Death Knows My Name (Memory Keepers) (13 page)

The newcomer was small but nicely built. Her cocoa-colored skin appeared soft and creamy. Her dark black hair spilled over her shoulders in loose curls. Valience nodded. She put a hand on his arm as if soothing a sting away. He let her for a brief moment and then left. Maybe this painfully gorgeous woman was his ex.

“We need to talk.” She took my hand, her brown eyes haunting.

They held so much depth I wanted to look away from them. Then she plunged into my mind. I tried to stumble back but I was already up against the bar. I felt my mind being leafed through like a filing cabinet.

I shook my head.
Stop. Please.
And she did just that. So she was an angel too, then.

She grinned. “Only half.” She opened up her arms and enveloped me in a hug. “It is so good to finally meet you,” she whispered. “My God, you look so much like your mother.”

I shrank back. My mother? “Wait, you knew my mom?” My mouth hung open. The only memories of my mom were those I had while I slept. Grief and sorrow clawed at my chest.

The small woman nodded. I noticed now that half the guys in the bar were staring at her. Was she some kind of siren or something? If she were only half angel, was the other half siren? The guys were blatantly ogling her and this chick seem oblivious.

She laughed. “No, I am half human like you. I knew your father, too. I told you, we need to talk. About a lot.”

She took my hand and started leading me over to where I was sitting before I saw Valience, only a few minutes earlier. Had it really only been a few minutes? It seemed like hours. This new woman came in and dropped two bombs on my life and me. She knew
both
of my parents.
I
didn’t even know them. I was so young when they died. I finally realized where exactly she was leading me. I stopped.

“No. They don’t know anything about this. I don’t want them to know about Angels of Death or anything of the sort.” I whispered the word
angels
.

She smiled patiently at me, her eyes like pools of understanding. “I just want you to tell them that you are going to be a while so they don’t worry. I completely understand how you are feeling. When I found out what I was and the how and why I came to exist, let’s just say you are handling this with much more grace than I.”

I grinned at her, in spite of myself. I couldn’t help it. She seemed so nice, almost like I had known her my entire life.

“I seriously doubt that.”

She laughed and nodded. “I am serious. I was a complete brat! I was horrible to my father who is fully an angel. I blamed him for everything wrong in my life and for my brother not being with me. I was a little bitch.”

I choked on my next breath. Could angels say
bitch
?

“Angels, rather us hybrids, can do whatever the hell we want, especially if you’re me.” She answered my unvoiced question. I had a suspicion that this woman was a badass. She had to be, the way she had intimidated Valience. A small, but wicked smile danced on her lips as she tugged me forward.

“Come on, and let’s go speak to your friends.”

She led me to the booth and released my hand. Devon slowly looked up from Tammy. His eyes dragged up the tiny badass angel’s body and widened even more when they landed on her face.

“Woah.” His mouth froze in that ‘O’ shape. That was all he said.

“Woah is right!” Tammy exclaimed.

The angel held out her hand to Tammy. “Hi, Tammy, I’m Dhylaka. Call my Dhyla.”

Even her name sounded exotic and badass. It fit her.

Tammy took her hand. “Hello?” It sounded more like a question than a greeting, but Dhylaka was already turning her attention to the drooling boy sitting across from Tammy. I rolled my eyes.

“Devon, I’m Dhylaka,” Dhylaka hesitated. “I am a friend of Mayne’s.”

He took her hand and his face hardened in what most likely was his attempt to regain composure. “Oh yeah? How did you two meet?”

Dhylaka’s eyes pinned his, and he looked how I had felt earlier. She was rifling through his mind like she had done mine. Did all angels have this power? I knew Eric could read my thoughts sometimes but could he dig through my mind for anything that he wanted? It seemed like a violation of some sort.

Devon lifted a hand to his head as if he were getting a headache.

Dhylaka lifted her brow. “How strange.” She didn’t elaborate.

“Enough, Dhylaka.” Did I really just tell this badass angel who just told me she could do whatever the hell she wanted enough? After what she did to Valience? I really did have a death wish.

