Yeah, technically the same could be said for me.
But she’d refused to stay behind, and in the end they’d let her come because she’d said the magic words.
I’m okay with being a pawn.
For the chance to see Nate again, however small, she’d sacrifice anything. Take any risk.
So here she was, about to do that very thing.
Ruby turned to Abby. “Are you sure you want to do this? You’ll be weaponless.”
They could kill you in an instant, her eyes seemed to say.
For a chance to save Nate?
There wasn’t even a question.
Squaring her shoulders, Abby nodded.
Ruby’s breath slowly escaped her lips. Looking resigned, she said, “Then off you go.”
“See you after.” With bravado she certainly didn’t feel, Abby headed for the stairwell.
Whoever said love is blind only had half the equation, she thought as she made her way down the stairs and out of the building. It’s also stupid.
What else would possess her to suggest riding a trolley into the heart of angel territory, knowing they’d sniff out her nephilim blood and be on her like white on rice? But if it succeeded in creating a diversion for the rest of the group, it would be worth it.
Let’s just hope they can save everyone before I get turned into toast.
Her heart crept up to her throat as she stepped up to one of the booths selling tickets for the historic trolley tour around the White House. That would put her in the vicinity of the angel tower, where one of them was bound to pick up her unmistakable scent.
“One ticket, please.”
The man at the booth gave her an amiable smile, drawling in a Southern accent, “Your passcard please, ma’am.”
He swiped it and returned it to her, along with the ticket. Minutes later, she was on her way.
“Just a tourist. I’m just a tourist,” she murmured under her breath.
“Excuse me?” said the man sitting next to her, a small artist type who held a camera that looked too large for his stick-thin body.
“Sorry.” She gave him a wobbly smile. “Talking to myself.”
After shooting her a worried side-glance, he unobtrusively slid out of his seat and into the one behind her.
Oops.
So much for acting nonchalant. She was going for clueless, not psycho. If the angels who picked her up so much as suspected she was part of a ruse, this would all be for naught. She needed to look like someone who had no idea she had angel blood. Someone who’d just happened to innocently wander into their path.
Oh, God.
Placing her hand on her roiling stomach, she fought the urge to vomit. If she could approach Jason without knowing what he would do to her, she could do this. It wasn’t so different.
Except the people I’m surrendering myself to are evil, and I was pretty sure Jason wasn’t.
Willing herself to calm down, she forced her gaze on the scenery. As Jason had warned her, if she so much as betrayed a hint of nervousness or fear, the angels would be onto her. She had to be blissfully unaware, and damn convincing at it.
Her life depended on it.
It happened sooner than she expected, right before they reached the Washington Monument.
A Consortium Guard stepped out into the road and flagged the trolley driver down. When Abby’s heart skipped a beat, she used every deep-breathing meditation she could think of to calm herself.
Moments later the trolley screeched to a stop, and the driver opened the passenger door for the approaching Guard.
“Is there a problem, Sir?” the nervous driver asked. He started to rise from his seat.
“Don’t move.” The Guard’s booming, authoritative voice made more than a few people jump. They began to look around warily.
Good. So she wouldn’t be the only one whose heart beat nervously.
The Guard boarded the bus and looked around. Then, apparently satisfied with whatever he’d been searching for, he took the steps down and paused by the door. His gaze shot to the sky, and he gave one sharp nod.
“Oh my God!” a woman behind Abby shrieked.
Mere moments later, a pair of white wings beat down beside the Guard, answering the mystery behind the woman’s panic.
“Angel. Mommy, it’s an angel,” said a little boy around five years old who sat directly across from Abby. He tugged on his mother’s dress in excitement. “I never seen one before.”
His mother hugged him to her, her voice shaking when she replied, “Neither have I, baby. Neither have I.”
A sliver of sympathy wound through Abby. She could understand the mother’s fear. Angels were notorious for keeping to themselves. Seeing a member of the elusive race had to be unnerving. No doubt the woman was terrified about what it meant for her, and for her son’s safety.
Caught up in the other woman’s frightened emotions, she didn’t have time to think about herself. Not until the angel had already absorbed his wings and boarded the bus. The sound of a heavy pair of booted steps stomping across the bus floor shocked her into momentary paralysis.
A pair of faded jeans came to a stop in front of her, the zipper of the fly right about eye level.
Oh jeez…
Swallowing hard, she moved her gaze upward, going past a smooth, muscular chest and to a face that would have been devastatingly handsome if not for the hawkish set in his gaze. His dark hair hung in loose waves almost down to his shoulders, and he’d tucked his locks behind both ears. The look would have been downright sexy if, again, he hadn’t been looking at her like she was a filthy piece of slime.
“Um…h-hi?”
The angel pursed his lips in obvious disgust. “Come with me.”
“Is-is everything okay?” The tremor in Abby’s voice and the fear trickling from her seemed especially well placed under these circumstances.
Baring his teeth in a gesture of pure aggression, the angel said, “Don’t speak. Just obey.”
O-kay. That seemed to be the smart thing to do, so she rose and hugged her purse in front of her, meekly following the angel off the bus.
