of her arrival would keep Templeton from realizing that his wards were gone.

  Dropping the vials back into her pockets, she pulled out her identification and advanced with it unfolded in her hand to walk across what seemed like a half acre of marble flooring covered by thick Persian rugs. Templeton probably didn’t care that many of those rugs had been made by children, by slave labor, their small fingers ideal for the task.