Authors: Ednah Walters
sneaking around causing trouble?”
I left the two of them talking and hurried to the conference room. It was empty. I pinged Bran. He was at Remy and Sykes’. I teleported to their place.
Laughter drew me downstairs, scents of cheese and pepperoni wafting through the air. Boxes of pizza sat open on the downstairs wet bar along with packs of canned soft drinks.
My eyes sought Bran’s and my heart strings jerked. Aunt Janel e’s words rang in my head. I didn’t care what anyone said. I refused to lose him.
“Come join the celebration,” Remy cal ed out.
“Sorry you missed out,” Izzy added. “The raids were fun.”
“You should have seen us, Red. We made bad look good,” Sykes added, smirking.
I made my way to Bran’s side. Causing mayhem definitely agreed with these guys. They were in high spirits, each with a different version of how things went down at a different place. Even though I envied them, I was happy they made it home safe.
“Were the Cardinals angry?” I asked when there was a lul in the conversation.
“A little,” Bran said.
“A little?” Sykes asked. “That’s a freakin’
understatement. They chewed our asses out. Where were you? We hoped you’d deflect Cardinal Falcon’s wrath like you usual y do.”
Not when he and I weren’t talking. “Mrs. D
waylaid me. She took me to see
daisensei
Kenta.”
“What is he doing here?” Kim asked.
I frowned. “What do you mean? Doesn’t he teach here at the Academy?”
Kim laughed. “No way. My father sent him home after your brother,” she glanced at Bran, “kept sneaking into the val ey. Dad said he sucked as head of security. He teaches at one of the schools in Xenith.”
“Are he and Mrs. D an item?” I asked.
“There was a rumor they were engaged, but…,” Izzy shrugged.
“No wonder he wants Haziel’s job,” I said. The others laughed as though the idea was ludicrous. I tilted my head and smiled into Bran’s eyes. The thought of never sitting in his arms like this made my chest hurt.
“You’re worrying again,” he whispered.
The pressure in my chest increased. “I can’t help it. I’m scared.”
“Don’t be.” He looked away but not before I saw the swirling despair in the depth of his eyes. His arms tightened around me.
I wanted time alone with him. It was time I saw the damage to his wings. Tuning the others out, I asked, “Are we doing anything tonight?”
“Yeah,” he said. “Lottius came through. We’re meeting her and Zedekiah tonight at nine. Sorry we left you behind earlier.”
I shrugged. “That’s okay. It gave me a chance to talk to Kylie. She’s the medium.”
“What?” Izzy, seated closest to us, overheard me and screamed. “How did you find out?”
“Not by accident.” Right at that moment, I made another decision. No more secrets from these guys. So I told them everything, starting with freezing the bowl. “I know, I should have told you guys earlier.”
“You got that right,” Kim snapped. “You can’t get mad with us for not tel ing you about the List when you had a little secret of your own al along.”
“Let me finish talking, then you can yel at me al you want. The fact is Kylie heard everything Celeste and I discussed while she and Cade were frozen. I talked about demons, powers and Guardians. She heard it al . I had no choice but to explain what they meant.” The others leaned forward, total y engrossed. When I finished talking, everyone had something to say, and it wasn’t good.
Not defending myself, I just sat there and took it. Bran was the only one who kept quiet.
“Enough guys,” he final y said. “She came clean, and you’re ripping her apart for it. That’s just not cool.”
“Of course, you’d support her,” Kim said with annoyance. “She tel s you everything.” Bran studied her. “And your point is?”
“We are a team,” Kim retorted. “We might not always get along, but when it comes to what counts, we stand together. She needs to let go of her human friends.”
“Whoa, Blondie. Slow down. We don’t need to go there right now,” Sykes cut in. “Lil’s friends serve a purpose.”
“What?” Kim snapped.
“They are her friends…her posse. When she needs time away from you,” he squinted at Kim, “and needs time away from you,” he squinted at Kim, “and Guardian duties, she hangs out with them.
She
gets to decide when to let them go, not you. So back off,” Sykes finished with a bite.
Kim’s eyes flashed. “Of course, you’d side with her. You want—”
“Okay, okay, enough already,” Izzy cut in. “No need to fight over this. I say we use Kylie to ID the guide first, then erase her memory.”
Thank you, Izzy.
“How?” I added aloud.
