Gus let out a heavy sigh. “I made her orgasm, and you made her cry. This is why you’ve spent the last few millennia alone, Brother.” He’d rolled onto his side, so he could watch us both, looking perfectly contented. “Now we’ll have to make her cum again, just to dry her tears.”
Memphis grinned down at me. I hoped Blue had headphones.
Chapter Nineteen
“Get dressed. I’m long overdue to rip off the Band-Aid.”
So much for angelic protection. Gus and Memphis were still sound asleep, a mash of legs, arms and wings that was as beautiful as it was hilarious.
Gusion opened a groggy eye, and rolled over, slapping Memphis in the face with one white wing. Memphis groaned, reaching out a long, muscular arm and shoving Gusion all the way to the other side of the bed. Maybe I was going to need a bigger bed if this was going to become a regular sleeping arrangement. I paused at the thought. Did I want it to become a regular arrangement?
Everything south of my naval screamed a huge, resounding yes. I was still walking on Jell-O legs, even after a long, hot shower. Last night had been crazy. Crazy wonderful. Crazy pleasurable. Crazy scary. Because I’d let go and just lived in the moment. I got a brief flash of just before dawn, where Memphis woke me up to thoroughly make love to me, the easy rhythm of his movements winding me up until my muffled moans woke Gus. He’d watched me come apart in Memphis’ arms, and it was so freaking hot I was probably going to self-combust thinking about it.
Gus’ hooded gaze told me he knew the nature of my thoughts, so I gave him a quick grin and left the room before I ended up back in bed.
I needed to do something before this whole thing changed me forever. I had an errand that only the Old Hope could complete. I’d do it myself, except I didn’t think the guys would let me out of the house without a full contingent of bodyguards.
My steps faltered when Blue was in the kitchen, drinking coffee out of Adnan’s favorite mug. I sucked in a huge, fortifying breath, and stepped into the kitchen.
“Good morning,” I said, trying not to sound too upbeat, or like a person who’d just engaged in an all-night ménage with two ridiculously hot, and talented, Fallen Angels.
I wasn’t sure exactly what that would sound like, but I did my best. Maybe I would be lucky, and he’d slept like a log and was completely oblivious to our midnight shenanigans. Maybe he went out, and I didn’t notice. I mean, he wasn’t a prisoner here. It was completely plausible.
He mumbled something, but didn’t meet my eyes.
Okay, so maybe oblivion had been too much to ask for. “I have to run an errand today, out to the suburbs. I think I’ll be fine, if you don’t want to come.”
This time, he lifted his eyes to mine, and I winced at his expression. Completely neutral. Not a hint of how he felt, like a perfect Blue Halloran mask, looking like the killer he’d been the first time he’d stepped into my hospital room. I hadn’t realized how far he’d come until that moment. Like it had been such a slow, gradual thing, like your hair growing, or the five pounds you put on over the holiday season. Even after he’d returned after our fight, he hadn’t reverted back to this Blue. Murderer Blue. Dead inside Blue.
“Look-” I started, but Blue stopped me with a look.
“None of my business,” he cut me off. “I’m your bodyguard, not your chaperone. Your attack dog on a leash, nothing more.”
Why did those words make my soul hurt?
“That's not true.”
Now emotion crept into his expression. Anger. Hurt. Why? Apparently, self-delusion didn't sit well with me. I knew why.
“You like me.” It was a statement, not a question. I could feel it in the betrayal that was wafting from him like acid.
He just stared. He didn’t need to verbalize it. We both knew that I knew.
“Do you like the idea of me, the Princess on the Mulligan pedestal? Do you see this playing out as some kind of Aladdin story where the street kid makes good? Or do you actually see me?” The words were harsh, but I needed to know. I was already knee deep in someone else’s unholy redemption, I didn’t need a second. I just wanted someone to want me for me, not for what I represented. He stayed stubbornly silent.
“Answer me!”
He took a menacing step forward, and grabbed my arms, pulling me into his body until we were nose to nose. Then he kissed me.
