Destiny Strikes (5 page)

CHAPTER 4

Seven and a half hours later, Travis’ shift was almost over.

As luck would have it, he made it to the office without incident, and the strange glow illuminating his skin disappeared a couple of hours later.

Elbows on the desk, Travis scooted his chair back stretching out his spine and wearily rubbed his eyes. Knowing Officer Calvin would show in a matter of minutes, Travis went around the desk and grabbed a bottle of water from the small fridge. He also removed leftover sandwiches he’d been unable to finish, setting them on the desk for Calvin.

After tossing the water lid into the trash, he paused before the window and looked out at a quieter scene than last night. Rays from the morning sun as it rose bathed the town in a tranquil quiet before streets became busy.

Even though his twilight hours were uneventful, after his encounter with the vexing beauty on the motorcycle, dawn brought a different sort of dilemma.

The tattoo on his chest still bothered him. With one finger, he pushed the shades he always wore higher on his nose, even though there was no need. Questions plagued him. Would the glow appear again? Would his eyes return to the demon black portrayed on TV? What the crap had happened last night?

Keys clattered on the outside door, distracting him. This side of the building stayed locked but citizens entered the hardware store freely. Late-night civilians in need of assistance used a doorbell.

Travis went to the door and opened it. Calvin, the stout and darkly tanned officer he covered for last night stood outside, all smiles. Since Travis and Calvin weren’t riding the big city beat any longer, they’d never lost the partner mentality, no matter how small Seagrove was.

Travis noticed Calvin’s smile indent his cheeks after he spied the plate Travis had earlier set out.

“Good morning, partner,” Calvin mumbled around a mouthful of cold-cut turkey sandwich. “Thanks for covering my ass last night. My daughter has an ear infection.” He winced. “At least the screaming has stopped.” Calvin sat, the chair squeaking under his weight, and swept breadcrumbs away saying, “Sorry about the double shift, and your car.”

Lifting one shoulder, Travis brushed it off.

“Did the mechanic say what’s wrong?”

Travis shoved his hands in his pockets, continuing to watch the pottery shop signs switch from ‘Closed’ to ‘Open.’

“Glad to know your daughter’s okay.”

“What’s wrong,” Calvin asked, “not so talkative today? Is it the sandwiches?” Travis glanced over his shoulder, watching Calvin hands raise in the air. “Man, you know I can’t resist Donna’s cooking.”

Travis didn’t know anyone who could either. She’d forced the plate into his hands yesterday. “I know you’re doing double duty, you’ll need your strength.” He’d left with a kiss on the cheek.

“It’s been a trying shift. All I want is for the day to be over.”

“Sorry to hear that.” Calvin eyed the third sandwich on Donna’s plate.

Travis couldn’t suppress a chuckle. “Go ahead. Eat all of them if you want. Donna made more than enough for both of us. I hate to see good food go to waste, especially when I don’t have an appetite.”

“I’m going to head out. I just saw my vehicle being towed in.”

Travis didn’t wait for an answer as he walked over to the Red Rollback truck, and waited while his 68 Ford truck lowered to the parking lot asphalt. Firm handshake, and cash paid for his vehicle, he was about to hit the road when Calvin shouted.

“The loaner squad car should be here within the next hour. Dispatch will also relay all our calls this way. We’re back in business. Great thing crime is low here.”

With a simple thumbs-up and, “I’m outta here,” his mouth full again, Calvin closed the door.

Keeping one hand on the steering wheel, he rubbed the mark on his chest. Last night, it felt as if he had left a part of himself behind with the exotic beauty.

Chest heaving, Travis struggled to breath.

One minute he’d been dreaming about stars. The next, he’d been thrust into a fantasy where his hands and feet were spread and fastened to the bed with invisible bindings.

Muscles flexed, straining to free himself, Travis realized he was naked and his dick was hard as stone.

“Calm down. This will end soon enough. I don’t want to rush this.”

Jerking his head around to see where the voice coaxing his testicles to draw up tight came from.

