Eternal Rider - Larissa Ione [86]
“He doesn’t have to live with me, does he?”
“No, but you can’t predict when he’ll pop in to see you. The bond is powerful. He won’t want to be far from you.”
Okay, she hadn’t thought that far ahead. There was no point, not when she barely knew what was going to happen in the next hour, let alone the next week or next month. Reaver reached out and absently toyed with one of the pieces on the chessboard.
“Ares will take care of you. But keep in mind that he is a Horseman. If his Seal breaks, he will be the very definition of evil. And even now, he has an inborn need to win any challenge, no matter how minor, and no matter what the cost.”
She’d noticed his competitive nature, for sure. “What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that he doesn’t have a sense of fair play.” Reaver flicked his fingers and leveled all the chess pieces. “He follows no rules, because to him, the end result is what matters—not how you get there.”
A tremor of unease went through her. “And you’re telling me this, why?”
“Because you need to be prepared to do the same. If you want to survive, you may need to make sacrifices and do things you never thought you’d do. Things that go against everything you’ve ever believed.” His tone was dark, ominous, all the more frightening because it came from a being she had always associated with a soft… goodness. As if he knew what she was thinking, he took her hand. “Angels are warriors, and some of us, like me, are what you might think of as Special Ops. We play on the side of good, but make no mistake—we are soldiers, and we’ll do what we have to in order to win.”
“You… kill?”
“There is very little we won’t do in the fight against evil.”
She swallowed. “So you have no rules either?”
Reaver’s sudden laughter had a deep, uplifting bell-tone quality to it. “We have rules. Oh, we have lots of rules.”
Ares approached, and Reaver shot her a wink as he stood. “Kynan texted the coordinates to the hellhound. We can go as soon as I hear from Li or Than.”
“I’m being summoned anyway,” Reaver said. “I’ll be in touch.” He punched Ares in the shoulder, and in the next instant, was gone.
Cara blinked, feeling a little loopy, as though she’d just gotten off a carnival ride. “I have to say… he’s not what I expected of an angel.”
Ares laughed. She loved it when he did that. “What did you expect?”
“That maybe they’d be a little more… rigid. Or righteous.”
Ares snorted. “He’s not like other angels. They all have superiority complexes and sticks up their holy asses. Reaver’s different. Probably because he spent some time as a fallen angel.”
“Really? He fell? And he was able to go back?”
“An angel can fall, but if he doesn’t enter Sheoul, he can be redeemed. But once a fallen angel enters Sheoul, he becomes irreversibly evil. Reaver earned his way back into Heaven by helping save the world not long ago.”
Not long ago? She wasn’t even going to ask.
One of those gate things opened up behind him, and a massive black horse leaped out—but it was like no horse Cara had ever seen. Its eyes glowed red, its teeth were more like fangs, and its hooves scorched the floor. Limos, her armor splashed with blood, was in the saddle, expertly guiding the stallion with her knees. Gone was the ultrafeminine beach-girl, and suddenly, Cara saw the warrior she was.
“Get Cara out of here,” she yelled. “Than’s coming.”
Ares took Cara’s hand in his and tugged her against his hard body. “What happened?”
“Reseph. Fucking asshole started a plague in Slovenia that’s mowing people down by the thousands, almost instantaneously.” Her stallion danced beneath her, as agitated as its master. “Something else is going on in that area. I can sense need and desperation, but I can’t pinpoint it.”
“I’ve felt something similar,” Ares said gravely, and Cara wondered if that was why he’d been wound so tight. Then again, he seemed like the type that was always a bowstring waiting to be released. “Was Pestilence there?