Blue’s shields weren’t as good as Gus and Memphis’, so the moment his lips touched mine, I got everything. Thoughts. Feelings. He was a swirling vortex of lust, and self-loathing. He was on his third cup of coffee because he’d stayed up all night, hard as a rock, listening to the Fallen Angels making me cum time after time.
What am I doing? Last night she was kissing angels. How can I compete with fucking angels? Is she comparing us now, judging my technique with theirs? I should pull away. Cut my losses. I’ll go back to the Mulligans, get them to change my job. Tell them I have feelings for her. They’ll send me across the fucking ocean to get me away from her. God, she tastes good. So soft. That noise. Fuck, I’m so hard right now.
He nudged me back into the bench, his hands drifting down to my ass, kneading gently.
I’ll make this moment count. Never again. I wanted to answer his thoughts, but I’d learned from my mistakes. But I wasn’t comparing. I could barely remember to breathe let alone do a complete analysis, so I kissed him harder. I let my fingers run through his short soft hair. Maybe I could pour my assurances through his lips. He lifted me onto the kitchen bench and I wrapped my legs around his waist. I felt the solid length of him against my core, and moaned gently. I knew he wouldn’t let it get that far though. His doubt was a dark thread of emotion in his mind, even as he lost himself in the kiss. I felt his shoulders tense as he prepared to pull away. I let him.
“I don’t want you to go,” I said quietly, gauging his reaction from beneath my lashes. Now we weren’t touching, I wasn’t privy to his thoughts, but I could see the indecision in his eyes. Finally, he nodded once and left the room.
Gusion walked into the room, his face solemn for a change. Stepping between my thighs as I sat on the bench, he looked down at me, his gaze measured but he remained silent. I rested my forehead against the steady thump of his heart.
“What happens in the future?” I asked, not lifting my eyes to his. Asking felt like cheating, but I wanted — no, needed — to know.
“I have three more cups of coffee before I can even feel remotely alive. Memphis has a pastrami and swiss on rye for lunch. Blue Halloran falls in love with you, but you knew that already, didn’t you?”
All the breath left my body.
I walked past the white minivan parked in the driveway. The grass along the edges of the pathway was a little overgrown, and the sight made a lump form in my throat. I stepped over a bright yellow toy truck, and if I’d been the Hope from before, I would have jumped down the hopscotch grid that looked like it had been painted on the footpath a decade ago. It probably had.
But I wasn’t in a hopping mood. I walked up the porch steps, and knocked on the screen door, my heart in my throat.
A young woman, still in her teens, opened the door, a fussing toddler on her hip. Her mouth swung open and her eyes narrowed. “What are you doing here? You are a month too late. Dad’s funeral came and went without even a card from you. Turn around and go back to your Manhattan tower, Princess.”
Each word was a stab through my heart. She meant each one too. In that moment, she hated me. It rolled off her in thick, dark waves. But beneath it was overwhelming, shuddering grief and that was an emotion I could relate to. Not even the looming presence of Gusion and Memphis eased her hatred.
Claudette, JJ’s teenage daughter, stared me down with pure wrath.
“I’m sorry.” I was more than sorry. I should have come to see my former bodyguards family sooner. He was my friend. They’d treated me like family and I’d abandoned them when my presence was needed the most. The baby on Claudette’s hip began to fuss more, and my eyes
dragged to his little face.
Claudette had gotten accidentally pregnant at sixteen, a fact that had stressed JJ out so bad, he went grey almost overnight. But he was nothing but supportive to Claudette, reassuring her that despite her mistakes, he loved her and he would love the baby. Claudette had adored her father, so I understood the malice she was throwing my way. I deserved it. Now John James Junior would never know his granddaddy, and Claudette had lost the one person who had her back at all times.
“Who’s at the door?” A voice yelled from inside the house.
“A ghost,” Claudette yelled back, her nose scrunched up in a sneer.
A second figure appeared in the doorway. Marinette was small and delicate, more like a doll than a woman who would be married to a former spec-ops marine. Her light voice was made even more sweet by her slight French accent. I took one look at her, and burst into tears.
