Keeper crossed his arms over his chest, brows knitted in confusion. “Why do you think I don’t trust you?”
“Uh…” I started ticking the reasons off on my fingers. “You won’t tell me your name because I’m not worthy, or whatever. Every answer you give me is cryptic, and you get pissed when I ask too many questions. You won’t let me out of your sight, even when you pretend to. Remember the cleansing?” It was my turn to raise my brows.
Help coughed to cover his laughter after Keeper slugged him.
“I am not ‘Help’,” Help said. “My name is Gabriel.”
Fitting. He was smoldering hot, with his dark clothing and rocker hair. The name Gabriel suited him.
“What suits me?” Keeper asked, his lips pulling up at the corners.
“I wouldn’t trust myself to give you a name.”
He huffed. “You’re infuriating.”
I smiled flirtatiously. “You didn’t find me infuriating a few minutes ago.”
Gabriel nudged him hard. “Give her your name. If you trust her, and you should, she’ll need to trust you as well. Especially now that we know why she is here.”
I sucked in a sharp breath. “You know why I’m here?”
The men exchanged a look.
“I will be back soon. I have to relay the information. You should find a safer place for her. He knows she’s here.” Gabriel raked his hair back. “He’ll come for her. The only question is when.”
“Handle the human I showed you, or better yet, bring him here so that I can take care of him myself.”
Gabriel smiled. “You might be a little behind the times, but you’re still the most fun.”
Keeper wasn’t a person I’d describe as fun.
“It’s the asshole in him,” Gabriel said with a wink before stepping forward and walking up a staircase made of invisible steps, easily crossing the divide when it appeared before him—in the damn living room. Gabriel didn’t need a fissure. He punched through the same way the crow did. Why couldn’t Keeper do the same and leave this hell hole?
Keeper cleared his throat and held his hand out for me to shake. Warily, I took hold of it. “Carmen Elaine Kennedy,” he began. “My name is Michael.”
12
“Michael?” I asked, my mind catching on. Or at least I thought it was.
Keeper inclined his head, too long pieces of hair falling into his eyes.
“Gabriel?” I looked to the spot at which he vanished.
He inclined his head a second time.
“The Michael and Gabriel?”
Keeper nodded and simply said, “Yes.”
“Angels?”
A smile tugged at Keeper’s normally stern lips. “Archangels,” he corrected. Of course, he was an archangel. In Purgatory. Talking to my soul because it was stuck here. And in this place of gray and shadow, it seemed to fit for some strange reason. He seemed to belong to this place and it to him.
“Why crows?” I wondered aloud, raking my eyes over him. He was delicious.
“I’m not delicious,” he said with a grin.
“You totally are. You look like a dark-haired, hot emo-guy, all tatted up and sexy.”
Then the Keeper of Crows smiled and I could see he was more angel than I’d imagined. In that moment, I knew I was in trouble. Since he could read my mind, he knew it, too. But being a gentleman, he didn’t even make fun of me for having a crush on him. Were his pleas finally sinking in? Was the Keeper-crack taking hold of me? I hoped so, with every ounce of me, I hoped so. The Lessons were terrifying, and if I never saw another one again, it would be too soon.
“I’m worried about the wrong person overhearing our conversation. Not the Lessons, and not merchants. There are worse things in Purgatory, most of whom work for a very evil man.”
He led me to the couch, his warm hand singing the small of my back. I sank into the worn cushions and he sat beside me, leaving enough distance between us that I could turn and point my knee toward him.
“I’m really confused. Gabriel didn’t exactly clear things up.”
“I know. Where to begin…” He exhaled heavily, gathering his thoughts. “Crows,” he started, “have always ushered souls to and from Purgatory.”
“So, why are you here?”
“When Christ was crucified, the veil was torn completely in two. The archangels hurried to repair it, but it was difficult to mend. The fabric was stretched tightly, thin over the Earth. After several years, it was clear that the fissures that happened occasionally due to the strain were here to stay. It wasn’t safe for souls anymore.”
