by C. L. Coffey
“Her source is credible, but apparently, he’s not been here long. He moves as soon as he hears whispers of a threat.”
“How many angels have you got hunting the Fallen?”
Gabriel turned off the road and into a hotel parking lot. “A handful.”
“Then who on earth is he considering to be a threat?”
“According to the source, the Fallen. He went into hiding when Leviathan was killed, and they’re still holding it against him.” Gabriel killed the engine. “Wait here while I check in.”
He left me in the car, so I pulled out my phone. I’d sent a couple messages to Leigh-Ann and I’d not had a reply back. Was she still in the infirmary?
The one person who would know was Ty. I quickly sent him a message. He replied quickly.
She’s with me. Killer headache, napping, and can’t find her phone. Where you at?
At least she was okay. Before I could explain, Gabriel reappeared. “If anyone asks, you’re here to check out the college.”
“Why would anyone ask?”
Gabriel jammed a thumb in the direction of the small reception. “The guy in there did, and we have no idea if anyone here could tip Abaddon off.”
“Where are we heading first?” I reached behind me to grab my backpack.
Before I could wrap my fingers around the strap, Gabriel opened the back door and picked up both of our bags. “We’ll leave these in the room and then go get something to eat.”
I was prepared to tell him we could wait before eating, but my stomach decided that was an appropriate time to remind me that the journey had been spent with snacks, but nothing substantial.
Gabriel smiled. “Apparently there’s a great place around the corner.”
After he dropped the bags in the room, we left the car and took a walk, following the directions Gabriel had been given. I was grateful to stretch my legs after such a long journey.
Spring had hit Manhattan. Flowers were in bloom and the town looked alive. There were also a lot of students around.
As we took our seats, I couldn’t help but stare enviously.
It wasn’t the more stereotypical college life they were experiencing, but the fact that they were just ordinary students and the worst thing they had to worry about was graduation and not some impending attack on their college.
The place served all day breakfast, so I dug into my country skillet. When I was younger, and my mom wasn’t ill, she made something similar to this on the first Sunday of every month.
“Is there something wrong with your meal?”
Glancing down at my plate, I realized I’d been chasing the gravy around the plate. “I know my mom said not to look for her, but I want to. Not now, of course.”
Gabriel lowered his pancake-filled fork. “I still have my contacts looking for her.”
“What about Pi—Dean Pinnosa’s contacts? Can I ask her?”
“We can, but usually, it’s easier for humans to find humans.”
Reaching for my soda, I took a long drink to try and swallow down the lump in my throat. “I just need to know she’s okay and let her know how to get in touch with me if she needs me.”
“I’m sure . . .” Gabriel stood still. Before I could ask if he was okay, he had turned to the side and doubled over, practically disappearing under the table. As I started to peer under, he sat back up, but this time, at a strange angle.
“What are you doing?”
“Continue eating,” Gabriel said in a harsh whisper as he picked up his fork.
I recoiled slightly at his command but quickly cut a piece of the chicken fried steak and promptly put it in my mouth.
“Both angels and humans have auras. Few can see them, but some angels can. While it’s impossible to differentiate between a human and a nephilim, depending on how long the Fallen has been inhabiting the vessel, you can spot one because they don’t have an aura.”
Although Gabriel was talking to me, he kept looking into the corner of the room. I was itching to turn and look too, but I had a feeling that wasn’t a smart move. “Is there a fallen angel in here?”
Very slowly, Gabriel nodded his head. “He came in just now and went to a table in the back. The fact that he’s still there means he hasn’t seen me.”
“Can he see your aura?”
“No, but do you remember what I told you about vessels?”
I thought back. There had been a lot we’d covered, and that wasn’t including all the ‘human’ studies. “Needing to change them?”
“I’ve never changed mine. That could be Abaddon, or it could be another fallen angel. There’s a chance he wouldn’t recognize me anymore, but it’s not something I want to risk.”
My gaze scanned the room as I ate a mouthful of hash browns. The only man sitting by himself was at the back of the room, in the corner, facing the door. He was busy reading the menu, so I quickly returned my attention to Gabriel. “What do we do?”
“Finish up what you want to eat, and I’ll get the check. If we can walk out without attracting his attention, we should be fine. We’ll get the car and wait for him to finish so we can follow him.”
“I’m done,” I said, setting my cutlery down.
The meal sat heavily in my stomach as I waited for the waitress to bring the check over. Gabriel barely glanced at it as he left a wad of bills in the small folder. “You go first.”
“You go first. I’m almost as tall as you. I can block him seeing you.”
Gabriel glanced up behind me once more before nodding. He got up first, and I followed. It was only then that I realized there was a decorative mirror on the wall.
Fighting against the urge to cringe as the door chimed when we left, I breathed a sigh of relief when we were clear of the restaurant. “Now what?”
He didn’t respond. I stepped beside him, expecting to find Gabriel staring at the door, but he seemed to be scanning the main street.
“Gabriel?”
The archangel looked back at the diner. “Okay.” He turned and started walking back towards the hotel.
“Shouldn’t we pick up the pace?”