“I’m so sorry,” I said between sobbing breaths. Marinette strode forward, bending me so somehow, until I was crying on her shoulder. She whispered to me in French, platitudes that I knew because Valery would murmur the same words when I was little and scraped my knee.
“It’s all my fault, and I wasn’t even here.” The words were garbled by tears.
“Tsch, it is okay. JJ, he knew. He knew every day when he got out of bed to go to work, that there was a chance he would not come home. It has been that way since he was a young man. It is not your fault, ma petite. I have been prepared for him to die in the line of duty since he joined the military.” Claudette made a disgusted noise, and strode back in the house. Marinette sent an exasperated but sympathetic look at the retreating back of her daughter. “Will you come in?”
I shook my head. I wanted to, but I couldn't. I couldn’t face her empathetic face, her understanding. I needed her anger. Her accusations that it was my fault. It was my fault. And in the end, JJ’s death had been for absolutely nothing. “I can’t.”
Marinette nodded. “We all need time to grieve, and you, you have had a pain worse than anything these last months. You always have a sympathetic ear here, ma petite. JJ, he thought of you as a third daughter. You are family.”
Her words made me sob harder. Gusion put a supportive arm around my waist, making Marinette smile. “It looks like you are in good hands.” She leaned forward, her eyes sparkling. She fanned her face and made a high pitch whistle, making me smile through my tears.
I reached out, grabbing her hand and wrapping it in mine.
“Do you need anything? The girls? JJ Junior?”
Marinette shook her head. “No, child. You Papa’s been around, set everything up. Made up some lie about a pension fund that JJ was supposed to get and now shifted to his widow. I am not silly, the only person who gets a pension that size, is the President, no? But I will take it, for the girls, and Junior.”
“Lux came here?”
Marionette nodded. “Oui. And Tolliver. And Sam. Also, the handsome French one brought us a ratatouille that reminded me of home. Your Daddy came and hugged me so tight I thought my bones would crack. He felt JJ’s loss. He told me what you looked like in the hospital. If my husband had any regrets, it would be that he could not have saved you from that pain.”
A tear slid down Marinette’s cheek then, and I was lost. Gus reached out a hand, catching the teardrop on his finger.
Memphis crossed his arm across his chest, his right hand fisted over his heart. He bowed low at the waist. Marinette stared at my dark angel, a little awed. Memphis had that effect. “Thank you,” he said solemnly. Marinette merely inclined her head. I wiped my tears on my arm and reached out to hug the beautiful French woman one more time.
“You need anything, anything at all, you call me? I owe you everything,” I mumbled. She patted my back soothingly.
I said my goodbyes, and we left. I slid into the back of my Tesla. Memphis and Gusion together in my small car was almost laughable. Even with the seats all the way back, it was like a clown car.
“Where to?” Gusion asked from the driver's seat.
I stared out the window as we pulled away from the curb. I memorized the house, the shape of Marinette in the doorway, the face of Claudette in the upstairs window staring daggers at me. I pictured JJ on the porch with Marinette like he had been so many times before. I memorized it, because I knew I wouldn’t be back. Despite Marinette's assurances, I would forever be a scab that wouldn’t heal. Sometimes a clean break was better.
I sat in the back and let the tears flow easily. They were cathartic. Sometimes tears were the only way to cleanse wounds to the soul.
“Hope?” Memphis prompted.
“I need something deep fried and smothered in chocolate.”
Gusion’s golden eyes met mine in the rearview mirror. “My specialty, Sweetheart.”
I gave him a tentative smile. “I thought your specialty was sex and sin?”
He grinned, and I wished I could take a picture of his face in that moment. It was like sunshine in a thunderstorm. “It is, Princess, and it’s even better with chocolate sauce.”
Chapter Twenty
We were in the elevator when Memphis’ phone rang. This was surprising for two reasons. One, I didn’t realize either Angel had a smartphone. Memphis muttered about new technology when he was driving my car, or trying to figure out the microwave. The idea of him having a state-of-the-art cellphone was a little amazing, frankly.
