Page 3 of Sleeping Redemption
The small cafe buzzed around me; people coming and going as they retrieved their morning coffee orders. It was all a blur as I remained stuck inside my mind, sitting at a small table next to a display of books for patrons to read while they stayed to consume their caffeine.
I had only been in Brixton for a few weeks, a small city several hours away from Syracuse, tucked into the Adirondack Mountains. Despite getting settled into a temporary apartment and having had nearly a year to prepare for this moment, I still struggled to find the balls to go through with this meeting.
When I first moved here, I knew it was home to one of several hundred portals to Hell across the globe. Kinley hadn’t been at any of the others, which is what brought me to this otherwise unassuming city. It had enough inhabitants that suspiciousthingscould happen to people and there would be minimal questions raised or alarms alerting the attention of the human authorities.
As I had expected, the crime rate was above average, and the body count was astounding. It had all the markings of everything I had come to learn about Kinley’s current state of mind.
My hand cradled my mug, and I tapped my finger against the side of it to ease my anxiety. It was now just shy of nine a.m., the time she had agreed to meet. What if she knew what I had become? Would she try to send me away?
My fingers pushed a loose strand of hair back into place as my hand ran over the dark blonde of my locks pulled back into a small bun. My gray-blue eyes continued to search for any sign of her arrival.
After another influx of guests filed into the coffee shop, and that was when I saw the nearly white blonde of her hair. God, I loved her hair, I always had. My dick instantaneously reacted to the memory of what it was like to lie naked next to her with my hands buried in those silky strands.
She stepped into full view as she skirted around the line of people waiting for their orders. The sight of her took my breath away, and I didn’t care if I ever got it back again.
Kinley never did compromise on her looks, and while so much of her had changed, it seemed that piece hadn’t. With a pair of jeans hugging her hips and a black button-up blouse, she had chosen to dress casually for our meeting. Her blonde hair was loosely twined into a braid, and her sapphire hues stood out amongst her thin-framed features.
Our eyes met and she smiled. The curve of her mouth had my heart secretly hoping she was the same woman I used to know. Yet, my brain knew better than to cave to such naive thoughts.
I stood when she arrived at my table. I was prepared to grab her face and fiercely kiss her after centuries of being torn apart. Just as I nearly gave in, she extended her hand toward me.
“You must be Alex.”
Heart. Fucking. Shattered.
C’mon, Kinley, you have to remember me. Look just a little harder, angel.
Clearing my throat, I reached out to take her hand gently to shake it. “Uh, yeah. That’s me.” The lie ate away at my conscience.
“I’m Kinley Ward. It’s nice to meet you.” She withdrew her hand and dug into a tote hanging from her shoulder, pulling out a tablet before taking a seat across from me.
My eyes stared at her, and I didn’t give a fuck if she thought it was rude or awkward. My soul practically begged for her to remember me, to rememberus. There had to be a part of her that did.
Kinley tapped a few things on the tablet in her hands, but I just stood there, staring at her. It probably felt like my eyes were boring a hole in her head because she glanced up to notice me still standing there, just staring at her.
“You are ready to get started, right?” she asks me, a hint of annoyance in her voice, before turning her attention back to the screen in front of her.
Quickly, I plunked down into my seat. “Of course, sorry. I am just a little surprised.”
Not looking up from her tablet, she spoke. “Because beautiful women can’t be tech geniuses, or because I’m not immediately flirting with you to secure your business?”
I gave a light chuckle; she never minded calling people out. I missed that about her.
“No, just how much you look like someone I used to know. It’s uncanny.”
I wiped my palms over my gray dress slacks, mentally telling myself to pull my shit together. I gestured at her. “Please, continue.”
Her eyes suspiciously looked me over. I had hoped that wearing my white dress shirt and matching gray vest would have prompted some level of recognition of an era gone by.
Baby, please. There has to be a part of you that hasn’t been lost. I see you, why won’t you see me? Just look a little harder…
I knew it had been a couple hundred years, and a lot had changed for us both, but I had to continue holding onto a sliver of hope. Under orders from up above, I was supposed to be cloaking my true appearance and maintaining a healthy distance from Kinley. While my ability to hide my familiarity from her was currently in use, it was a half-assed mask that she should have been able to see through like the dark film on a pair of sunglasses.
Guardian Angel 101: Be present but not present.
That seemed to leave a lot of wiggle room, didn’t it? The powers that be never made anything clear as day.
Setting her device down, Kinley’s eyes occasionally glanced down at her notes. “I did a preliminary assessment of your company’s online footprint. It’s remarkably pitiful.”