“We’l come up with something. But Izzy is right. Her memories must be erased,” Remy added firmly, cocking his brow at me.
“Fine,” I mumbled. I hated the idea but knew it had to be done.
“Any more secrets?” Kim asked with a look that dared me to say no.
My ears stil ringing from the berating I just received, I hesitated. But it was very brief. “What do you want to hear first? Valafar’s phone cal and his offer or what the Cardinals said about the Specials?”
***
“That was brave of you,” Bran told me later after we left the guys’ place and went over to mine.
I looked down and smiled. He lay sprawled on the lounge by the TV, one leg dangling on the side.
He looked so relaxed, like he didn’t have a care. I stil couldn’t look at him without imagining him gone.
“Standing up to the senior Cardinals or the junior ones?” I asked.
“Both.” He crooked his finger at me. “Come here.”
“Can you show me?” I asked instead of joining him.
He didn’t move, but his expression grew wary. He knew exactly what I meant.
“I put off asking, but now I need to see how bad they are.” When we flew last week, I didn’t notice any difference in his wings. The next day, I found a few feathers on the floor. Just normal shedding, I thought, and put them with the others in my special box.
He got up. I moved back, giving him room, my heart pounding.
Please, don’t let them be like
Dante’s.
Bran pul ed off his shirt and rol ed his neck then locked his eyes with mine. He strained. Dul pain radiated on my back, echoing his, but it was brief. Then his wings rose behind him, so huge and magnificent, white on the tips and inside. A few feathers floated to the carpeted floor. He widened his stance, his eyes stil not leaving mine.
A lump formed in my throat. Strips of his beautiful feathers on the underside of his wings were gone, leaving behind thin golden skin. Last week when we watched the sunset, they were intact.
He turned around.
The black plumes on the outside seemed thinner, but I couldn’t see any skin yet. I wanted to touch them but feared they might fal at my feet.
Tears wel ed in my eyes, until he became blurry. I hadn’t cried in his presence since he told me the truth. Now tears streamed down my face.
“Don’t,” he whispered.
He must have turned around to face me. His arms closed around me. Wings fol owed. Once so warm and soft, the boney ridges dug into my shoulder. I cried harder, accepting the inevitable. His wings would someday be exactly like Dante’s, then he’d have to leave.
23. The Contract
“What a dump,” Kim said as we studied our surroundings.
We’d teleported behind a grocery store on North Las Vegas Boulevard. Across was the Paladin Hotel & Suites, three gray boxed buildings that blended with the mountain backdrop. Red door and window canopies covered the front entrance, low brick wal s separating the hotel’s parking lots from the neighboring office buildings’. There wasn’t much vegetation except for a few palm trees and shrubs. A shuttle and a few rentals, including two SUVs, sat in the parking lots.
Kim and the others had pinged me after Bran retracted his wings. We were discussing the chances of Valafar keeping his promise and giving back Bran and his brother’s contracts. Bran doubted Valafar’s sincerity. I didn’t. Valafar’s concern had seemed genuine. My trust in him was stil shaky, but I was convinced we could actual y have a relationship now. I just needed to learn to ignore his mistrust toward the Guardians.
“It’s not so bad,” Sykes said, interrupting my musing, “if you ignore the drunks and the drug dealers.”
“Let’s go,” Bran said impatiently, and we left the shadows.
Crossing the freeway, we drew attention of the loiterers hanging around the hotel’s entrance.
Were they real y drug dealers like Sykes claimed? A group of rowdy hotel guests, who looked like col ege students, entered the shuttle. They were probably headed to downtown Las Vegas. Nearby, a plane took off with enough noise to pop eardrums.
Perhaps the sounds drowned the sirens because as we approached the front entrance, several police cars screeched to a stop behind us, lights flashing. Cops poured out and rushed passed us.
“No going inside,” one cop ordered as he hurried in after his buddies.
“Stand back, folks,” another added as he and his partner carried crime scene yel ow tape and set a perimeter around the hotel entrance. The sound of an ambulance buzzed as it approached at high speed.
We stil had fifteen minutes before the meeting with Zedekiah and Lottius, but from the looks of things, that wasn’t going to happen. The crowd grew fast. People craned their necks to see what was happening, which wasn’t much. A few speculated. From what I picked up, police presence in the neighborhood was a common thing. Within minutes, guests poured out, some in their swim suits, others in their pajamas and robes. Some adults had little children with them.