Fallon appeared from the shadows of his bedroom. His eyes glazed over her outfit. The black leather corset pushed her unbound breast high. He watched her cherry-red nipples hardened before his unwavering gaze. A belt contraption cinched her waist and flared in four lengthy sections over her hips. Thin strips at each end flowed down her thighs and disappeared into knee-high stiletto boots. Her mound was bare.

His jaw locked, he ground his teeth, his body razed in sensual agony.

She sauntered over to the mirror-dresser combo. Her pale slender fingertips skimmed his badge, gun, keys and his wallet, that he’d placed there before falling into slumber.

Something about her nearness to the possessions that defined his existence doused his desire.

“Why are you here, Fallon?”

Her husky voice caressed his skin. “It’s only a dream.” Her luscious bottom lip rolled inward. “I need you.”

His roof vanished and lightning flashed above them. He closed his eyes against the bright intensity as the bed dipped. Then she was on him, straddling his waist, and he nearly dislocated both arms.

The sight of her in such a sensual position, so soon after thinking about the things she could do to him and where, had the nerves in his sack tingling. Blood rushed to fill his enlarged member even more. How she ended up in his home didn’t matter not at all compared to the demand from his rod, and every pulse for release blotting everything else out. The strength of it made his teeth grind against his back molars as her silky hand wrapped around the overstimulated head of his erection. The sensation left him panting through clenched jaws.

Then Travis noticed how her image began to weave in and out of focus. What centered his vision were the smooth thighs gripping his hips and the hard nipples skimming his chest. His cheeks billowed as he fought the demands of his body to find release on the flat stomach. He felt her soft breaths against his cheek as she leaned over him. One slim finger came to rest against his lips.

“Shhhh, lover, it’ll be over soon,” she whispered seductively.

Her chuckle drove him mad as her torture continued. Her wet tongue passed over his lips as she removed her finger.

“I need you to finish this, now,” he growled against her throat. He raged at his helplessness as she swiped at his ear with the same moist caress.

“Don’t worry, we’ll be together. Accept—”

Thunder slapped his ears like a palm on a drum, and drowned out the rest.

His sweat clung to her skin as she peeled away from him, advancing his downward spiral into madness. How could her face be directly above him, and he not see it clearly? Try as he might to focus, the view remained bleary, like he’d been staring right into the sun. He tried to blame the darkness that surrounded them. As soon as he’d reasoned it out, the scenery changed. The earth beneath them fell away, and all that remained were stars. One particular constellation stood out more than others. It outlined the same shape as the tattoo he wore on his body.

Just when he thought the scenery hadn’t confused him enough, lightning flashed around them in a brilliant blue/purple blaze. Yet, there wasn’t any mask available to protect his sight. Mounting confusion and irritation obliterated his senses, and the dream began to fade.

“Oh no you don’t, big boy.”

He could see Fallon’s lips parted slightly as she lowered hers, so damn slowly, to his. The sensation of waiting almost drove him insane. Full lips came into stark focus as they came closer. Her pink tongue darted out, glistening them.

His body trembled between her thighs.

“Why do shadows cling to you when I need to see you?” His voice sounded hollow, almost animalistic.

“Because of my weakness,” she replied, as if he should understand, and her velvety kisses traveled from his lips to his neck. She worked her way down to his chest and straddled his hips, her wet heat creating a delicious friction against his penis. The back and forward slide of her slickness along his cock drove him wild with the need to enter her. To have the walls of her sex clenched around his cock, drawing him inside. He drove his body upward against the restraints.

She circled his chest with both palms, equal parts rough and light as a feather. She licked at one pectoral and blew on it with warm breath. He watched with rapt fascination as she switched to give the other pectoral a swipe of her pink tongue, and then lovingly outlined the birthmark on his chest.

He stiffened in anticipation as she slowly made her way further down his body. If he complained of his inability to move, or dared to breathe, the dream might end. He wanted whatever she would do next.

The lightning illuminated her face as she lowered her mouth over his straining erection. When her lips were poised over the mushroomed head,
crack
, another bolt split the air as her eyes lifted.

