by Rae Foxx
Michael and Gabe joined me at the sink and washed their own hands. "But why do you have him?"
Gabriel sighed. "She said he'd protect her, and I have to admit, he's foiled me a couple of times from trying to kill Lucian."
I dropped the towel I was drying my hands with and glared at him. "What do you mean?"
He shrugged. "I mean, I tried to get at him a few times and the dog wouldn't let me or was blocking me when I tried. But come on, Lil, I'm not trying all that hard, you have to know that. If I was, Luc would be dead by now."
He sure was full of himself. "Oh, you think so? What about this spell on him? For all you know, it would stop you."
Michael picked up the towel I dropped and gave it a shake. A few dog hairs drifted off of it. Jellybean hadn't been in the house long and he was already getting his fur everywhere.
I moved to the refrigerator to look for more breakfast ingredients. Lucian had opted to do a protein shake and hit the gym before work—something I normally would've done with him. Not now. I'd be lucky to make it from the couch to the TV to pop in a yoga DVD. Besides, sex was exercise, right?
"Can we run through everything we know?" I asked.
Michael took the sausage from me. "Only if you sit. You look exhausted."
I allowed them to help me make breakfast. Why not? Settling at the kitchen table, I watched the two gorgeous angels and grinned at them doing mundane tasks like whisking eggs and finding the right frying pan.
Michael brushed his curly brown hair out of his eyes as he flipped the sausage a few minutes later. "I've been studying the gates. I imbibed them with all the power I could, and if we amassed enough angels, Fallen, and maybe Upper Demons, we could shore it up for a while. Long enough to figure out the baby situation."
Gabriel gave him a flat look. "Or we could get Lucifer back where he belongs and take care of the problem in minutes." He twisted his arm around a skillet full of eggs. "I have some news in that regard." With a sigh, he continued cooking without expanding on his statement.
"You gonna tell us or make us guess?" I asked.
Gabriel shot me a scathing look. "It's hard to say."
"What is?" I stood from the chair and barely avoided groaning as the baby settled low in my hips, making them ache and feel like I carried a watermelon between my legs.
"Sit, sit," he hurried over and turned me around. "What can I get you?"
"I was coming to comfort you. Whatever you're about to say is bothering you." I let him help me back to the chair with a sigh. "I'll be glad to get back to my regularly scheduled body."
Gabriel sat across from me and took my hand.
"I think Raphael is behind all this."
My jaw dropped. I couldn't imagine him doing something insane like risking the gates of Abaddon. "Why do you think that?"
"He's unaccounted for," he said with a morose look on his face. "Nobody can find him. And it had to have been an insane amount of power to put that spell on Lucifer. A longevity spell like that is, well, nearly impossible."
Michael dished a bunch of eggs onto a plate after Gabriel finished cooking them and brought them to the table. "He's always been good with manipulating magic." Michael said, he looked stricken by the idea as well.
"Why though?"
Gabriel shrugged. "No idea."
Michael brought the sausages over, and Gabe rose, going to the fridge. "Do you have any orange juice?" he asked. He answered his own question when he pulled out a big jug.
"My pregnancy, the spell of longevity, Lucian's personality being all one-sided. What else is going to happen?" I dug into the food. All this stress made me even hungrier. This human body wasn't one to lose her appetite when stressed, though I did remember times I had been that way. It was a little different every time. Overall, I'd end up with the same personality, but my upbringing altered me in small but significant ways.
"The baby." Michael pointed at my stomach with his sausage. "That's a big one."
"Yep. Why in the world would Raphael make me pregnant?"
Gabe chuckled. "He didn't make you pregnant."
Always the jokester. He couldn't just let one pass. "Of course not, but why would he do something that surpassed the curse on my body and make it so I could get pregnant?"
They both stared at me blankly as they chewed. "Exactly," I said. "There's no reasonable explanation."
The why behind it all had been on my mind since the moment I was able to retain my ethereal memories. Nothing made sense. Nothing tied it all together and explained everything.
