by Nia Shay
Dark Angel's Ward
Angel Warden Series, Book One
by Nia Shay
Dark Angel's Ward
Published by Moonwild Press
Copyright 2011 Nia Shay
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher, except for brief quotations in critical reviews and articles.
Table of Contents
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
One
Screams tore through the roaring emptiness inside my head, a sharp, piteous plea for redemption or release. Judging by the scent of blood in the air, I guessed the latter. My lungs grew tight, choked with the thick odor. I was drowning in it. My world melted into a sea of red and black, and in the middle of it all, someone was dying. And I couldn't do a damn thing about it.
Still, I couldn't stop hearing that helpless cry...until my elbow slipped sideways, and my chin hit my desk with a thump. A shower of papers fluttered to the floor at my feet.
Damn it! I knew better than to let my mind wander. I turned bleary eyes to the clock on the wall--no more than ten minutes had passed since I'd set down my pen. Not time enough to have fallen asleep. Definitely not a dream, then. Which meant I'd been hallucinating. Again.
Gulping in deep breaths to slow my racing heart, I leaned down and retrieved the small stack of charge slips I'd knocked over. The Weston Mall didn't do a booming business on Wednesday nights, and sales had been slow. Too slow, obviously, giving me time to think when I wanted to forget. Let go. Nothing out of the ordinary here. Be normal. Be normal. Be normal. The words found purchase in the drum line of the song blaring over the loudspeakers, pounding a steady rhythm in my brain.
The thought didn't soothe me, though, nor did the music. Restless, I pushed back my chair and wandered out into the store proper. The dim lighting of the sales floor made a refreshing change from the harsh fluorescents in the manager's office. I met with the identical stares of my two employees who were, by necessity, doing nothing. The place was absolutely empty.
"Yo, boss," muttered a languid Cara. She slumped beside the register, penning away in a journal titled "True Confessions of a Goth Princess" in spiky handwriting. Her twin, Sara, merely nodded at me and moved to half-heartedly straighten a rack of leather corsets.
I smiled a greeting. They were gorgeous girls, tall and curvaceous, with glossy brown hair and bright blue eyes. I could just imagine them as little girls in the family photos, with pigtails and grins and matching dresses to go with their matching names. Yet here they were at nineteen, their locks done up in short, glue-stiffened spikes, faces made up in opposing patterns of black and white. Both wore black leggings and baggy tee shirts bearing the store's name, Dissonance. It was entirely apropos.
Dissonance was a bit of a conundrum itself--a chain store catering to the nonconformist fashions of the goth and emo crowds. A thousand and one ways to make the outer reflect the inner, beauty wrought from ugliness. The twins and I fit the theme perfectly, because we didn't fit in at all.
A rude noise startled me. "Have I told you lately how much you suck, Jade?" Cara groused, flinging the cap of her pen at me.
I caught it on the fly. "Why? What did I do now?"
"It's so unfair that you get to wear cool clothes while we're stuck in these lame-ass tee shirts," she grumbled.
I shrugged, looking down at myself. I'd dressed pretty conservatively, especially compared to some of the twins' wilder outfits. A metallic silver club shirt, several sizes too big, largely concealed my black lace camisole and skinny jeans. I popped open three buttons and twirled like a runway model, sticking my tongue out at Cara as I spun past.
With a smirk, she tossed the pen itself, missing me by a mile. "What's with the man shirt, anyway? Are you trying to create the illusion that you have a boyfriend?"
"I might, you know." I stopped my strutting and turned, planting my hands on my hips. "Just because you've never seen him doesn't mean I don't have one."
"No, but the fact that you never talk about one, and you never take a day off, and you have no discernable social life...."
"All right, brat, you wanna know the truth?" Fighting back a grin of my own, I reached over a rack of accessories and plucked up a silk top hat, perching it atop my dark waves. "I was actually born a man."
"Yeah, right!" Sara hooted from behind me.
Cara rolled her eyes. "And you're only working here 'til you can pay off the boob job, right?"
"You got it. So, did anyone call while I was in the back?"
"Oh, yeah!" She perked up, waving a page torn from her diary. "This body piercer guy wants to rent out part of the shop and set up a chair. What d'you say? Can we have him? Please?"
"We'll feed him and take him for walks and everything," Sara added, giggling.
I shrugged, accepting the scrawled message. "I'll run it by corporate, but I doubt they'll approve."
"Screw corporate." Cara thumped the cash register with a defiant fist. "Bunch of money-grubbing whores."
"Whores who, incidentally, sign your paychecks. Anything else?"
She looked significantly at her sister, who had her back to us. "Just a creepy pervo doing the heavy-breathing-and-hanging-up routine."
I raised an eyebrow. "Is this something I need to know about?"
"First time it's ever happened," Sara replied without turning, "so I doubt it."
"Hm." How utterly unconvincing. Still, I couldn't do much unless it went on long enough to be called harassment. "Well, are you two gonna be able to handle this crowd by yourselves if I head back to the office?"
