Earth Angel (Falling Angels Saga) (12 page)

Suze eyed him skeptically. “
You’re
from the gas company?”

“Yes, ma’am, and I need to get inside.”

She opened her mouth to respond, to tell him if he didn’t get away from her door immediately, she was going to call the police, when a vacant expression fell over her like an invisible veil. “Yes,” she crooned her voice a near whisper. Her eyes clouded over as she opened the door and stepped aside. “Be careful.”

I was dumbfounded. My mother was allowing the strange man she just found on our doorstep into our house. “What did you do to her?” I demanded.

“No worries. It won’t last. Now, we must hurry.”

When I opened the door to my room, the Ibwa was gone. My bedroom window was wide open, the curtains flapping in the breeze. My old CPU was lying in the middle of the floor. It had been ripped open, its guts of wire and motherboard splayed out across the carpet like the innards of a dead animal.

“Oh, my!” I gasped.

“Let me guess. The book was hidden inside yer computer.”

“Yes.” I replied. While I didn’t totally trust the Ibwa, in my heart I wanted to believe he was good. Bad idea.

“Look at me, girl!” Harrison demanded. My eyes moved to him. He was staring at me with contempt. “Are yatellin’ me you were indeed in possession of
The Book of Calls
, and that the Ibwa has stolen it?”

After a moment’s hesitation I replied. “Yes.”

His arms gripped his stomach as if I had punched him in the gut.

“Hello up there,” my mother called from downstairs. “Did you find the leak yet?”

Harrison’s cautious eyes moved to me, as he slowly regained his composure. “It’s wearin’ off.”

He strode across the room, yanking open the bedroom door. “I think I found it,” he called out into the corridor. “It should be all clear in just a few minutes,” he added, sounding all business.

“Thanks,” she called back. He eased the door shut.

“How long before she starts wondering why you’re looking for a gas leak in her daughter’s bedroom?” I asked.

“Not long. I’d better get going.” He started to open the bedroom door then stopped. Looking over his shoulder at me, he added:“Perhaps I can get to the demon before he turns the book over to his master. Do not worry. I’m a good tracker.” He offered a weak, conciliatory smile. He was trying to find it in his heart to forgive me.

“Okay,” I said.

“My kind could have really used the book.” The timbre of his voice was suddenly sad. The arrogance had fallen away. He seemed vulnerable.

“I’m sorry I lied to you, Harrison. But angels are powerful without the book. I’m sure you don’t need it to defeat demons.”

“I am not an angel.” Solemn eyes fixed on me. He searched my face for a reaction.

My head began to spin. “But you… you can’t be…
You’re
a demon?” I began backing away. I stumbled on the mess of computer parts strewn across the floor, and bumped into my bed.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” he said.“Of course I’m not a demon. Do I
look
like a demon?” He was suddenly annoyed with me.

“I don’t know. It’s not like I see demons every day.”

He considered my response. “That’s true.” The annoyance fell from his face.

“If you’re not an angel, what are you?”

“I am Nephilim,” he said. He ran a hand through his long blond hair, and threw his chest out with pride.

“What’s Nephilim?”

“Nephilim are forbidden love children, born of the union between angels and mortals. Half man, half angel.”

Now, I was floored. My mouth dropped open, but nothing came out.

A knowing smile blossomed on Harrison’s lips. “Thought you and Guy were the first, did ya? Far from it. Angels and mortals have been fallin’ in love for centuries.”

“Hello in there.” Suze was now standing just outside my bedroom door.

Harrison shot me a wary glance. “I’d better give her another dose before I go. No worries. The last thing she will remember is when you stepped outside with yer friend.”

He pulled open the bedroom door. “It’s all taken care of, ma’am. I’m leavin’ now. Forget I was ever here.”

There was a momentary pause as my mother looked into his eyes. “Yes,” she said softly, her voice coming from far away. Harrison pushed past her. I could hear his boots clomping down the stairs. The front door opened and closed. He was gone.

I looked at my mother standing in the doorway and mustered up a smile. “So, what’s for dinner?”

