Angelic Avenger (10 page)

I was ready to strangle them both as I glared between them, beginning my pacing all over again with my hands waving wildly in the air.

“I’m not doing anything with anybody and I haven’t in so long that I’ve forgotten how a good shag feels. I don’t even think I could pay for sex right now.”

I spun around and caught sight of Gray, leaning against my couch with his arms crossed over his chest, emphasizing the width of it. It only took a moment to fully appreciate the view as my gaze drifted up to his face and the smug smile registered there. What I’d admitted in frustration registered in bold colors in my brain.

Oh hell. Me and my big mouth. I groaned as I dropped my face into my hands.

“I can’t believe I just said that in present company. That’s it. I’m going to go die of embarrassment and jump off another bridge. You two are on babysitting duty.”

I started for the door only to run into Gavreel’s chest. I’d not even seen him move. Stumbling backwards, I glared up into his face. The way he looked down at me made something register. Quickly, I glanced between the angel and the halfling. Why hadn’t I seen it before? It was there for anyone to see in the similarities in the bone structure, if you looked beyond the difference in the coloring. Gray could see Gavreel because he’d been sired by the archangel himself. Well, would you look at that? Gav had a few secrets of his own to keep.

I stood back and shook my head. The question that popped out of my mouth was motivated by instinct rather than design. If I’d taken the time to think about it, I’m sure I wouldn’t have asked it.

“Why me?”

“Because I like you,” he answered with total aplomb.

I was suddenly speechless. Before I could find my voice, a bright light shone in the room and a sandy-haired man stepped out into the living room. Reapers tended to stay away from one another, as a rule. There’s no real reason why, except being around other people on the same path you’re on reminds you that you’re beyond redemption. It can be depressing. At least that’s my excuse. I’d never asked anyone else. Ben Cameron and I had worked a shifter investigation last year and had done the occasional dinner since. I would count him among the few I would call my friends.

“I swear, Bella—” he grinned the cheeky grin that totally complimented his drawl, “—you can’t handle a simple babysitting job without a little back-up?”

“I didn’t invite you to the party, Ben, but I’m damn glad to see you. How are you?”

We smiled at one another in greeting. The cavalry had arrived. Ben, boy scout that he was, would rescue me from the insanity of wayward angels and crazy plans.

“I’m good. Things have been a bit slow on my end. I might have to start borrowing a page from your book and move down where all the action is. Maybe I can crash in your spare room?”

“It’s taken.”

We both turned to face a furious Gray. Well, well, well. Imagine that. A single mercy date and he thinks he’s got a right to be jealous. Poor fool.

“Where are my manners?” I gushed and smiled even wider. “Gray Devereau, this is Ben Cameron. We’re colleagues. Gray, this is Ben. Unfortunately, he’s right. At the moment, there’s a tiny person sleeping in there. Talk to me when this is all said and done. We may be able to work something out.”

“It’ll still be taken,” Gray mumbled under his breath.

I ignored him as I looked back at Gavreel.

“Why, exactly, do I need back-up? You’re only a call away, right?”

“You won’t be able to be in both rooms at the same time,” Gavreel replied with a shrug. Why did I think I was missing something, again?

“I won’t need to be.” I shook my head in confusion. “I’d planned to pick up a book and sit by her bedside for the night.”

“And what will you do if he seeks out Gray, first?”

And this affects me, how, exactly?

My duty was clear enough with the sleeping little girl. Wasn’t it? Thinking on my feet, I latched onto the first thing I could think of to get the man out of my apartment before I killed him myself. It takes a lot to rile my temper, but I can be vicious when riled.

“Fine, Ben can go home with him and everything’s good as long as he’s gone.”

I looked between the three men and realized I’d missed something in translation. Gray and Gavreel looked at each other over my head and I knew I wasn’t going to like it. Ben didn’t say anything, but he wouldn’t look at me, either. Apparently, he had been treated to the full briefing while I was still picking up the details on the run. I’d debate the fairness of
that
later.

“I am home.” Was that his courtroom voice? It brooked absolute certainty that he was right when in fact, he couldn’t have been more wrong.

