by L. L. Foster
* * *
Knowing Luther watched her every tiny move, Gaby turned her head to the side and smirked. Little by little, the grip of the righteous calling subsided, pulling its sharp talons out of her soul, releasing her to deal with more earthbound issues.
Like Luther.
It hurt to keep looking at him, to see how he looked at her.
After the hell of her life, she’d thought herself tough, strong enough to stay alone, to relish her isolation from the pathetic society surrounding her.
But God’s truth, walking away from Luther weeks ago had almost destroyed her. She’d needed a purpose, any purpose other than the agony God saw fit to strike her with at His whim.
Luther’s breath heated her neck right above the collar that she always wore. Like her association with divine forces, the choker gave her solace.
“Answer me, God damn it!”
The blasphemy bothered her far more than the bone-crushing grip on her wrists. “You know why I left.”
“Tell me.”
Temper snapping, she jerked her hands loose and shoved him back several feet. That felt good enough that she went ahead and shoved him again, her attack taking him by surprise enough that he stumbled backward and nearly fell on his ass.
As he took a stance against her, his nostrils flared. “Gaby . . .”
“Luther,” she mocked. She might be skinny, but when enraged, she had undeniable strength, with or without God’s influence.
Leaning in to him, stalking him, she snarled, “I left because I wanted you, all right?”
He planted his big feet and stopped retreating.
His savage expression didn’t impress her one iota. “You showed me things you shouldn’t have, Luther. But then Mort died and I . . .” The harsh memory of losing her only friend caused the words to strangle in her throat before emerging as a faint whisper. “I felt so guilty, I had to leave.”
Straightening on a deep sigh, Luther surveyed her, shook his head, and holstered his gun. “Gaby,” he said again, not as a warning this time, but with softened exasperation and what sounded suspiciously like condolence.
“Don’t do that.” She turned her back on him, resisting the urge to slap her hands over her ears. “Don’t talk all gentle and sweet when nothing can ever happen between us.” To reinforce that fact, more to herself than to Luther, she said harder, “Never.”
He had the audacity to laugh. “Bullshit.”
Whirling on him, she opened her mouth—
“It’s happening, Gaby.” To emphasize his point, Luther closed the insignificant space between them. “Believe it. Accept it. I can’t say when, but I know it will.” He looked her over. “You know it will, so stop fighting that much, at least.”
Meaning he knew she fought everything else? Her commiserable life? Her very existence?
Her purpose on earth?
Okay, so they had that unsettling sexual chemistry thing churning between them. She did accept that. But the rest?
Not possible.
So why did he have to hunt her down and start teasing her with impossible things again? As a paladin, a warrior for God, her life wasn’t normal, would never be normal.
She was abnormal—in every way.
Luther couldn’t know what she did, and he wouldn’t believe why she did it. Normal people weren’t summoned by God.
Normal people didn’t destroy life in any grisly manner necessary.
Normal people didn’t behold the abominable evil that showed itself clearly to her, the evil she was ordered to annihilate.
Like spilled oil in a dirty gutter, it all came back to the surface: her duty, and Luther’s inability to ever grasp or accept it. He was a damn cop, and given half a chance he’d arrest her, see her prosecuted, and stand by while unknowing normal people saw her locked away.
For life.
And that hurt more than anything could.
Ready to disguise her anguish with anger, Gaby charged forward, and Luther held up a hand to stop her.
“Mort’s not dead, sweetheart.”
She drew up short. Sweetheart? What sappy shit was that? No one called her . . .
Then the rest of what Luther said sank in and Gaby’s world tilted. Her knees felt weak. Her heart punched hard against the wall of her chest.
Not dead? But . . .
Weeks ago, Mort had died. She knew it.
She’d seen it.
Images burned through her mind with a flash-fire intensity that seared her soul and inflamed her agony.
She saw Mort bravely staying behind in the abandoned building after she’d dispatched the zombielike souls and the monstrous doctor who’d created them. She saw Mort showing his first signs of personal pride, practically glowing with his sense of purpose—God’s purpose.
