A Terrible Fall of Angels

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  “You went to school with my brother Mark, I’m Sam Cookson.”

  “You mean Mark Cookson? I didn’t even know he had a brother.”

  “We only became close recently,” he said with a smile that managed to be both charming and unsettling. Though that might have been me projecting.

  “I can see the family resemblance, but you’re definitely the cute brother,” Shelby said with a smile that she shouldn’t have been flashing at other men, especially in front of her almost-fiancé.

  “I don’t care who you are, offering to buy Shelby a ring is inappropriate,” her boyfriend said.

  “Inappropriate . . . well, I lost my bet,” Mark, alias Sam, Cookson said.

  “What bet?” the boyfriend asked.

  “That you’d know any five-syllable words and how to use them appropriately.”

  It took Boyfriend a second or two to catch on and then his face flushed. “Are you making fun of me?”

  “Would I do that?”

  Boyfriend frowned at him.

  Cookson ignored him and turned to Shelby. “Let me buy you the ring or anything else you desire.”

  “Back off,” the boyfriend said.

  Cookson kept staring at Shelby, as if the boyfriend hadn’t said anything. “Anything that money can buy, name it, and it will be yours.”

  “Anything?” she asked.

  “Shelby!” her boyfriend said.

  She smiled up at him. “Come on, sweetheart, you know I’m your girl. I’m just curious what he means when he says anything.”

  “I mean anything, Shelby. Pick any piece of jewelry in the shop and it’s yours.”

  She looked around the store like she was thinking about it.

  Boyfriend grabbed her shoulder and moved her to look at him. He stood between her and Cookson, blocking their view of each other and giving the other man his back. That let me know that her boyfriend was an athlete but not a fighter, or maybe he’d just been bigger and stronger all his life, so he felt secure. I knew size and strength weren’t everything in a fight, but then I’d fought it for real.

  “I thought you wanted me to buy you an engagement ring today,” he asked her.

  “I do,” she said.

  “Then stop screwing around and let’s pick out a ring.”

  “The lady deserves the best, and you can’t give her that,” Cookson said, his voice calm and very certain.

  The boyfriend whirled and yelled, “I can give her plenty!”

  Cookson laughed, and he was definitely laughing at the boyfriend.

  Apparently that open mocking laugh crossed a line for Shelby, because she stood up, wrapping her arms around the boyfriend’s waist from behind. “Don’t get mad, honey, it’s you I want to spend the rest of my life with, not him, no matter how cute he is.”

  Boyfriend smiled and turned in her arms so they could kiss. “I love you, babe.”

  “I love you, too,” she said, and seemed to mean it.

  “Are you sure that’s your choice?” Cookson asked.

  I almost wished I could have told Shelby to lie and choose Cookson until my backup arrived, but I couldn’t think of a way to tell her, or to keep her boyfriend from losing his temper if she did.

  At least the uniforms should have been here by now. I prayed for help to save everyone in the shop and to make sure that demon or human, Cookson never hurt anyone else again. Warmth breathed through me and voices like an unfelt wind whispered, “Angelus Lucis.”

  I almost said yes out loud, then realized the angels weren’t calling me by my title, they were reminding me what I was, and what that could mean, if I would allow myself to embrace my truth instead of hiding from it.

  Cookson sniffed the air like a dog on a scent. “Better get busy before the other side gets their wings under them.” He didn’t know it was me that smelled of angels, he just thought the angels were coming for him. Good.

  The saleswoman said, “What’s happening?”

  I focused and I could see everyone’s Guardian Angels at their backs. They were all soft shining light except for Cookson’s. It hurt me to see his angel tortured and dimmed at his back. I’d never seen a Guardian Angel that needed its own rescue more than it needed to rescue its person.

  For the first time in years, I broke the rule that the Angeli Lucis are forbidden to break: I didn’t just give the Guardians permission to help their people—I told the elder salesman’s angel to take him and the saleswoman to the back room. We weren’t allowed to dictate to people’s angels, because that interfered with the human’s free will. Most, even among the Angeli Lucis, couldn’t command an angel to do anything, but I could.

