“God? You swear to God?” He laughed again. “God has abandoned us all.”
A shock went through me. A wild mixture of relief, confusion, irritation and something far stronger, and shattering. For the first time since I’d known Zayne, I felt fear in his arms.
My body went ice-cold, and my own personal alarm system reacted to the bolt of fear. Deep inside me, my grace sparked.
Zayne hissed—he actually hissed—like an angry, feral cat. An angry, very large feral cat the moment my grace pulsed inside me. That was beyond weird.
Instinct took over. Twisting my body, I ignored the pain from all the healing injuries and brought my knee up, slamming it into his groin.
Or at least, I tried to.
Zayne anticipated the move. My knee hit his thigh. A wave of anger and rapidly growing panic whipped through me as my grace pressed at me, demanding to be let out, but I fought it down. He was confused and he’d just come back from being dead with angel wings, so I didn’t want to hurt him too badly. My grace would do more than that. It would kill him.
Managing to get an arm free, I punched him in the jaw, hard enough to send a flare of pain across my knuckles, and he smiled. He smiled like I hadn’t even punched him, and the curve of his lips was all wrong. It was icy and inhuman.
“Ouch,” he murmured. “You’re going to have to do better than that.”
I jabbed out with my palm, catching him under the chin. He grunted in pain as he pushed—no, threw—me aside. I hit the ground several feet back with a sharp yelp. Shock still had its tight grip on me, dampening the sting of a fresh new wave of pain as I looked up at him in realization.
This was Zayne but not.
He would never toss me like a Frisbee. Even if I deserved it, and God knows, I could be extremely obnoxious, but Zayne would never do that. I could kick him straight in the face, and he would never lift a finger against me in any way that would harm me.
Shaking off the pain and confusion, I climbed to my knees—
There was a blur of golden skin and wings, too fast for me to track, and then he had ahold of the scruff of my shirt. He lifted me off the ground and straight into the air. I dangled several feet from the ground.
Holy crap.
His wings rose and spread out. They were massive and beautiful. Also, really frightening at the moment. He held me there like I was nothing more than a toddler throwing a tantrum! A small one, at that.
And that really flipped my bitch switch.
I kicked out, catching him in the stomach. His grip on my shirt loosened, and then suddenly I was flying.
I landed on my stomach, slamming into the ground once more. Pain lanced my ribs as the air rushed out of my lungs. Okay. That was what being tossed like a Frisbee really felt like. Now I knew the difference. Good to know. Groaning, I flipped over and started to sit up. I didn’t make it very far. He was there, above me, his face in mine. Those brilliant blue eyes were like shards of ice. His stare chilled my flesh, my soul.
“Zayne, please—”
He gripped my chin, fingers pressing into my skin. “Stop calling me that.”
“It’s your name—”
“It is not.”
“Then what am I supposed to call you?” I shouted. “Jackass?”
One side of his lips kicked up. “You may call me death. How does that sound?”
A whole lot of fear blasted my system, but I hid it. “How does that sound? It sounds pretty stupid.”
The smirk froze.
I swung my fist.
His hand snapped out, catching my wrist. He hadn’t even taken his eyes off mine—hadn’t even let go of my chin. “This feels familiar.”
“Me telling you something you’ve said sounds stupid? Because it should—”
“No.” His eyes narrowed. “This. The fighting.”
“That’s because we’ve trained together! We’ve fought each other,” I told him in a rush, trying to overcome my panic and anger. “Not to hurt each other. Never to hurt each other.”
“Never to hurt each other,” he repeated slowly, as if he couldn’t comprehend how those words went together. His head twisted to the side as his eyes closed. “This isn’t...” His fingers dug in, squeezing until I was sure that my jaw would splinter. “You know me. You’re important.”
I swallowed down the fear. “Because...because we do know each other. We’re together. You wouldn’t do this. You wouldn’t hurt me.”
“I wouldn’t?” He sounded even more confused. “Why is that? You’re a nephilim. You carry an archangel’s grace.”
“That doesn’t matter. You wouldn’t hurt me because you love me,” I whispered, voice cracking. Tears filled my eyes. “That’s why.”
“Love?” He jolted as if burned, letting go of my chin. “I love you?”