And then . . . Mort falling beneath a madwoman’s lust for blood, buried in ashes and dust . . .
“No.” Lost on the night breeze, her whispered denial faded into oblivion. She wheezed, trying to draw in needed oxygen, but instead her lungs bloated on the nastiness of depravity and the craven sense of despair.
“Yes, Gaby.”
Luther’s reassurance didn’t touch her. Reaching out, she braced a palm on the roughened surface of broken bricks, her eyes burning and her throat constricted. “I saw . . .”
“What?” New anger sparked in Luther’s brown eyes. “What did you see?”
“Nothing.” She shook her head. She couldn’t let Luther know that she had been there, a part of it all, the biggest part—the part that butchered, hashed, and permanently destroyed atrocities too vile to survive.
He didn’t buy it. “You were there, weren’t you, Gaby? Mort lied about that much. Admit it.”
Luther didn’t approach her, didn’t touch her. He just waited, watching her, judging her reaction the way he always judged her—with suspicion and cynicism.
He was a good man.
Auras of strength and purpose always surrounded him, a protective halo to remind her of all the ways they contrasted.
That he remained distrustful of her was one good reason to keep her distance. If a do-gooder seraph like Luther ever found out what she did, he’d never be able to deal with it.
Reminding herself of that gave her strength, enough to amass her wits and face him again.
She steadied her palpating heart and locked back her jellied knees. Suspicious, hopeful, she surveyed him. “Mort’s really alive?”
Fed up, Luther reached for her—but this time Gaby was ready. Exhilarated by the idea that her old landlord and only true friend might have survived, she ducked out of Luther’s reach and came up behind him.
Her right arm clamped tight around his throat, tight enough to squeeze his windpipe. “Take it easy, big boy.”
The taunt sent him over the edge.
He reacted so quickly, he caught Gaby off guard. In a series of well-timed movements, she found herself slammed back up against the wall, this time with Luther’s big, imposing body plastered to her. Unless she decided to hurt him, and she didn’t want to do that, she couldn’t defend herself.
Her bones, her joints, protested and her pride prickled . . .
But oh God, jubilation filled her. Euphoria erupted. She was better than ecstatic.
Morty was alive.
Luther wouldn’t lie about that. He couldn’t. Somehow, by some divine intervention, Morty had survived.
Damn, but she couldn’t wait to see the little weasel again. When she did, she’d give him hell for sure.
Incredulous, Luther snarled. “Don’t you dare smile, Gaby.” He bracketed one big, hard hand around her throat, and with the other pinned both of her wrists high. “Don’t you dare act like nothing is wrong.”
Throughout most of her lamentable life, Gaby had had no reason for joy. Now she felt it in spades, and damn it, she couldn’t suppress it. Even Luther’s pissed-off attitude couldn’t dampen her buoyant spirits.
Gaby eyed him, lifted one brow, and when the happiness threatene
d to implode, she kissed him.
Luther jerked back—but she followed and kissed him again, needing to celebrate the foreign emotion of pure, undiluted happiness bursting inside her.
She’d never felt it before, and she loved it, wanted to cherish it and this moment. It was a first for her, a sign that somewhere in her blackened heart, a real woman lived and breathed and accepted influence from the world that had rejected her so harshly.
Breathing hard and fast, Luther resisted her impetuous onslaught for only a nanosecond before the hand at her throat softened, his fingers slid up into her hair, and he positively devoured her mouth.
Kissing was as new to her as joy, but doubly thrilling. As a creature of instincts, Gaby rubbed herself against him. When that didn’t appease, she groaned and bit him.
He jerked back, panting, his face red and his eyes burning like the devil himself.
They stared at each other. Gaby said, “I like kissing you, Luther.”
An internal struggle manifested itself on his features. He fought hard, making his beautiful brown eyes blaze and his sensuous mouth tighten.