  “Come, daughter, let us give them room to decide these things.” I was betting if anyone had asked the elderly jeweler what things they were leaving their customers to decide, he wouldn’t have been able to answer the question, but I didn’t care, I just wanted them safe.

  He held out his hand and his daughter went to him, looking at us as if she knew something was wrong, but she wasn’t sure what.

  “Angels, angels, why do you care about the jeweler and his daughter?” Cookson asked, watching them go toward the back door. He still wasn’t talking to me, but to the air, to the listening angels.

  “Let’s go, babe, we can pick the ring another day,” the boyfriend said, trying to lead her toward the front door.

  “Oh no, boyfriend, you don’t get to take Shelby away from me.”

  “What do you mean, take her away from you?” He looked at Shelby. “You didn’t fuck him, please tell me you didn’t.”

  “No, I promised you I wouldn’t sleep around, and I haven’t. I don’t even know this guy,” Shelby said.

  “Get the hell out of our way,” the boyfriend said.

  “No,” Cookson said. The angel trapped at his back opened its misshapen mouth and wailed soundlessly to the other people in the room, but the sound stabbed through me like a spear to my heart. I put a hand out and caught myself on the glass display cabinets. If Cookson’s human body died, the angel would be free to go back to the light of God. He would cleanse it and make it whole again, but first Cookson had to die.

  “I won’t leave you,” I said to the angel. I didn’t realize I’d said it out loud until Cookson spoke.

  “Shelby, you must be even more special than Mark told me for a stranger to stay and risk his life for you.”

  “I wasn’t talking to Shelby,” I said, and drew my gun underneath the oversized tank top.

  CHAPTER FORTY-THREE

  Police, don’t move,” I said, and I sounded like Detective Zaniel Havelock—Hank and his flirting and ring searching were gone. But for the first time since I’d become a cop, I was also Zaniel the Angelus Dictum, and Angelus Lucis. I was a light against the darkness, but this time I had a gun.

  “Wait, we know that voice,” Cookson said. He started to look back.

  “Hands on your head, lace your fingers together.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “I will shoot you in the head if you move. You won’t survive that.”

  The demon laughed, the sound of it echoing so that the hair on my arms rose in goose bumps from the sound. “I won’t die.”

  “Mark Cookson’s body will, and that sends you back to Hell,” I said.

  The demon laughed again. “You still don’t understand what we are, do you?”

  “I know you’re a demon and he’s a college student who thought you’d give him his heart’s desire for the use of his body.”

  “Well, you aren’t wrong as far as that goes,” Cookson said.

  “Demon, what do you mean, demon? What are you talking about?” the boyfriend asked.

  Shelby was pulling him farther away from Cookson. She looked frightened. I don’t know what Cookson’s face looked like because all I could see was the back of his head, but she was seeing something that made her want them both out of his reach. I approved, one less thing to worry about. Where was my backup?

  “Lace your fin
gers on top of your head, now,” I said.

  “And if I don’t, are you really going to shoot me in the head for just standing here with my hands raised? Will you honestly shoot me, kill me, just because I won’t follow every order to the letter? You’re a good man, Detective. Good men don’t shoot unarmed civilians in the head when their arms are raised in the air.”

  “I will not let you hurt anyone else,” I said, holding the Sig Sauer P238 in a steady one-handed grip aimed at the back of his head. The gun was so small in my hand that a standard two-handed grip was awkward.

  “A bad cop that doesn’t want to spend the rest of his life in jail doesn’t shoot unarmed civilians, even murderers, when he’s on security camera,” Cookson said.

  I glanced up and there it was: a camera angled exactly right to see me shoot someone that looked human. If I shot him before he did something threatening, and he died, losing my career was the least of my worries.

  “I can smell your hesitation, Detective—Havoc, wasn’t that what they called you at the hospital?”