“Were you sent here to guard Purgatory and help souls?”
He smiled lightly, his shoulders relaxing. “Mostly,” he hedged. There was more to the story, but he didn’t want to discuss the fine details just yet. I had other questions, so I asked one of those.
“You had wings, right? What did they look like?”
His smile faded. “I did. The crows I command were born from my wings. They had to become part of me, and they are obedient to me alone. I’ve seen them watch you, though. It’s strange. It’s like they know you’re a part of the veil.”
“Better watch out. I might take your crows away, Michael.”
Shaking his head playfully, he silently told me that wouldn’t happen. I imagined him, the way he looked before he came to this place: dark hair, morphing tattoos, oil slick feathers in great wings that arced behind him, holding a broadsword and kicking demon ass. He would have been fierce, but then again, he still was. He was intimidating.
“I’m not, and I don’t know that I really looked the way you’re imagining.”
With complete sincerity, I looked into his eyes, softening into caramel. “On behalf of all womankind, I hope you looked exactly the way I imagine.”
When he laughed, the room was filled with a presence that was larger than the air and all the objects in it. Then he sat back and sighed. “I do miss them, though. My wings.”
“I bet you do. I imagine that was really hard to accept.”
He swallowed. “It was.”
“So, can I ask a really nosy and rude question?”
“You may ask, but I will choose whether or not to answer it.”
“Okay. Who were you and Gabriel talking about, and why do you think he’s coming for me?”
The Keeper, Michael, threaded his fingers together and pursed his lips into a tight line. “What do you know about your father?”
“I know he’s a lying bastard who hated my mother, hates me, and can’t seem to keep his dick out of any woman half his age who pays him the slightest bit of attention. He’s just...incapable of most human emotion,” I said, feeling glad to have that out in the open.
“He is also a crosser.”
“A crosser? What’s that?” I asked, although my gut said I wouldn’t like his answer. My gut didn’t lie.
“When the veil was torn, certain souls escaped from Purgatory and walked the earth. You see, some who come here, like you, have bodies waiting for their souls to return. Others who come here had bodies who have passed away. Their soul has nowhere to go but to Heaven or Hell. If a soul with no body escaped and walked among the living, they would appear ghostly, like an apparition. That was what most people assumed: that the dead walked among them. It wasn’t exactly the case.”
I couldn’t even form a rational thought.
My father was a crosser. His soul was an escapee.
“But he has a body. On Earth, he has a body. He’s young and real. This is...it makes no sense, Michael.”
“He took one. It’s not the first one he’s taken, but if he takes over a body, he can live normally on Earth. He can have a life, a family. He’s taken many lives in order to walk among you. He’s had numerous families over the years. Your father is one of the most dangerous beings among the realms.”
Of course, he was. My father was a bastard. I raked my hands through my hair, frustrated. This couldn’t be real.
Could it?
“And his name isn’t Warren Kennedy.”
I huffed. “What is it?”
“Malchazze.”
Several minutes of trying to absorb the gravity of the situation later, and my internal freak-out still hadn’t subsided, not in the least. “So, he’s evil? Then send him to Hell.” I wouldn’t lose sleep over it.
Michael frowned. “I can’t without the order.”
“Well who can send him? Who can give the order?”
“No one here.”
“Then get someone to help!” I screamed in exasperation. “Ask someone to come and banish him. Ask your freaky demon friend to drag him down through the tar.”
Michael stood and walked to the sliding glass door. “I have no demon friends,” he hissed, composing himself again before speaking. “Demons approve of his actions here. If souls aren’t rested, if the Lessons learn nothing, then the souls are forfeited to Hell. And he’s made it easy for them to work the system. Purgatory was intended to be a place of rest; a place for souls to learn what they did wrong, and to complete their journeys. Lessons aren’t supposed to be here. They don’t belong here. But demons are using Purgatory for their own purposes. The Lessons the demons bring belong in Hell—like the man you saw punished—but now Purgatory is just another layer of Hell for some people, another realm of torture until they descend. That’s not the way it was meant to be.”