He exhaled long and hard then roared her name. “Fallon.”

He saw that his unusual color of violet eyes were hers, and in their depths, he could see lightning. Stunned, he watched in enslaved stillness as she rose above him and literally snatched a bolt from the sky. The slithering light wiggled within her palm as if it were a long boa, constricting and snapping as it fought for freedom. Somehow, he knew what was coming and prepared himself as the bolt slammed into his chest.

In the distance, he heard his cell phone buzz. Startled into semi-consciousness, the dream lingered, along with a sledgehammer of an erection hard enough to break bricks, and a healthy dose of respect that it was just a dream, he sucked need air into lungs.

His cell phone buzzed again. Jelly-legged, he left the bed and walked over to the dresser. Just holding the iPhone, the slight twinge in his bicep echoed his participation in the dream. He checked the number.

Damn.

“Yeah, Captain.”

“Get your ass over here. We got a body.”

After filling Travis in on where to locate him, Travis made his way to the shower. As the spray of cold needles pounded his body, he muttered, “With that woman, it figures being struck by lightning would be the way I’d go.”

CHAPTER 5

Texas, Killing Fields

“Hey, watch where the hell you’re throwing that shit,” Wallace growled, ridiculing his brother Avedon.

With one monstrous angelic hybrid holding Wallace captive, every time one of Avedon’s throwing knives struck, the damn thing increased the amount of pressure around Wallace’s trachea.

It was a shame Fallon wasn’t here to at least even the odds. Frying the bastards seemed to take the fight out the angelic half-bred nuisances. At present, his brothers, Michael and Avedon, were doing a piss poor job of devising a plan to get him out of the unholy being’s chokehold.

Ankle deep in mushy vegetation, for more than a hundred miles, the Killing Fields were nothing but marshland, unable to sustain urban development. Believing it was a perfect place to lure unsuspecting the Halfling.

In crazy way, it helped that Fallon wasn’t here. Wallace and his brothers needed answers. Fallon hadn’t wanted to talk about her issues before she left town, but her crazy behavior wasn’t or harmless as she’d believed. Her psycho tendencies left them in the dark. The Dead didn’t talk.

Out of the corner of his eye, Wallace could see Avedon’s hands sink deep within the earth. An assortment of emerald plant life sprouted from the earth’s depths in greeting. His hands disappeared within the soil, then, elbow deep, he came away with two crudely fashioned daggers. You didn’t need a blacksmith when you held the gift of earthbound magic at your fingertips.

Wonder over his brother’s talent making him careless, Wallace’s head whipped around when contrary to his gift, the first blade grazed Wallace’s cheek.

Eyes dilated, Wallace now watched Avedon warily. Avedon flipped the second one with nonchalant ease and a wicked grin on his tanned face.

“Sorry, man, it’s not my fault you let that thing get close enough to catch you.”

How was Wallace to know the fucker holding him had been stronger and faster than any angelic hybrid they’d encountered thus far? “I kind of like the idea of using your body as a dart board, especially since you had a
hand
in getting Fallon in trouble.”

“Poor taste with timing there, bringing that shit up, bro.” Glancing over his shoulder, he added, “Ain’t that right, buddy?” The confused look on the hybrid’s face was exactly what he’d hoped for. As long as the crossbreed kept its focus on them, it wouldn’t notice Michael meditating. Of Avedon and himself, Michael was a maestro when it came to questioning the enemy. Avedon’s construction of the temporary cage would hold the Halfling, but it would be up to Michael stay reasonable during the interrogation progress. His older brother controlled the element of air, and every breath that left his body carried either life or death behind it. So yeah, he needed his time.

So for now, Wallace continued in his false struggles, saying, “Avedon, if you don’t get me out of this, I’ll tell Fallon you took a turn on her motorcycle too.”

Fear replaced Avedon’s smirking expression.

Snorting, unimpressed with how Wallace had bested his brother, a searing bright light suddenly emanated behind him, filling everything in his peripherals. A symphony of music, more beautiful than any human orchestra or children’s choir touched his soul.