“Guys, I am going to go sit over there and talk to Dhyla about something. Devon, if I’m not back in time can you make sure Tammy gets home safely?” I quickly added, after the twinkle I saw in his eyes. “Alone, please.”

He sat back, pouting.

Dhylaka reached out and tousled his hair like he was a petulant five-year-old. “Devon, She is serious. Please behave yourself.”

Still pouting, Devon answered, “Yes, Ma’am.” His eyes widened in shock. Maybe he was thinking the same thing I was thinking,
Ma’am
? She couldn’t be more than a few years older than him, thirty-five, if that.

Dhylaka didn’t respond.

We sat in the far corner away from everything. She looked like she was in bars every day. At least the guys stopped ogling her outright.

“Do you want a drink? Before I start?” She straightened the cuff of her tan shorts before crossing her legs as she smoothed the nonexistent wrinkle from her linen tunic.

“Will I need one?”

“Probably, but it might help you comprehend better if you don’t have one.”

I grumbled, “Do all Angels have this immense dislike of alcohol?”

“We don’t like the thought of being intoxicated. We want to be in total control. Those that are like me don’t have the luxury of losing self-control or people are apt to lose their lives. A lot of people. I shall begin now.” Her eyes met mine.

“Eric loves you. That is why I am here. When a being such as Angels and other Celestial beings love, it is heavy.” She exhaled.

It was an exhale like the one I had heard from Eric once before. It was as if they were tired. Eons worth of it.

“Humans, you don’t understand how good you have it—to be able to love and love and love and never have to limit the amount. We have duty and honor to think about. How it affects the whole. It seems unfair, but it’s just the way it is. I had to accept that. It took me a while, but eventually we all get it, we all catch on.

“I have confused you, I know, but please allow me to continue. Eventually the two ends of this circle my words have formed will meet. Eric loves you very much. Is he willing to risk it all for you and give you what you want? I do not know. Time will tell. If he does, there will be much disconcert. There will be a battle. Not just a battle, The Battle. I want you to be able to live your life and have what you want, I just can’t help but wish that you weren’t a keeper and Eric hadn’t chosen
you
to be the one he would take a stand with. My husband and I never would have imagined that he would ever go this route. He has chosen his duty over love before.” She laughed.

“It figures that you would be the one he’d decide came before it.”

So she and Valience were married? Not only, but something else she had said. I had to interrupt. “Wait, he said I was his first.” I felt hurt he’d lied to me.

“Oh you were his first time while he was imitating man. Celestials of any kind don’t, we aren’t supposed to . . .  have sex. It’s how I came to be. The great schism of Heaven. But there has been another whom he debated risking the truce for.”

“Truce?” I asked, lost.

“The truce between Heaven and Sheol. There is a battle that is going on and has been going on. We are only at a truce that hangs thinly in balance. Keepers and Death are what keep it in place.

“The other time he chose duty and friendship.”

“Who was she?”

She smiled. It wasn’t happiness on her beautiful face but sorrow, regret, and exhaustion. “It was I. If he had chosen me, Lucifer would have
never
accepted the truce as it has been and still is. He is a jealous Angel.” The love in her eyes was obvious as she spoke.

“Hold on, you and The Devil?” Okay, so she and Valience weren’t together.

She laughed. “Don’t sound so disgusted, he has his charms. He isn’t all he’s cracked up to be. I
suppose
, he can be worse, but don’t let him hear you call him devil. He does have feelings.”

“I can almost guarantee I won’t be speaking to the devil anytime soon.”

“Eric is there now, which is why I am here. They have no idea.” She grinned a sneaky grin.

I realized right then that I liked Dhylaka. She seemed so petite, but really she was like a tidal wave. Unstoppable.

“By the way, you have spoken to Lucifer and you liked him fine enough.”

“When?”

“You made his coffee today.”

“No way. That’s him?”

She nodded. “But back on track. Eric didn’t choose me and it was the right thing. He would choose you. He is arguing right now that maybe it’s time. I think he is right.”

“Time for what?”