“What is my father doing here? If he can live on Earth, why cross back and forth? What’s in it for him?” Because there had to be something lucrative for Father to give it his attention.
Michael was silent for a long moment.
“What’s going on, Michael?”
He turned around and pinned his eyes on me, royal purple and roiling. “He’s establishing an empire.”
“He’s making an empire. A kingdom in Purgatory?”
“Yes, and right now, I cannot stop him.”
“But Purgatory wasn’t meant to be ruled. Right?”
“Right,” he agreed, turning his back to me again.
“How is he—?”
Suddenly, Michael ran toward me, lifting me up and racing toward the steps. “Upstairs! Lock the door, move furniture in front of it, just don’t let anything in until I say. Okay?”
I nodded. Looking past him out the glass front door, I saw a Lesson. This one had no mouth, just skin stretched taut over where his mouth should be. When the creature tried to smile, his cheek bones stretched the skin further, revealing purple and blue veins that forked across his pale face. His eyes, every part of them, were black. Soulless. Evil.
He pressed his hands against the glass, fingertips leaving black smudges across it. Michael released a deep, reverberating growl before running toward the Lesson and leaping across the couch. The door shattered when he burst through it, but the Lesson’s throat was in his fist in a fraction of a second. I could swear time stood still, and that the shards and splinters of glass were still falling as I took my first step upstairs.
“RUN!” he yelled. It was hard for a girl to run without knowing what she was running from, so I looked past him again. Big mistake.
Lessons. Some with ears and eyes that oozed black tar-like fluid, and some like the one Michael held with his feet flailing above the ground—no mouth at all. They were all over the yard, running toward the back porch and Michael. He needed help!
“No! Carmen, no! This is my purpose! Go upstairs, now!”
No way, Michael. You can’t handle all of them. There are twice as many as last time!
I looked for a weapon and found a broom in the corner. Better than nothing.
In an instant, there was a loud caw from outside as the crows came to defend their master, individually and as one ferocious group. Feathers rained from the sky, and each time one touched a Lesson, the Lesson’s skin began to sizzle and steam from the contact. The ones who could yell, did. The ones who couldn’t, jerked and writhed on the ground. Then the crows began to swoop down in groups of thousands, carrying the Lessons away, their screams rising into the air as they were taken into a vortex of flying dark feathers and sharp beaks.
Michael stepped outside, watching the melee unfold. I relaxed my grip on the broom handle and lowered it to my waist. Bad move.
It grabbed me from behind, somehow having snuck up behind me. He didn’t make a sound, because he couldn’t. He had no mouth. I tried to hit him with the broom, but he was at a weird angle and I couldn’t get leverage. Looking over my shoulder, I could taste the sulfur on his fingers as they covered my lips, just before I parted them and bit down hard. He slammed my head into the drywall as I screamed for Michael. A very angry Keeper rushing to help me was a powerful sight to behold.
He lifted the Lesson with one hand, crushing his throat with a sickening series of cracks and pops. “You chose to follow the wrong leader,” Michael told him, calling his crows as he carried him out the back door, glass crunching beneath his boots. The crows carried the Lesson away and Michael strode to me, his hands feeling my body for damage. Up and down. Around. “Are you hurt?” he said frantically, his eyes wild.
Feral.
“I’m not hurt.”
I was panting, my breaths fueled by adrenaline and his hands on my body. He finally began to relax his muscles, but didn’t take his hands away from me.
“You could have been killed,” he breathed against the column of my throat.
“I’m fine.”
“You shouldn’t try to defend me. It’s my job to defend you.”
“Am I your assignment?”
He didn’t answer, just held me.
“Am I your assignment, Michael?”
“No,” he admitted, tilting his head so that his lips hovered over mine.
“Good,” I breathed. And then I waited, hoping he would lower his lips to…
And when he finally closed the distance, his breath hot on my lips, I thought the Lessons would be safer. Because Michael, the way his eyes swirled, the way his muscles rippled beneath the skin…he was far more of a threat.
