“Sierra. My name is Sierra.” Would he want her last name? He wouldn’t find any information on her if he searched.
But all he said was “Your memory’s intact, then. How’d you get out here?”
“Where is here?”
He swore softly.
“I didn’t lose my memory,” she clarified, her voice getting stronger. The part of her that enjoyed some conversation, no matter the subject, was embarrassing. This was her punishment. She wasn’t on Earth to make friends. “I just don’t know where I am.”
“How could you not know?” His tone remained even. They could be talking about how the sun rose and set every day.
Chewing over what she was going to say, she squeezed her eyes shut. She didn’t sense malice. If he’d rescued her, he should get some answers. Starting her new life on a pile of lies wasn’t ideal, but it wasn’t like she’d thought about what was going to happen once she was dumped on Earth. She’d done everything not to think about it. It’d been her problem.
It wasn’t just her right now. It was Boone. “I don’t recall the attack or how I got here, wherever here is.”
Guilt churned in her stomach until nausea threatened to make her gag. When was the last time she’d eaten? She’d been fed regularly in her cell, awaiting her punishment, but the stress had made it hard to eat.
“The attack,” he murmured as if testing her lie for himself. Perhaps he wasn’t human if he doubted her story when she was in a mutilated heap. “But you know you were attacked.”
“Wasn’t I?” She wanted to tell him she’d been punished and he could take her back to wherever he’d found her. I betrayed my realm, got angels hurt, and got kicked out. Leave me alone. Please. But the words stuck in her throat.
“Who are you and where are you from?”
Why did lying feel like a long, treacherous trip down a road that had no turnoffs? “Sierra. From Vegas, but I was planning to move.” There. She was sticking close to the truth. She had been sort of living in Las Vegas. She’d often set up her technical headquarters wherever her team’s missions took them.
“Move to where?”
Was he fishing to see if she knew where this log cabin was located? “Anywhere. I was . . . I am homeless.” The lies rolled out easier. “Had a fight with my boyfriend and he’d been controlling everything for so long that I just left with nothing. I caught a ride with anyone who looked like they wouldn’t rape me and . . . well . . .”
“Were you raped?” Even tone, steady voice. The guy could be a robot. A robot that smelled like the forest and had the most pleasing growl she’d ever heard.
“No.” She’d been oh-so-willing. She wished her memories had been taken with her wings.
“Montana.”
“What?” She tried to turn her head, but winced. It wasn’t her back. She was stiff and sore in a way she’d never experienced.
Right. Because she no longer had her normal healing abilities. She would mend slower, like a human.
“You’re in Montana. There’s a storm and you’re nowhere near an interstate.” Of the few emotions he allowed in his voice, accusation rang loudest through the cabin.
Irritation flashed through her. She’d had a day and she couldn’t even fall and be alone and miserable. Sure, he was apparently responsible for her life and the roof over her head, but her tolerance for male crap was extremely low at the moment.
“This might surprise you, but I really don’t care if you don’t believe me. I don’t know what happened, okay? I just know my back hurts and I’m stiff and sore.”
He was quiet for a beat. “The only liberties I took were to cut open your top and try to clean your wounds. A few of them go pretty deep, but nothing major was cut.”
“Thank you.” Something pretty damn major was cut, just not life threatening. Losing her wings was life changing.
There was movement, soft footsteps. On her side, she couldn’t see all of him. Dark blue jeans covered thick thighs and a flannel plaid shirt was tucked into them at a trim waist. Whoever he was, he kept in shape.
She shifted enough to look up. A mountain of a man towered over her. From his brawny shoulders to his bushy beard, he was everything intimidating to a hurt female. Given the dimness of the room and the way shadows clung to him like a second skin, she should be terrified. But she wasn’t. His gaze was as steady as his voice, but he couldn’t mask the wariness in his brown eyes like he could with his tone.