To further support there’d been something monumental going on at his back, Wallace soon learn his feet were no longer planted firmly in wet lands, but dangled several feet midair.

Wallace wondered if it had anything to do with the
whomp, whomp, whomp
that rushed wind past his ears and drowned out all other sounds.

Still unable to move completely, Wallace strained his eyes in search of Avedon or Michael.

Oh. Fuck. Things just got real.

Wallace could hear Avedon call out, “Hey, Michael, you better hurry up and get a load of this crap. Our brother’s being lifted up and not in the good way.”

Held hostage in the sky, Wallace counted off what was wrong with this picture. He had a Halfling strapped to his backside, its thick arms coiled around his stomach and neck, embracing him like a lover.
Uncomfortable
wasn’t a strong enough word to cover how the demon spawn would suffer. Especially if what pressed against him wasn’t a weapon in its pocket.

Wallace asked, “Hey bud, since we’ve become so intimate.” Breathing proved difficult as the angelic demon’s forearm pressed deeper into his windpipe. Wallace drew as much air into a depleted supply before continuing, “Shouldn’t we at least be on a first name basis?” No answer. “OK, since you’re being a baby about it. How does MuFasa sound? For some reason, I got
Lion King
on the brain.” He tried to shrug. “I’ll use it until you give me something better.”

His lungs burned, but he had to get the bastard behind him to talk. “What’s up with you guys lately? Your kind has become less like the usual one-night stand and more like the exes that we can’t get rid of?”

Utter smugness in the newly dubbed MuFasa’s voice filled Wallace’s ear. “The hour for the Nephilim Destroyer’s is at hand. Archangel and Seraphim shall come together for one cause. We will wipe Earth of those whose body dishonestly carry blood of angels. An abomination whose survival even after the great flood taints the very order of existence.”

Wallace’s throat worked against the thick obstruction ensuring Wallace couldn’t escape without a crushed windpipe.

He’d wanted his brothers to get their act together, but just when Wallace felt more would be forthcoming, now he’d gotten him to talk, Michael’s order traveled on the wind. “Get ready! We’ve done all we can down here. Use your ice when I say so, and we’ll take care of the rest.”

“Make it quick. This guy has a lot of explaining to do,” was all Wallace expressed before mild pressure turned to teeth-grinding pain.

MuFasa removed his arm, and Wallace sucked air in. The short-lived reprieve was exchanged for one a large hand curling around his next.

If Wallace could change into mist, he’d have freed himself, yet he had to let the MuFasa think he had the upper hand against him and his brothers. That meant going along for the ride when the crazed angel peeled Wallace from his body and held him away from its body like a rag doll.

When his gaze landed on what he’d been held by, his bug-eyed stare was from something other than a deficient intake of air.

“Shit,” he cursed under his breath.

The creature had white wings, downy feathers that lifted as they glided back and forward. Wallace glimpsed totally superiority in black eyes, which compelled him to search their depths. Darkness swirled inside murky orbs rapidly filling with glimmering specks of light. Oddly, the eerie gaze resembled a scene treasured on the coldest night of winter and blanketed the night sky with nothing but stars.

He’d been restrained by a motherfucking Archangel, the highest hierarchy of Angels. They’d all been fooled. Another question was how long Archangels been masquerading in the disguise of Sortanephs? And why?

So many unfathomable questions interrupted by an unfamiliar dialect mixed with ancient Samarian.

“The New Fire allows for Orion and his children to shape the fate of heaven and earth. Orion’s blood can stop what is to come. They can join us or die. It matters not. We are ready.”

“It’s got to be now,” Michael urged.

Wallace felt the change in atmosphere as Michael called forth wintry conditions on an hundred and five-degree day, and Wallace gathered moisture from the heated marshlands below.

Nervous as hell this wouldn’t work on an archangel, Wallace visualized how the two would combine. The water beneath them trembled as a geyser of water shot up into the sky and enslaved its wings and Wallace.

