Page 82 of Even Angels fall
Angélique stirs a bit, but she doesn’t wake.
She surprises me, though, because, without the book in hand, she turns a bit on her side and grabs my arm inside of hers, as if I was her very own plushie, and then she settles over my shoulder.
I should have left, yes, but now there is no way in hell I will do it. It’s not much, but the fact that she turned to me unconsciously feels like more than I ever deserved.
It hits me right in the middle of my chest—there is nothing I wouldn’t do for that woman.
And suddenly, I think I understand my father, because my wife might not love me, and I might not be there yet, either, but there’s something inside of me that makes that stupid thing that beats in my chest louder and stronger.
I might not love my wife yet, but I’d pluck the moon from the sky for her if she asked me.
I circle my right arm around her and bring her closer to me.
I’m gonna stay here with her for a little while.
Life can wait until tonight,I think to myself as I deposit the softest kiss on the side of her head.
Her hair has started to grow a bit, and I wonder if she would let it grow long if given the choice.
I’m startled when Angélique jumps from where we were on the ground and points a dagger at me with eyes wide open.
“What are you doing here?” she asks.
52
Angélique
Elhyor stands slowly, as if he has all the time in the world.
“As far as I know, this is my house, my archive room,” he says without a concern as he brushes non-existent lint from his pants.
He’s changed since last night, and he’s not wearing the wedding attire that he was the last time I saw him. Instead, he’s wearing a V-neck, dark gray t-shirt that almost seems to be painted over his body. It shows his tattoos, and now that I can see them closer—and I’m not actively trying to kill him—I can see that they aren’t just words or sentences. Between the letters, there are flames and smoke that give some depth to the whole design. I wonder what they mean and if I’ll get to see them in full one day.
“I meant sitting right next to me,” I hiss through my teeth.
I refuse to acknowledge that I was super comfy against him and that I was having very nice dreams and that, maybe—just maybe—he was involved in making those dreams very, very sweet.
He doesn’t need to know.
“Do you mean that I can’t hold my own wife against me as she sleeps?” he asks with fake outrage in his voice.
Except… I’m not so sure all the outrage is fake. Surely, I’m mistaken.
“Please, we both know ‘wife’ is just a name. We’re roommates at best,” I answer him as coldly as I can.
I’m not sure it works, because instead of leaving me alone, he gets closer, not minding that I’m still holding my dagger between the two of us.
He’s just at the tip of it when he stops.
“I know what you’re doing, Little Devil.” He pauses. “You’ve been hiding in here in hopes of finding something that will finally kill me so you can save your best friend up there,” he adds, as he points to the ceiling in a direction which is probably where Léandre is sleeping off all the alcohol he drank yesterday. It’s the middle of the night, so it would make sense.
I want to lie to him and tell him that he’s wrong, and that I wasn’t trying to find something to kill him. Really I want to, even with half of the books on the ground next to us being on dragons and the other half on poisons, but I can’t seem to be able to master my own tongue in time before Elhyor grabs my hand—the one holding the dagger between us—and I think he’s going to remove it, but instead, he closes his hand around mine and brings them higher, until the tip of my dagger is right in the middle of his chest. I can see the indent the tip of the blade is making on his shirt, pushing against the fabric and his body without breaking the skin.
“I know what you’ve been doing,” he repeats. “What you’re still trying to do.” He pauses and takes a deep breath that makes the blade of my dagger dip a bit deeper, the fabric tearing atthe contact. “You won’t find anything in those books. There is nothing that can kill me in those books. I can’t die from poison, and the only fire that can destroy me is the one coming from another dragon. And before you start researching if there are other dragons on Earth, yes, there are two others. One lives in Japan, and the other in New Zealand. No matter what you have planned, they can’t be here in time.”
I don’t understand.
Why is Elhyor telling me all of this? Does he not care about his own life?