Bran looked at me. “See what you can find out.”
I tapped into the thoughts of the cops inside the motel. “Two bodies, a man and a woman,” I said.
“The man is dead, a severe burn on his chest, and the woman is barely alive yet there’s no…pulse.” Bran’s eyes sharpened. He didn’t have to say Zedekiah and Lottius.
“I’l confirm it.” He stepped over the tape.
“Hey, where do you think you’re going?” one of the policemen yel ed.
Bran raised his hand and kept going without breaking his stride. The policeman stopped then went back to finish setting the perimeter.
“Where’s he going?” Izzy asked, moving
“Where’s he going?” Izzy asked, moving closer to me.
I turned to answer her and saw him—Dante.
He stood in the back of the growing crowd, his eyes on me. Like Friday, he wore a suit. This time, the trench coat was real.
“We have company,” I whispered. “Look behind you.”
Izzy turned, and her eyes widened when she saw Dante.
Kim humphed. “He’s taking this bodyguard thing seriously, isn’t he?” Amusement tinged her voice.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“He wasn’t around earlier when we torched Damien’s properties,” she explained.
“I’l be your personal bodyguard if you like, Kim,” Sykes said.
She ignored him, eyes on Dante.
“Let’s see what he wants,” Remy cut in, voice tense.
Surrounded by my friends, I approached the demon. He moved away from the crowd, heading further down into the parking lot. We fol owed, our amulets glowing and bodies tense.
“What are you doing here, Dante?” I demanded.
“You need to leave this place at once, Lilith.” His voice was soft yet frosty. “Gabreel and his fol owers wil be here soon to claim his daughter’s body, and you don’t want to be here when he arrives.
He’s angry and has a bloodlust.”
“So it’s Lottius in there with Zedekiah,” I said.
The others gasped. My gaze didn’t leave Dante as I explained. “The police found two bodies, one man and a woman who’s stil alive but doesn’t have a pulse. Bran went to confirm it.”
“Since she has the mark of the Guardians on her forehead, Gabreel wil know your friends,” he nodded at the others, “did it. Your crazy rampage this afternoon unleashed something you’l not contain. The rules are to go after only those stealing souls, not peace-loving demons.”
Sykes chuckled. “Peace-loving demons is an oxymoron, dude.”
Dante pinned him down with eyes that slowly changed color from brown to red. “Don’t cal me dude, Guardian,” he spat out. “Kil ing Lottius in such a merciless manner wil bring the wrath of Gabreel and the entire House of Nosferatus on your heads.
You should have sent her straight to Tartarus.”
“We didn’t poison her,” Remy said. “We just got here.”
“That’s a lie,” Dante snarled. “You were here earlier.”
“How do we know you didn’t put the mark on her?” Kim asked. “It’s obvious you already saw her body.”
“What do you mean by the mark of the Guardians?” Izzy added.
“The six-sided amulet.” He lifted his arms, palms out. “If I touched one, I would have a fresh wound on my hands, and it would heal slowly. You did it.” He glared at al of us then singled out Izzy.
“And you know it.”
“He’s right,” Bran said, coming behind us. “He didn’t do it. No demon can. Only a Guardian could touch the amulet and leave the imprint. Zedekiah’s body is stil warm, which means he just died.” His gaze locked with Dante’s. “We barely got here. We didn’t do this.”
“Don’t lie to me, Llyr.” He slanted his head toward Izzy. “I recognize her. Lottius died of salt poisoning, the kind only delivered through a
hellgel
, which I believe you placed in her last Friday. And to add salt to injuries, the five of you destroyed a few ships jointly owned by Damien and Gabreel. Another deed you al wil answer for. Lil is the only one leaving this place tonight because she wasn’t with you this afternoon and I didn’t feel her presence earlier. The rest of you must stay and face Gabreel.” He snapped his fingers and five of his men materialized, boxing us in. “Lil. Leave.” I laughed. “You’re crazy if you think I’m leaving my friends. Besides, I placed the gel inside Lottius.
She tried to kidnap me, broke my ribs, legs and arms. You want to help us, get more of your people and help us fight her father and his minions.”
“Yeah,”
a
familiar
voice
rang
out
accompanied by clapping.
Angelia? I turned as the scrawny girl raced toward me and flung her arms around my waist.