Nobody's Angel (The Earth Angels)

by Stacy Gail

  “That’s quite a goose egg. Look at me.” He coaxed her chin up, way up, as if he was positioning her to receive his kiss. Her heart trembled to a breathless pause when he lowered his dark head, and the light in his golden-brown eyes burned into hers as if he was trying to memorize everything about her.

  “Your pupils are reactive, so I think you managed to avoid a concussion.”

  The breathless tripping of her heart face-planted into a pool of disappointment. So much for her fantasy of mutual attraction. “I told you I’m fine.”

  “You must be made of some pretty tough stuff.”

  “Thanks. I think.” Before she lost her mind any more than she already had, Kendall discreetly shifted out of his reach and turned back to the counter. “For what it’s worth, I’m glad you showed up this morning. It saves me the trouble of hunting you down.”

  “Yeah?” Like her, he settled back to dig into his cup of oatmeal, though his gaze remained fastened on her with unsettling intensity. “Why were you going to do that?”

  “I wanted to thank you for all you did.”

  He offered a seam-straining shrug. “I didn’t do anything.”

  “Still, I’m grateful.”

  “Your gratitude isn’t necessary.”

  Kendall froze as the jarring sense of déjà vu smacked her in the face. What was it about her that made men reject her thanks? “There’s another reason I wanted to talk to you.”

  “Oh?”

  “Why did you ask if the veil in Dave Beamer’s eyes was white?”

  There was an odd flicker in his expression before he sipped his coffee. “Did I?”

  “Absolutely. I mentioned I had seen a veil in Dave’s eyes. You asked if it was white.”

  “Or some other random color. I was trying to distract you.”

  “Red,” she said with a snap of her fingers. “Not some other color. You wanted to know if the veil I had seen in Dave’s eyes had been either red or white. Why those two colors?”

  “There was nothing specific about it. I was just doing my job.”

  “It felt like more than that.” Her chin lifted in a staunch refusal to back down, because the moment she’d seen that milky wrongness in her attacker’s eyes at the hospital, her memory snagged on Zeke’s odd questioning. “It’s as though you were specifically looking for a sign of either red or white in Dave’s eyes. Maybe you’ve run into this phenomenon in your work?”

  “Not that I can recall.”

  “What does the color white in a person’s eyes signify?”

  “I’ve already answered this. It’s not significant.”

  “What about red? What does that signify?”

  “Investigative journalism,” he muttered. “I just remembered what your specialty is.”

  When his mouth flattened, she decided it was time to throw a change-up. “Look, all we’re doing is talking, okay? I promise, this is off the record.”

  “Who cares whether or not it’s on the record? There’s nothing to tell.”

  “Okay.” Frustrated by her lack of progress, she reached over and picked up her smartphone charging on the counter. “I’m capable of finding the answers for myself.”

  He pushed his empty oatmeal cup away. “What are you doing?”

  “Indulging in my profound love for super-fast search engines.” With a determined click she sent out the request, then raised her brows. “Goodness. Who knew there was so much information out there regarding strange colors in a person’s eyes? Setting aside the articles on camera flare, there seem to be lots of hits on the occult and paranormal—”

  The hand that held her phone was suddenly engulfed by his, as if her fingers were no bigger than a toddler’s. Startled, Kendall looked up to discover he’d once again left his seat and was now towering over her. Too late, she realized she was trapped on her stool as he leaned his free hand on the counter beside her, his knee brushing her outer thigh while his other hand kept hers captive.

  Alarm spurted through her, but this wasn’t the self-preservation sort of alarm a rational woman should feel when cornered by a man she didn’t know. This alarm was an inexplicable thrill, fueled by an attraction to a man who made all her feminine instincts flutter. If his goal was to intimidate her, he was doing it wrong. The only thing he’d managed to do was jack her pulse up straight into the stratosphere.

  “You do like to push things, don’t you?” Zeke moved closer still, until there was no more than a breath between them. “Don’t you know there are some things you can’t push?”

  “You say this when you have me trapped?” Far from cowed, she decided turnabout was fair play. She leaned forward just enough to invade his space, while nearly head-butting him in the chin. “I think you’re the one who needs to learn that lesson.”

  “Now, now. No need to get feisty.” He was smart enough to inch back, but the fierce delight in his half-smile told her he was more than up to any challenge she was insane enough to throw out. “I’m just trying to offer some friendly advice.”

  “What? To not be too pushy?”

  “Some people might see pushiness as an unflattering trait.”

  “I’m not worried. I have other traits that make up for it.”

  The light in his eyes turned scorching hot. “I’m sure you do.”

  “Besides, who gives a damn what people think? I’ve never let that slow me down.”

  “Why am I not surprised?” The powerful fingers holding hers softened, and his thumb caressed a path over her knuckles as if captivated by the texture of her skin. Then, with the faintest pressure, he held down the power button until the screen went blank. “Let me put it another way. Your investigative instincts could land you in a place you can’t get out of.”

  Her brows arched. “That’s not a threat, is it?”

