Earth Angel

by Siri Caldwell

  “They broke up.”

  Crap. “When?”

  “Last week,” Megan said.

  She’d had high hopes for those two, but very few of their friends could see past Hank and Aisha’s constant clashes to agree with her. Now it seemed her friends were right and she was wrong. “Hank must be devastated.”

  “Devastated enough to sleep with a stranger from New York and turn on the rebound to the loving arms of her dear friend Gwynne?”

  That would never happen, and Megan knew it.

  “Knock it off.”

  “I’m worried about you, that’s all.”

  Megan was worried. Great. She’d have to make it a point to act happier next time she saw her.

  “I don’t need a woman to make it better.” Not that she hadn’t tried that approach in the past, but she liked to think she’d learned something from the experience.

  “Of course you don’t,” Megan said. “I just thought…”

  “I’m working this morning.”

  “I know. That’s why I said we’re going after lunch.”

  “I already have plans for after lunch. Abby and I are driving to Baltimore.”

  “Really.” Megan sounded instantly suspicious. This was the problem with being friends with women who were smart. “What are you doing in Baltimore?”

  “I’m helping her go through some boxes in her grandmother’s attic.”

  “You’d rather go through musty old boxes than walk on the beach?”

  “I can walk on the beach anytime,” Gwynne said, ignoring Megan’s unspoken question.

  It didn’t remain unspoken for long. Like, two seconds, really. “Why would Abby ask you to help?”

  Megan was going to love this. “I offered.”

  “Typical,” Megan said, and she was right.

  Gwynne didn’t need to help. She didn’t want to help. But somehow she always found herself opening her mouth and volunteering. She should start her own chapter of Butting-Into-Other-People’s-Business Anonymous. The thing was, though, she didn’t trust Abby not to decide at the last minute to drive despite her suspended license. And besides, she was curious. She’d asked the angels what the deal was with Abby—what they needed her help with, why they thought she was an angel—and they’d refused to answer.

  When Megan spoke again, she’d turned serious. “Is everything okay with her?”

  Damn it. Did Megan sense something she should know about? Had Abby been asking Megan about her aura too?

  “Uh…why?”

  “I know I shouldn’t have peeked in the windows of her van, but the backseats are missing and it looks like she has a mattress in there. I was concerned she might be sleeping in there. She’s not homeless, is she?”

  Gwynne felt a rush of relief. “She’s not sleeping in her van. The mattress is in there to protect her harp.”

  “Oh. Good. Her harp.” Megan sounded undecided about whether that made sense.

  Well, it made sense to Gwynne. Maybe a pile of blankets would look less odd, but a mattress provided more padding, and considering the dilapidated appearance of Abby’s minivan, she wouldn’t be surprised if its suspension was subpar.

  As she mumbled something about how there wasn’t anything wrong with being slightly eccentric, Nimbus dashed into the room with Peter the Fifteenth at his heels, their nails scrabbling on the hardwood floor. They raced around her feet, circling and skidding at top speed, stopping on a dime to reverse direction and circle again. And again. Gwynne spun in place in her own version of rabbit dancing, and Nimbus got so excited that he jumped straight up and flicked his head spastically in midair while he tossed his hindquarters in the opposite direction. Gwynne flicked her head over one shoulder but made sure she remained on the ground. The last time she’d attempted to add the full-body twist in midair, she’d crashed into the dresser, and she’d just as soon not repeat that fiasco while Megan was on the phone.

  “So tell me again why you’re driving with her to Baltimore?”

  Nimbus sat back on his hindquarters between Gwynne’s feet, his front paws lifting off the floor, and flicked his ears at Peter, who pounced on him.

  Gwynne stepped over and around the fuzzy obstacle. “I’m doing her a favor, okay?”

  “Int-er-est-ing.” Megan dragged the word out.

  “It’s not interesting. We’re friends.”

  “Friends is such a vague word. It can mean so many things.”

  True. So true.

  Which made it the perfect word.

