Authors: Christine Pope
“Guess I’m just a sucker for redheads.”
Uriel smiled thinly. “Good guess, but that’s not it. Simple enough, actually — your soul finally found its match in hers.”
“Demons don’t have souls.”
“Ah, the old lie. You should know better than to believe everything you hear, especially if it comes from Lucifer. What better way to keep demonkind trapped in eternal toil than to trick them into believing they have no souls, and therefore can never achieve salvation?”
Samael glared across the cluttered coffee table at Uriel, who looked serene and perfect and very out of place on the black leather couch. He had the sudden incongruous notion that the archangel would have fared much better against the backdrop of Felicia’s airy, art-hung loft.
“So you’re saying we’re soulmates?”
“Such a simplistic term. Let us say, rather, that there are qualities in her soul which speak to yours — and vice versa. But let us say also that it is only in this here and now that your souls had the opportunity to meet. A million things could have happened differently, and your paths might never have crossed.” Uriel paused and tilted his head to one side. Pale hair swept against paler robes; here, in the privacy of Samael’s condo, the archangel hadn’t bothered with adopting human dress. He added, “Of course, His ways are inscrutable even to me, and since it was obviously His will that you and Felicia should encounter one another, it stands to reason you if you hadn’t met this past Friday night, then you would have met each other at some other time.”
“So this was all predestined?” Samael asked. He found he didn’t like the thought of that very much.
“You demons have that much in common with mankind…such an emphasis on free will. I am not here to debate philosophy with you. Rather, let me say that it pleases Him very much to have another soul freed from Hell’s dominion.”
The words took a few seconds to sink in. “Another soul — what?”
An expression of annoyance ruffled Uriel’s perfect features. “For an immortal, Samael, you can be remarkably obtuse. Let me draw you a diagram. In deciding to save Felicia no matter what the personal cost to you, you experienced a moment of true selflessness. Redemption required that you experience such abnegation of your own needs. Most demons never experience such a thing. But you did. You’re free. I was sent here to tell you the good news.”
If it weren’t for the fact that he’d never experienced a moment’s sleep, Samael would have thought he was dreaming. There seemed no other explanation for what Uriel had just told him.
“Free?” he asked. “So what exactly does that mean?”
“Precisely what it’s supposed to mean. You’re free of your duties to Hell. You’re free
of
Hell, actually. This is you now — this human form of yours. You had an identity here already. Now it’s the simple truth.”
Samael sat still for a moment, digesting that statement. He didn’t feel particularly different, but then again, he’d grown used to his human disguise and wore it more often than not. Why should it feel any different, when it was a body he’d grown accustomed to over the millennia?
“I wouldn’t jump off any more balconies, if I were you,” Uriel went on. “You’re as human as the next man on the street. Perhaps still a bit stronger, a bit healthier. But mortal nonetheless.”
“So I can die?”
“Of course you can die. And will, one day, a very long time from now. But you have no reason to fear death. You have paid your debt.” The archangel stood. “Be at peace, Samael. One part of your journey has come to an end. But another is just beginning.”
He leaned down and touched Samael on the shoulder. Warmth spread through the erstwhile demon, but this warmth soothed and comforted, instead of searing. That touch brought with it a memory of a time so long ago Samael had almost forgotten it existed, a time when all in Heaven and Earth was at peace.
A time before Hell.
“Love is the greatest gift of all, Samael. Go to her.”
The warmth turned to a golden glow, and Uriel was gone. Samael remained sitting on the couch, a quiet within him he hadn’t experienced in uncounted millennia.
The sensation of a peace lasted a whole fifteen seconds, until he focused on the archangel’s final direction to him.
Go to her.
Samael pushed himself up off the couch, and hoped grimly he could find a clean shirt somewhere in the condo.
• • •
Trust your agent to be the one person who’ll come pick you up in a strange coffee house in Los Feliz, no questions asked.
Well, not too many questions. Felicia managed to dodge the pointed remarks on the stupidity of going to paint in the wilds of Griffith Park without a cell phone in hand and without telling anyone where she was going. Lauren was clearly less than thrilled with her, but since Felicia had come out no worse the wear — well, except for her shirt — her agent had let the matter drop.
“Next time I’m calling Carrie,” Felicia murmured, as she shut the door behind Lauren with the excuse that she needed a hot shower ASAP. The main reason Felicia hadn’t called her sister was that Carrie had still been on shift at work. Lauren’s time, however, was her own. She also lived much closer.
Felicia clicked on the local classical radio station and then made a beeline for the bathroom. Being around people had helped a little; nothing could slam you back into reality like having your agent chew you out for a serious error in judgment.
Somehow, though, she could still feel the heat of Sam’s mouth on her hands, and the strength of his inhuman arms around her.