  “It’s a statement of fact. If you’re planning on an exposé focusing on strangely lit eyes and the occult, you’re going to come off sounding...Well.” He grimaced in an almost apologetic way. “Like a candidate for the funny farm.”

  The unexpected jab hurt. “Is that what I sound like to you?”

  Again he brushed a caressing thumb over her knuckles, a bittersweet gesture that somehow condescended. “You sound like someone who’s struggling with the trauma she’s experienced.”

  “I’ve experienced two traumatic events, and the only thing I’m currently having trouble with is you,” she shot back, stung. “I know what I saw, and I know you meant something specific when you questioned me. This isn’t a flight from reality.”

  “If it’s not a flight from reality,” he said with great gentleness, and it was that very tone that made her want to wince, “then what is it you’re looking for?”

  “I don’t know. That’s why I’m asking.” With an angry flick of her wrist, Kendall dislodged his hand. “I need to understand what happened to my friend, just as I need to understand why I was attacked by a man who had that same white veil in his eyes that Dave had—the same veiling that you seemed so interested in. Now, are you going to be honest with me about how you knew to ask what color that veiling was, or are you going to keep making me feel like there’s something wrong with me?”

  Something flickered across his rugged face before he stepped away. “If you were attacked by someone with a veil across his eyes, I’d say you’d be stupid to dig into it any further. You got out alive—twice. Be happy with that and go on with your normal, human life.” With that, he packed up the refuse of their breakfast and let himself out.

  Kendall stared after him, mind churning. Maybe he was right. Maybe she should simply drop the madness of the night before and pray it never happened again. But Dave had been her friend, the only real friend she’d made since moving to San Francisco.

  Even more than that, though, there was the quiet, awful fear that now ran through her like a slow-killing poison. Every instinct she possessed told her that the thing that had ended Dave’s life had also attacked her with the single-minded intent of ending hers. She didn’t k
now how it was possible she was targeted, or why, or even what it was that had her in its sights. None of it made sense, and that was the problem. As long as she didn’t understand what was happening, she was condemned to live in abject fear.

  Would it attack again? Whatever “it” was?

  Her ruined throat worked on a convulsive swallow while her stomach tied itself in knots, and she shivered in the warmth of the loft. She couldn’t do this. She wasn’t built for constantly looking over her shoulder and waiting to be a victim. That was no way to live. If she wanted to save her sanity, the only option she had left was to dig into the truth behind what really happened the night before, and face it head-on.

  Zeke Reece wasn’t the only source who could help her make sense of it all, she decided, her hands visibly shaking as she reached for the last of her coffee. There was one other who knew even more than the fantasy-inspiring paramedic.

  If she wanted to stay alive, she had to find the masked man.

  Chapter Three

  “If I were a masked man, where would I be? Fortress of Solitude or the Xavier Mansion?”

  The apartment was quiet as Kendall munched on the sinfully salty fries she’d gotten from the diner across the street, before letting her fingers do the walking on her laptop. She didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to know finding someone who wore a mask was going to be tough. Obviously he had no desire to be found, but if she had to use up her lifetime’s allotment of research mojo, she’d find him. Whether Zeke believed her or not, her life depended on it.

  After linking to KPOW’s research databases, her jaw dropped at the number of masked-man sightings there were throughout the city. Apparently her savior was a bit of a local celebrity, with his very own superhero name—The Guardian Angel. Not exactly the most inventive moniker the world had ever seen, but people clearly didn’t know what else to call a guy whose primary hobby was swooping in to save the day. The first article she clicked on was proof enough of that.

  Feral Animal Attack in Alamo Square Park, Two Teens Wounded

  Eureka Creek High School students Kia Kagawa and Orlando Boatwright were attacked around ten o’clock last night as they crossed Alamo Square Park. The magic of their first date came to an end when Boatwright, sixteen, suffered injuries to his head and neck as an unidentified animal attacked him. Kagawa broke her wrist while trying to pull the animal from Boatwright.

  According to authorities, the teens were saved by a man dressed in black. This unidentified man tackled the beast with such ferocity they flew into the darkness and seemed to vanish. In pain and in shock, Kagawa and Boatwright were unable to describe their black-clad savior, as the teens thought he may have been wearing some sort of mask. Toxicology and blood alcohol levels on the teens came back negative, and while authorities won’t officially confirm this as a sighting of San Francisco’s urban legend, The Guardian Angel, unofficially they believe it was yet another event involving the mysterious crusader. Meanwhile, area residents have been told to be on the lookout for stray animals.

  Kendall rubbed at the tension gathering at the base of her neck before she scrolled down to another headline that made her do a double take.

  Guardian Angel Saves Man Who Claims Dead Wife Tried to Kill Him

  When police responded late last night to a possible jumper on the Golden Gate Bridge, they were in for a surprise. According to witnesses, tractor-trailer driver Virgil T. Smoot was screaming for help. Yet when officers approached to pull the burly truck driver from the edge, he informed them his wife was trying to make him jump. His dead wife.