I looked at Gray like he had lost his mind. He certainly was not going to stay at my apartment. Duty was duty and that was fine, but I so wasn’t going to let the man stay here after all the lies he’d told. Okay, lies by omission are still lies. I can’t abide liars.

“I don’t think so.” It popped out of my mouth before I could censor it. “You can take Ben home and do whatever you need to do to clear this up. I’ve got guard duty on the mini-person. There’s no reason for you to bother with me, anymore. You guys can call me when Turel is dealt with and we’ll get little Elizabeth situated with her next of kin. Then I never have to look at you again.”

I could hear the bitterness in my voice and couldn’t understand it. It wasn’t like I was that into him. Sure, he was sexy and powerful, but we’d only had dinner. It wasn’t like I’d jumped into bed with him, after all. There was no crime in thinking about it, though. Was it the fact he was the first man who’d registered on my fantasy radar only to turn around and betray me that had my back up? That had to be it.

Reflexively, I caught the missile Gray threw to me. Blinking, I stared at the small black box. Surely it wasn’t…

“Put that on.”

Flipping it open, I stared at the solitaire. Snapping it shut with hurt fury, I threw it back at him.

“No. We’re not playing this game. Absolutely not. As soon as this is dealt with, you can go do your own thing. I want nothing to do with you. In fact, get out. I don’t need or want you here. Ben can be your guard dog until this is finished.”

Biting my tongue before I could say something really cruel, I turned to stalk away, feeling the tears threaten to flow. Sometimes life isn’t fair. How exactly had I found myself in this position? Oh yeah, favors for angels. No more of that business.

“Bella, this isn’t the time for female sentiment. Gray told the police you were engaged. It’s the only way we could secure Elizabeth and keep her safe. She’s the only witness in a murder investigation, after all. They wanted to put her into foster care, but he persuaded them to leave her with the two of you so she’d remain off the radar of the killer as they see it.”

The anger in Gavreel’s voice rocked me to the core. After all of this, he had the gall to be angry with me? I had a right to feel the way I felt. I was entitled to a little female sentiment, all things considered.

“I am not going to pretend to be engaged to him.” The stubborn tilt of my chin must have told him not to argue. But the ring box popped back into my hand magically. Okay, fine, apparently I was going to have to play the besotted fiancée. With a glower, I reached in and snatched it out, hoping beyond hope it wouldn’t fit so I’d have a reasonable excuse not to wear it.

It was too much to hope for.

Dropping the empty box to the ground, I refused to look at any of them as I stalked across the living room. My words were for Ben, who had done his best to be inconspicuous in the dining room.

“You get to sleep with him. I’m going to curl up with Elizabeth so she doesn’t wake up afraid of the dark.”

“Bella.”

The quiet tone stopped me, mainly because it was so different than the fury of only moments before. I turned to face Gavreel, but kept my face as neutral as I could manage. It was harder than I thought it would be.

“It’s in the best interest of the child. Would it hurt to be a little more graceful?”

“Yeah, it would. It would hurt a hell of a lot. When this is done, I want a new handler.”

I turned away. I couldn’t look at him. Part of me wanted to rant about what he was making me do. In a lot of ways, he was making me relive the worst failure of my life. I’d failed as a woman and a lover. Hell, it was why I was in this mess to begin with. Now, I had to play all sweet lover to a man who would use me, again. Granted, this time I knew it ahead of time and knew the reason why, but it didn’t salve the aching hole in my heart, even for Elizabeth.

The one man, or angel as the case may be, I’d trusted above everyone in life and death had betrayed me. How could I live with that?

Simple—one day at a time because there was absolutely no choice for the moment. I hated that most of all.

Chapter Nine

I lay there around the tiny body, snuggling it close in the dark. How had my perfectly ordered life gone to hell in a day?

Elizabeth whimpered in her sleep. Hugging her close, I kissed her temple and she relaxed into me with a sweet smile. For a heartbeat, I wondered what might have been if I’d taken a different course. Would I have had children? Chris hadn’t wanted them, but he had proved not to be my future. If I’d not jumped off that bridge, would I have picked up the pieces and moved on? I’d honestly never thought about it before now.