“For a change in the grand design. It is cruel. He sees the effect now that he sees how you responded to it. He knows that Lucifer and I are the right people to persuade. He told me the other night, knowing I was the right person to warm Lucifer up to it. Once he gets us both on board . . .”

“Why you two?”

“For our ties of course. My ties to Heaven because I do work for the 3-in-1. And Sheol belongs to Lucifer. Also, because Eric knew we would fight for you as soon as we found out who you were. Be assured, if there are any three people with your best interest at heart they are Eric, Lucifer, and I.”

My head was spinning. The ends of the circle still weren’t meeting up. Do circles even have ends? I’m sure my old geometry professor would have something to say about that.

“I understand Eric, but why Lucifer and you?”

She took my hands and warmth travel up my body. “It’s how I knew your parents. Your mother was my great-granddaughter. My granddaughter, your grandmother, rebuked everything that I was, everything that I have done. She left the family and our history. Her daughter, your mother, came across a man who had a similar heritage and they didn’t even know it. They had kids, you and your brother.”

“And Lucifer?”

“He is your great-great-grandfather of course.”

I laughed. “You don’t look a day over thirty-five.”

“Some of us live a long time like myself and other hybrids. Others are timeless such as your great-great-grandfather and your great-great-great-grandfather, my Father. They are Angels, so they are immortals. We are older than you can imagine,
seen
more than you can imagine.”

“What about Eric?”

“What about him?” she asked back.

“He is an Angel, so he, too, is immortal?”

“That is for him to tell. He has been here longer than I have been.”

I had a lot swirling through my mind. I was sure once my brain began working I’d have a lot of questions, but right now I was trying to keep a grasp on what concept of reality I had left.

This woman was half-angel and half-human. She was wife to the devil who was besties with the man I was sharing a bed with.
Oh wait, I missed something
. They are my great-great ancestors but Dhylaka, the angel hybrid, looked no older than my sister’s age let alone a regular grandmother! She’s saying she is hundreds of years old and the man—angel—that I loved was older.

“Thousands of years old, not hundreds,” Dhylaka interjected, shrugging. “What can I say? I look damn good for my age.” She laughed. It was throaty and downright appealing. The guys in the next booth heads all swiveled in her direction, and she dismissed them with a flick of her wrist.

She demanded attention of every guy in her vicinity and could also read minds and rummage through thoughts like she was ransacking an office.

“Ransack? I do not leave a mess behind.”

“Stop that! No reading my thoughts. They’re private.”

“If you would just say them out loud I wouldn’t have to,” she retorted stubbornly.

I leaned back against my chair, my hands still in hers. She held them tighter, as anyone offering comfort would.

“I am aware that I told you a lot tonight. And some night I may tell you the rest, but, for now, it’s enough. I am willing to answer any question you have, but if you prefer Eric to answer them, that is fine, too. But tonight, just think over all you have learned. Better yet, go home and be with Eric and forget it all until morning. I have to go.” She nodded to a tall man standing in the corner. His skin was like ebony and his onyx eyes were fixed on our booth. Dhylaka smiled.

“Who is that?”

“That is Dartainian. He is the guy I go home to and forget about my problems until the morning.” Dhylaka waved at him and his face broke into a smile. It was heart stopping the way it transformed his face. The adoration was clear.

I blushed and looked away. It was almost like I was eavesdropping on a private moment. “I thought you were with—”

Dhylaka cut me off. “Don’t say his name. It will only upset my dear Dartainian. My husband and I are estranged. We haven’t been together in lifetimes. I am sure Eric and everyone else would tell you that we never should have been together in the first place. But then, nobody else knows him like I do. They never will. But Dartainian and I go back just as long, and it’s just as complicated. When Eric chose his loyalties over me, Dartainian chose me over his loyalties. That means something, if only a little, to a girl like me.” Her face glowed.

I didn’t want to mention that I thought she loved Lucifer more, not that I didn’t believe she loved this tall god of a man, erm, angel.

Dhylaka looked me in the eyes knowingly and nodded curtly, as if to agree with me and confirm what I suspected.