Cara grinned at my sarcasm, glancing around the deserted shop. "You know what? I think we've got it covered."
"You're sure spending a lot of time holed up back there." Sara turned a fierce look on me--a bit surprising, coming from the more soft-spoken half of the pair. "Just what're you up to, anyway?"
Sadly, I had no good explanation to give her, only a horrific one. "Inventory's coming up." I waited out their cries of dismay, adding, "Hey, you think the counting is a drag? You should try wading through all the damn paperwork."
"Yeah, we could help you with that." Cara nodded thoughtfully. "Or, we could take turns clawing each others' eyes out instead."
"That does sound like a lot more fun." I flexed my fingers, though my bitten nails were anything but intimidating. "Who wants to go first?"
Sara scowled at her sister. "Depends on how much a transplantable cornea will sell for on the black market. We're late with the car payment again."
"So?"
"So, it wouldn't kill you to be serious every now and again."
Cara snorted. "Are you scolding me, Mommy?"
"Oh, you did not just call me that."
"Hey, the blind can't drive, anyway. Problem solved." My helpful comment earned me a pair of icy glares. I shook my head and slipped away as they began to argue in earnest, calling an unheard "you kids play nice" over my shoulder.
Their bickering faded behind me, a background cadence to the mournful tones of keyboard and electric guitar. A slow song had begun, one more likely to lull me to sleep than inspire me to dig into the dreaded paperwork. It sat in an ominously neat pile on the corner of my desk, just as I'd left it last night. And the night before. And the night before that.
Resigned, I closed the door and plunked down in my chair to flip through it. A contract for the inventory company sat on top, with a due date of the day before. Oops. I scrawled my signature and slipped it into the fax machine. Next, a payroll report. Then a comprehensive list of which merchandise should be included in the count. After a quick glance, I could sum it up in one word--everything.
On and on it went, drudgery piled upon mundanity. Thankfully, I had a far better grasp on the mundane now than I'd had earlier. I sank into the task, grateful for its repetitiveness. After all, who had time to ponder the yawning maw of insanity when there were HR forms to be filled out in triplicate?
I lost track of the time as I scribbled and scrawled. When my desk intercom buzzed, I scooped up the receiver without even looking up. "Yeah?"
"Dude. I wholeheartedly apologize."
I frowned at Cara's incredulous tone. "Huh? For what?"
"I guess you really do have a boyfriend. Yowza."
"Oh." Snickering, I picked up my pen again. "No, sweetie, I really don't. I was just messing with you."
"Oh yeah? So how come there's a major demigod out here, asking for a lovely young woman who fits your description to a tee?"
I only half heard her as I shuffled through papers. "What?"
Cara let out a squawk of annoyance. "Could you be any more square, Jade? I just got done telling you there's an incredibly hot guy out here asking to see you, and all you have to say is...."
"What?" I asked again, far more sharply this time.
"Now you're listening to me? Good! So who is he? Are you gonna come out of your cave, or should I show him on back?"
My heart stuttered in my chest. "Don't you dare tell him anything!"
"Well jeez, freak out on me, why don't you? Oh hell, he's headed back your way. Sor...."
I didn't wait to hear her apology. Slamming the handset back into its cradle, I leapt from my chair. Only one man in the world would ever come looking for me. If he was here, now, it was nothing short of a crisis. Dread churned in my stomach as I burst out of the office. I nearly tripped in my haste, stumbling down the short hallway leading to the sales floor.
There he stood at other the end of it, with an anxious Sara hovering at his shoulder. Or more around his elbow, actually, since he towered over her by nearly a foot. The pitch black hair that had once spilled down his back had been cropped to cheekbone length, a becoming frame for a face so beautiful, it was almost painful to behold. Almond-shaped eyes shone through his tousled forelock like a pair of exotic jewels.
I stopped short as his eyes lit on me, and watched the play of emotion over that perfect face. It came in a dizzying shuffle, impossible to read at first. But finally, something settled into his eyes that I could recognize--pain. With a groan, he lurched forward and fell to his knees at my feet. His gaze sought mine as he spoke. Just three words, but they shattered everything I'd made for myself in the past two years.
"I need you."
And so I found myself in an interesting predicament, with one of the rarest, most powerful beings on the planet bowed in supplication before me. What's a girl to do? I drew back my foot and kicked him in the stomach.
Two
"Jade! What the hell?" Sara hopped from foot to foot beside me as I readied for another kick. I realized she'd shouted to be heard--over me. Apparently I was yelling.
"You vile son of a whore!" He absorbed my second strike just as he had the first, with a grunt and a small sway backward. "You have some fucking nerve!" Kick. "I thought I told you..." Kick. "I never wanted..." Kick. "...To see you again!"
By now his mouth had begun to open. Finally tired of the beating, he was preparing to defend himself. I rocked back on my heels and aimed the next kick at his head.
But the blow never landed. A slim forearm slammed around my neck and hauled me backward before I could move. "Let go of me, Cara!" I shrieked, outraged.