The engagement ring on my finger winked in the dim light of the cracked door. It felt old. Don’t ask me why, but it did. I was betting that the delay in getting back from the police scene had been an emergency meeting with an afterhours bank manager with a vault key. It felt wrong to be wearing it on oh, so many levels.

Elizabeth jerked awake, effectively cutting off my maudlin thoughts of what-ifs. She blinked as she focused on me. I watched her brow furrow with confusion then something flashed in her eyes far beyond her years.

“Shhh,” I whispered. “It’s okay. I’m here.”

“My mommy isn’t coming back, is she, Miss Bella?”

The voice was scared, but I was impressed there was no panic in it. Gavreel may have tinkered with her mind, but he’d not erased it. For some reason, I was grateful for that small fact. It made me feel better about him despite what he’d done to me.

Cuddling her close, I sighed. How do I handle this? What do you say to make it all better? Nothing. All I had was the truth and there wasn’t much comfort in it.

“No, Elizabeth, she isn’t. She loved you very much, but she’s gone to live with the angels. Mr. Gray and I are going to keep you safe until they catch the bad man, then we’re going to find you a place to live where you can be happy.”

“But I want my mommy.”

If it had been me at that age, I would have wailed it. Elizabeth’s voice was small and frightened in the darkness, but a cornerstone of strength ran through it. It impressed me. I don’t know why, but the fact she was being rational made me look at her like she was older than her years.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart, but I’m the best you’ve got at the moment. Did you have an aunt or uncle that we could call, maybe? Someone you’d like to stay with better?”

“No.” Her bottom lip quivered as the first tear fell. “It was just me and Mommy.”

I lay there in the darkness and held her while she cried. I said silly things, soothing things until her breathing evened out into sleep. I looked up to the doorway and my eyes met Gray’s across the expanse of hardwood floor.

I’d not heard him listening, nor felt his presence, but the look on his face left me no doubt he’d witnessed the entire scene. Without any conscious effort on his part, the interior switch that contained his aura flipped on and it washed across the room to me. The strength of it called to me, offering me a comfort I craved as surely as the child in my arms did. The knowledge that I couldn’t reach out and accept what he offered was a knife in my heart.

What would it be like to be able to bask in that strength?

I don’t know how long we would have stared at each other over the chasm of circumstance had Ben not come to close the door. His blue eyes held laughter, but his lips didn’t even twitch as his gaze met mine while he reached for the door handle. I think I would have hurt him if he’d dared. He pulled it closed, but left it cracked enough for a thin shaft of light to keep the darkness at bay.

Laying alone in the dark with the warmth of the soul cuddled to my chest, I had no more answers than I had when I entered this room, but a whole lot more questions. One of these days, I’m going to get my hands on those ladies of fate and have a nice,
long
talk.

***

“Then the seagull came, and this was this, and that was that…”

My eyes were glazed. I knew it.
The
Little Mermaid
was going to kill me. Death by Disney, was there such a thing? Ben made absolutely no effort to rescue me as he swooped behind Elizabeth’s to slide her empty plate away. He replaced it with a fresh plate with a Mickey Mouse shaped pancake on it. Gray had wanted to make her old-fashioned waffles for breakfast. I think he was still upset I didn’t own a waffle iron. He’d improvised with pancakes. Who knew men could be domestic?

I still didn’t know how the conversation had turned into a running commentary on every Disney animation film ever made, but it had. I was so out of my depth on this one. Give me angelic politics, any day. Right about now, Luke would be preferable than sitting at my kitchen table learning Disney by default.

Where were all the souls that needed fetching? There, I was good. I mentally begged for an assignment even as I floundered to make sense of her chatter. This was beyond me. What was I supposed to do with her?

Gray slipped a fresh cup of coffee across the table toward me and our gazes met over it. We’d not talked about any of the events from last night. The diamond was still on my finger, mainly because I had no idea how to take it off and still do right for the chattering magpie in front of me.

There was no way a rogue angel was going to snuff her out. I’d die a true death first. In the course of the night, my goal had firmed into iron resolve. Personal issues could wait until she was settled into her new home. Whatever was between Gray and me could wait until then.