Instead of knocking Arik across the room, Than swung around to Kynan and held out the book he’d fetched from the vault in the dungeon where he kept his most priceless items. “It’s a history of angels. I flagged some passages about qeres.”

“Damn.” Kynan took the book. “We don’t even have this. Where did you get it?”

“Found it in a burial chamber outside Babylon.”

Ky cocked a dark eyebrow. “Long time ago.”

“You could say that.” Than glanced at everyone as he spoke. “It says qeres incapacitates angels, which you know. But it also lists one of its ingredients. ‘Poison like the hounds of hell.’”

“You think it’s made of hellhound saliva?” Arik asked.

“I don’t know. But if it works like it, qeres could, potentially, work on us.”

Limos’s head whipped around. “Pestilence. We could use it on him.”

“Exactly. He’s become nearly immune to hellhound venom, but qeres has other properties. He may be vulnerable to it.”

“And then what?” Kynan smoothed his long fingers over the leather binding. “You incapacitate him, but what if the effect is only temporary? We don’t have much of the stuff, and once it runs out, there’s no way to hold him.”

“What about Regan?” Limos asked. “Her power held you for a few minutes. Maybe it would work on Pestilence.”

The reminder made Than twitchy, not because he’d been held immobile and helpless, but because all he could think about was Regan on top of him, her na**d body undulating, her panting breaths matching his as they neared orgasm.

“Even if she can hold Pest while in freaking labor,” Arik said, “what then? If we miss the incredibly narrow window of the baby’s cry, Deliverance won’t kill him. Then we definitely have to wait for the comet.”

Thanatos’s pulse pounded in his temples at the thought of killing his brother.

“What if we freeze him?” Arik asked. “You know, like Han Solo.”

Thanatos shot Arik an are-you-kidding-me look. “Yeah … carbonite freezing machines might be a little hard to come by, given that we don’t live in the Star Wars universe.”

“Ass,” Arik muttered. “I’m talking about ice. Flash freeze him with liquid nitrogen or something.”

Limos toyed with the orange flower in her hair. “Even if you could lure him into a trap like that, he’ll unfreeze in minutes.”

Kynan shifted in his chair with a wince. No doubt his massive injuries were agonizing. They were also leaving blood all over Than’s furniture. “So what we’re left with is trying to hunt him down and incapacitate him while we wait for your son to cry.”

Son. Than wondered if he’d ever get used to hearing that. “Yeah, and you wanna explain why the f**k you believed this evidence you found that said my kid would save the world?”

“Because Regan inspected the scroll your brother planted for us to find,” Kynan said. “At the time, we didn’t know it was a setup, but Regan discovered that the author believed the prophecy they wrote.”

Thanatos picked up Reseph’s iPod for no other reason than to remind himself that the male who had loaded the mp3 player with country music would hate himself for what Pestilence was doing. “So we know Pestilence didn’t write it. It was his trick to take my virginity.”

“And that’s what’s so weird about the situation,” Ky replied. “He thought it was a trick, but the author thought it was true, and it might be true after all. So did the author believe your son will save the world because they know something we don’t? If that’s the case, they may be working against Pestilence rather than with him.”

Thanatos really wanted to have a chat with this mysterious author. “We have to find whoever penned the baby prophecy. Have you talked to Reaver or Harvester? Maybe they can provide some insight.”

Limos tucked herself more fully against Arik. If she got any closer she’d be up his nose. “The last time I talked to them… what, a month ago? They said they didn’t know anything. Or if they do, they aren’t talking because it’s against their stupid Watcher rules.”

“And don’t get them in the same room together,” Arik said. “Christ, we had to rebuild half of Limos’s party house after our last conversation with them.”

“Why?”

Limos studied her nails, painted yellow and pink today. “They got into a fight. It was like two jumbo jets colliding in mid-air.”

Harvester and Reaver had never been fond of each other, but they didn’t usually get physical. “What were they fighting about?”

“Dunno.” Arik lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “They didn’t say a word. We were talking to Harvester, and Reaver showed up and they went at it.”

“And that’s the last time anyone has seen them?” Than asked.

“Yep.”

