The Seer's Lover (The Seven Archangels Series) (33 page)

Calise held her breath.

“Don’t worry. I’m not leaving you. Not now.”

She exhaled. “Maybe we could all go in a few weeks?” she offered.

“You can’t
go
anywhere. It’s way too dangerous. Michael
must
remain hidden,” her mother said.

He nodded. “I agree with your mother. Carmen has handled everything down there without me for many years. She’ll figure out what to do.”

“What about your family’s artifacts? Can she move them somewhere safe if Alejandro isn’t around to protect them?” Calise said. Extreme exhaustion hit her hard.

He sighed. “I hid them with Alejandro. Carmen doesn’t know where they are.”

Her mother got between the two of them. “You can go, Lucas. This sounds important. I won’t let anything happen here. Ellen and I will stay with Calise twenty-four seven. Even I understand the importance of safeguarding your family’s artifacts.”

He came to Calise’s side and knelt beside the bed.

She started crying all over again. “Please don’t go, Lucas. I need you here. Michael and I need you here.”

“I’ll do whatever you want, Cali.” His hoarse voice wavered.

She watched her mom cradle the new life. She thought about Ellen and then grasped the necklace Lucas had given her like she’d seen him do a hundred times. A small shard of wood contained in glass had intertwined their lives. “I’ll be fine. This is bigger than just you and me. When will you leave and how long will you be gone?” She was starting to do that highly unattractive lip quiver where her whole face turned a blotchy red.

“I’ll leave tonight and be back before you two come home from the hospital. I’m going to protect us and find a way to keep us safe. Don’t you understand? I don’t want to have regrets—regrets that haunt me. I want to spend time with you and Michael in peace, so he can really get to
know
who we are. I don’t want to live in constant fear and hiding. I want the three of us not just to be
in
each other’s lives, but to be a part of each other’s souls.

"Time passes so quickly and I know my father had so many regrets on his death bed, too late. We worked constantly to ward off evil and escape danger, but in doing so we sacrificed bathing in each other’s goodness and cherishing the times where we were afforded a bit of safety. I will not do that with you and Michael.

“We will make each other a priority above all else. Work, commitments, friends, and life’s headaches will be waiting for me tomorrow. Today and forever, I want to love you. Both of you.”

He kissed her and held her while she cried.

Her mom brought Michael and handed him to Lucas. “I’m going to find your father and give you two some privacy. After that, I’m going home to pack a bag so I can be by your side until Lucas returns.” She smiled and Calise saw the angel within her that had always been there. Maybe her love for her family overshadowed her angelic duties, but the angel was always right there, and now Calise could really see her.

“I love you, Mom,” she called.

“I love you, too.” She shut the door behind her without a sound.

He called the airport and booked the next flight out. They had precious little time together as a family. He crawled in bed with her, and they adored Michael.

She yawned. “Have the nurse bring in one of those bassinets for the room. I’m not letting him out of my sight.”

“No problem. I have to go.” He cradled her face in his hands then ran his fingers down her cheeks. “You are so beautiful and so strong. Thank you for this precious gift, our son. Oops, I almost forgot.”

He fished around in his jeans to remove a box—small, black, and velvet. He knelt by her bedside on one knee and snapped open the box. “Calise Rowe, I love you and refuse to imagine even one day of my life without you, or Michael. I was going to ask you last night, but… Will you marry me?”

Her life had been so orthodox and boring until she met Lucas. With him, she had been brought to life, and found love worth fighting for as well as the strength to be strong for things that were more important than herself. Her childhood selfishness turned to selflessness. Lucas and Michael were the most important things in her life. Her whole body flushed with warmth at the love she felt for them both.
I’m a mother and soon to be a wife.

“Of course, Lucas.
Te amo.”

****

Her mom called. She was on her way back to the hospital. Ellen had requested that three angels come as soon as possible and guard the door at all times. Lucas kissed them both and left, promising to send in a nurse with a bassinet so she could get some sleep when her mom returned.

