Samael by Heather Killough-Walden Page B

a drink of her beer, and his eyes flashed, glowing one second, and shifting back to their deep, tumultuous gray the next. “It does get tiring.”
    “That must be why you don’t look any better,” said Hesperos, with a gleam and a smile.
    Sam was unruffled. He looked around, as if he hadn’t heard the Nightmare King. Angel stood glued to her spot, her body going strangely numb as she took in his appearance. He was dressed all in black, just like Hesperos. However, his countenance and stature were such to suggest that he was no less than the king of the faire, and by the way the people around her were behaving toward him, Angel would almost believe they were under the hypnotic misconception that he was exactly that.
    In fact, as Sam lowered his mug – or, her mug, rather – two “ladies in waiting” nodded respectfully at him and blushed when he smiled back.
    “So, which of these unsuspecting females are you here to deflower, Hesperos?” Sam asked. “And do you plan to share with all your men?” He gestured to the other incubi Angel had noticed standing around the faire. The men were watching silently, their smiles gone.
    “That one, actually,” said Hesperos, shocking Angel. “And no.” He smiled suddenly. “Unless she’s up for it.”
    He was nodding toward a middle-aged woman who was standing beside the archery range. She didn’t know he was watching her. In fact, she was perhaps one of the only women in the park who seemed relatively oblivious to all the drop-dead gorgeous men in black leather meandering through the faire. Instead, her gaze was distant. She seemed sad, in fact.
    She had very long, well kept brown hair that was clearly a feature she’d taken great care with. Unlike so many of the revelers around her, she was dressed in plain street clothes. Despite the warm humidity, she wore blue jeans that hugged ample curves, and a white loose fitting V-neck tee that revealed healthy striations in strong pectoral muscles. Her arms were also well muscled, not overly so, but with the appearance of genuine strength. She was on the shorter side, no taller than five-two or five-three, but her rugged engineering boots had a little heel to them, and she stood with her shoulders back and her chin up, making her appear taller.
    Despite her radiated strength, there was a hollowness under her brown eyes, deep and dark. She rested against one of the posts surrounding the archery range, her arms crossed over her chest. There were people shooting nearby, but whether they were part of her party or not, Angel couldn’t tell.
    “She’s beautiful,” she whispered. Like Hesperos, she could see the good or bad inside a person as well, and the woman was not only attractive on the outside, she was very much so on the inside. That kind of goodness radiated from a person. It was difficult to describe.
    Angel was still reeling from the fact that both men were there at the faire, standing on either side of her, and hadn’t realized that she’d spoken the words out loud until Hesperos responded.
    “Indeed,” he agreed, his heated gaze still locked on his unwitting target.
    Angel looked from him to Sam, who stood behind her, watching her as intently as Hesperos watched the woman by the archery range.
    Before Angel could say anything to him, the Nightmare King turned back to face them. “Well, Angel, I think you’re in good hands here. If you’ll excuse me.”
    Angel’s eyes grew very, very wide. “ What? ” She couldn’t help but ask.
    It wasn’t that she wasn’t glad to avoid trouble, it was just…. He was going to just leave her? Leave her with Sam of all people? Since when did he trust Sam that much? How could he just aban–
    But Hesperos left the drink stall, his beer vanished from his hand, and she watched in stunned silence as he approached the archery range, moving around the brown haired woman’s location like a shark determining the perfect angle for attack.
    Feeling the world shift under her feet,