Page 130 of Veil of Death and Shadow

“Yeah, that’s one word for it.” I tried to map what he’d told me about her onto the woman I’d just met—the person he spent most of his time with. She was definitely intense, a bit terrifying if I was being honest, but she’d seemed legitimately concerned about him—worried enough to track him. Which was both peculiar and . . . intense. “What exactly does your family do, Levi? And what did she mean—” I searched for the phrase she’d used, “wipe us?”

“She didn’t mean anyth—” he started to say, but then he thought better of it when he saw me readying to call bullshit. “Some secrets are good, necessary, even,” he said instead, echoing my words from months ago back to me. “Can you just trust me on this, Mareena? The less you know, the better. I don’t want to lie to you, but I can’t tell you this truth either.”

I took a deep breath, studying him, trying to decide what that meant—trusting someone who had the kinds of secrets that he and his family clearly had. At the silent plea in his eyes, any hesitation I had dissipated when I exhaled.

I’d kept impossibly big secrets—to keep myself safe, to keep Sora safe.

Maybe Levi was protecting someone he loved, too.

“Fine,” I said, “but you still owe me a truth next time I see you. And you better make it a good one, or no deal.”

“I can do that.” His lips curved into the start of a smile, but then they dipped back down into a straight line just as quickly. “I should probably go.”

I nodded, not sure what else to say into the unusually awkward void now gaping between us.

He turned to leave, took two steps, then turned back. “Can you do me one more favor?”

I arched my brow in question.

“Can you—can you not go to that weird bar we saw today? The one earlier, on the way to the bus stop?”

“I, uh—” Confusion stole any chance I had at coherence. I wasn’t sure what favor I’d been expecting him to ask for, but that was as far from a possibility as it could get. “Huh?” was all I landed on.

“Promise me, Mareena.” His eyes were dark and urgent, and they drilled into me with relentless desperation. “Please.”

“Okay,” I said, not bothering to ask, because I knew I wouldn’t be getting any more information if I did. “I won’t. Promise.”

“Good.” His shoulders relaxed slightly. “Thank you.”

I held his gaze for an impossibly full moment, all of the new, unsaid strangeness churning question after question in my mind.

“I think my two minutes are up,” he said, looking suddenly exhausted and so much older and more worn out than he had ten minutes ago. “I better go.”

He was a few feet away before I found myself calling out his name.

When he turned back, my chest tightened at the sight of him, like something big had shifted, but I didn’t understand what.

“Promise me you’ll be careful,” I said, hating how vulnerable my voice sounded, how vulnerable I suddenly felt.

His lips twitched. “Deal.”

22

MAREENA

Present Day

“What the hell are you doing here?” Kieran asked, his voice low and laced with an edge I hadn’t encountered from him before.

The man walked towards us.

Like Kieran, his arms were covered in ink, the edges of some design on his chest peeking out from beneath the collar of his shirt. His eyes were so dark that it was almost impossible to discern between iris and pupil, and there was a jagged scar etched through his right eyebrow.

He was attractive, but as he studied Kieran, his face was carved in what seemed to be a permanent scowl. He’d spared me only the briefest of glances before deciding I was apparently not worth his interest.

But it was his hands that had my blood running suddenly cold. Looped around his fingers was a set of rings. Rings that were identical to Kieran’s. Was this guy another guardian angel? He looked even more dangerous and menacing than Kieran did,which meant that angels were clearly nothing like the ones in the stories we’d all been fed.

“What do you mean what am I doing here?” he snarled in a subtle British accent. “You were supposed to report to the Order days ago. Rafi sent me to see what the holdup was.” His dark gaze slanted in my direction again, before shifting back to Kieran. “And apparently, you’ve just been wasting our time, gallivanting with the living. Really Kieran,” he shot him a look of disgust, “didn’t have you pegged as someone who’d risk the Order’s wrath for a plaything that can see the dead. Are you truly that desperate for a taste of this world?”

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