Her heartbeat thrummed hard and heavy beneath her ribcage. She didn’t fight it, since she figured fear was all but a given at this point, even for someone who had no clue they were nephilim.
“Stay right here,” the Consortium Guard spat at her, his eyes blazing as if she were the lowest of the low.
As if I’d be stupid enough to try to run.
She didn’t say anything though, just plastered a baffled look onto her face.
The angel waited, silent and all superior-like, until the bus began to move again. Then, without a word of warning, he grabbed her around the waist and zoomed into the sky.
Abby let out a loud shriek and grasped onto whatever she could, which unfortunately for the angel happened to be locks of his hair.
Serves you right, asshole.
Playing up the clueless damsel bit, she tugged hard and shrieked, “What’s happening? Where are we going?”
The angel grunted but didn’t respond. It became obvious quite quickly where they were headed, though. He swiftly and efficiently flew them toward the angel tower.
Yes.
She tempered her burst of joy, forcing herself to focus again on the fear behind the entire situation. A clueless tourist wouldn’t be happy to be going to the tower. She’d be terrified.
The angel landed right in front of the entrance to the tower. Unceremoniously setting her on her feet, he grasped her elbow and propelled her forward. Two Consortium Guards scrambled to open the doors and he strode right through, dragging her past a front desk, complete with secretary—wait, the angel towers had a reception area?—and through a set of wooden double doors.
“Wha-what’s happening?” she stammered.
She was inside a large, mostly empty room. It looked like a ballroom, with brown-veined marble flooring and ornate white columns, but there was a raised platform on the far end of the room, and
three throne-like chairs on it.
Three angels sat on the chairs, two male and one female. Though they looked to be about the same age as the angel holding her—as any angel she’d ever seen, for that matter—their imposing air made them seem much older.
The Tribunal.
Holy shit. Talk about out of the frying pan and into the fire.
“She was on one of the tour buses,” the angel holding onto her said in a bored voice.
One of the male angels spared her a dismissive glance. “A tour bus?”
“Yes, by the Washington Monument.”
The male’s gaze went back to her. “Tell me, female, what are you doing here?”
The look on his face, as if she was a bug he was about to squish, made Abby’s stomach do an uneasy flip.
Just a tourist, just a tourist.
After wishing for one brief moment that she’d taken some acting classes growing up, Abby infused a note of confusion into her voice. “I’ve never been to D.C. before. I was touring the national monuments. Did I…did I do something wrong?”
The male locked gazes with his peers and they seemed to share some silent conversation. Finally, he shrugged and murmured, “A fortuitous occurrence.”
Fortuitous. Yeah, for them. In their minds, it was one less nephilim they now had to hunt down and slaughter.
The male on the platform turned back to the angel holding her. He waved a dismissive hand. “Take care of it.”
No!
She was pretty sure she knew what that meant, and it was not good for her.
Come on, guys. Any time now.
The angel holding her nodded and moved his grip to her neck.
God, no. She hadn’t expected it to happen so quickly.
Shit, Nate was going to be so pissed she’d gotten herself killed in this way.
But before the angel could do anything more, the male who’d so callously ordered her death stiffened and sat forward.
“Do you feel that?”
There was a collective pause. Even the air stilled. Then, with no warning, the three Tribunal members rose to their feet.
“Sires?” the angel who gripped her by the neck asked.
“We are being ambushed,” the female angel replied. “From all sides, it seems.”
“Get to the roof and see what’s happening,” the male who’d ordered her death said.
The angel gave a murmur of assent and released her neck.
In the nick of time. She breathed a sigh of relief, but before she could even relax, the angel’s fist shot out and connected with the side of her head. She flew across the room, colliding hard with the wall before sliding to the ground in a boneless heap.
Dazed, she could do no more than blink. Her bruised brain slowly processed the angels leaving the room. Leaving her behind as if she were of no consequence. But she couldn’t rejoice in their absence, because a blinding, throbbing pain hit.
Blissfully, that lasted but a moment, before she surrendered to the sweet release of unconsciousness.
Chapter Thirteen
Nate was in agony.
His shoulders had been dislocated, his legs broken, and his skin set afire. Not for the purpose of killing him. No, apparently he’d lost that privilege when he’d escaped a dozen years ago.
This was good old-fashioned, just for the hell of it, torture.
Every time his body healed, Ezekiel or one of his lackeys would come down into this dungeon and begin inflicting pain all over again. They were sort of assholes that way.
“It’s okay,” Michael grunted beside him. “We’re okay.”
That was all relative, of course, but he took comfort in the fact that he wasn’t in this alone. Though he’d never wish this on any of his brothers, he was glad Michael, Seth, and Ethan were here with him. They kept him strong.
Sane.
Abby. I’m so sorry.
He pulled on the chains suspending his arms high above his head. His skin chafed where the metal cuffs bit into it, but of course that was the least of his worries.
I miss you so much.
How he longed to be with her. To have the opportunity to tell her he loved her. He’d say it a million times over if he had the chance to do it again, but he knew better. You couldn’t change the past, and this dungeon was his present.
