Page 173 of Wicked Believer

The Angel of Death.

He may not be arealangel, but he’s been that more than once for me.

Slowly, I walk to his side, and soon I’m sitting on the ledge right beside him, our knees brushing. “I’m—”

“Sorry,” we both say at once.

The hurt in Azrael’s eyes softens.

“You first,” I whisper to him.

“I never meant for it to hurt you.”

I lift a brow, not certain what he means, and I track how the muscled cords of his throat writhe.

“God’s blade. The Holy Lance. The one Michael, and now Lucifer, have been searching for. The one Michael claims to have is a fake. But therealone, the one that killed your actress is still out there.” He hesitates before he says, “AndIwas the one who put the real blade into play.”

I suck in a harsh breath at the revelation, at what he’s just confessed to me.

“Why?” I breathe.

“I did it to hurt him.” His eyes dart back toward the rooftop’s entrance as if I don’t already know exactly who he means. “I never meant for it to—”

“You love him,” I whisper.

It’s not a question. I can see it right there in his cold blue gaze.

It’s something we both have in common.

Death looks a little ... lost as he stares back at me then, his expression an aching mixture of guilt, pain, regret, and longing. “I wish that I didn’t, but I do. But also, I”—he swallows, and the cold fire in his gaze returns—“didn’t expect to feel anything for you.”

My heart starts to pound rapidly, so loud and forceful that the sound of it echoes inside my ears. “That’s why you made whatever deal it is you made with him, isn’t it? Because you love him, and also because you—”

“Didn’t think I could bear the thought of seeing you hurt? No. Not after I’d held you.”

An amused, self-deprecating huff tears from my lips as I shrug, turning to look back toward the glittering lights of the city. “I’m sure you’ve heldplentyof other humans as they’ve died.”

“None that were ever brave enough to look at me, to see me,” he admits. “None that ever managed to escape.”

I smile so wide I nearly laugh. “So that’s what this is? It’s the thrill of the chase for you?”

To Death I’ll always be the one who got away.

The only former human who’s managed to escape from him, even though it was my time. This strange fascination we have with one another, that we’ve been harboring since the very beginning ...

It’s as new and strange to him as it is to me.

Maybe that’s why I’ve been dreaming of him, because some part of me knew that he’d played a role in gifting my freedom to me. Held me in his arms long enough to let Lucifer offer me God’s redemption.

Even though he should have hated me from the start.

For falling in love with the fallen angel he’s clearly been in love with for all eternity.

And to think I ever thought they were just fuck buddies.

Lucifer and Death’s relationship is so obvious now.

It spans the whole of time, of human history.