Page 64 of Roman

“What about Charlotte?”He couldn’t stop the trepidation that slithered up his spine.

Where the fuck is she?He quickly opened a drawer, pulled out some sweatpants, and dragged them on.His brow creased as he noticed some clothes were missing.He knew Charlotte had taken them.He tried to remain calm and not jump to conclusions.She was probably just downstairs, getting something to eat.She’d be starving.He noticed an empty coffee cup and a half-eaten roll sitting on a plate on the small table near the window.He stared at them, confused.

“Roman, I think you need to sit down for this conversation,” Ariel answered.

Roman slowly sunk into the chair by the table, still staring at the empty cup and the half-eaten roll.“Ariel, what the fuck is going on?”He was about to seriously lose his shit.

“I know who Charlotte’s parents are, Roman.Which angels conceived her,” she said.

Roman was shocked.So, it was true.Shewaspart angel.“How?And you said angels, not angel.Do you mean to tell me she has two angel parents?How is that even possible without any of us knowing?”He sat back in the chair, running his hand down his face, Charlotte’s scent filling him.Flashes of her naked body hit him.Her head back as she cried out his name.Her gray eyes enthralling him as she licked his body, watching him.He grew hard for her instantly.

Focus,he thought, angry with himself.This was not the time to be daydreaming about sex.

“Yes, Roman, two angels.What I’m about to tell you isn’t easy for me…”

He could hear her voice quivering.He had only heard her voice quiver like that once before.When they were reunited after she crawled out of Hell, she’d broken down to him only that once.Then, she had picked herself up and buried whatever had happened to her deep down inside, like the rest of them, and had been nothing but a solid rock since.

“Ariel, what is it?”he asked, his worry for her taking over.

“About twenty years ago, I felt her presence.It had been so long that it took me a moment to realize it was her.It crippled me at first.”

“Who?Whose presence?”he asked impatiently.

“Arella’s,” she whispered, her voice finally cracking.

Roman was speechless.Her sister.Arella hadn’t been seen since the fall.Ariel and her sister had both fallen straight into Hell, but only Ariel had crawled out.Roman knew that the guilt of her escaping without her sister had slowly eaten away at her all this time.

“She called out to me, over and over.I could feel her terror, her confusion.Her thoughts nearly shattered my mind.”

“Which gate?Which gate did she crawl out of?”he asked her, his mind racing.

How did she not tell anyone?Where the fuck was Arella now?He had so many questions, but he could tell Ariel was hanging on by a thread.

“Greece.It was only a coincidence that I was in the country when it happened.By the time I made it from Athens, she had wandered her way into Delphi.I found her hiding in the church, huddled in the darkness.”She paused, and he could hear her taking a deep breath.“She was heavily pregnant, Roman.”

“What?”It was all he could say.

The shock of her words slowly sunk in.His mind finally wrapped around what she said.Arella’s image, his last one of her up in the heavens, flashed through his mind.Red hair like fire, the same as Ariel’s, then he almost stopped breathing.Arella’s deep gray eyes flashed through his mind.Just like Charlotte’s.

“She’s her mother?”he murmured, asking the question and already knowing without a doubt what the answer was.

No wonder Ariel couldn’t stop staring at her the other day with that look of surprise when Charlotte had sat at the table.It had been thousands of years since he had seen Arella, he hadn’t even seen the similarity.But now, there was no question.She looked like a blonde version of her mother.

“Yes, she’s Arella’s daughter.”

“Then who’s the father?”A shiver slowly crept up his spine.

She crawled out of Hell pregnant.

“Roman… it’s Lucifer.”

Roman nearly dropped the phone.No, no, no.It can’t be possible.That monster couldn’t be the father of someone so beautiful, so kind, the one he loved more than anything in this godforsaken world.He could feel his rage building, his eyes burning as anger consumed him.

Roman stood, dropping the phone as a deafening roar ripped from his chest, shattering the window.He kicked the table over, screaming again with fury.Fucking monster,he seethed.Lucifer’s face flashed in his mind.

His mortal enemy, the thing he wanted dead more than anything.

He smashed his drawers to pieces, then went for the wall.He could feel his last tether finally snap as he smashed his fists over and over again, plaster and concrete flying everywhere.

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