Death Takes Wing, page 13
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
She ran a hand through her hair, trying to work the rampant curls into a semblance of decency. Utterly failing, she ignored the frizzy results of her ministrations and focused on the task at hand. Her stomach grumbled, and she leaned back in the seat, thumping her head against the soft headrest. That would be getting a real breakfast, she thought to herself. She stared at the pop-tart he’d handed her as he rushed them out the door the minute the sun broke through the haze of darkness.
Upset that he’d woken her from one hell of a dream, involving him, a can of whipped cream and silk sheets, she glared at him from the passenger seat. He just looked back at her, not wavering in his gaze. She narrowed her eyes at him.
He looked at the pop tart. “You’re not going to eat it?”
“It’s cold. You didn’t even warm it up first,” she replied petulantly.
Apparently, he thought, she’d been spoiled by yesterday’s feast, if this attitude was any indication. Not his problem. She knew they’d have to get up early. Although, that might not have been the problem, judging by the lustful expression she’d had on her face as he woke her up.
“If you aren’t going to eat it, I will,” he said as he took it from her and proceeded to eat half of it in one bite.
She sighed and brushed the remains of the Pop-tart off her hands. “So what am I having for breakfast, then?”
He handed her the Snicker’s she’d stuck in the glove box yesterday. “Happy breakfast,” he said, giving a mocking salute with the remains of the offending pastry.
Narrowing her eyes at him again, she stuck her tongue out. It made her feel childish, but it relieved some of the stress. Or maybe that was the Snickers. Definitely the Snickers, she decided, as she washed it down with the remains of yesterday’s Mountain Dew. Nothing better than sugar upon sugar to get her going so early in the morning. At least, according to Morgan, who regularly survived on such a diet on a daily basis. Not to mention the excellent sugar high she could feel brewing, simmering just under her skin like someone had dumped a can of writhing ants down her shirt.
Or maybe, as she was stuck in a small car with a rather large, imposing driver, that wasn’t such a good thing…oh well, she decided, it was his fault for not having given her a warm pop-tart. That would have been a much better breakfast. Definitely not so much sugar. If she didn’t eat the frosting. Which she would have, she decided. The frosting was the best part of a pop-tart. An integral part, she told herself as she licked the melted chocolate off her fingers.
She stretched out, and tried to think of something to do in the car to keep herself amused. He’d immediately vetoed her first idea of playing show tunes. Which she didn’t understand, as he seemed like a show tunes kind of person. Not the gay kind, she amended, but just a guy who’d appreciate show tunes. But, alas, he wasn’t. So he wasn’t perfect, she thought.
He was the “Joy Division, Green Day, Bach, Aerosmith” kind of man. All were good musicians, but not to her taste. More to Sam’s taste. Sobering at the thought of Sam, she stared out the window, watching the sun and clouds create shadows on the road.
So the interior of the car was silent for the time being, as he refused to listen to show tunes, Euro-pop or Linkin Park, and she steadfastly refused to listen to any of his kind of music. She didn’t think that was fair, as she hated riding in a quiet car, but it was his car…it wasn’t like he would let them take her car, and he wouldn’t let her drive his. Or, even if he did let them, he couldn’t wedge himself in the car…unless it was in the backseat, which she couldn’t see him allowing.
“Are you all right?” he cautiously asked her, noticing the bemused look on her face. It went away as she looked at him.
“Just thinking,” she replied, coming back to reality with a start that made him snicker.
“About what?” He asked, genuinely curious as to what caused the dazed look on her face.
“Music,” she answered. “You don’t like my music, and I don’t like your music and I hate riding in a quiet car, so I’m on a stream-of-conscious thought… Not to mention, I had a Snickers for breakfast, and half of a two-liter of Mountain Dew to wash it down. I’m on the verge of a serious sugar buzz. I hope we’re going to do something physical. Soon. Otherwise, you’re going to have to deal with ADHD girl.”
“Oh, I think there’s several physical things we can do that could…burn…off your extra energy,” he purred seductively, casting her a sultry look.
She gulped air as she thought about her fantasies and dream involving the dark angelus. She arched a well groomed eyebrow at him. “I seriously doubt there’s enough room in this car, especially with your wings, to – accommodate – any type of that activity.”
He laughed. “All right, you’re probably right on that. So, I’m curious about something.”