The hot water beat against her head, raising a ghost-scent of ash from her hair. She shampooed not once, but twice, and then sat with conditioner on her head for a long while. Was she trying to wash off more than just the scent of the fire? She couldn’t even say. She only stood there until the water began to turn tepid, and then reluctantly rinsed off the last of the soap and the conditioner and got out of the shower.
A pair of yoga pants and a tank top were enough; the loft still felt warm from the dregs of the afternoon’s heat. Smoke blurred the sky. Part of her wanted to turn on the news and see what has happening with the fire. But KUSC was playing a Mozart quartet, and the elegant, measured tones soothed her nerves the way a blaring newscast certainly wouldn’t.
She had started across the living room to get a glass of water when a knock came at the door. Her heart seemed to skip, and she forced herself to take a breath.
It’s only Rosa
, she told herself.
Or maybe that kid from the second floor who keeps trying to sell me candy or wrapping paper.
She didn’t feel particularly up to dealing with either one, but the sooner she answered the door and took care of whatever business awaited outside, the sooner she could crash on the couch and not get up for the next fifteen or twenty years.
Every once in a while the door stuck. She gave it a determined yank.
Sam gazed down at her. His wavy hair was half-damp, and stubble shadowed his cheeks. So human. So very human. And yet she knew he was anything but.
“Can I come in?”
This time she didn’t allow herself to hesitate. “Sure.” Belatedly she realized her own hair was still wringing wet, and she didn’t have on a speck of makeup or even a bra. “That is, I just got out of the shower, but — ”
His mouth came down on hers. He tasted like toothpaste and smelled of soap.
Do demons have to brush their teeth?
she wondered dazedly, and then realized she didn’t care. All that seemed to matter were his arms around her, the supple warmth of his lips, the heart she felt beating against hers. He had braved the fire and rescued her. Surely he meant her no harm.
It might have been a few minutes or a few hours when he finally pulled away from her. “Damn it, I really meant to talk to you first, but — ” He hesitated, then shook his head.
“It’s okay,” she said. At least, she thought it was okay. “If I’d wanted to, I would have stopped you. But I didn’t want to.”
He took her very gently by the shoulders, then gazed down into her face. “You didn’t? I don’t…horrify you?”
“I guess not,” she said, and felt a nervous little chuckle tickle the back of her throat. She realized she spoke nothing more than the truth. “I suppose that’s just proof that I really am certifiably insane, but really, how can I be frightened of you, after what you did for me? Maybe we need to have a long talk about certain things, but — ”
“We probably do,” he cut in, “but I know I need to tell you something.” He paused, and added, “Well, two things, actually.”
She wondered how he could manage to boil down the existence of demons and Heaven and Hell into only two topics of conversation, but she just nodded and make herself wait for his words.
He ran a hand through his damp hair. It proceeded to stick out in all directions, and again Felicia felt a hidden laugh bubble up from somewhere inside her.
“First thing,” he said. “I was a demon. Accent on the ‘was.’ Circumstances have changed.”
“‘Was’?” she repeated. “How do you just stop being a demon?”
For a second he didn’t say anything. Then his gaze made a significant shift upward. “Let’s just say that Someone decided I’d done my time.”
Felicia pulled in a breath. With the sixteen impossible things that had already happened today, what difference did one more make? Once you’d managed to acknowledge that demons really did exist, it wasn’t too difficult to also admit that God existed, and that He could make such decisions if the mood took Him.
“All right,” she said, keeping her tone steady. “You’re not a demon anymore. Well, I’d be lying if I didn’t say that makes everything a bit easier. So what’s the second thing you wanted to say?”
“I love you. I know it sounds crazy, but — ”
This time she was the one who moved forward, who pulled him against her and tangled her fingers in the damp locks of his hair. Was this kiss even sweeter now that she knew how he truly felt about her? Or was it simply that his admission allowed her to acknowledge the truth of her own feelings?
With some reluctance she pulled her mouth away from his. But she knew she had to speak. “I think — I think I might just love you, too. Crazy as that might be.”
His dark eyes glowed, but with normal human warmth. That flash of red was gone. He tangled his fingers in hers. “So you don’t mind hooking up with an unemployed ex-demon?”
She laughed then, pure joy seeming to well up from somewhere deep within her. “We’ll figure it out. We have all the time in the world.”
His expression sobered, and he shot another glance upward. His hands tightened around her fingers, even as he drew her close. “Maybe not all the time,” he murmured. “But enough.” He bent down and kissed the top of her head, his mouth warm against her wet hair. Then he spoke again.
“It will be enough.”
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Playing With Fire
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Other Paranormal Romances by Christine Pope
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