He didn’t trust her, and he didn’t want her in this cabin. From the way he was dressed, it was winter and the storm must’ve been full of snow. He hadn’t wanted to rescue her, just like she hadn’t wanted to be rescued. Yet here they were, stuck together.
From what little she’d witnessed, he was a good man.
And relief seeped in as she realized she’d been granted some time to adjust to her surroundings, to not have to deal with anyone or anything besides one grumpy human.
Nice to see she continued to be a coward no matter what realm she was in.
She hadn’t been strong enough to reveal her secrets and face the consequences, choosing blackmail instead. She hadn’t been strong enough to keep from sleeping with the enemy. She wasn’t strong enough to look at her new world and see its bleak expression as it looked back.
His hands clenched and unclenched but there was no aggression in the move. He was uncomfortable around her. “Do you think you’re injured anywhere else?”
Putting him at ease was the least she could do. Closing her eyes, she concentrated on the rest of her body that wasn’t her aching back. “No,” she said, opening her eyes once again.
He drew back. He might’ve taken a step but the wall was right there. “Do you need to use the bathroom?”
“No,” she said quickly without thinking. Hiding in bed was just fine for now.
“Are you sure?” One of his brows cocked so subtly she might’ve missed it, but her gaze was glued to his face. A mess of dark hair covered his brow and the tips of his ears, but neither that nor his beard could hide the harsh angles of his face. They did a shit job at softening them. “Sierra? Are you sure?”
Her breath gusted out. Still a crap liar and now she was staring. “No, but I don’t want to get up.”
“Moving around will help the healing if you’re careful.”
She nodded, her hair bunching around her cheek. She hadn’t had a shower since the day before her trial. “How long have I been here?”
“I carried you back yesterday.” His barrel chest expanded as he drew in a heavy breath, and he rubbed the back of his neck, his gaze sweeping the room she hadn’t seen yet. “It snowed. And it’s winter in the mountains. We’re not leaving for a while.”
Since she was in no shape to leave, she didn’t care.
“You should get up and move.” He said it softer this time. Yep. A good man.
“What time is it?” She was stalling. Boone was trying to help despite obviously not wanting her around.
“Two in the morning.”
Her brows popped. “And you’re still up?”
“You were passed out. I needed to be awake when you woke.” His look spoke volumes. He didn’t know who she was and he wasn’t closing one eyelid until he had answers. She’d only given him more questions.
“I appreciate it.” She hated that she did, that after weeks alone in a cell with no visitors, she took more comfort than she deserved, knowing that someone was capable of caring about her. But he didn’t know her, and that was the only reason he was concerned about her. None of that mattered at the moment as she faced a stark reality. “I don’t want to move to use the bathroom.”
“You need to.” His brows drew in as if he knew just how bad getting up would hurt, that first shock of letting gravity weigh on her injuries.
Fatigue swamped her. She wanted to sink into the mattress and melt away. Her pain gone. Out of her misery. But then Boone would be left to deal with the mess her short existence in this realm had caused.
As she g
roaned and rolled to a sitting position, agony traced up and down her spine, spreading over her body as evenly as if she’d been doused in angel fire. The pain sparked an awareness deep inside of her. She was afraid to look any closer at that feeling.
Anger. Roiling and toxic. Her people had turned on her. Some had tried to use her. They’d all used her. When they’d gotten what they wanted, she’d been disposed of. Loss welled up. A yawning hole of nothing. Her team hadn’t been there in the end. She’d told them she’d deal with her punishment, she’d take it, and they . . . they had let her. Without even a goodbye.
And Papa. A warrior who’d given up his identity for her. And this was how she’d repaid him.
She slammed a lid on the festering emotions. They did her no good. She’d let fear lead her before, and this was where she’d ended up. At least she couldn’t hurt anyone else.
Chapter 2
A gong rang through the manor. Millie Richter put her stitching down and stood. Her mate, Leo, was asleep on the bed, his back turned to her. He was always asleep, managing to face away from her. She wasn’t worried the noise would wake him up—she hoped it would since she wasn’t ornery enough to do it.