  Chapter Ten

  Gwynne was running late. The spa had been unusually busy that morning, and by the time Abby was supposed to show up for Gwynne to play chauffeur, she was still dealing with customers and desperate for a bite of the provolone, avocado and roasted red bell pepper sandwich that called to her from her desk drawer. What she was really desperate for was to spend time with Abby. Well, no, not desperate. Feeling a tingle of anticipation at the thought of spending the afternoon together didn’t mean she was desperate. Not necessarily.

  The phone rang. “Abby?”

  “I’m here,” Abby said. “Where are you?”

  “Inside. I’m sorry, I’m not quite done here.”

  “No problem. I’ll wait for you outside.”

  Gwynne finished up with a customer while half listening to Yolanda, who was taking the afternoon shift for her, tell a long-winded story about her cat’s visit to the vet, which would normally have interested her, but not today. She finally extricated herself and left through the hotel’s side door rather than the front to cut her walk to the parking lot by a few seconds. While she walked, she got her arms into her coat sleeves and pulled out her phone. “Where are you?”

  “Out front,” Abby said. “By the benches.”

  Oops, wrong way. Holding the phone to her ear, Gwynne headed in that direction, around the side of the building and toward the main entrance where several marble benches nestled among tall ornamental grasses the landscaping crew hadn’t yet sheared to the ground for spring. “Looking forward to visiting your grandparents?”

  “Yeah, I haven’t seen them in a while. How about you? You get an afternoon off and you decide to spend it stuck in a car with me?”

  “I’ll live.”

  Gwynne came within sight of the benches and spotted Abby lying flat on her back in a shaft of sunlight, one boot-clad leg sprawled over the front of the bench, the other leg dangling off the end, the inseams of her jeans stretched tight. She had one arm folded behind her head, which made her fisherman’s sweater ride up; with the other she pressed her phone to her ear. She was the sexiest thing she had ever seen.

  “You haven’t seen my backseat driving,” Abby said into the phone as a gust of wind rustled the ornamental grasses. “I can be pretty distracting.”

  “Now you tell me.”

  Abby’s back arched—just a bit—in a discreet yet incredibly sensual and open way. Gwynne sucked in her breath, on the edge of arousal. Tension coiled in her thighs. Abby was attracted to her. She was moving like that because she was thinking about her, talking to her.

  Gwynne gripped the phone more tightly and stopped walking, afraid to startle her from the bench. She wanted to climb onto her. Her hips wanted to grind into hers—wanted it badly. The contact would be electric. Devastating. She became dizzy thinking of that broad expanse of bare skin she’d come so close to touching in her bedroom, that bra she wanted to unhook, the toned arms that Abby hid under long sleeves when she played the harp.

  Abby swiveled and sat up. “Where are you? Are you still inside?”

  “I’m here.” Gwynne put her phone away and closed the distance between them with quick, shaky strides. “Ready to go?”

  Abby started to get up, but then with a sharp, abrupt movement pressed one hand to the side of her face and sank back down, rubbing her jaw, clearly in pain. Her aura turned muddy.

  “Is your ear infected again?” Gwynne sat next to her on the bench, her hands burning with the need to help. “Did
you see a doctor? You didn’t, did you?”

  “I didn’t have time.”

  “You need antibiotics.” Gwynne peered into her ear. “It’s completely swollen.”

  “The antibiotics never work for long. The infection always comes back.”

  “There must be something they can do.”

  “Yes, doctor.”

  “Sorry.” Abby wasn’t a client. She didn’t need her to tell her what to do. She certainly didn’t need to push her away with her usual I-don’t-see-clients-anymore, go-see-a-doctor attitude. The last thing in the world she wanted to do was push her away.

  What she wanted to do was take away her pain. She could take away her pain. She’d never had a problem easing her clients’ suffering. She couldn’t save their lives, but at least she could make people more comfortable. And with all the light that bubbled up in her heart in Abby’s presence—with all the love—the healing would be effortless.

  She wasn’t talking about platonic love, either. No, that effervescent weightlessness coursing through her body was not the least bit platonic.