She held out her hand. “I’ll take that phone now.”And just that quickly, her mood had returned to where it was before the doorbell rang.

I sighed, and began crossing to my nightstand. “Whatever.”

“You smell gas?”

I froze. She was sniffing the air. “No!” I blurted, wondering if memories of Harrison entering our home would come flooding in. There is no way I would be able to explain to her what he was doing in my room.

She sniffed the air for several minutes. Satisfied there was no gas leak she asked: “What happened in here?” She was now surveying the mess the Ibwa had left on my bedroom floor.

Relief flooded my body like a slow does of adrenaline. This I could handle. “I was trying to fix my old computer,” I replied.

She seemed surprised. “You know how to do that?”

“Obviously not,” I responded, gesturing toward the mess.

For the first time all day a smile showed on her face. “It’s good having a daughter who’s smart. We’re having spaghetti for dinner. You can come down and help after you’ve cleaned up.”

With my phone in hand, she went down to the kitchen. I began picking up the mess on my floor, tossing the parts into my wastebasket.

By now, the Ibwa’s master knew he’d stolen the wrong book.
Pants On Fire
makes for a good read, but there weren’t many spells in it.

When Suze and I were cleaning up the grandfather’s clock we’d gotten at the garage sale, I discovered a secret drawer hidden in the top. One day while she was at work, I removed
The Book of Calls
from my old CPU and hid it in the clock. For some reason, I decided to put
Pants On Fire
in its place.

The Book of Calls
was still safe. For now. Of course that also meant I was still a target. To make matters worse, the half man, half angel who had been tracking the demon thought the demon had stolen the book from me. If a demon returned to harm me, Harrison might not come to my rescue. As far as he was concerned, I was no longer worth rescuing.

My thoughts turned to Guy.
Where are you?

#

Tuesday morning, my mother went to work. Normally, we’d dance around each other with sleep in our eyes as we took turns in the bathroom. We’d meet up again downstairs in the kitchen when we were fully awake. She’d be reading the morning paper while I rushed down a bagel and a glass of orange juice before heading off to the bus stop.

Tuesday when I woke up, I stayed in my room. I couldn’t bear to see the anger or disappointment that had been prevalent onSuze’s face.

“You up?” she called as she rapped gently on my door. It was after eight o’clock. Of course I was up.

“Uh-huh,” I replied, deliberately making my voice husky with sleep.

“Mind of I come in?” She was doing her best to keep her tone neutral.

“Nope.”

I had been seated at my desk, on my laptop, doing research on Nephilim when she knocked. Now I quickly hopped back into bed, scooting under the covers as if I’d been there all morning. She entered, looking nice in a stylish charcoal pants suit I don’t remember seeing before.

From the look of her, there were no tell-tale signs of all the drama she’d been through the day before. This was her game face, the way she wanted to appear to her coworkers, as though her life were a bed of roses.

“I’m going to stay a little late today since I was out yesterday.” She was looking at me as if I was a science project she was having the darnedest time making heads or tails of.

“Okay.” I yawned, stretching my arms above my head, and sat up.

“While I’m gone, you can start on that list.” Her eyes narrowed slightly, and I could tell she was bracing herself, waiting for me to launch into protest.

“Yup,” is all I said. No sense getting either of us worked up with an argument this early in the day. Besides, I already told her I wasn’t going to write the list betraying my fellow classmates.

“You plan on doing some school work today?”

I allowed myself a small smile. “I’m an AP student, Mom. You know how driven we are. No way I’m going to let myself fall behind.”

She nodded, shooting me a tiny smile. She crossed the room and planted an antiseptic kiss on my cheek. “Call me if you need anything.”

I opened my mouth to say
‘with what phone?’
But that would have been a knee-jerk reaction. We had a land line. Instead I said: “Yup.”

As soon as she was gone, I slipped into some sweats and went downstairs. I stood before the old grandfather clock in the entryway. It was a regal clock, with a cherry wood finish and a swan neck head piece at the top. I pulled open the glass door and pressed the button in the roof of the clock, releasing the secret drawer above the clock face. The drawer slid out with a soft
whoosh
.
The Book of Calls
was still in the drawer where I’d hidden it.