He swallowed, worked his jaw, then flattened her by asking in a brisk, but affected voice, “Why were you chasing the boy?”
The wind left her lungs. Fucking asshole. Her pride bristled at such a harsh rejection. “Let me go.”
“Not until you answer me.”
She shook her head; not in denial, but because she didn’t have an answer for him. “I don’t know why.”
“What?”
Because she detested being uncertain in any way, she snapped, “Clear out your ears, cop.”
His left eye flinched. “So now we’re back to insults, is that it?”
“Hey, I clearly wanted to fuck. You’re the one—”
He released her so quickly, Gaby almost fell. Before she could regain her bearings, he’d turned his back on her and paced away. One hand rubbed the back of his neck, the other clenched into a fist.
In a perfect world, Gaby would try to figure him out. She’d want to understand her sudden hurt and why she’d ever, even for a single second, thought a man like Luther, a good, kind, beautiful man, would want any part of her.
But this world was imperfect, in part because of her, in other ways, in spite of her.
Best if she just left, right now, while she still could. She started to do just that.
Luther said, “Please don’t go.”
“No reason to stay.”
Without making a sound, he came to her and his hand closed over her shoulder. In a harsh, hungry whisper, he said, “I want you, Gaby. Don’t ever doubt that.”
“Yeah, I could tell.”
He ignored her sarcasm. “You’ve been hanging out with prostitutes and now suddenly you want sex. With me. I haven’t seen you in a long time. Hell, I wasn’t sure if I’d ever see you again. When last I did see you, you made it clear that sex wasn’t an option. Hell, you cursed me for making you want sex.”
“I have a good memory, and you’re saying sex an awful lot for a man who just turned it down.”
Gently, he turned her to face him. “Just moments ago, you told me it would never happen.”
“And it won’t.”
It was his turn to smile, halfheartedly, crookedly. It made him look so appealing. “I already promised you that it will. But not in a moment of insanity where you might regret it later.” Both hands cupped her face. “When I get on top of you, and I will, we won’t be in a dirty alley, or in a hurry, and we’ll both be clear about what we want.”
Those words affected her so deeply that she hid her response. “Whatever. You done with me?”
“No, I’m not. Not by a long shot.” With a hand at her back, he started her walking out of the alley toward the street where lamps filtered through a growing fog. “Tell me why you chased that boy. And no bullshit about not knowing why. You always know what you do. You’re a very decisive woman.”
Okay, so maybe she did know. Something about the kid had . . . reminded her of herself. Oh, he was better dressed than she’d ever been, clean and fresh and healthy. He had normal weight, where she’d always been frail. His eyes were bright instead of sunken with depression and pain.
But something about him, some ethereal aura showed his confusion about his purpose in life.
She was good at reading auras.
It was a talent, not unlike her talent in destroying rancorous evil.
As a child, she’d been adrift in incomprehensible pain and confused direction. The more she fought against it, the worse it got. At times, the pain would ease, but it never completely left her.
That is, not until she accepted her insights, and exterminatedthe immoral malevolence surrounding her. Then, and only then, could she draw an easy breath.
The blind, the unknowing, summoned doctors for a cure, but they couldn’t name the ailment.
Authorities refused to acknowledge it as real.
The foster families who occasionally allowed her into their homes thought her a fraud, a faker, and they punished for the pain.
No one understood, and no one knew how she escaped the agony—no one, except Father Mullond. And that good man encouraged her, coached her, helped her gain direction to her purpose and deception to cover her tracks.
As a man of God, he understood her duty more than she ever could have. He made it crystal clear that if anyone found out, she’d be labeled a murderer, and the rest of her days would be spent in prison, or an asylum—where the pain would gnaw on her all the rest of her days.
And so they’d worked together, Father Mullond and her, an odd pair matched by God. Gaby told Father of her auras, shared with him the first niggling of discomfort, and he, through the confessions of a priest, learned the truths behind her visions.
