Crystal Tomb (Starfire Angels: Dark Angel Chronicles Book 3) (2 page)

A perfect match and the
answer right before them—Earth. Then it was all true—the Inari had
established a colony over twelve thousand Earth years ago, a colony
remembered as Atlantis. She could accept that. But— "Who are the
Miru?
What
are
they?"

"Allies…sort of. One of our more
advanced allies. We've never been able to crack interdimensional
travel without the Starfire. They had ships that could for as long
as we've known them. No one knows their homeworld or how to contact
them, but they've always helped other species. From this—" He
pointed to the image on the flat screen. "It sounds like they
brought a few hundred Inari to Earth to save our species from
destruction. It doesn't say why the outsiders attacked, though,
only that they were destroying the homeworld when the refugees
escaped."

"Obviously the invaders failed."
Inar'Ahben was alive and thriving as a world.

He frowned and his eyes pinched as if
focusing on part of the image. "Can you read that?" He pointed to
the blurry inner ring around a central sphere of round red
crystal.

Raea closed her eyes and recalled the
image in perfect clarity from the Starfire vision with her mother.
This was one time she was grateful for the unfading memory the
Starfire in her genes gave her.

Raea studied the smaller characters
clear in her memory but didn't understand more than a couple, and
those didn't make sense. She'd only been learning to read and write
the language of her species for a little over two weeks. "I'm not
sure."

At a soft sigh from him, she opened
her eyes. "The language is old. Things have changed," he
said.

"But Inari were on Earth long ago,
before the Starfire came to them."

Elis stepped back and sat on the edge
of the queen bed filling most of the space in the room. His eyes
shifted from the monitor, past her in the desk chair, to somewhere
else. He wandered lost in his thoughts again, the quiet guy who had
brooded around school and earned the nickname Creeper because of
it, until he became a hero.

"The mystery deepens." With him as
much as with the monolith.

Elis exhaled sharply but said nothing,
his expression one of deep thoughts she could only
guess.

Not even a glance? Not a kiss or a
touch to acknowledge her?

He really was focused, but she could
change that.

Raea move from the chair to sit on his
thigh, forcing him to take notice. The monolith represented history
past and gone; he didn't need to spend all his time worrying about
it. This was the present with its own challenges and trials. Still,
for once he didn't think about the Shirukan, the elite soldiers of
the Shirat Empire, who had come after her for the Starfire; she
supposed that was an improvement.

A warm hand slid around her middle,
the security of his arm holding her close to the firm, fit body
beneath the dark shirt. Although she still wasn't sure about
bonding permanently—sharing his pleasure and pain through a sort of
telepathic connection that would build from physical contact—she
couldn't imagine her life without Elis, her dark angel and the most
sensitive and caring guy she'd ever known. Not even her friend Josh
could compare, although he came close but only as a
friend.

Raea laid her arms around Elis's
shoulders, a shiver of anticipation coursing through her from the
light trace of his fingers on her side.

She combed aside the black locks from
his eyes, the soft strands slipping like silk through her
fingertips. When she'd escaped from Inar'Ahben to return to her
Earth home, he said he'd cut his hair if she really wanted, but by
then she didn't want him to. It gave him a dark, mysterious look
that fit him. Elis was the Dark Angel, after all. She couldn't ask
him to change.

Her hand settled along his smooth
cheek and she leaned close. "Don't think about it so much. It's old
history, lost at that," she whispered.

"I'm not…anymore."

Exactly what she wanted to
hear.

["I was thinking you need to study
harder."]

What a way to ruin the mood. Why did
he have to be so serious?

No. He teased her. Ooh! She'd wipe
that coy grin from his face.

"You—"

While holding her tight, he
pulled her down on the bed with him and laughed.
So clever, and weird.
He
had changed so much since the Starfire brought them
together.

All right. So…he'd taken her by
surprise. That was unusual for him. Elis usually shied from too
much intimacy.

Raea pushed herself up on one arm, her
brown hair sliding over her shoulder to hang alongside her head.
She could play along with this game. "School's out, I'll have you
know."

"I know."

Not that again. Raea growled and her
eyes narrowed, until he lifted his head to kiss her. She tried to
pretend to be mad with tight lips but she couldn't when his kiss
sent shivers of anticipation through her and touched the deepest
desires of her body. He drew her back down beside him on the
bed.

This wasn't the Elis she had known for
two years and avoided. Had she known he could make her fly without
wings, she would have asked him out sooner. He'd been nothing but
sweet and caring to the point that he never asked for anything in
return for giving her whatever she needed.

She would have done anything for
him.

Oh, God, that felt good.

The hands sliding along her back and
sides found all the right places to make her pulse race, which made
her more agreeable. His lips pressing against hers stole her breath
and inspired a pleasurable warmth which coursed through her and
urged her to press against him for more.

As usual, he pulled away at that
point.

He lay close so his breath blew warm
across her mouth. So tempting.

"You're forgiven," she whispered in
the hopes he would take it as a hint.

He lay in silence, his breath
steadying and his hands enticing her with the gentle massage along
her side and hip.

After what felt too long, Raea frowned
and studied his face. Something was wrong. She set her hand on his
cheek to get his attention. "I was only joking." She wasn't mad.
Surely he realized that.

Since her return from Inar'Ahben, she
told him she would bond with him. He shouldn't be afraid anymore,
but she had hurt him by almost rejecting him. Did it still bother
him that much?