  I ignored him and said, “Shelby, take your boyfriend and stay as far across the room from us as you can; do not let him grab you, but go out the front door. There should be uniformed cops out there in a marked car.”

  “I won’t let them leave,” Cookson said with his hands raised at the elbow as if he were doing the minimum to look cooperative. Most security cameras didn’t have sound, or not good sound, so his hands up were clearly visible; me yelling for him to lace his fingers might not be clear in the video. It would look like I shot him after he gave up. Heaven help me, but I needed him to look dangerous on the security tape before I fired.

  “I won’t let you hurt them,” I said. I nodded at Shelby and she took her boyfriend as far from us as the glass jewelry cases on the other side would allow.

  “Unless you have a major holy relic on you, Detective Havoc, you can’t stop me.”

  “A holy object will be enough,” I said, still staring at the back of his well-cut hair. My gun was still pointed, one-handed and steady.

  Shelby and her beau were moving slowly along the far display cases toward the door.

  “I’m not a vampire, Detective; you can’t chase me away with crosses.”

  “Not that kind of holy object,” I said.

  “Ankh, pentagram, Star of David, throw the Qur’an at me, it’s all the same and all just as useless against me now.”

  I thought about what he’d said, against him now. What did he mean by that?

  “Don’t lose your nerve, Shelby,” Cookson said.

  My gaze flicked to them but didn’t actually look away from the man I was aiming at, so it was hard for me to judge what he was talking to her about.

  “If you run for the door, I will stop you,” Cookson said.

  “Just move slow,” I said, “don’t run. Demons are like big cats, you run, and they will chase you.”

  “He doesn’t look like a demon,” she said, but her voice was strained thin. Cookson was right, her nerve was failing; she was going to make a break for the door soon unless she regained control of herself.

  “He’s possessed Mark Cookson’s body,” I said.

  “It was a fixer-upper,” Cookson said, “but I’ve done wonders with it, don’t you think, Shelby?”

  “Ye . . . yes,” she almost stuttered.

  “What’s your boyfriend’s name?” I asked.

  “Jeff, my name’s Jeff.”

  “Keep her calm, Jeff, go slow for the door.”

  “I won’t let them leave, Detective, you know that.”

  “How are you going to stop us?” Jeff asked.

  “I’m going to kill you, Jeff. I’m going to kill you both.”

  “I won’t let that happen,” I said.

  “How will you protect them from me after you’re dead?”

  “You won’t kill me,” I said.

  “Oh, I think I will.”

  “I know you won’t,” I said.

  “Cocky, I like that in a victim. It’s always the confident ones that beg the most at the end.”

  I was fighting so my hand didn’t start to shake with the gun held out and aimed. I was either going to have to lower it, change hands, or change to a two-handed grip. I’d wanted to keep one hand free just in case, because I’d shot him in the hospital and hadn’t killed him; of course I hadn’t tried shooting him in the head point-blank, but guns were never the first choice for demon fighting.

  Cookson looked completely human now; I was hoping that meant his body was more bullet friendly, but I’d have to shoot him to find out.

  “They are too close to the door, Detective. I will not allow them to leave.”

  “Are you sure that Mark Cookson’s head is bulletproof?”

  “Yes,” he said.

  “A hundred percent bulletproof, you’re absolutely sure of that?”

  “Yes.” But he sounded a little less certain.

  “Because if he dies then you go back to Hell.”

  “He’ll go with me.”

  “He’ll probably go to Hell, but he won’t be in the same section as a demon that disobeyed the laws of Hell,” I said.

  “I have acted within the parameters of the clauses in the treaty that pertain to my kind.”

  “You mean the treaty between Heaven and Hell?” I asked.

  “What other treaty is there for my kind?”

  I couldn’t argue that, so I said, “A little angel told me that you’ve been doing things that aren’t allowed.”

  “Heaven is always pissy, but no one in Hell is upset with me, and since that is where I will eventually be cast back into, that is all that matters to me. Heaven can go fuck itself, for I will never see inside its pearly gates.”