She straightened her pristine white robe and tiptoed from the bedroom, closing the door to keep from making a sound. She trotted down the stairs, running her hand along the hand-carved railing. So much opulence. So much emptiness.
Before Leo’s injuries, she’d worked in the field. As a chaperone, she’d escorted souls to the pearly whites. She’d experienced their last moments on Earth with them and stood by them in their first moments of eternity. It’d been rewarding, rescuing her from the quiet manor while Leo worked long hours.
Now this manor was her prison. Leo was her warden. She’d synced herself to him, their souls entwined. The injuries were awful, but the way he’d shut down afterward was worse. She couldn’t bring herself to leave him. The thought that they would leave the manor—together—kept her going. But each day that went by, her high hopes lowered a little more.
She lifted her pale wings before she opened the door. She didn’t have to ask who it was. Bryant Vale stopped by every day he was able. Bryant and Leo were close, but she tried to hide how stark her and Leo’s existence had become.
“Bryant, come in.”
His stern gaze bored into her like she could hide nothing. Why did she even try? He’d seen for himself how despondent Leo was. His mate, Odessa, wasn’t with him today. Millie missed her talks with the director’s wife. Odessa’s youthful enthusiasm was a dose of sunshine in a house that had become a tomb.
“How is he today?” Bryant kept his voice low. Leo would hate that Bryant checked on him with her first.
Defeat hung on Millie’s wings. Hate would be welcome. Anger. Righteousness. Any emotion beyond the nothingness that consumed her mate would be welcome.
“Right. Odessa picked these up.” Bryant held out three brochures. Prosthetics.
Millie gave him a sad smile. “I’ve looked at them all, but I haven’t brought it up.” Bryant had made the comment to Leo that humans survived amputation and learned to adapt. But Leo had ignored him, and to her he’d pointed out that humans’ lives were poetically short.
She had wanted to say that to humans, life felt inexorably long, but definitively short. They were innovative and their prosthetics would continue to improve. But Leo had retreated into his mind and she didn’t have the heart to speak up. He’d been kicked while he was down enough.
Her mate had loved his job. He’d lived to serve his people. His work had defined him. When he’d lost his legs, he’d lost his position. She often wondered if she should tell Bryant that his visits might be harder on Leo. But the person responsible for the incident had been on Bryant’s team. His own guilt drove him to visit, and if she said something, would it hurt how he did his job? They needed a strong director now more than ever.
She wished it could be Leo again. She wished Leo would be something again. Like a male who didn’t have to be coaxed to eat. Or a male who did more than stare at the bedroom wall. A mate who let her back into his bed.
“He’ll come around.” Bryant had been saying that for months. Would he be saying it for years?
“I wish I could get through to him.”
Bryant’s brows pinched, and if Millie didn’t know him so well, she’d be terrified. He was a harsh-looking male. “Listen, Millie. I know he doesn’t get news if I don’t tell him.” Leo’s only visitor was Bryant. Her mate had scared all others off or they’d given up. “But there’s change coming.”
Bryant often filled them in on what was happening outside of the manor. She clung to news, to the gossip Odessa whispered to her, jealous of how the realm moved on while the inside of her manor was in stasis. But how could she live her life when her soul mate wanted to give up on his own?
Heaviness weighed down Bryant’s steely wings and his whiskey eyes were grim. She feathered her fingers against her chest. He had bad news. Bryant was like a brother to Leo. He’d become family to her and she knew that look.
“Oh? What sort of change?”
“We’re going to push some topics with the senate.”
She shivered, like a cold wind licked across her neck. “That sounds ominous.” And futile.
“It’s about the fallen.”
Her inhale was sharp. Emotions roiled inside of her, pushing the needle higher until she didn’t know when she’d explode. The fallen. One in particular was the reason why her mate was all but lifeless in the bed they used to make sweet love in. Her mate who’d doted on her every chance he got to make up for the long hours he spent at the warriors’ barracks.