We ate in silence until all three of us were pretty much done. Then, I sighed and sat back. "Michael, can you try again? Can you delve in and study the baby and just make sure she's human?"
He started and smiled. "Of course. Go get comfortable and we'll try."
"I'll clean up here," Gabriel said. "Be there in a few."
Michael walked with me up to my bedroom and sat cross-legged on the bed. I laid down on my side with my trusty pregnancy pillow between my legs and waited for him to do his thing.
He put his hands on my stomach and I closed my eyes as they glowed.
The next thing I knew, he was rubbing my shoulder. "Wake up."
I blinked at him and smiled. "I fell asleep?"
He grinned. "Yeah, but I helped you get there. You looked exhausted."
"So, what did you find?" I sat up and rubbed my eyes to find Gabe lying at the end of the bed on his back, tapping his feet to some music only he could hear.
"Much of the same." Michael still had his hands on my stomach. He breathed deep and flexed his fingers on me. "She's human. I'm sure of that. But I've been trying to see if I can sense any magic in her at all."
He cocked his head, eyes closed, and went quiet. "I can't sense any, but your magic is loud, Lil. It's coiled deep inside, locked away so it doesn't ruin this human body. I can't hear or sense hers over it, if she has any."
Disappointment flooded me again. There had been a small bit of hope that he’d come up with something new this time. "Even if the baby is a human with magic, which is exceedingly rare, she can't follow us to Elysium."
Michael shook his head and put his hands in his lap. "She'd die immediately, and her soul would go straight to Elysium."
The age of accountability. The souls of children or adults with child-like minds were sent straight to God when they died. Their rebirth was inevitable and usually quick.
"Something is odd, though," Michael said. "The baby herself is perfect. As long as nothing traumatic happens to you or her, she'll be born without complications."
I glared at Gabe. "Traumatic like her mom dropping dead?" Which is what would've happened if Gabe had successfully killed Lucian.
Gabe shrugged. "I keep telling you, if Lucian died, I'd get to you immediately and take care of the baby."
"You've said that only once, and it didn't reassure me. I want to say goodbye to her, find her a home, a proper home. If I can't raise her, I need to make sure she's cared for."
Gabe's jaw dropped. "I'm sorry. I didn't look at it like that." He looked stricken. "Lil, I know this is traumatic for you. I see it. I'm so sorry."
Michael shook his head. "But Gabriel is right. We just don't have any way of knowing how much time we have. The gates could stand for a century or they could fall tomorrow. And if they were directly attacked? I think they would fall. We could shore them up, but…”
There were too many what-ifs to count.
I nodded. "I know. We're taking a gamble every single day Luc is on Earth. If this was engineered by someone with the intent of attacking the gates when they were weak, their plan was working. But why would someone want to attack the gates? Contrary to popular belief, we're all on the same side. We want demons in Abaddon with the sinners, the evildoers. The unrepentant."
Michael nodded. "We're all on the same team." He sighed and waved his hand over his face. His glow dimmed and features altered until he looked like Adam again. Similar, but not exactly the same.
I sat up on the bed and pushed pillows up behind me for support. "What are you doing?"
The Constance in me was sad at seeing her husband's best friend. Human memories tried to swamp me, but I pushed them back. He was the same person, even more so because he'd remembered himself while human.
"I'm going to go inspect Lucian now that I'm at full power. It takes some time once I’ve turned back to my angel form. Maybe I can see if I can get anything else off of him. Because there's something else I sensed in the baby, but I need to check Lucifer before I can be sure."
I nodded. "You won't tell me what?"
Michael scooted off the bed. "Don't worry, it's not bad, but might be a clue to who did this. I just need to make sure I'm not confusing the aura I sensed with Lucifer's."
Turning my head up, I puckered my lips and waited for a goodbye kiss. He popped one on my lips and disappeared.
Gabe hopped up and held out his hand. "Come on. Let's go watch TV until he gets back."