  “I can get rid of the swelling,” Gwynne offered, trying to keep the emotion out of her voice. “That should help.”

  “With your energy?”

  “Yeah.” Without waiting for a response, Gwynne opened her heart and threw her consciousness out into the void, letting herself disintegrate into vast, exhilarating nothingness. After a breathless eternity, the void began to vibrate. The vibration was quiet at first, barely audible, but soon it became louder and louder until the void became filled with it, became a universe of countless sparks that sang and pulsed and swirled into eddies and currents.

  Another healer might have tried to pull that swirling energy through her body and channel it. But she didn’t draw energy from the universe, she was the energy of the universe. With a thought, she burned out Abby’s infection, chased down the microbes that evaded her, and, acting on instinct grounded in years of experience, found the biofilm where they hid and broke it down so they wouldn’t return.

  “I already feel a difference,” Abby said. “There’s less pressure now.”

  “You don’t feel dizzy?”

  “No, I feel great.”

  “You sure?”

  “Yeah, thanks.”

  Abby skipped to the parking lot and surprised Gwynne by ending up at the right car. Gwynne followed more slowly, part of her still out there in the seductive void, reluctant to return to earth. Abby hopped onto the hood of Gwynne’s car and waited for her to catch up, sitting there with her ankles crossed and swinging her legs.

  “What did you do to me?” Abby said when Gwynne arrived and unlocked the doors. “I mean, energy healing. What is that, really?”

  “Basically? It’s faith healing without the religious bullshit.”

  Abby slid off her perch and leaned back, pressing her hands behind her against the car.

  “I like you, Gwynnosaurus. You’re not afraid to have an opinion.”

  Abby liked her. Jesus.

  Gwynne stared at her. “Usually people feel dizzy afterward.” The energy was a lot to handle, and her clients always felt dizzy as a result. Sometimes they even…“You’re not going to throw up, are you?”

  “Do I look like I’m going to throw up?”

  Abby’s aura looked strong, but also fiery and chaotic, which gave her pause. “You look like I need to do a bit more to finish this.”

  “Okay.”

  “I could try to hold back,” she said doubtfully.

  “Don’t hold back. I can handle it.”

  “Such an optimist.” At least they were outdoors if she did upchuck. With her mind, she touched the essence of Abby’s immune system and energized it, giving it the strength to overpower what was left of the infection on its own, then soothed the ear with a final pulse of compassion.

  Abby prodded her ear, testing it. “It’s like magic. No wonder your clients don’t want to let you go.”

  Make that her ex-clients. Gwynne’s mood instantly soured. “They’ll survive without me.”

  * * *

  The drive to the leafy Baltimore suburb where Abby grew up took an hour longer than it would have taken Abby to drive herself, but after an eternity of watching Gwynne keep to the speed limit, they arrived at her grandparents’ familiar split-level. Finally she could stop thinking about Gwynne, about how her healing energy had swept through her, warm and overpowering, charging her up, making her weak in the knees.

  When Gwynne had asked if she felt dizzy, she’d lied, because she seriously doubted she was having the usual reaction. Dizzy? Sure, she could believe other people got dizzy. But did they also get warm and turned on? Probably not. She hoped not.

  She pushed those thoughts aside and traipsed up the buckled walkway to the front door. Gwynne was right behind her, which made it difficult not to think about her, but the irritating whine of a chain saw coming from somewhere nearby and the sound of barking dogs helped. Anything that distracted her was good. There was a note stuck to the screen door telling them to go around back, so they circled to the backyard.

  Grams, in purple flowered gardening gloves, was wielding a chain saw against a fallen maple tree, turning it into firewood. Grams spotted them and stopped the saw.

  “How are you even lifting that?” Abby surged forward to try to take the chain saw away before Grams hurt her back or dropped the thing on her toe. Just four weeks ago, she had broken her foot under vague, unexplained circumstances and ended up in the hospital. “Don’t you think you should let somebody else—”

  “Do you know how much people charge for tree work? It’s outrageous.” Grams revved the engine and swung the saw to prove she had it under control, even as she struggled with her footing.

