Quote-Tastic(8): "Archangel Legion" by Nalini Singh

This meme is about sharing your favorite quotes and the books they come from!

It is Hosted by Anna at Herding Cats and Burning Soup.

This week I chose a scene from a book that came out on 29th October. It's a book that I already read once and re-reading now. I loved every scene in it and had the damnest time choosing 1... I ended up choosing 2 :)) Let me present to you "Archangel's Legion" by Nalini Singh:

“What is it?”
“I have two pieces of . . . interesting news.”
Elena’s stomach dropped. “Lijuan? […] She’s not—”
Raphael shook his head before she could complete her question, the black silk of his hair rich and dark. “My mother,” he said, “has invited us to a ball.”
Elena pulled a blade from one of the butter-soft forearm sheaths that had been a gift from Raphael. “Excuse me while I stab myself in the eyes—and disembowel myself while I’m at it.” […]
“I’m afraid I cannot permit that,” Raphael said, in what she thought of as his “Archangel” voice, formal and ruthless. “Who would then keep me amused at the ball? I may otherwise be driven to pluck out my own eyes and I believe you are quite fond of them.”
“Funny.” Sighing, she leaned her head against the muscled strength of his arm, his skin bared by the brown fighting leathers that told her he’d come from a sparring session, likely with Illium. “Why is Caliane having a ball?”
He spread his wing across her own in a susurration of sound that was a familiar intimacy. “Her city and people have fully awakened, and she wishes to formally greet the other powers in the world.” A pause. “My mother may have been many things, but the one thing she has never been is impolite; as an Ancient, she is cognizant of her responsibility to take a part in the ruling of the world, even if it is from a distance.”
Complex, intelligent, once-insane, Raphael’s mother wasn’t a woman who could be put easily into any kind of a category. The Ancient had left her son broken and bloodied on a forsaken field an eon ago, but she’d also risen perilously early from a centuries-long Sleep to save the life of that same son. “When’s the ball?”
“In less than two weeks.”
“I’ll make sure my jewels are glittering and my nails done.”
Raphael’s lips curved again as she slid away the knife and held out her hands to display unpolished nails clipped hunter-short. The back of her left hand was bruised from a tussle with a recalcitrant vampire she’d retrieved for the Guild a few hours before, and her palms, when she flipped over her hands, proved to have a plethora of calluses.
Even her newly immortal body couldn’t erase those calluses, not when she worked constantly with weapons. “I don’t think a manicure is going to cut it.”
“Should you ever touch me with court-softened hands, I will know an imposter walks in your skin.”
Some women might’ve taken his words as an insult; they made Elena want to initiate a very public, very hot kiss. “So,” she said, promising herself she’d indulge that particular need as soon as they were alone, “what’s the other piece of news?”
“Perhaps I should take your weapons first.”
Elena tried to think of what could be worse than attending a ball with the most powerful, most vicious angels and vampires in the world, and came up with, “My father wants to have dinner with us?”
“No, it is not Jeffrey.” The suddenly brutal angle of his jawline made his opinion of her father clear.
[…]
Flying wing to wing with him, she swept out over the water, following the river north, before turning to head to their house in the Angel Enclave. Situated along the cliffs on the opposite side of the Hudson from Manhattan, it was a magnificent building that offered sweeping views of the city, but for Elena, it was simply home.
Montgomery has prepared something special for you. Do not break his heart.
Elena grinned at the thought of the butler. You know Montgomery and I have a mutual love affair. 

The 2nd scene, they are mind-talking(it's hilarious!)

You are wearing no panties with another male in the room? Raphael ran his hand down Elena’s spine and over her lower curves, searching for lines and finding nothing but firm feminine flesh. You truly aren’t.
Elena’s shoulders shook, deep creases in her cheeks. Oh, my God, you’re scandalized! Eyes tearing up in the effort to fight her laughter, she pressed her hands to his chest and stared down at the floor. Should I tell you I did find a way to wear a knife? In a thigh sheath.
Of course you did. What do panties matter so long as you have your steel.
Stop it! Her shoulders shook harder, the diamond-studded pin that anchored the knot at the nape of her neck catching the light as her touch seared him through the crisp white of his formal shirt. I’m trying to be elegant and graceful and consortlike.

After reading those excerpts don't you want to read the whole books?

To read more about the series and the author visit Nalini Singh on her website, blog or Facebook page.