Tanner snarled.

Sam sent a bolt of fire at him and singed his fur. “You don’t snarl at her.”

Fine. He’d just take off the Fallen’s head. The panther charged at Sam.

“He’s hurting,” the woman said, sounding sad.

Sam lifted his hands, not to attack Tanner, but to ward him off. “Easy, beast. I don’t want a war with you.”

The panther’s claws dug into the gleaming hardwood.

Sam winced at the damage, then sighed. “She’s gone, isn’t she?”

And because he couldn’t speak as a panther, Tanner let the shift sweep through him, fast, brutal. He didn’t even feel a whisper of pain. Too much fury rode him. He kept his claws out even as his body became that of a man again, just in case he needed to behead a Fallen.

Tanner would make Sam help him. “Her wings grew back.”

“Impossible.” From Seline.

But Sam nodded. “I thought your healing magic might work on her.”

And he hadn’t bothered to pass along that little bit of info? Tanner jumped up and hit him in the jaw. The blow would have shattered a human’s jaw, but Sam just lifted a brow. “Feel better?” the Fallen asked him.

Hell, no. He wouldn’t feel better until he had Marna back.

“And, damn, man, put some clothes on.” Sam waved his hand and conjured a pair of jeans on Tanner’s body. “Or are you trying to make me go blind?”

The Fallen was an ass**le. Tanner lifted his claws. “You knew I’d lose her.”

Sam didn’t back down. “I knew Marna would have a choice. She didn’t fall, not technically, so she could go back, as long as she had her lovely black wings.”

“Her wings were white,” Tanner growled out. “The ones growing back were white.”

“Interesting.” A little shrug. “But then, I never thought she belonged to the death angels.” He caught the woman’s hand. Seline, that was her name. Sam pressed a kiss to her palm. “Maybe she’ll get to guard you. It seems as if she’s earned someone’s favor, so perhaps your angel will be by your side.”

Sam brushed by him and left Tanner standing on the staircase, just feet from Seline.

“If she’s my guardian . . .” Tanner cleared his throat, almost afraid to hope. “Will I see her again?” Get to touch her? Hold her?

“Guardians aren’t meant to be seen,” Seline told him quietly, voice even sadder now.

“And never meant to be touched,” Sam said, his voice rising from below them. He was staring out of the shattered window. His gaze was on the darkness that waited beyond the house.

Tanner’s breath heaved out. So she could come back, but still be forever beyond his reach? That sucked.

“She could fall for you.” Seline’s voice again. Her words had him stiffening because, hell no, he didn’t want her falling.

“If she falls”—Tanner knew his voice sounded too hard, too rough—“then she burns.” He’d never want that agony for her. She wanted her wings.

“Yes.” Seline stared at him.

“It’s the only way,” Sam said. “If you want her back here with you, then she has to fall. She has to choose to come back.”

While he stayed there, helpless? She would have to suffer?

“Does she love you enough to burn for you?” Sam turned slowly to face him. Tanner could see the shadows of the Fallen’s wings. As dark as the night behind him.

Sam’s gaze drifted slowly to Seline, and Tanner knew the woman had suffered the fire for Sam. She’d burned for the Fallen she loved so much.

Did Marna love him that completely?

“I don’t want to know,” Tanner said, and he forced his feet to move. His chest ached, not from the shift, but from the giant freaking hole where his heart had been.

Gone. Marna was gone, and he didn’t want her to suffer in order to come back to him.

He stopped, his bare feet crunching the glass beneath him, courtesy of the window he’d shattered on his way in. “How does a shifter make it to heaven?” He’d suffer. He’d take the pain, whatever it was.

“Even when you die, you won’t see her.” Was Sam just trying to piss him off? “The carried souls have a different paradise waiting. You won’t be with the guardians.”

So he was never going to see her again? Never?

That hole just burned hotter.

“Tanner!”

His head yanked up. That had been Marna’s voice. She’d been scared, hurting, screaming.