Breathing a soft sigh, I removed the book, turning it over in my hands. I felt a charge of energy coursing through my body as I recalled discovering the book in Armando’s library, and my life and death battle with Robin, who was guarding it.

Hard to believe this tiny leather bound book had caused so much pain in the world. But it had also ended my ordeal with the devil. This little book was the reason my mother was still alive. It is the reason I hadn’t been carted off to hell as Satan’s bride. It had saved us both from unimaginable horrors. But it had served its purpose. It was time for
The Book of Calls
to go bye-bye.

The pages of the book were crafted of dried parchment. The ancient paper was so old it felt as though it would crumble in my hands… which is exactly what I wanted to happen.

I grabbed a handful of the wafer thin pages and yanked, attempting to rip them from the spine. The pages didn’t budge, anchored as if by some form of super glue. I grasped one of the flimsy pages, and lifted the book by the page, allowing the weight of the book to weaken the page. Then I ripped the page in half—at least I tried to. But the page resisted.

That’s when I felt an energy emanating from the book, like a soft humming against the palm of my hand, my fingers vibrating ever so slightly.
A harmonic
, I thought. That’s what they call it in Physics when two things vibrate together, like wine glasses. I know, another piece of useless trivia. But one thing was clear, the book had a will of its own, and the 
harmonic
was the book trying to exercise that will. It had survived for centuries. It was not going to go down so easily. Not without a fight.

So, it’s a fight you’re looking for.

I dashed into the kitchen, threw the book on the counter and began rummaging around under the sink. I found the can of charcoal lighter fuel way in the back of the cabinet. We hadn’t used our grill in two years, ever since Suze realized grilling was bad for the environment, not to mention charcoal grilled meat was loaded with carcinogens.

I snatched up the book, grabbed a box of matches and headed out the back door. Our kettle grill stood on the side of the house next to a curl of garden hose, and a pile of dusty flower pots.

I pulled the lid off the grill, and threw the book onto the grate. A spray of dust splashed into the air. I doused the book with lighter fuel.
Nothing like a good fire to destroy a book from hell,
I thought.

I went back into the house and grabbed some old newspaper. Back outside I pulled pages from the paper, crumpling each before tossing it on top of the grill. I only stopped when I ran out of lighter fuel, but by then there was a mountain of smelly, drenched pages on top of the book.

I moved the grill away from the house. I had a hunch this fire was going to be a big one.
Don’t want to destroy my home along with The Book of Calls.

I stepped back, admiring my highly flammable handiwork and allowed myself a smile. “Bye bye,” I whispered. Then I struck a match and threw it on top of the mountain of newspaper pages.

The paper on top caught instantly.
Whoosh!
The flames danced across the crumpled pages, and began rising as the entire paper mountain burst into flame. Black smoke began billowing up from the grill.

WHOOSH!
The flames suddenly shot up higher, rising ten feet into the air.

“Oh, my!” I cried, certain one of my neighbors would see the fire and call the fire department. It dawned on me that this was what
The Book of Calls
wanted. It wanted someone to come and rescue it by putting out the fire. “It’s not gonna happen! At least not before you’re gone!” I hollered at the grill.

At that moment, as if in response to my threat, the grill began to vibrate. At first it was just a tremor, something that might happen when a large truck rolled down our street, but in seconds the grill was shaking like a jack hammer, hopping across the cement floor.

It’s trying to jump off the grill
, I thought.

Thinking quickly, I grabbed the domed cover and approached the grill. Flames were dancing wildly, as the grill hopped around, threatening to tumble over. I needed to get the cover on the grill to keep the book from jumping out of the fire. As I neared, the heat grew intense. The thought
do not try this at home, children. I am a professional
, popped into my head. Yeah, right.

Each time I got close, the flames snatched at my hands and the sleeves of my sweats. Yet after a few tries, I somehow managed to get the lid into place without setting myself on fire. Call it a miracle.