Page 6 of Angel's Temper

And the line at the door now spilled onto the sidewalk, threatening to swallow the bicycle racks and parking meters.

Molly lowered the tray onto a rack and began dispensing orders. Once she’d been relieved of the weight, however, her shoulders still tensed under an unseen burden.

Did she really have a choice?

Dammit, Benny.

She grabbed a rag, dropped to her knees, and silently cursed her friend’s name while cleaning up fallen food and musing over how one worded a job ad for a position they couldn’t afford to post.

Wanted: Dishwasher and other TBD kitchen duties, with opportunity for advancement. Maybe.

Chapter 3

Of all the small towns in the world, Aurora seemed as good a place as any to descend into complete and utter madness. After nearly two thousand years of torture, Brass, a fallen sentinel, could hardly keep his head above the tar threatening to pull him under.

Especially when the threat’s poisoned tentacles were mere weeks away from ensnaring his mind altogether.

Three weeks, to be exact. Then he’d see just how accurate his own hell would be compared to the one mortals threatened their so-called sinners with.

Brass tightened his grip on the motorcycle’s throttle and jerked it toward him. Even after millions of years living in the mortal realm, he’d never developed the fondness for motorized vehicles his brother sentinels had. What he wouldn’t give to trade his BMW’s handlebars for horse reins and kick the beast into a frenzied gallop. To feel the panting horseflesh heaving against his strong thighs as he gave the animal leave to churn up the earth with wild unrelenting abandon. Uncaged, unencumbered, with only the will of the animal and the freedom of its primal urges to answer to.

The power of answering to no one save for the rider and his reins. The pulsing, pounding ardor finally released?—

An electric vehicle blew the yield sign and whipped onto the lane in front of him. Brass clenched his teeth and braked his bike hard to the right. Tires squealed against the newly slick asphalt, still damp from the morning mist that hadn’t fully burned off yet. The engine sputtered and growled beneath him, voicing its annoyance at being stalled.

“Mages dammit!” Brass whipped his head forward and caught the faint glow of the small car’s brake lights pulsing through the thin fog. “Oh, now you brake?” The red rectangles briefly blinked their acknowledgment, or perhaps mockery, of his situation as the vehicle proceeded to speed up while approaching the amber traffic light instead of slowing down.

It all happened before Brass even had time to call the rage back. The snap in his mind resounded through him like a bone crushed beneath stone. He mentally leaped for the flapping tether of restraint, which now danced taunting circles in the hollow of a mind he barely recognized.

His power answered before his conscience could. A twist of his fingers into a fist saw the vehicle not only braking before it hit the light but slamming to a halt by an unseen anchor. Lights sputtered and metal groaned. Even from this distance, he could hear the vehicle’s various alarms casting out their cries for help.

Help is not coming. It will never come.

The whispered warning in his mind locked his joints, imprisoning him further against his cursed nature as he cast out his power. His metal sought out every molecule of copper and zinc that held the vehicle’s vital bits together and gave it all a new master: him. Wires sparked. Batteries bled. Wheel axles whined beneath an unknown weight. Through the haze of rampage, he could make out limbs. Bystanders tugging at door handles, the driver beating against the closed window to get out and flee, to run and escape.

There is no escape.

The voice rumbled through his mind like an avalanche, crooning and coaxing him with its unrelenting power. Just before it crashed into his soul for good, however, it burst into a spray of cascading ice shards that rained down its cackling torment.

Ice he could melt.

“Nooo!” In a blink, he tossed himself from his bike, ducked into an empty bus stop shelter, and welcomed the burn of his angel fire roaring to life. The last celestial power afforded to him before he fell from the Empyrean shot through the red vapors of rage, its blue flames beating back the hold on his metal. Chest heaving but with his mind clear once more, he called his metallic power back.

No longer being ripped to scrap, the electric vehicle’s metal sighed against the asphalt. Mortals flew onto their asses as doors they’d been tugging on finally yawned open. The driver, vermin that he was, scampered away from the car as if the thing was a tampered toy constructed by the laboring class to seek vengeance on the wealthy.

He wasn’t terribly far off, but Brass wasn’t about to point that out. He had enough problems to worry about. His angel fire extinguished before the next car passed the bus stop. To any mortal driving by, Brass appeared like just another human locked in the infernal cycle of early-morning commutes and miserable day jobs.

Good. Better they think him a mundane misanthrope than a cursed devil.

An insistent ringing filled the interior of Brass’s Bluetooth helmet, yanking him away from the mess, both down the road and in his mind. He slapped the button on the side to engage the call. “What.”

A grizzled snort echoed against the padding, doing absolutely nothing to ease the headache sprouting behind his eyes. “Not your usual greeting. Had to check the phone for a second to make sure I didn’t call Chrome by mistake.”

They both knew that was a trumped-up statement made for no one’s benefit. His brother Iron never did anything without purpose.

Including making casual phone calls. The angel wouldn’t know casual if it wore a red dress, stripped him naked, engaged in a little wing play, and made him pay for dinner afterward.

Which meant Iron had called with an agenda.

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