"I didn't understand why you were so resistant to getting Luc back to where he belongs," he explained. "I thought maybe your human side was influencing you."
"No, I have to settle the baby. Having a baby is enormous. Huge. I don't think you get that."
"I do, truly." He walked into our living room and looked at me as I paused in the doorway. "I'm sorry. I understand now that you can't just walk away from the baby."
"Could you?" I narrowed my eyes at him, waiting on his answer.
"Of course not. But I figured it would happen like Constance's body died, you went and fixed up Abaddon while I got the baby to a human hospital where they'd make sure she was okay. Then you'd come help me get her settled. You're looking at it the other way around. You'll settle her, then settle Abaddon."
I nodded. "Okay. I forgive you. And I do get why it's important to get us back to Abaddon, but for right now, the most important thing is that I go pee."
Several minutes later, I joined Gabe in the living room where he had one of my favorite true crime shows on. Snuggling beside him with a blanket, we lost ourselves in the storyline while we waited on Michael.
It only took him the span of an episode. He blinked into the living room and plopped down on my other side with a sigh. "Nope, I was right. Lucian has Lucifer's magic deep inside. Feels like you do in that aspect. And I sense the curse, but I think I delved a little deeper because I can tell it's a layered curse. There must be a different one for his long life and for blocking his personality."
"I'm still fuzzy about why the personality block was necessary."
Michael shrugged. "More than likely, Lucifer would be predisposed to live a dangerous life."
Lucifer's past human lives had been wild. "Yes, that is true. He's always the rebel, the daredevil. The bad guy that women love."
Michael rolled his eyes. "Why don't they love the good guys."
Bless him. He was the consummate good guy. "They do, honey. That's why I keep you around."
"Well, Lucifer being exactly as I'd expected leaves us with a huge clue. I sense Sandalphon on your baby."
My jaw dropped. "What?" That was completely out of left field.
Gabe sat up. "What do you mean sense? As in the baby is his!?" His energy crackled in the air. He was ready to throw down.
"No, not in the baby. And it's faint. But Sandalphon had a hand in the creation of this child." Michael set his jaw. "I'll go find him." He disappeared without another word. I hadn't even had time to wrap my mind around what that meant.
"What the fuck?" I asked.
Gabe gave me an incredulous look. "That was shocking news. I'm going to go help him, and Luc will be home soon." He leaned over and pressed a kiss to my temple. "You okay?"
"Yeah, I will be. I'll just sit here and marinate until you figure out where Sandalphon is and what he had to do with this baby."
Gabe disappeared, and I considered what I knew about Sandalphon while I waited on Lucian to come home.
He was the angel charged with the protection of unborn children and expectant mothers. If he had a hand in my pregnancy, it was most likely something to help me get pregnant. The question wasn't what he did, it was why.
Fallen and High Demons spend their time tempting the wicked and keeping lower demons and the souls of the damned trapped in Abaddon.
11
They didn't return for several days, and I didn't try to summon them. Instead, I enjoyed every moment as a pregnant wife to a doting husband.
One morning, I stared at Lucian as he tied his shoes. "Stay home with me today."
"What?" he asked. "I've got work."
Shrugging, I circled the kitchen table and put my arms around him from behind, letting my belly hang down behind the chair. "Come on. Play hooky."
I didn't know how much time we had. Michael and Gabe could turn up with Sandalphon at any time. If Lucian was here, they'd wait until he left. At least this way I got an extra day with him. If he stayed. He was pretty responsible, and playing hooky wasn't in his nature. "Our lives will be so crazy soon. Let Linda hold down the fort at the office or forward all calls and give her the day off too. Please?" Twirling—awkwardly—around him, I sat in his lap and gave him my biggest puppy dog eyes.
My sweet husband laughed and nodded his head. "Okay."
I stood and bounced on my heels. If I hadn't been pregnant, I might've jumped up and down, but a small bounce was all I had in me. "Yay! We can watch TV and cook and maybe..." I wiggled my eyebrows up and down, then winked at him.