His eyes dropped from her and his
touch disappeared from her side to her hand on his face, which he
grabbed in his and pulled to his chest. Now she knew something was
wrong. Her insides ran cold with dread. What had she
done?

"Elis?"

His fingers rubbed hers and those
purple eyes stared at her and through her at the same time. This
wasn't right. Oh, God.

"Did I do something
wrong?"
Say no.
Please
say no.

"No." His fingers tightened around her
hand.

Whew!
But that still didn't tell her anything. "Then…what is
it?"

He released her hand to softly comb
the hair from her face.

The distant ring of the
phone
filled the silence as his hand slid
down her shoulder to her back, and he pulled her close so her face
tucked into his shoulder. She held tight to him, unwilling to let
go for any reason. Everything felt right when they were together
and nothing else in the universe could separate them.

"I would never do anything to hurt
you," he whispered.

She swallowed the lump of emotions
sticking in her throat, afraid yet eager to know what he tried to
say. "I know."

His swallow sounded loud in her ear
and spiked her through with dread. "Everything is happening so fast
and… "

"Elis! Raea!" The shout from
downstairs chilled the room.

No! Evelyn couldn't have worse
timing.

"And what?"
Not yet, Evelyn.
She had
to know what he meant to say. A million ideas raced through her
mind, some of them bad.

"Raea! Debbie needs to talk to
you!"

No! Not now. Her aunt had the worst
timing. They were next door. Couldn't she wait?

His arms loosened around her. "It's
not important."

Not important? But—
What was he going to tell her? That he wanted a
break? That couldn't be right. Did his cousin Nare get to him and
make him more cautious? Was the idea of bonding to her now wrong?
Was she moving too fast for him?
What?

Elis sat up and pulled her up next to
him. "You better take the call."

"Debbie can wait." Besides, it was
probably another call to check up on whether she planned to come
home for the night as an excuse to talk her out of sleeping with
him. Sure, she'd stayed a few nights, but nothing had happened, at
least nothing that involved clothes coming off. And it wasn't
anyone else's business if something did. She was eighteen and done
with high school, technically. A few more days and a stupid speech
and she would be completely free, at least from school.

Debbie would still be
there.

A wry smile crooked up his face—so
cute on him she wanted to forget everything else. Elis might not be
the hottest guy in that town, but he was cute and loved her, or at
least she hoped that's what he was trying to say. He'd never had
any trouble before. Geez, each time he kissed her was like it was
their last breath.

Maybe it was.
No. No. No! Don't think that.

"No, she won't. You know
that."

Raea huffed out her frustration and
stood. Damn. She hated that he was right. He was always
right.

This checking up on her by her aunt
had to end. She wasn't a child anymore; she controlled her own
life. "Fine." This was the last time her aunt would interfere; then
he would finish what he intended to say.

His hand grasped hers, stopping her
from storming down the stairs. To her relief, he stood with her, a
calm look on his face. Her anger melted—he'd always had a soothing
effect on her—and she led him by the hand out the room and down the
stairs with her. Maybe she wouldn't be so hard on Debbie.
Maybe.

Leaning on her cane for support,
Evelyn stood at the bottom of the stairs with the cordless handset.
Her cheeks sagged with age and her back hunched from years of
osteoarthritis. The short curls of gray outlined a friendly face
inspiring guilt in Raea for her anger.

Evelyn put the phone to her cheek.
"She's right here, dear," she said and handed it Raea.

Raea took the handset and lifted it to
her face, glancing at Elis a step behind her for the calm strength
he offered. His fingers tightened within hers momentarily and
relaxed, releasing her frustrations.

"Debbie."

"Oh, good. Raea. I'm glad you're all
right."

Her aunt sounded relieved, as if she'd
been deeply worried. Not good. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"I know; you're with Elis. But the
message on the machine—"

Uh, oh. Her stomach knotted. "What
message?"

"He said he called on behalf of a
Matthew Stein. He sounded out of breath as if he'd been working
out…or running."

Raea grimaced and looked to Elis.
Matthew Stein had been the bodyguard of Mister Torres, the
protector. Elis had used the abilities of the Starfire to link to
Torres's mind for the secrets of the Eye, an amulet protecting a
fifth shard of the Starfire crystal from detection.

"What did he say?"

"I think you should hear it for
yourself…both of you. He mentioned you and Elis. Raea, you're not
in trouble, are you? I mean, besides the Shirukan?"

"I don't know. We'll be right
over."

"Good. Hurry, before Mike gets home.
You know how he feels about all this."

Yeah, did she ever know. Her uncle
Mike had never thought much of her, usually ignoring her and
favoring his own two boys. He had become grouchy since all the
attention by Nina Russet, the reporter who had nearly exposed her
secret two months ago. Mike knew nothing about what Raea was, and
she'd prefer to keep it that way.

"Be there in a few." Raea clicked off
the phone and handed it to Elis, freeing her hands to open the
foyer closet. In one hand, she lifted her cheap slip-ons and in the
other Elis's sneakers.

"Is something wrong, dear?" Evelyn
stood in the doorway between the foyer and the sitting
room.

Elis took his shoes and sat down at
the bottom of the steps to put them on. Raea slipped her feet into
her shoes while he was still tying his laces.

"I don't know. Nothing we didn't
expect, I guess, but it could be trouble." Torres and Stein had
come to them because they had lost contact with other protectors of
the Eye. They didn't want the knowledge of its location lost. Elis
now possessed all of Torres's knowledge. If someone knew he had
visited them…