The fallen who hadn’t told anyone why she’d done what she’d done but had willingly paid the price. Falling was supposed to be a fate worse than death.
Millie hoped so.
“What about them?” She managed to keep her voice steady. It was getting hard not to shout. To yell. To holler at the world and demand to know why she’d lost her mate. Wasn’t it enough to have tried for years to have a child and be without, now she had to lose her mate too? He avoided looking at her. Any thoughts of a family had evaporated with his legs.
“Jameson Haddock showed us how ignorant we are of them. He showed us that they may not be as powerless as we think when we take their wings. If we know that, others do too.”
She had to think a moment. “Demons?”
“Yes, so we can’t just forget about the fallen. After what Jameson did, the underworld is going to wonder what other knowledge and delights fallen are hiding.” Bryant took a step, then paused. His gaze traveled up the stairs. “Do you think it’ll bother him? That we’re requesting the ability to conduct surveillance on . . . Sierra.”
“Likely not.” Her mate had done the equivalent of crawling into his shell to die. Except he was an immortal angel, not a crustacean. “If he cared about anything, it’d be a miracle.”
She hadn’t meant to say that out loud. Ignoring it made it easier to continue to ignore. But she’d spoken it out loud. And she was tired. Her wings ached from resting on the floor while she sat on her ass and stitched all day. She looked at her hands. Her fingertips were roughened. She stitched too much for them to heal. She stitched for hours. She hated stitching, but she couldn’t concentrate enough to read. The manor was pristine, and she hated cleaning. What else could she do?
“I’m losing hope, Bryant.” The words rushed out. “I’ve tried to get him to talk. I’ve tried to get him to just let me lie beside him. He’ll barely look at me. Can a male lose his mind after staring at a wall too long?”
She pressed her cool fingertips to her forehead. A dam was breaking down inside of her. She couldn’t hold it together for much longer.
“Take the gloves off, Millie.” He lowered his voice. The cavernous echo in the marble manor hadn’t been so noticeable when there’d been more noise, when Leo had actually talked to her and she hadn’t had to hide discussions about him from him. “Don’t go e
asy on him anymore. Hit him where it hurts. You love him, that much is obvious. But he needs tough love, or he’ll never come back to us.”
“And how would I do that?” Leo washed himself when she brought him the basin, but he only exerted the effort so she wouldn’t have to. He ate to avoid being spoon-fed by her. He did only enough to keep her at a distance.
“I don’t know. You’re the only one who knows him well enough.” Bryant went to the base of the stairs. Before he stepped on the first one, he said, “But you’ll have to hit him where it hurts, in a way that makes him want to get better for himself, not for us.”
Take the gloves off. Hit him where it hurts.
Her logical brain rebelled, but that part of her had been steering since Leo was hurt. It was time to let her emotions take the wheel.
Boone kept an eye on his odd guest. Sierra was sleeping, this time on her left side. Smart choice to switch it up.
She didn’t seem like an idiot, but those brilliant eyes of hers were dull, their dimness cutting straight through him. She was evasive, and he’d bet the pension he’d walked away from that she was lying her ass off. But that didn’t bother him as much as it should.
Two weeks had passed and she’d done little more than go to the bathroom, eat a few bites when he was extra persistent about food, and sleep.
Depression was understandable, but this was . . . different.
Her wounds had scabbed over and were well on their way to the next stage of healing. She should be moving, slowly stretching out her arm and back muscles, keeping the scar tissue healthy and reducing any limitations they could cause.
He pestered her about it. She half-assed some exercises if only to placate him, then tucked into his bed and ignored the world.
Admittedly, there wasn’t much world here to ignore.
He perched on the edge of the couch and scanned his bare-bones cabin. Books were the only items adorning the shelving he’d put up when he’d thought this would be a hunting retreat for him and—
Demon Fire (The Angel Fire Book 3) Page 2