Those damned angels. Yeah, the Horsemen could summon them, but that didn’t mean they’d arrive in a timely manner. They seemed to delight in showing up only at their own convenience. Did Reaver know about Pestilence’s attack on the Aegis? Did he even know Regan was pregnant? Speaking of which, she’d been gone too long for his comfort. And, wait…“Where’s Decker?”

“He went to check on Regan—” Limos hadn’t even finished her sentence before Than was halfway down the hall.

Insane, possessive anger clawed at him as he threw open the bedroom door. The sight of Decker sitting so close to Regan spiked Thanatos’s anger meter up to critical. Before he knew it, he had his fist in Decker’s T-shirt collar and had thrown the human across the room. In the next instant, Regan was on her feet, putting her body between them.

“Stop it! Decker was only talking to me.”

Decker picked himself up, calmly brushed himself off, and shot Thanatos the bird. “You know what you need? An old-fashioned ass-whupping.”

“You going to be the one to give it to me?” Than taunted.

Decker shook his head. “As much as I’d like to, I’m not stupid. But I’m also not leaving unless Regan tells me to go.”

Thanatos’s respect for the male went up by a point. Which gave him a grand total of one point. On a scale from zero to a hundred. Still, you had to credit a guy who knew how to check his testosterone at the door and not try to beat down a male who could squash him with a finger.

“It’s okay, Deck,” Regan said, with way too much familiarity and affection than Thanatos liked. “You can go.”

“You sure?” Decker gave Thanatos the evil eye.

“She’s sure,” Than growled, at the same time Regan said, “I’m sure.”

Decker shot Thanatos another hateful glare as he moved to the door, and the second he was gone, Thanatos swung around to Regan. “You are never to be alone in a bedroom with a male.”

She snorted. “You have no say over who I have in my bedroom. If I want to invite the entire Miami Dolphins team into my bed and have a big orgy while covered in chocolate sauce, you have no say in that whatsoever.”

The brief image set fire to his blood, but he kept his temper on simmer, unwilling to let her bait him. Still, he kind of wanted to hunt down every player on the football team and turn them into stains on the Astroturf.

“My house,” he gritted out, “my rules. No chocolate NFL orgies in my keep. I think that’s a reasonable request.”

“For Christ’s sake,” she said, throwing up her arms. “Do you seriously think my mind is set on getting Decker into bed?”

“He wants you.”

“No, he doesn’t. And even if he did, it’s not like I’m a real prize right now. My feet are swollen like overcooked hot dogs, I have stretch marks, I’m fat and ugly and awkward—”

“Stop.” He clenched his fists at his sides to keep from reaching for her. She was so pretty in her indignation, her cheeks pink with a delicate blush, her dark hair framing her face in tousled waves that gave her a wild fierceness that wasn’t diminished by her pregnancy at all. “Never say that to me again. You aren’t fat or ugly. There’s nothing more beautiful than a woman carrying her mate’s child, and—” He broke off with a horrified grunt. Mate? What an idiot. “Not that you’re my mate. It’s just that breeding women are—”

Once more, he broke off, aghast at his rambling, moronic self. Humiliation turned his cheeks hot, and he spun around, intent on leaving, but her soft voice stopped him, and he swung back around.

“Breeding? Look, if I’m going to stay here, we’d better set some ground rules.”

“Like?”

“Like you aren’t going to order me around. And I get my own bedroom. And I want ice cream. The good stuff, not the icky ice milk crap.”

He cocked a tawny eyebrow. “Anything else?”

His sarcasm wasn’t lost on her, but she ignored it. “Yes. While we’re at it, I want some Guardians here with me.”

Regan held her breath, wondering if she’d gone too far as he moved toward her, his big shoulders rolling, his eyes flashing. When he was close enough that their bellies touched, he dipped his head so low she thought he was going to kiss her.

Crazily, she didn’t know if that would be a good thing or a bad one.

“Here’s how this goes. No Guardians. I don’t trust any of them, including you. You can have as much ice cream as you want. I doubt I’ll stop ordering you around.” He turned his face away and put his lips to her ear. “And you don’t get your own bedroom. You sleep here. With me. Remember what I said.”

How could she forget? For the next eight and a half months, you’re going to be mine. Every. Night.

Reaching up, she fisted a handful of silky hair and forced his face back toward hers. His firm lips were a mere inch from hers, and she went up on her toes to get even closer, so close his heat caressed her skin.