Page 76 of The Fallen
“Hey.” I hold up my hands. “I just don’t want to get done in for slander.”
Eve jabs me in the arm with her elbow, throwing me a high-intensity glower. I bite my tongue between my teeth and wink at her. She rolls her eyes. "Shut up, Lil."
I place a hand over my heart. "I was just fact-checking you; good journalists are supposed to care about that. Fuck, you're so emotional sometimes."
Eve balls up a napkin and throws it at me. It hits my forehead and then falls to the tabletop.
I dart my eyes between Adam and the wadded-up napkin. "See, now that's how you throw something at a person who's sitting two feet away from you."
Eve looks between us questioningly.
"I have no idea what you're talking about," Adam mutters, refusing to meet my eyes.
I blow out a breath, shaking my head mournfully. "Denial. So sad."
“There’s news!” Adam says, flashing an amused grin at Eve and flipping me off at the same time, clearly about to use the knowledge of Azrael’s existence as revenge against me. Eve’s gonna be so pissed.
Eve frowns at him, rightfully suspicious. She slides a wary glance at me. “What’s happened now?”
“Our sister has decided to adopt a pet Angel,” Adam tells her with exaggerated excitement. “What joy this way comes.”
Eve whips her head between us, her mouth open in shock, disbelief written across her face in a furious scrawl. “What the fuck? Seriously, an Angel? Where is it?” She turns her head, searching the flat for some sign of my new guest as if she thinks Azrael will be hiding behind the sofa or something.
“She’s not an ‘it,’” I say sternly. “Her name is Azrael, and she’s lying down in my bedroom, so keep your voice down, for fuck’s sake.”
Eve shoots me a scowl of confusion. “But Angels don’t sleep.”
I shrug. “They dream, though.”
“So … what,” Eve says slowly, a horrified look dawning on her face, “you have an Angeldaydreamingin your bed right now?”
I bob my head. “Pretty much the size of it, yeah.”
“Have you gone absolutely bonkers?” Eve hisses at me, darting a fearful glance towards my closed bedroom door.
“That’s what I said,” Adam chimes in unhelpfully, and I make a face at him, which he promptly ignores in favour of sipping away at his tea. I resist the urge to knock it out of his hands. Barely.
“Chill out,” I soothe Eve. “It’s not that big a thing.” Except it really, really is, to be fair.
Eve does not chill out; if anything, she becomes even more irate in response to my blasé attitude. “You can’t keep an Angel here, Lil. Michael and his cadre of feathered bellends will come storming in, all righteous and stupid and stabby.” She makes a stabbing motion with her fist. “I don’t want to get stabbed by Michael.”
Adam raises his hand. “I second not wanting to get stabbed.” He screws up his nose. “Especially by Michael. Thatprick.”
“No one’s getting stabbed.” I wave them off. “They won’t come for her yet. At some point, Michael or Gabriel will contact me, asking for her back first.”
“And you’ll tell them …?” Eve prods.
“To take a flying fuck at a rolling donut, yeah.” I tap out a quick rhythm against the table edge, flashing her a jaunty grin.
“Lilith!” Eve and Adam both yelp with varying degrees of shrillness. They’re looking at me with despair on their faces, so identical it takes real effort not to take the piss out of them for it. This is not the time for jokes. I’ll only get hit, and Eve is strong for a human.
I don’t know if Azrael was waiting for the chance to interrupt, or if she just has the best accidental timing in the world, but her trepidatious wandering from my room to the kitchen couldn’t be more welcome.
Azrael, despite her quiet demeanour, comes off as relatively menacing in the light of day. Or that might just be the distrustful scowl she’s aiming at Eve and Adam as if they’re the ones who are intruding and might have suspect motives for being here.
She’s still wearing the same clothes from last night: a simple halter top, the only sort of shirt she could wear to allow for the wings without getting creative with the sewing scissors, and some combat trousers stuffed into similar military-style boots. All black, like Heaven had aCharlie’s Angelsmovie night and decided to develop a sense of humour, finally.
Azrael, despite the wings protruding out of her back that I will never be able to view as anything but obscene, is beautiful enough to have been cast in one of those films. I noticed that last night, but it didn’t strike me until now, seeing her standing here in my kitchen with the sunlight filtering through the windows to bathe her in a faint glow.