"Sorry, boss. You can't just kill someone in the middle of the mall. It's bad for business."
"Like hell I can't!" But the words tasted bitter on my lips. If only she knew how right she was. I glared down at him as he met my eyes again. Then he doubled over, his hands braced on the carpet in front of him. His hair swung forward like a curtain, hiding his face from sight. For some reason that pissed me off even more. I growled like a rabid dog as Cara dragged me behind the counter.
"Your ex, huh?" she murmured sympathetically as she released me.
"Yeah. You could say that."
"You sure did a number on him." She giggled. "That totally ruled."
I blinked, shocked by the fiendish glee on her pretty face. "You are such a psycho."
"Says you, karate kid!"
Before I could top her comeback, our uninvited guest groaned in pain. Sara leaned over him, laying a hand on his shoulder. "Hey, are you all right?"
"Get away from him, stupid!" I barked. "And for hell's sake, don't touch him!"
"He's hurt, stupid." She leveled me with an insolent glare, telling me she'd drawn the same conclusion Cara had. And, predictably fascinated by his looks, she'd taken my warning as misplaced jealousy. "Why shouldn't I help him?"
I bit my lip, ingrained teachings whispering through my head--Never reveal our secrets.... But fury won out. "Because he's a dark angel, you nit. So if you value your soul and sanity, you'd better take two giant steps that-a-way."
"A dark angel?" the twins repeated in simultaneous awe.
I scowled at Sara. "Move!"
She reacted to my tone at last, scuttling behind a clothing rack. I strode out from behind the counter, shrugging off Cara's hand as she tried again to restrain me. I stood directly before the fallen man, knowing he would sense my closeness. "Get up, Zeph. Get the hell out of here."
"I can't." He spoke to the toes of my boots, his voice raw with pain. "I can't leave without you, Jandra. I'm...sorry."
I snorted. "You mean your Siphon's sorry."
"Jandra?" Sara repeated, giggling. "Your real name is Jandra?"
"Shut up," I replied absently, "and turn that music off." Another slow song had begun, the singer's voice low and sensual. Not what I needed in Zeph's presence. Especially since he'd straightened up to look at me again.
"I don't siphon, and you know it," he said, his tone as flat as his eyes.
"How should I know how low you've sunk, you wretched bastard? Unless you've been given another Warden, you must have...."
"That's it!" Cara's triumphant cry startled me. I whirled to find her wide-eyed, studying me as if I were a bug in a jar. "You're an angel warden," she concluded.
"Was, not am." I frowned. "And what do you mean, 'that's it'?"
Cara shrugged. "Well, we always knew there was something weird about you."
"We just figured you were on something, man." Sara cackled.
I folded my arms over my chest. "Oh, please. Just because I take my job seriously does not mean I'm on something."
"This explains a lot, actually." Cara wound her way out from behind the counter and extended a hand. "Hi, nice to meet you. I'm Cara."
&nb
sp; I looked daggers at him, but Zeph nodded to her, though he tactfully ignored her proffered hand. "And I am...."
"No one. Nothing. I told you not to talk to them."
"No." His gaze swung my way. "You told them not to talk to me."
"And they shouldn't be! What the hell were you thinking, coming after me in the middle of a busy shopping mall?" All right, so maybe the "busy" part wasn't true, but still. I pointed at Sara, who giggled and sang under her breath to the music she'd never turned off. "See? You're already affecting her."
Cara shook her head at her twin. "No, she's just that weird sometimes."
"Get up, Zeph," I repeated. "You need to leave."
He didn't. Instead, he turned that haunted expression on me again. "I won't make it out of here unless you take me, Jandra."
"What? How dare you threaten me? After what you did...."
"Um, boss?" Cara arched a dark brow at me. "He didn't threaten you. He asked you for help."
I stopped myself before I could scream at her. She didn't understand--how could she? "No, sweetie. What he's saying is, unless I let him mind-rape me, he's going to eat the soul of the first person he passes on his way through the food court."
Her eyes went wide. "Oh."
"Yeah, oh."
"Hey, eat Kevin, eat Kevin!" Sara shrieked, bouncing up and down like a giddy monkey. "The blond cashier at Wiener Works!"
Zeph frowned at her antics. "You're right. We do need to leave."
"Not we. You. Get out of here and never come back."
"No! Don't go away!"
Startled, I sprang forward just in time to catch Cara, who'd flung herself at him in a sudden frenzy. The situation was going downhill in a hurry. I pinned the struggling girl in a headlock, gesturing to Zeph with my elbow. "Go in the back room. Now."
Thankfully, he didn't argue. He leapt up with an agility that belied his battered midsection, and vanished into the office before I could blink. "No!" Cara wailed, lunging against my restraining arm. "Bring him back! Make him come back..."
I drew in a deep breath and prayed for patience. "I will, sweetie, but you have to calm down first. All right?" I glanced over my shoulder. "Sara? You okay?"