Page 38 of Angel's Vengeance

Oh, she knew.As sure as her hair frizzed the moment the humidity level hit seventy percent, she knew exactly what she dreamed of.However, ever since her fear had chased her into the chaos that was the mortal lands, a whole new set of wants and desires had begun to take shape and morph around her formerly once-constant goal.

Rhode took a step closer, and the blue and red lights from the adjacent police chase video game painted him in perplexing contrast to the metal she knew him to command.The metal he’d used to open the arcade for her.

Then that small smile, so seldom in its appearances, returned for a repeat performance, lifting the angles of his face into an interesting piece of art, one she wouldn’t mind staring at for as long as he’d allow.Her fingers were anxious to trace it, to map each contour of his happiness lest it disappear again and never return.

His haunting tenor voice broke the spell, stealing her focus back to his words.“Was it a memento that you dreamed of, then?Some special keepsake of joyful times shared?”

Neela thought on it a moment, of what having a keepsake or token would have represented for her while she was stuck lounging beneath the earth, longing for the sun and cursing herself all the same for what her desire to embrace the sunlight meant.

Then she thought of the angel before her, who she was somehow bonded to in ways neither of them had truly begun to explore.

Did she want to remember all of that in her prior life, or would she have preferred to forget the past for just one moment and take a piece of her present into the future with her?

As if she even had the luxury of such a choice?—

“Take a picture with me,” Rhode said.Then he was at her side, holding open the burgundy curtain to the photo booth, an expectant gaze lifting his features as he waited for an answer.

“I-I’ve never had my picture taken before.Not really.All my gaming profile images are just avatars or animations.”

“I have never had my picture taken either.”

The symbiotic truth hung somewhere in between the similar statements.

We’ve both had time and experiences stolen from us.

“What if you don’t like it?”Neela asked.

He shrugged.“What if I do?”

“What ifIdon’t like it?”

His gaze darkened.“Then I’ll know something about you that no one else does.”

A secret.A treasure.A token.Something shared voluntarily, beyond whatever supernatural bond and haunted past that had claimed them both.

A new start.Small but still sacred.

“I think I’d like that,” Neela agreed and ducked her head beneath the photo booth’s curtain.

Chapter19

Rhode had fought in countless battles, uncovered secrets from enemies who’d sworn against their souls to never reveal, and there he stood, arm shaking beneath the slight weight of the photo booth’s curtain as he held it open for Neela and wondered what the hell had possessed him to offer such an invitation.

He and Neela, alone in a box with barely enough head clearance for him, never mind the enormity of what she’d shared ...and what he’d offered.

A photo.Together.Next to each other.Possibly even?—

“Are you going to come in?”Neela asked, poking her head out and eyeing him curiously through the gap in the curtain he still held open.The bulk of her flaxen curls dangled over one shoulder and swayed enticingly in the empty space between them, as if offering a bridge toward some great beyond he’d yet to cross but which Neela had already conquered.

Conquered.Nowthatwas a word far too keen for the circumstances.He hadn’t meant to conquer anything beyond the guilt that had gnawed at him for his behavior—behavior he alone would have disemboweled any angel in his legion for displaying.Yet somehow, guilt had turned to pity, which had then morphed into some harsher grip of anguish.

What Neela described was far too close to a predicament he’d previously seen no way out of.

Loneliness.

Owing one last look around the arcade to ensure they were still by themselves and marking their coats and various game prizes exactly where they left them on top of the air hockey table, he swallowed past his apprehension and slipped inside.

“Why do I feel like I’m in a coffin?”he asked as he took a seat on the hard bench next to her.

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