Calise snuggled with her baby boy. He was utter perfection. His breathing came in soft, adorable pants and she reveled at the miracle of all his working parts. His eyes blinked slowly open and she could see Lucas splashing in the surf in his ocean blue eyes. She rubbed at a bit of redness between his eyebrows. She licked her finger but it remained. He had a small angel’s kiss birthmark. How fitting. She lifted him to her and inhaled his scent. He smelled like lavender and powder. He squeezed her pinky finger and they stared into each other’s eyes. His skin was so smooth and new that it felt like cashmere. She stowed him snugly under the crook of her left arm and let the peace of the moment consume her.

So this is how it feels.

The bond between them was strong and immediate. She counted his perfect fingers and toes knowing she would do anything to protect him for the rest of his life. He completed her in every way and she ticked off in her head all the things she needed to teach him.

Trust.

Honesty.

Wait, is that inbred in angels?

Sense of humor.

Love of adventure.

Someone knocked softly on the door. She clutched Michael to her chest. “Who is it?”

“It’s the nurse with the bassinet you asked for. Is this a good time?”

“Sure.” But her mind panged with something familiar.
That voice.

When the door opened, Nara’s aura entered the room before she did. Black wisps of ice cold smoke jutted out like fingers reaching out and paralyzing Calise.

She opened her mouth to scream and found everything frozen. She couldn’t move. Fear radiated through her and every hair on her body stood at attention trying in vain to help. Pressure on her chest allowed breathing only in the form of quick intakes.

“Hey, Calise. Long time no see. Hm, hm, hmm. What have we here?” She snapped them into darkness and her blood red eyes closed in on Calise as every sympathetic synapse in her body fired to move. To no avail. Still paralyzed.

Nara inched forward and turned her attention to Michael.

Calise’s brain screamed, “NO!”

“Ah. An angel for the seers, huh?” The lights returned. “He’s cute. Your sister-in-law will enjoy torturing him, I’m sure of it.”

Calise must have heard her wrong.

“Oh yeah, did you know? Liza is a demon. She works for me. If I kill you now, Shane will know it was me. But don’t worry, I’ll get to you. Right now, I want to hurt your boyfriend. Did he tell you he killed my mother? Well, you can tell him that the next time he sees his son, his son will be a fallen angel hunting seers alongside
me
.”

Understanding flooded through Calise. Squeezing her eyes shut, she saw Liza as the demon she always was, enjoying the daily torture of Dean and her own child. What did Nara mean, Liza worked for her?

Nara pried Michael out of her arms as tears streamed down her cheeks. Nara took her baby with Calise powerless to do anything to stop her.

“This is your punishment for Shane. If you do so much as cough near him ever again, I’ll kill Lucas. Don’t cross me. I don’t lose. Say bye-bye to mommy.” Nara picked up one of Michael’s arms and roughly waved it at her.

Calise was so far beyond pain. Her brain and body were being crushed.

“You must be exhausted, dear. You need some sleep. Nighty-night.”

Calise managed to utter one word, in a whisper of a breath. “No…”

Then Nara opened the door and disappeared.

Calise, overtaken by her power, fell asleep.

Chapter 32

Mitchell Airport Detention Room

Milwaukee, Wisconsin

“Long time no see, Lucas.” Shane stripped away his disguise, peeling off his wig and ripping off a dark moustache.

Lucas tugged at the ropes binding his arms. “Haven’t we been through this before,
transitor?”
Lucas was in no mood to play to Shane’s fantasies. When human airport security escorted him to a detention room to “ask him a few questions,” he’d followed. But the transitor had been lying in wait.

Shane circled him with a smile playing on the corners of his mouth. “Yes, but this time,
I’m
in control. I know Calise had your baby and still you decide to leave her alone, unprotected? You’re a fool. Did I really sound that much like your aunt?” Shane stopped in front of him and rested his hands on Lucas’s knees, looking down on him, like a parent chastising a child.

Inside, Lucas wavered. This was all a trick? Maybe by leaving Calise, he had left his family vulnerable just like he’d done with his father. He couldn’t show Shane his fear. He sniffed, “You’re so right,
Shane
. She does need to be protected from her stalker ex-boyfriend. But don’t worry, she’s in good hands.”

