A Dark Kiss of Rapture

A DARK KISS OF RAPTURE

A Renegade Angels Novella

SYLVIA DAY

Published by Sylvia Day

Smashwords Edition

ePub ISBN: 978-0982857175

A Dark Kiss of Rapture

Copyright 2011 Sylvia Day

All
Rights Reserved.

Cover art by Trish at Pickyme Digital Art

This book is a work of fiction. All names,
characters, locations, and incidents are products of the author's
imagination, or have been used fictitiously. Any resemblance to
actual persons living or dead, locales, or events is entirely
coincidental.

* * * * *

License Notes

Thank you for downloading this free ebook.
You are welcome to share it with your friends. This book may be
reproduced, copied and distributed for non-commercial purposes,
provided the book remains in its complete original form and proper
attribution is given. If you enjoyed this book, please return to
www.SylviaDay.com to discover other works by this author. Thank you
for your support.

* * * * *

Praise for the Renegade Angels Series

Praise for
A Touch of
Crimson

“
A Touch of Crimson
will rock readers
with a stunning new world, a hot-blooded hero, and a strong,
kick-ass heroine. This is Sylvia Day at the top of her game!"

—Larissa Ione,
New York Times
bestselling author

“Angels and demons, vampires and lycans, all
set against an inventive, intriguing story world that hooked me
from the first page. Balancing action and romance, humor and hot
sensuality, Sylvia Day’s storytelling dazzles. I can’t wait to read
more about this league of sexy, dangerous guardian angels and the
fascinating world they inhabit.
A Touch of Crimson
is a
paranormal romance lover’s feast!”

—Lara Adrian,
New York Times
bestselling author

“Sylvia Day spins a gorgeous adventure in
A Touch of Crimson
that combines gritty, exciting
storytelling with soaring lyricism. Adrian is my favorite kind of
hero — an alpha male angel determined to win the heart of his
heroine, Lindsay, while protecting her from his lethal enemy.
Lindsay is a gutsy, likable woman with paranormal abilities of her
own, as well as a dedication to protecting humanity against a race
of demonic monsters. This is definitely a book for your keeper
shelf."

—Angela Knight,
New York Times
bestselling author

“
A Touch of Crimson
explodes with
passion and heat. A hot, sexy angel to die for and a gutsy heroine
make for one exciting read!”

—Cheyenne McCray,
New York Times
bestselling author

“Only Day can take a reincarnation plot and
make it a gripping, touching and scintillating page-turner. She
skillfully blends a timeless tale of love lost and found.
A
Touch of Crimson
is a perfect romance with excellent
worldbuilding rich with angels, lycans and vampires.”

—
RT Book Reviews

Praise for Sylvia Day writing as S.J.
Day

“Great characters and terrific storytelling
in a hot-blooded adrenaline ride. A keep-you-up-all-night
read.”

—Patricia Briggs, #1
New York Times
bestselling author

“Exhilarating adventure in an edgy world of
angels and demons...will keep readers enthralled.”

—
Publishers Weekly

THE AUTHOR

Sylvia Day
is the national
bestselling, award-winning author of over a dozen novels written
across multiple sub-genres. A wife and mother of two, she is a
former Russian linguist for the U.S. Army Military Intelligence.
Sylvia’s work has been called an “exhilarating adventure” by
Publishers Weekly
and “wickedly entertaining” by
Booklist
. Her stories have been translated into Russian,
Japanese, Portuguese, German, Czech, Italian, and Thai. She’s been
honored with the
Romantic Times
Reviewers' Choice Award, the
EPPIE award, the National Readers’ Choice Award, the Readers’
Crown, and multiple finalist nominations for Romance Writers of
America’s prestigious RITA Award of Excellence.

Sylvia also writes under the pseudonyms S. J.
Day and Livia Dare.

Connect with Sylvia Day online:

http://www.sylviaday.com

Twitter:
http://www.twitter.com/SylDay

Facebook:
http://www.facebook.com/AuthorSylviaDay

* * * * *

Title
Page

Copyright

Praise for the Renegade Angels Series

The Author

GLOSSARY

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

A Touch of Crimson

GLOSSARY

CHANGE
—the process a mortal undergoes
to become a
vampire
.

FALLEN
—the
Watchers
after the
fall from grace. They have been stripped of their wings and their
souls, leaving them as immortal blood drinkers who cannot
procreate.

LYCANS
—a subgroup of the
Fallen
who were spared vampirism by agreeing to serve the
Sentinels
. They were transfused with demon blood, which
restored their souls but made them mortal. They can shape-shift and
procreate.

MINION
—a mortal who has been
Changed
into a vampire by one of the
Fallen
. Most
mortals do not adjust well and become rabid. Unlike the
Fallen
, they cannot tolerate sunlight.

NAPHIL
—singular of
nephalim
.

NEPHALIM
—the children of mortal and
Watcher
parents. Their blood drinking contributed to and
inspired the vampiric punishment of the
Fallen
.

SENTINELS
—an elite special ops unit of
the
seraphim
, tasked with enforcing the punishment of the
Watchers
.

SERAPH
—singular of
seraphim
.

SERAPHIM
—the highest rank of angel in
the angelic hierarchy.