“We are not wearing clothes most people would exercise in. We shouldn’t draw attention to ourselves.”
Glancing up and down the street, I wasn’t sure who was around to tip Abaddon off, but then again, that was the point.
Thankfully, it didn’t take us too long to get back to the hotel. Instead of getting into the Range Rover, Gabriel hurried inside. Before I could get further than the doorway, he was standing in front of me with a black ballcap on and his backpack slung over his shoulder.
That was a look . . .
This time, he unlocked the SUV, slung the bag in the back, and we got in. Instead of peeling out of the parking lot, he reversed out of the bay and drove back to the restaurant like we were going to buy groceries.
“I can practically hear your thoughts, Kennedy,” he said, making me jump. “Abaddon has spent centuries in hiding. I’m not going to risk doing anything that could draw unnecessary attention to ourselves.”
“We probably should have picked a different car then,” I muttered. I didn’t know that much about cars, but this was a high-end vehicle, and I was fairly certain it wasn’t an American brand. There weren’t a great deal of Range Rovers that I’d seen on the whole journey here, never mind in this small town.
“Maybe.” He turned onto the street where the restaurant was, driving slowly past, but not stopping. I peered into the restaurant as we passed, but I couldn’t see too far back to see if the fallen angel was still there. “He hasn’t left.”
“How good is your eyesight?”
Gabriel gave me a wry smile as he spun the car around and parked in a bay just a little ways from the restaurant. “I checked the cars before we left. The only one that has gone was a small Chevrolet.”
“And you know Abaddon doesn’t drive one?” I glanced at the parked cars around us. I wasn’t sure I’d put a Prince of Darkness in any of them. “Ho
w do you know he didn’t walk?”
“Ursula’s source said he was living outside of Manhattan. He wouldn’t have walked.” Gabriel’s attention never left the restaurant as he spoke. “It has been quite some time since I last saw Abaddon, but he doesn’t strike me as someone who drives a Chevrolet Sonic with cat mom bumper sticker and accompanying cat decal.”
“You’re making the assumption about Abaddon’s gender.”
“No, I’m making an assumption about Abaddon’s ego.” When I glanced at Gabriel, I found him grinning.
It took about twenty minutes to find out he was right.
“That’s him.” Gabriel nodded his chin at the door to the restaurant.
The man who came out was tall, and now half of his face wasn’t hidden behind a menu, so I could see he had a beard. The casual pace he walked down the street indicated he hadn’t spotted us.
And then he stopped in front of a pickup truck.
When I glanced at Gabriel, the grin was back. It quickly disappeared when the pickup backed out of the space and drove off. Gabriel pulled out, following him.
Thankfully, there was a fair amount of traffic on the roads to keep our cover as Gabriel kept back, but as we started to leave town on a quieter road, my nerves started to flare up as the cars thinned out.
“Where do you think he’s going?” I asked, even though Gabriel had as much information as I did.
Eventually, Abaddon turned off onto a single lane track. Instead of following, Gabriel drove straight past.
I turned in my seat, watching the road disappear behind us. “You missed the turn.”
Gabriel pulled over onto the shoulder. “Following him in this would have been too obvious. That looks like a drive. I could just make out a building.”
The sun had almost set, but looking in the side mirrors, I could make out security lights.
“What now?” I asked.
“Now we go on foot.”
The alarm on my face must have been more noticeable in the dim light than I realized.
“You can stay here, Kennedy.”
“Oh hell no.” No matter how nervous I felt, I was not letting Gabriel go by himself—even if it was just recon.
Gabriel reached up and turned the interior light on before turning to face me. “All we are going to do is see what kind of building we’re dealing with, and what kind of security it has.”
“And then what?”
“Then I make a call, I return you to the hotel, and I wait out here for backup to arrive.”
Something about that felt off. Something obvious. But because I was trying to prepare myself for sneaking onto the property of one of the Fallen, it wasn’t quite clicking.
“You can stay here if you prefer.” Gabriel offered again.
Instead of answering, I jumped out of the SUV, closing the door carefully behind me.
Gabriel turned the interior light off, but it took a minute before he was standing beside me on the other side of the vehicle. “If you remember from our runs last semester, sound travels easily when there’s nothing to stop it. I need you to keep silent so that no one hears you coming, and so you can hear whatever is around us.”
I nodded.
Glancing up and down the empty road, Gabriel crossed it, jogging lightly towards the drive. I followed after him, trying to keep as quiet as possible.
The drive was loose gravel and crunched under our boots. As soon as we were past the entrance, we moved into the grass. Our footsteps disappeared as we merged with the grass blowing in the breeze.
The building had seemed closer from the road, but the drive was long. Every six feet or so, tall pine trees lined the road, offering darker shadows to melt into.
If I wasn’t with Gabriel, I would have found the silence eerie. Despite it being dusk, there weren’t many animals sounds, and the only real noise came from the wind in the trees and the rare car driving by on the road behind us.
As we got closer to the building, Gabriel slowed, raising his hand like he was a marine. I stopped with him, just behind one of the wide trunks of a tree and peered up at the house.