The second reason it was surprising was because the name on the screen read ‘Luc’.
“They have cell reception in Hell?” I mouthed at Gusion. He rolled his eyes, but the corners were crinkled in amusement.
“He’s in Mexico,” he whispered back. Ah, that made more sense.
So far, Memphis hasn’t said anything, just made small grunts of affirmation.
“Yes. Okay, we shall be there momentarily once we secure Hope. Yes. Of course. No, I trust the Mulligan, she will be fine.”
With that he hit the end button. The doors slid open onto the penthouse floor in silence. I took the three steps forward into the foyer and waived my key-pass. I then typed in the eleven-digit code on the keypad. Yes, eleven digits was overkill. Tell it to Lux.
“Making plans for me again, Memphis?” I asked, walking into my apartment, my eyes involuntarily searching for Blue.
“Unfortunately, we are needed in Hell. We shall be gone for an indeterminate amount of time as time moves differently in the underworld. It is not predictable. That being said, we shall return as soon as possible. I estimate less than an earth week.”
Gusion raised a brow. “We’ve been summoned? Must be important.”
Memphis’ eyes held mine. “Lux and the Mulligans caught up with the arms dealer that dispatched Estrella. Unfortunately for him, he made his way to the afterlife in pieces. His ending was not swift or painless. Lucifer would like us to ensure that he knows that his afterlife will be as painful, and never ending. He is otherwise occupied.” This time he looked over my head at Gus. “Ace had to talk Azriel from casting his soul into purgatory.”
Gusion’s eyes opened wide. “Daddy’s little death dealer wanted to break the rules and put this man’s soul into the abyss? Why?”
Both eyes turned to me. Gusion waggled his eyebrows and Memphis looked annoyed. “What? It had nothing to do with me,” I argued.
Gusion stepped forward and swept me into his arms, bending me backwards as he nailed a playful kiss on my lips. “Oh Sweetheart, it has everything to do with you, and you know it. Azriel, the Mighty Angel of Death, has an angelic hard on for a pretty mortal.” He kissed my nose and straightened me. “It would be funny, if I didn’t have a hard on for the pretty mortal too,” he said, adjusting himself in his jeans. “I better go tell the hitman that we have to leave. Threaten his life if you so much as get your feelings hurt, that kind of thing. I’ll channel Memphis.” He winked and walked further into my apartment.
Memphis looked like he wanted to thump Gusion. Or maybe hit him in the balls with a baseball bat.
/> “We should go.” He stepped forward, pressing a tender kiss to the corner of my mouth. “Try not too…” he trailed off and sighed. “Just, be safe, yes?”
I winked at him, patting his cheek. “No getting drunk and bar hopping. I got you.”
Gusion reappeared, Blue in tow. Memphis shot the shorter man a steely eyed look that would have made a normal mortal man shudder. But not Blue. I was beginning to think that perhaps he was more broken than I thought.
Then Memphis and Gus were gone. I was left alone in my living room with a flint-eyed Blue Halloran. I didn’t know what to say. He didn’t leave. But he didn’t seem happy he stayed.
I was emotionally wrung out. For just one day, I desperately wanted to be able to push my own emotions down the way Blue did.
Blue didn’t speak. He just stood there, his gaze unflinching, his face filled with judgement. “Do you have a problem?” I was tired. So fucking tired.
“Yes.”
That was it. Just yes.
“Are you going to do something about it?” I taunted. “Or can you only do what you are told? I know you don’t like when life gets messy. But guess what, fuckhead? I am one giant mess, and I am done with your bullshit.” I glared at him, and then purposefully turned my back on him. Something about Blue was primal, driven by his animalistic urges. I could feel them there, under the cracking wall of glass that held down his emotions. I wanted to take a sledgehammer to that wall. I walked back toward the front door, but a hand grabbed at my elbow.
Hell's Redemption- The Complete Series Boxset Page 72