I could lose my heart to him.
As soon as I thought the words, I felt the connection sever. He stepped away, raking hands through his hair.
“You can’t. I can’t.” He liked that word. Can’t.
I hated it.
Keeper retreated to his room, and then I heard the lock engage. If he thought I was a girl who gave up easily, he was mistaken.
13
I woke in the dingy gray bedroom with a headache that stabbed straight to the core of my brain. A single crow stood guard on the bedrail at my feet. He didn’t make a sound except for shuffling his feet from one side to the other. I groaned and let my head fall back onto my pillow. No gray light filtered in through the disgustingly dirty window. The bitter taste of Hell lingered on my tongue.
Michael appeared at the doorway.
“I collected the manna this morning. Are you hungry?”
“What time is it?”
“Nearly sunset. We’re about to have a visitor soon.” I slept all day?
“Who?” I sat up and swung my legs to the side of the bed before I realized they were bare. “Uh, did you undress me?”
“You’ve slept without jeans on since coming here. I thought you’d be more comfortable. You fell asleep on the couch, so yes. You slept much of the day, but that’s good. You needed it,” he said, refusing to look me in the eyes. I decided to mess with him.
“You saw my ass again, didn’t you?”
He smiled and shook his head. “I wasn’t looking.”
“Wasn’t looking or wasn’t interested?”
He grabbed hold of the top of the door frame and blew out a harsh breath. “I can’t be interested, Carmen. I shouldn’t have let you believe otherwise. For that, I’m truly sorry.”
“That’s an interesting choice of words, Michael,” I purred. “You said you can’t be, not that you aren’t.”
“Angels are forbidden from being intimate with humans, and I can’t afford to be dis
tracted.”
“Am I human?”
He swallowed thickly. “I believe so, yes. But whatever you are, the answer is the same. Angels are forbidden from being intimate with souls, humans, other angels, with anything at all. Our sole purpose, the reason we were created, was to serve.”
I wished he could serve me. I was frustrated as hell, and it wasn’t because of the Lessons and their feeble attacks. It was because I was tantalizingly close to an Adonis all day long and had to endure looking at his beautiful face and physique. It was torturous, really. Maybe I was being taught a lesson of my own. Would someone squish tar onto my eyes if I kept ogling him? Maybe it would be a just sentence. I couldn’t manage to tear them away from him.
I was so going to Hell.
He chuckled. “You aren’t. And for the record, it’s not easy for me either.” He left with a wink and a grin, leaving me sitting on the bed, a frustrated, hot, flustered mess of a woman.
Closing my eyes, I pictured him returning to the room, shirtless, with his jeans hugging his hips, deliciously revealing the V I knew lurked beneath his clothes. I’d stand up from the bed and walk to him, waiting for his eyes to finish undressing me, and then I’d rub my hands over his chest, shoulders, back…pulling him close to me and our bodies would touch. They would ignite us both, a fire that had been smoldering beneath the surface, now fed with oxygen, sparking back to life, flames licking at both of us. I’d drop to my knees and unbutton his pants, unzip them inch by inch, and free him from the confining clothes he wore. I’d take him in my hand, stroking him, and then take him into the warmth of my mouth, drawing him in deep. He would groan and his thighs, hard as stone beneath my fingers, would tremble as I raked my nails over his skin, the skin that was like velvet.
His head would crane back as I brought him closer and closer to the brink…
“Carmen,” a growl of warning came from downstairs. The pictures on the walls quivered in response and so did I.
I’d stand and pull the t-shirt over my head, letting it billow to the floor at our feet as he stepped from his pants. Guiding him to the bed, I’d watch as he fell back on the mattress and then I would climb up, straddle him, and rake my breasts all the way up his torso, reveling in the rumble that came from his chest. His eyes would turn every color under the heavens. Gold, silver, amethyst, emerald, sapphire, ruby… His tattoos would churn and I would sink down onto him, slowly, torturously…
Keeper of Crows (The Keeper of Crows Duology Book 1) Page 10