VAMPIRES
—a term that encompasses both
the
Fallen
and their
minions
.

WATCHERS
—two hundred
seraphim
angels sent to earth at the beginning of time to observe mortals.
They violated the laws by taking mortals as mates and were punished
with an eternity on earth as
vampires
with no possibility of
forgiveness.

Go tell the Watchers of heaven, who have
deserted the lofty sky, and their holy everlasting station, who
have been polluted with women, and have done as the sons of men do,
by taking to themselves wives, and who have been greatly corrupted
on the earth; that on the earth they shall never obtain peace and
remission of sin. For they shall not rejoice in their offspring;
they shall behold the slaughter of their beloved; shall lament for
the destruction of their sons; and shall petition for ever; but
shall not obtain mercy and peace.

The Book of Enoch 12:5–7

CHAPTER 1

Raze’s night had been going pretty well,
until the woman he’d just spent four hours fucking stumbled across
a naked, disemboweled body on his doorstep. Her scream had
shattered the serenity of the predawn, forcing him to knock her out
before she drew a crowd. Now, as the sun stretched sleepy tendrils
of light over the horizon, he stood over the corpse and struggled
to contain his roiling fury.

“Dumped on my goddamn porch like trash.” He
ran both hands over his shaved head. “Poor bastard.”

“Guesstimate of the time your gift arrived?”
Vashti asked, her stiletto-heeled boots tapping out an impatient
staccato as she paced. Her crimson hair swayed around her shoulder
blades, the vividly-hued tresses the only wash of color against her
skintight, all-black jumpsuit. She was a comic book aficionado’s
wet dream, with her lush tits and ass offset by a fallen angel’s
incomparable beauty. Her appearance was as lethal as the twin
katanas she often wore in crisscrossing sheaths on her back, her
physical beauty another weapon in the arsenal she used as
second-in-command of the entire vampire nation.

“Hell if I know,” he bit out. “There was
nothing out of place when I got home at midnight. He was found at
four.”

“You didn’t hear anything? Nothing at
all?”

Raze scowled. He had a squeaky board on his
front porch and everyone knew it. Even if they ruled out the
benefit of his vampire hearing, his powerful sense of smell should
have picked up on the freshly spilled blood. “No. Christ. If I’d
heard anything I would have caught the fuckers.”

Damned if he’d tell her that it hadn’t been
possible to hear anything over the woman moaning beneath him and
the steady banging of his headboard against the wall as he pounded
into her. The smell of hot sex, dripping sweat, and semen
filled-latex had saturated the air along with the scent of the
blood he’d drunk from her—a lover whose name he couldn’t remember
now. It shamed him that the broken body on his doorstop had been
lost among the sexual excess.

He stared at his name carved into the
corpse’s left biceps and the cattle-branded monogram he recognized
as the mark of a vampire known as Grimm. A growl rumbled up from
his chest. Even without the mutilation, the victim was Raze’s now.
He would stand for the man and the vengeance due him. “I almost
wish Grimm was still alive so I could kill him again.”

“You’ve got enough on your plate dealing
with his minions,” Syre said, entering the room soundlessly.

Despite the hour, the vampire leader looked
flawless. Even in casual dark jeans and a plain T-shirt, there was
an elegance to him that was regal and commanding. Raze would brave
the pits of hell for Syre if he commanded it. They’d come to earth
together, fallen together, lost their wings together. Two hundred
of them. And there wasn’t one of the Fallen who wouldn’t give their
life for their leader. From the heights of grace as Watchers to the
fall that cursed them with vampirism, Syre led them forward with a
confidence that inspired them all.

Vash’s pacing came to an abrupt halt. “Do we
have any idea how many minions we’re talking about here? How many
have you taken out so far, Raze?”

“A dozen pairs, give or take a few. Adrian
was on it, too,” he said, referring to the angel who’d severed
Syre’s wings. Raze had a lot of reasons to resent Adrian, as well
as the Sentinel angels who served under him—the Fallen’s vampiric
punishment being the least of it—but there was no denying that when
they were aligned and hunting the same prey, Adrian’s involvement
was a benefit.

Syre crossed his arms and looked at Vashti,
his second-in-command. “Remind me: how long did Grimm evade our
attention?”

“Too fucking long. He was in our faces, but
I didn’t look deep enough. On the surface, his theory had merit.
Still does. Or maybe it’s wishful thinking. With the number of
minions we lose to madness during the Change from fledgling to
vampire, I’d like to think there’s some way to cut the waste. He
wrapped his dogma up with pseudoscience and I bought it.”

“He was the one pairing fledglings into
couples to ease the transition? I remember discussing it with you.
He had enough success in the beginning to justify allowing him to
proceed, if I recall.”

Raze shot her a chastising glance for being
hard on herself. “If you were looking for a ball and chain, and
vampirism was one of your requirements in a perfect mate, Grimm was
the man to see. He had personality profiles, compatibility charts,
etc. All of which he used to weed out the whack jobs so he could
pair them with nutcases. I knew his doctrine was dangerous, so when
I took him out I hunted down all his disciples, too. Whoever is
responsible for this, Grimm didn’t document them the way he did the
others.”