Abaddon’s house was a two-story building with a porch. On the porch was a swinging chair which screeched as it blew back and forth. The house was well lit with security lights shining almost to the tree line where we hid.
The wooden walls needed a lick of paint, and the windows were desperately crying out for a bucket of warm, soapy water. This was the kind of place which, if I was to go in, I’d expect the owner to try and take my face off me and wear it as my own.
A shiver ran down my spine.
A light flickered on inside, then Gabriel grabbed my waist, pulling me back against him. Despite myself, my heart started pounding in my chest, and not because of the shock of the movement.
Gabriel tapped on my shoulder as though he knew I wasn’t paying attention and pointed.
The man—Abaddon—was standing in front of the window. From what I could see of the room, he was in a kitchen, filling something with water.
Behind us, the gravel crunched.
Before I could turn, Gabriel had tensed, tightening his arms around me.
“Looky what we have here, Jonah.”
“Our car broke down.” Although Gabriel’s tone was calm, he shifted his arms slightly. Something cold and metallic touched the back of my hand.
Even though Gabriel’s body was blocking mine, I glanced down slowly. Protruding from Gabriel’s sleeve was the blade of a dagger. When he gently tapped the blade against me a second time, I carefully wrapped my hand around it.
“We know who you are, Gabriel.”
“Get back to the car and get out of here.” Gabriel’s breath tickled the skin behind my ear. Then he shoved me forward.
I just barely managed to turn my body and adjust my weight before I hit the tree. As I did, I caught Gabriel swing around to face our opponents. A second dagger dropped from his sleeve, growing in size as he grasped the handle and swung it through the air.
It was like watching a dancer.
Gabriel’s moves were fluid. The fallen angels already had their swords drawn and blocked the attack, but Gabriel continued moving anyway. There was one male and one female fallen angel, and both were skilled fighters.
Although I had no intention of going to the car without Gabriel, my feet were firmly rooted to the ground. When it came to fighting, we’d not been taught anything with weapons in gym, and I’d only had a handful of one-on-one lessons with Gabriel. I didn’t even know how to turn the dagger in my hands into a full-length sword.
The one time I had managed to make a sword bigger, I’d not been paying attention to how I did it.
As it was, Gabriel was holding his own against the two of them, and if I tried to help, I would only end up getting in the way.
Until the female got the advantage. She moved around, putting herself between me and Gabriel, and although her attention was on him and not me, Gabriel reacted. As he did, Jonah lunged forward.
At the last moment, Gabriel sidestepped, narrowly missing the blade, but threw him out of his zone.
With the dagger raised, I stepped forward, stabbing at the female’s shoulder. But it didn’t touch her.
Something grabbed my wrist and flung me backwards.
My back and head slammed into the tree, sending pine needles showering down around me as my vision doubled. Before I could work out what happened, a figure stepped in front of me. “You need to stay out of this, princess.”
“Wha—”
Something stabbed my shoulder, piercing my body.
My scream seemed even louder in the silent night.
As Gabriel turned, eyes wide, I glanced down at the source of the pain, confused as to why I couldn’t move. There was a strange weapon, like a metal stake, sticking out of me just below my collar bone.
The two dancing pieces of metal became one and I realized I couldn’t move because the other end of it was stuck in the tree.
“Not so fast,
archangel.” The newcomer sneered.
When I looked up, Gabriel was falling to the ground.
That didn’t make sense.
Gabriel on the floor, no sword in his hand, clutching at his side.
Pain was making me hallucinate.
The woman stood over him, raising her sword.
“Britney, wait.” Jonah’s order was like a bark.
She stopped and frowned at him. “I have waited years to do this.”
The smell of smoke filled my nostrils. Now I was hallucinating smells too? I closed my eyes, trying to get my brain to ignore the pain so I could work out what was happening.
“And you only need to wait a little longer. Abaddon said to make sure it was her.”
My head was yanked back and upwards by my braid. As I moved, pain exploded from the injury under my shoulder as my body pulled against the stake.
“Leave her alone. It’s me you want.” From the ground, Gabriel spat out a mouthful of blood as he tried to sit upright.
As he did, the female fallen angel, Britney, kicked him so hard in the chest, I heard something crack.
“Stop it,” I screamed.
Jonah dropped to a crouch beside Gabriel. “No,” he said, shaking his head. “No, we don’t want you, Gabriel, dearest.”
Gabriel lifted his head, his eyes locking with mine. For the first time since I’d met him, there was fear there.
The sharp pain in my shoulder changed. Maybe it was the smoke that seemed to be getting thicker around us, but it felt like burning. Burning from the inside out.
But a burning sensation that didn’t seem to hurt as much.
Still crouched down beside Gabriel, Jonah looked up at me. “We’re still going to kill you, Gabe.” He turned, moving quickly as he punched Gabriel, barely looking at him as he kept his focus on me. Gabriel slumped to the floor. “Unless the little princess can show us what’s really inside her.”
“Gabriel?” I cried. “Gabriel!”
Jonah stood, folding his arms. “Show me what you got, princess.”
Chapter Fourteen