  I couldn’t argue that with him, so I didn’t try.

  “Shelby, don’t!” Jeff yelled.

  The demon turned in a blur of speed that no human could match. I pulled the trigger and he’d been so busy turning, he hadn’t tried to dodge the bullet. The bullet hit his shoulder, turning him; he reacted like a human being that had never been shot before, hesitating to act, so that I had time to aim at the back of his head and pull the trigger again. He collapsed face forward to the floor. He didn’t try to catch himself. He just fell. I kept the gun pointed at the body just in case he hopped up and went Just fooling! But as the seconds ticked by, I began to breathe again. Maybe Cookson and his demon weren’t faster than a speeding bullet after all.

  Shelby was screaming, and there were men shouting that I could barely hear through the ringing in my ears from shooting the gun without ear protection inside. I moved so my back was to the display cases and I could see the body on the ground and the uniformed officers coming through the door. My backup was here, not exactly in the nick of time, but I’d take it. I raised my shirt to flash my badge and I identified myself as the detective they were supposed to be backing up.

  CHAPTER FORTY-FOUR

  Cookson’s body lay facedown, one arm caught underneath it, the other flung to the side, the legs at odd angles that no actor ever manages on TV. A dead body just falls differently even from an unconscious one, and yet I didn’t believe it. The demon had taken a lot more bullets than this at the hospital and it had barely fazed it. There was blood around the head and shoulder, but not enough. At close range the nine-millimeter bullet should have blown out the other side of the head. There just wasn’t enough damage, but . . . the body lay like it was dead, and then I realized I had a way to be certain without getting close enough to check for a pulse. I tried to see the angel at his back, and it was still there, trapped and screaming for help like someone half trapped in quicksand. Cookson was still alive, or his angel would have been free to escape back to Heaven.

  One uniform wanted to check the body, but I said, “He’s alive.” I might have yelled it accidentally as my ears stopped ringing.

  “Ambulance is on its way, but shouldn’t we stop the bleeding or something?” Officer Stevens asked.

 
“Demonic possession, stay clear until we have a priest or a witch to check it for us.”

  He went a little paler than his natural skin color, which was damn near pasty. You didn’t meet that many people out here on the West Coast who looked like they’d spent the nonexistent winter indoors. He was probably from back east somewhere. Once I was sure that Mark Cookson wouldn’t get up and kill everyone, including us, I’d ask Stevens about his background and see if my guess was right.

  He moved up beside me and aimed his gun at the body, which meant this probably wasn’t his first demonic rodeo. His partner, whose name I didn’t catch, took Shelby and Jeff out the front of the shop and to the sunny day that was still outside waiting.

  I’d switched to a two-handed grip at last; I could hold that for a lot longer than the one-handed grip I’d had earlier. I kept my gun aimed at Cookson and waited. His angel screamed and writhed, trying to get away. I let myself lean against the glass cases as the sound of its pain stabbed through me.

  “I will save you,” I whispered. The angel quieted as it lay trapped on Cookson. Killing him would free the angel once and for all, but if bullets wouldn’t do it, what would?

  The “body” twitched, then groaned, and the ringing in my ears had died down enough that I heard it. The uniformed officer jumped and said, “Jesus, I hate supernatural cases, you never know what’s going on.”

  “You get used to it,” I said.

  The body groaned again, and moved more like it was waking up than injured. The voice was thick and sounded wrong, but the words were clear enough. “That hurt more than expected, but as I said bullets cannot kill Mark now.”

  Stevens hit his shoulder microphone and was calling for more backup. “. . . and we need a priest, we’ve got a full-on possession.”

  Cookson laughed, but it sounded like he was having trouble clearing some of the blood out of somewhere. “I am beyond priests.” He started to get to his knees.

  “Stay on your knees,” I said.

  “Hands behind your head,” the uniform said.

  “Or what, you’ll shoot me again?”

  “You said it hurt, we could just keep shooting you until the priest arrives.”