  Abby placed a restraining arm in front of Gwynne, who wasn’t hanging back, to keep her well out of range. Where was Gramps? He shouldn’t let Grams do stuff like this, but then again, he never could stand up to her, so why start now? When Grams decided something needed to be done, she did whatever it took to get it done.

  Grams pointed her chain saw in Gwynne’s direction. “Who are you? Do you live with my granddaughter?”

  “We work together, Mrs. Vogel,” Gwynne said.

  “Is that what they’re calling it these days?”

  “I suspect you know exactly what we call it these days.” Gwynne flashed her a smile that would charm anyone’s socks off.

  Grams eyed her suspiciously. “Oh, nonsense.”

  Gwynne winked at her.

  Grams beamed.

  Oh, God. Gwynne was flirting with Grams.

  “Grams, this is Gwynne Abernathy,” said Abby, belatedly making the introductions. “She works at the spa where I play.”

  “How nice. Would you girls be interested in homemade gingerbread cookies? I was just about to pop some in the oven.”

  “That sounds great,” Abby said as Gwynne simultaneously agreed, clearly onboard with anything that got Grams to relinquish the chain saw.

  “I made gingerbread girls just for you, Abby,” Grams said as they followed her into the kitchen. The oven was already on, a tray of shaped raw cookie dough waiting. “I know you like them better than the gingerbread boys.”

  Abby kissed her on the cheek. Grams gave her a tight squeeze and shooed her into the living room. Gwynne stuck close beside her as everyone settled into chairs around a coffee table that was usually buried under several inches of her grandfather’s newspapers but today was clear.

  “Are you a musician too?” Grams asked Gwynne.

  “I’m the spa manager,” Gwynne said.

  “She supervises the staff,” Abby explained. “She used to be a massage therapist.”

  Grams nodded approvingly. “How wonderful to be able to help people in pain.”

  A mask fell over Gwynne’s face, but she smiled politely. “I try.”

  “When Abby was a child she was always curious about others’ injuries. I’d have a scratch on my arm and she would want to pu
t a bandage on it. Once, she stopped a stranger on crutches in the street, went right up to him and asked him how he got hurt. He told her he fell, and she looked up at him, absolutely puzzled. ‘You fell?’ she asked him in that tiny voice, and you could see plain as day that she didn’t understand. So she deliberately tripped herself. Over and over. I had to take her hand and tell her to stop because I was afraid she was going to hurt herself. She knew something was wrong and she was simply determined to figure out what happened to that poor man.”

  “You never told me that,” Abby said. It seemed like it was always the embarrassing stories that were deemed worthy of being repeated, not the nice ones.

  “Your grandfather and I were convinced you were going to become a nurse. You had such empathy at such a young age.”

  “Where is Gramps?” Abby asked.

  “He’s puttering in the basement like he always is. He removes his hearing aid so he has an excuse to ignore me when I call down the stairs, but the smell of cookies in the oven will lure him up here eventually. Cookies and anything in a skirt—that’s all he notices.”

  Abby glanced at Gwynne, but she appeared to be listening with amused interest, not thrown by Grams at all. Maybe she had lots of experience meeting girlfriends’ parents.

  What a depressing thought.

  When the cookies were baked and they’d all eaten a few and Gramps had made a brief appearance before retreating to the basement, the three of them trooped upstairs to the trapdoor to the attic. Abby pulled down the squeaky wooden ladder and unfolded it, then tested her weight on the rungs as Gwynne and her grandmother looked on, both of them ready to grab her by the waist and steady her.

  “No one’s been up there in years,” said Grams. “I sure hope you don’t see any rodents.”

  “Me too.” Wasn’t that the truth. Not that she’d scream or anything—rats and cockroaches had never bothered her—she’d just rather not have anything interfere with her search, especially not a critter known to chew paper. She crawled through the opening and made her way to the middle of the attic where the sloped roof was high enough for her to stand. Her hands were covered in dust.