  If that wasn’t strange enough, while they waited for crisis counselors to arrive, something described as “fast and black” zoomed up from the unlikely direction of the water. The teetering Smoot was then snatched from the edge as if he weighed no more than a toddler, only to be flung back into the closed-off roadway. A black-masked figure, described by witnesses as The Guardian Angel, then landed on the stunned trucker and reached down to Smoot’s chest. Though the officers on scene have conflicting accounts as to whether or not Smoot was physically assaulted, one thing is certain. By the time the officers reacted, Smoot was rendered unconscious while The Guardian Angel jumped off the bridge himself, and vanished.

  “Whoa.” Kendall shivered and rubbed her arms for warmth. If the impossible actions of the masked man weren’t enough to rattle her, the similarities to both Dave’s inexplicable behavior and her attacker’s were too much to ignore. But before she could puzzle out what sort of crazy contagion had afflicted these unconnected people, another headline convinced her that no matter how bizarre her own life had become, it could always be worse.

  Masked Men, Red Eyes and Zombies, Oh My

  Authorities are still trying to untangle the violence that erupted during a concert in Stern Grove last night. As jazz band Carrot Seeds wrapped up its set, twenty-four-year-old Dodi Joaquin pulled a Swiss Army knife and screamed that his dead father was stalking him. Joaquin’s partner, photojournalist Dennis Sondenhein, claimed he saw the supposedly deceased man as well, with one startling exception. According to Sondenheim’s statement, he claims “the image of the man looked like Dodi’s father, but his eyes were glowing neon red.”

  Bystanders were attempting to subdue the knife-wielding Joaquin when a masked man identified as The Guardian Angel appeared. But rather than apprehending Joaquin, San Francisco’s masked hero inexplicably went after someone in the crowd. After a brief tussle with this unidentified person, The Guardian Angel was reportedly thrown several feet into a concession stand while Joaquin was at last subdued by fellow concert-goers. Both The Guardian Angel and the individual he attacked disappeared in the confusion, while Joaquin was taken into custody by park officials. Both he and Sondenheim had traces of THC in their systems, the active ingredient in marijuana.

  A low whistle escaped Kendall as she reread the story. While it was comforting that someone else had seen a discoloration in the eyes in association with a burst of violence, the color she’d seen was white, not a glowing neon red. Again her brain obediently offered up Zeke’s question about eye color, but she shoved it away with a growl. He’d made it all too obvious that door was locked, sealed and bricked over, and if she tried to force it open, his official plan of action was to make her feel like a babbling loon. Bastard.

  Without warning, her heart froze as an all-too-familiar headline leapt out at her.

  Guardian Angel Couldn’t Stop a Grisly Murder-Suicide at Fisherman’s Wharf

  Tourists got to see much more than the seals near Fisherman’s Wharf last night, when fifty-five-year-old unemployed handyman James “Jimbo” Denton attacked and killed his female companion, forty-five-year-old Angelique Raspberry, before killing himself. Witness reports are contradictory, running the gamut from the couple peacefully sharing a bag of popcorn to engaging in a shouting match preceding the violence. To further confuse the issue, a security guard claims that as he approached the scene, a masked man dressed as The Guardian Angel suddenly appeared and attempted to break Denton’s grip on Raspberry, but was repelled. According to the guard and other witnesses, after strangling Raspberry, Denton then put his fist through a nearby popcorn vendor’s glass display case, retrieved a shard, and slit his own throat. Both Denton and Raspberry were pronounced dead at the scene. There are no reports of where The Guardian Angel went in the aftermath.

  It was her story, Kendall realized, stunned. This incident was part of the murder-suicide story she had given to Dave to lead off the newscast. Little did she know her masked hero had tried to save the day there, too.

  Tried, and failed.

  Goose bumps broke out when her attention snagged on how the two people died. Just as she had nearly been choked to death, Angelique Raspberry had been brutally strangled. And just as Dave Beamer had taken the nearest implement—a pen—to his neck, the handyman had done the exact same thing. If she didn’t know better, she’d think this particular vein of insanity had been scripted by a singularly violent, if unimaginat
ive mind.

  And that was the problem. She didn’t know better. She didn’t have a clue what was behind Dave’s attack of the crazies, or why she had been assaulted. Or, for that matter, what that vaporous thing was that had taken off into the night.

  But she’d bet The Guardian Angel knew exactly what it was.

  * * *

  He should have known she wouldn’t give up.

  Scowling, Zeke watched Kendall from the curtains of shadows he’d pulled around himself as she weaved her way through the dwindling crowds at Pier 39, the sun nothing more than a memory as night laid claim to his city once more. Why the woman didn’t bother to get her errands done during the day was beyond him, but apparently not even a near-strangling was enough to scare her. At this point, he doubted anything would.

  He watched her cast about the pier, looking like the poster child for the helpless and muggable, and he cursed under his breath. Where were her survival instincts? She was proving to be more of a pain than he’d ever imagined, taking up time and energy he couldn’t spare when there was a rogue geist with weird abilities running around. The last thing he wanted was to babysit a bull-headed journalist so bent on establishing herself as the Twenty-first-century’s version of Geraldo she was willing to turn a blind eye to the dangers lurking around her.

  Only she wasn’t blind. Not completely. That was the problem.