Shane pulled Lucas’s head up by the hair. “You think? Nara just abducted your newborn under everyone’s nose and is heading out of the country with
it
. Exactly whose ‘good hands’ do you think she’s in? Wait, her mom? She barely remembers what it’s like to be an angel. Ellen? She’s too goody-two-shoes to suspect anything. You left her.
Alone
. You are responsible for yet another family tragedy. Your mother, your father, your girlfriend and your baby. Now this baby is gone because of your mistakes, too.” Shane inhaled and raised a finger. “But there is
one
person who’s willing to help her. One person who’s never abandoned her. Me. You’re going to tell her good-bye and to trust only me, for help.”

Lucas bucked in his chair and gritted his teeth. “Never!”

“Well, whether you want to hear it or not, it’s time to pick sides for the big finale. The end is coming, and I need to get back on the good side, and Calise is going to help me. What do think of this? You dump her, I ‘try’ to save her baby from Nara, but don’t. I kill Nara, then with you and your bastard child gone, Calise helps me ascend, and we raise
my
child together. I have the girl, the baby, and wait for the other six archangels to be called up so I can fight, like the hero I am, in the apocalypse.”

Fucking lunatic.
Lucas was powerless. Would Cali buy this asshole’s bullshit? His nails drew blood clenching his fists, picturing Nara wrenching his child from Cali’s arms.
If this is true, and Nara abducted my baby…
His mind reeled from the series of events transpiring since Michael’s birth a few hours ago. He would never forgive himself if anything happened to Michael, and Cali might never forgive him. It would destroy them. He swallowed the lump of rage that filled him with hatred.

“I’ll be back,
seer
, but I have some acquaintances who’d like to ask you a few questions. Be cooperative. I could really use those artifacts right now. Maybe if you play nice, I’ll let your child live.” With a smugness that made Lucas seethe, the transitor left the detention room.

Three demons entered the room, flashing their razor sharp teeth.

“Where are the artifacts hidden, seer
?
” one stocky, black-toothed demon asked.

“I’m sure I have no idea what you are talking about,” he answered.

The room was bitter cold, and Lucas saw his own breath when he exhaled. He shivered, being dressed in a t-shirt and shorts anticipating smothering heat upon his arrival in Costa Rica. The aura of the three demons together in the room dropped the temperature by forty-five degrees.

The second demon was a beast of a woman with cropped hair and multiple piercings. She stepped forward and landed a right cross to Lucas’s jaw.

After a flash of white light, his whole head rang.

“We have all the time in the world to beat answers out of you. Take your time. Now that we have you, our boss will be very patient.”

Cali and my newborn baby boy.
He never should have gotten involved with her because now, more was on the line than his own worthless life.

He did the only thing he could think of to do—pray
.

****

Calise struggled to wake up out of her nightmare. Something began rocking her gently, as if she was on a boat. She half-opened her eyes, feeling completely numb.

“Hey, baby sister. Wake up, sleepy head. It’s Dean. I came to catch a glimpse of the new addition to the family. Did they take him to the nursery?”

She snatched her brother’s arms to try to pull herself up while she wildly searched the room.
It wasn’t a dream.

Nara kidnapped my baby.

Frantic, she screamed at the top of her lungs, “HELP!”

He stepped back.

“Dean get help, now! A woman came in here and took my baby! She has Michael and says your wife Liza works for her and tortures babies!”

Her brother didn’t react. He pressed on her shoulders when she tried to get out of bed. “Relax. You must have that postmortem or postpartum thing. This place is secure. I could barely get in to see you. Sit tight; they probably took him to the nursery because you fell asleep and then had a bad dream. I’ll go out and get him and talk to the nurses.”

Her whole body was drained of energy. She couldn’t get enough air. Her mind was foggy, but she knew what had happened. The demon, Nara had kidnapped her baby. “Hurry!” Calise begged.

****

Although it hurt to take a deep breath, Lucas struggled anyway. Each inhalation produced a sharp pain in his chest. His head pounded and even footsteps and the drone of voices outside the room pierced his head like jagged rocks. Shane reappeared through the door, looking pleased by Lucas’s distress. He questioned his posse, “Any answers from the seer?”

They shook their heads, but Lucas figured they weren’t the type to be easily deterred. This could go on indefinitely even though he didn’t know how much more he could take.