And ultimately, he gave his blessing to each and every slaughter.
Father had changed her life with his understanding, his guidance.
Then he’d changed it again—with his death.
Chapter 2
The memories sent a shaft of pain slicing through Gaby. She pressed a hand to her gut, and glanced at Luther for a needed distraction. “That boy didn’t belong here.”
Eyes keen and wary, Luther watched her. “It’s a free country, Gaby.”
“No, it isn’t, not really.” A rusted can blocked her path; she crushed it with her heel. “But either way, it doesn’t change the fact that he was here for some reason, and he shouldn’t have been.”
“He looked around twelve or so. A kid. And a scrawny kid at that. Surely you don’t consider him a threat to your hookers?”
“My hookers?” That made her roll her eyes. “I don’t claim ownership to the ladies.”
He pressed her. “You consider yourself their protector.”
Rolling one shoulder, she said, “It’s a purpose. That’s all.”
“And you need one?”
“Don’t you?”
“Maybe.”
“Isn’t that why you’re a cop?” Even as he annoyed her with his persistence, she felt the encroachment of that odd comfort that always ameliorated her edge when she was in Luther’s close proximity. She sneered, “You want to accomplish things, make a difference?”
He strolled beside her in silence. “You say that like it isn’t possible.”
It wasn’t. But she wouldn’t burst his insulating bubble by telling him so. Not that he’d believe her anyway. Luther was special, but he was also blind to the true depravity of evil.
When she didn’t reply, he finally said, “It’s dangerous for you to hang out with whores, Gaby. Some of them have pimps—”
“Who get real mean on occasion. I know. I’ve seen it. And more.” God hadn’t asked for her intervention with the abusive johns. But she’d given it anyway—and enjoyed herself.
That was something she’d learned since meeting Luther, that righting wrongs—even those simple, quotidian deeds of inhumanity—gave her a great sense of satisfaction, and the feeling that she ha
d some control over her own destiny. She didn’t have to base her every act on God’s demand.
She, Gabrielle Cody, could sometimes act on her own.
Slanting another glance at Luther, she admired the strong lines of his nose, chin, and jaw, the way an evening breeze disrupted his trimmed blond hair—and she found him so visually pleasing, she wished she never had to look away. “I have an understanding with the men who do claim ownership of the ladies.”
Luther muttered a rank curse under his breath, tightened even more, and asked, “Let’s hear it.”
“Not much to hear.” Gaby forced her gaze back to the long stretch of road before them. Haggard vagrants curled in empty doorways; shadowy dealings took place in darkened parked cars; nightlife scurried about, committing conventional crimes and atrocities unworthy of opposition. “They rule the roost, as the ladies allow, but when they cross the line too much . . .” She let her voice fade off, and shrugged. “Shit happens.”
“Shit?”
Satiety unfurled lazily inside her. “In the dark,” she whispered, “where it’s impossible to distinguish a face, things can happen. Things like the slice of a knife where men hope no blade will ever venture.” Her palms tingled in memory of that first, light slice—shallow, superficial, and all the more terrifying for it. She could almost smell the fear of her targets, the memory of it pleasantly scorched into her brain. “It’s effective.”
Luther came to a dead halt. “Jesus, Gaby.”
Facing him, she crossed her arms and cocked out one hip. “When I met you, I was pretty damn stupid about all things sexual.”
Every muscle in his body tensed. “You were innocent, not stupid.”
She shook her head. “No, never.”
“Yes.” He stepped closer. “There’s a difference, Gaby, and I’m well aware of it.”
Fool. Luther might not realize it, but she wasn’t even innocent at birth. She didn’t know what it would be like to have innocence. “I just hadn’t much thought about sex, and I had zero action.” She looked at his throat, at the open collar of his shirt, and her heartbeat grew heavy. “After you, well, I thought about it a lot.” Her gaze came back to his. “The ladies taught me things.”
He stared, fascinated, horrified. Mute.