And his future.
“How long has it been?” he panted.
There was a pause.
“Can’t tell,” Seth finally murmured.
They were being kept in pitch-black darkness, and with all the torture, they’d lost track of night and day. It might have been days or even weeks since they’d been captured.
“Great,” Nate muttered. He’d kill for a glass of water right now. His lips were parched, his skin only beginning to heal from the last round of pain. At least they had a few hours to go until the next bout.
He hoped.
Suddenly, a prickling sensation swarmed his body, tickling across his spine and making his healing nerves dance with awareness. He stiffened.
“Do you feel that?” he whispered.
The room fell silent. His brothers’ emotions hit him with all the force of a battering ram, and they were a mirror to his own.
Cautious hope. Disbelief. Fear.
The crawling sensation along his body notified him that angels approached, and the glimmers of panic he sensed from the angels above them told the story loud and clear.
The Fallen were attempting to save them.
“No,” Michael whispered, dread pulsing off him in loose waves. “The fools.”
“They could make it,” Ethan said softly.
“It’s too dangerous,” Michael replied.
Nate knew what Michael was thinking. He thought the very same thing.
Where was his mate? Was she here, in danger?
Yet he couldn’t help but be hopeful as well. Maybe, if the stars aligned…maybe they’d make it out of this alive.
What seemed like an agonizing century later, the bolt on the dungeon door gave a loud click. It slid open a fraction, and a binding ray of light filled the room. Squinting, Nate tried to make out the figure that crept inside.
Her emotions hit him first. Fear. Determination. Hope.
“Samantha,” Michael murmured, his voice heavy with disbelief.
Aaron’s mate gave a soft cry. “It’s really you. You’re all here. I can’t believe it.”
Her booted feet padded across the cold stone floor and she paused to Nate’s right. In front of Michael, if he wasn’t mistaken. The clanking of metal told him she’d grabbed onto the chains. A moment later there was a soft click.
“Got it,” Samantha exclaimed.
Thank heavens the woman had been a cat burglar before she’d met Aaron. There wasn’t a lock she couldn’t pick.
She moved in front of Nate, and he let out a groan when she seized his manacles, inadvertently wrenching his bruised shoulder.
“Sorry,” she muttered.
Given what he faced if she didn’t release him, he’d take a little manhandling any day.
“What’s happening?” Michael asked. “Where is everyone?”
“Everywhere. Jason, Mara, Ben, and Aaron made sure they were spotted, then took off in four different directions. I slipped in undetected in the midst of all the confusion,” she replied, her brisk voice hiding any hint of the fear she clearly felt. After all, her mate was one of the angels being chased down at this very moment.
“Smart,” Nate said admiringly. Given that she could mask her angelic essence, it had been a sound, if risky, plan.
When she unlocked the second manacle, his shoulders popped back into place. He bit back a shout of pain. Stretching his back, he forced himself to his feet. His legs were healing, but he would still have to stumble out of here.
Hell, he’d crawl if he had to. Anything to make it back to his mate.
With an admirable swiftness, Samantha unlocked Seth and Ethan. If anything, Seth looked worse off than he was, so Nate half sup
ported, half leaned on him as they made their way outside the dungeon.
The trip up the stairs to the main floor was agonizing, but amazingly they made it undetected. They reached the main level, which was lined with doorways. But instead of heading straight down the long corridor toward entrance, Samantha started to the nearest door and peeked inside.
“What are you doing?” Michael whispered.
Samantha gave Nate a quick, guilty glance before averting her eyes.
“Abby’s in here somewhere.”
Abby?
“What?”
She gave a visible wince before turning back to him. “Abby volunteered to be the first distraction. Posing as an unsuspecting tourist, she was picked up by the angels and brought here.”
Heavens, no.
“How long?” he asked.
“About half an hour ago,” she whispered.
“No.” Nate’s heart stuttered at the thought of what evils might have befallen her in that length of time. “How could she?”
Samantha pursed her lips. “How could she not?”
He couldn’t argue with that, not when he would have done the same thing a million times over to save her.
Joining Samatha, he furiously moved from room to room.
Please, let me find her. Please. Let her be okay.
Much to his surprise, there was no one in any of the rooms. No alarm was raised. The angels were all occupied in hunting down his brethren.
And Abby isn’t here.
After searching all of the rooms lining one end of the corridor, Nate headed across the hall. Out of the corner of his eye, he noted Samantha striding to a set of wooden doors and taking a peek inside.
“Wait,” she cried in a stage whisper. “Here!”
The terror in her voice propelled Nate into action. Quicker than he would have thought possible, he limped past Samantha and into the room.
For a moment it seemed like the space was empty, until he saw a crumpled figure in dark jeans and a black coat.
“Abby!”
His heart seized, and his mind blanked. He didn’t even register rushing to her side. One moment he was at the doorway, and the next he was in front of her, kneeling down to brush the hair from her face and feel her delicate throat for a heartbeat.
Heart of an Angel Page 9