Lucian burst out laughing. "I'd love to..." He imitated my crazy facial movements. "Sounds like a great day."
While he called Linda and settled his workload for the day, I took a shower.
By the time I made it downstairs, he had breakfast cooking and was back in his pajamas. "Yay!" I cried from the stairs. "Fun day!"
"We'll call it our snow day." He dipped French toast in eggs, then settled it in the hot pan. "Since we never take those either."
"Deal." I felt lighter on my feet than I had in months and nearly skipped over to the fridge. "I'm so happy."
It was too easy to push the worry away and let Connie's personality take over. Sure, she was a little cynical, but her favorite person was Lucian. He made her happier than she'd ever been in her life. I let that side of me have one more day, time to spend with her husband and the growing life inside her.
That day stretched to four. It became increasingly difficult to convince Lucian to stay home, and finally, I resorted to talking him into working from home instead of taking the day off.
"You know we have a baby coming, right?" he asked in response to me trying to tease him away from his desk with the offer of a blow job. "We're going to need money."
I gave up with a sigh. I couldn't exactly explain to him that this would all be over soon. We did not need money. He never would've believed me.
In the end, I had to let him go back to work. Gabriel popped in on the morning of the fifth day while Luc was in the shower. I languished in bed, unwilling to leave my soft sheets.
"Hey," Gabe whispered, pulling me from my light snooze. The door to our bathroom was wide open, with Luc singing some pop song about working it. His Christmas concert popped into my head. If we didn't sort this soon, I'd have to go to his concert and pretend like I wasn’t preoccupied. Fuck.
"What are you doing?" I woke fully up in an instant. I sat up and rubbed the sleep from my eye.
The dog thumped his tail on the comforter. He'd taken to sleeping at the foot of our bed, which Lucian grumbled about, but secretly loved. He knew who Gabe was and liked him, though.
"I just wanted to pop in and tell you now we can't find Sandalphon or Raphael. We're looking for them both. Just hang tight."
I gave him a sarcastic look and patted my belly. "Not much else for me to do."
He shrugged, pressed a kiss to my lips, and disappeared. I hated to see him go, but we had to get some damn answers already. And it was better than him trying to kill Luc again.
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Two weeks passed before I heard another word. I tried to let life get back to normal. We even went out to eat a few times. I had another doctor's appointment, where they did the final ultrasound. I had to pretend I had no idea that it was a sweet girl inside me. "The baby is perfect," the doctor said. He looked over the ultrasound film that the tech had given him. "Their weight is right on track, and we see nothing that will cause any difficulties." He beamed at us.
Damn, faking enthusiasm for Lucian's sake was not easy. I smiled and pretended to wipe tears away. Luc immediately put his arm around me. "What is it?"
"Nothing," I said with a small, intentional sob. If he thought I was hormonal, he wouldn't question any enthusiasm I wasn't able to produce. "Just emotional. We're so close to the end."
The doc chuckled. He was an older man with salt and pepper hair, and kind eyes. "You could technically go into labor any time now. You're thirty-five weeks, and your baby’s lungs would likely be fine. We'd much prefer he or she cook in there for another four to five weeks though."
I nodded. "Of course. Is there anything there that would make you think I'd go into labor sooner?"
"Nope," he chirped. "With first-time moms, anything is possible. You could go tomorrow, or you could be two weeks late."
"Thank you," I said. His information directly confirmed what I'd already read online.
We stopped to get dog food on the way home. I insisted Jellybean have a raw meat diet, and we'd been purchasing it from a local butcher. As we took off our seat belts to go into the small store, pain tore across my stomach.
I cried out and bent over as far as I could, clutching my middle. "Holy shit!"
"What?" Lucian rubbed my back. "What's wrong?"
"Pain," I gasped. Rocking back and forth, I tried to breathe deep, through my mouth, like I'd seen the women on TV do. I'd been meaning to sign up for a birthing class, but never had gotten around to it. Did real people actually go to those things anyway?
The pain passed quickly. "How long did that last?" I asked.