Wrapping his arms around MuFasa’s waist, he and hung on for dear life.

They fell together hard. In the midst of a stand of bulky trees, an enclosure made of thickly woven vines appeared. Diving headfirst and without a parachute, Michael used the element of air to guide Wallace’s descent as close to the target as possible.

Nearing the target, MuFasa jerked like a fish-out-of-water head-butting Wallace and tried to take chunks of exposed flesh with him.

Wallace dissolved into mist at the last second.

The creature hit the edge of the cage and bounced inside with a backbreaking
oomph
.

The impact of being smacked silly by unforgiving earth had Wallace gasping after each breath. He managed to say, “Do you guys have any idea what it’s like to be held against a grown man’s erection? Not a position I recommend if you love the ladies.”

“Now isn’t the time!” Michael whispered in a ‘tuck your tail and run if your value life’ tone that, for once, didn’t rock the stratosphere surrounding them.

Since he’d taken care of his part, Wallace rolled onto the side that didn’t exacerbate his shattered bones, and catalogued his injuries: cracked jaw, three broken ribs, and a few missing locks of hair.

Trapped, and ramming the cage violently, he pointed out, “This cannot be. None can hold an Archangel.”

Wallace was freaked about that himself, but Michael never let the concern that affected them all deter him from asking, “Why are Archangels poising as Sortanephs?”

The underlying compulsion made MuFasa’s lips pull back from his teeth in an effort not reveal his secrets.

Something other than catching an Archangel, holding him, and consequences of such a thing made Wallace uneasy.

Gaze intent, Wallace searched the swampy landscape for anything amiss. Nothing. Yet, judging by the wild gaze sheening MuFasa’s eyes as they darted around with panic, something had alarmed him also.

“No!” MuFasa screamed at the top of his lungs. The cry plunged ever person, insect, and animal present into silence.

Looking at the Archangel in horrified fascination, MuFasa slammed his body against the side of his cage, and one of the thick cypress trees splintered. His feral gaze locked with Wallace’s before he dashed through the opening.

Soon after MuFasa escaped the crudely made jail, the bulging earth lifted Wallace’s prone body as something snaked underneath the marshy terrain in MuFasa’s direction. One damaged wing seemed to make flight impossible.

“This ain’t me, boys,” Avedon said with a visible shudder.

The grassy surface continued to undulate and swell beneath their feet.

Wallace braved the pain, twisted, then started crawling forward in an effort to save the bastard. His severe injuries slowed him down. “Michael. Avedon. Help MuFasa. I don’t care if he’s the enemy or not. Don’t just stand there. We need answers.”

MuFasa was too far away for any of them to help when the ground beneath him rumbled. Slithering vines punched through the soil, lassoing and holding Mufasa. Large roots became spears that staked him in place. In an effort to break free from the enormous mass devouring his body, he blasted the area with heavenly light.

With sickening dread, Wallace watched as a substantial stalk erupted from the rolled dirt and inched its way around the quivering body like ivy. Instead of squeezing the bastard to death, the vine speared him. Bits and pieces of MuFasa’s head exploded in a shower of blood and gore.

Mufasa wouldn’t be answering to anyone, anymore. The avalanche of vines, which had suspiciously steered clear of the three brothers, quickly devoured any evidence of Mufasa’s body.

“If someone could explain what the hell just happened to MuFasa, I’d like to hear it,” Wallace asked bitterly. “That’s the first date I’ve had in a week, and we didn’t get to the good part when he spills the beans concerning his hopes and dreams. We all could’ve used that part.”

“Can you shut up a minute, Wallace?” Michael spit out each word as if he’d swallowed poison. “I’m in no mood for your metaphoric anecdotes. First Fallon, now this. And, in case your crazy-ass didn’t notice, what he said while he had your butt in the air sounded fucking dire.”

Wallace could remain in the upright position with Avedon’s support. Together, they got his pain-racked body back to the SUV. “Should we call and tell Fallon about this?”

A unanimous “Hell no,” echoed around the truck.