“About what?” she asked, her own curiosity piqued. So far, she’d been the one asking all the questions. It’d be quite refreshing to find that he had some of his own.
He glanced at her and smiled. “So, you’ve made it very apparent that you aren’t afraid of me.”
She echoed his laugh. “That wasn’t a question. And, no, I’m not afraid of you.”
“So,” he said with a pause, “what are you afraid of?”
“Not too much,” said, curls bouncing around her shoulders as he hit a pothole, “since I had to get over most of my fears when I was in the force. I’m afraid of snakes. And spiders. Especially spiders. The big ones. They freak me out. Are you saying they don’t freak you out? Because they freak me out. Completely. Seriously, they do.”
He gaped at her, not realizing just how long she could speak without breathing. “You were serious about ADHD girl, weren’t you?”
She empathetically nodded her head, hair flying around the front of the car, some resting on his wings. “Totally serious. I warned you. I so warned you.”
He peered at her out of the corner of his eyes, almost afraid to provoke her. “Maybe I should have you run a few laps around the car? While going down the road at a slow pace?”
She rewarded his response with a glare and silently bounced in her seat. “Yes, because running me over with a car is a great way to get rid of some of my energy.”
“Hey,” he said defensively, “I didn’t say anything about running you over.”
“No, you didn’t,” she replied, smirking, but still bouncing, “But having me run around your car while going down the road? Can we say ‘oncoming traffic’?”
He laughed, “Oh, well, there is that. So, you don’t want to ride in a silent car? What, is our conversation not good enough for you anymore? Do my words bore you?” He pretended to pout, which made her grin.
She giggled and leaned against the door, quickly tapping her feet on the floorboard. “I didn’t say that, but I’m in the mood for some music, and face it, we haven’t had much to say since you took my breakfast. I mean, aside from you finding out what I’m afraid of. And now I’m afraid that you’ll use that against me. Which you’d better not do.”
“Well, it’s not like you were going to eat it,” he defended, a smile on his lips and a hint of fang peeking out.
“That’s not the point, bully” she pointed out. “Anyway, if you can find a subject we haven’t discussed, I might let the music thing slide.”
He paused again before saying, “are you ready for this?”
The change from the lighthearted subject to the future made her frown. “As ready as I’m going to be. I’m doing this because I have to find Sam. I can’t let something happen to her. I just can’t,” she said with a sigh. She looked at him. “You know how long it’s been since I’ve done something like this?”
“A few years?”
She shook her head. “Just over a year and a half.”
“Are you worried that you can’t follow through?” he asked, curiously. He really hoped that she’d be able to follow his lead.
She gave a dry, brittle laugh. “Oh, I can follow through.” She reached in her coat and touched the butt of the Glock that was safely holstered. “I just hope I don’t have to.”
“You’ve never shot anyone before?”
“I’ve shot at people, but no, I’ve never actually hit anyone.”
“Your aim was that bad?”
“No,” she snarled, “My aim was not that bad.”
“Ah,” he murmured. Judging by the frown on her face, and the nasty tone in her voice, that was a sore spot. Better not touch that with a ten-foot pole.
“Are we almost there?” she said impatiently, staring out the window again.
“Almost,” he replied as he glanced at her out of the corner of his eye. She wasn’t just bouncing in her seat, he thought, he could feel the nervous energy that surrounded her.
“So you recognize the address, I’m assuming?” She asked as she stared out the window, catching her own gaze in the reflection. The frizz-machine was still going strong. She heaved a defeated sigh as she attempted to tame the mass of hair.
He glanced at her, slight surprise on his face. “No, I thought you did.”
When she glared at him, he gave her a sheepish smile. “All right, yes, I know where it is.”
“Good. How much longer?” she asked, staring down her phone as she responded to a text Morgan had fired her, asking her what she was doing today.
“In a hurry to go to your doom?” He asked with a slight smirk.
Worry danced behind her green eyes. “It’s not my doom,” she snarled, not wanting to think that he might be right. “I’m only asking because my behind is tired of being under me in a moving car.”
“Oh? And where else would it be, if not under you, in a moving car?” He could think of a couple places he wouldn’t mind it being, but he sure as hell wasn’t going to mention those options to her.
She smirked at him, as if she could read his mind. “Seeing as it’s my day off, or supposed to be,” she inserted with a mutter, “I would be at home, on my couch, Lucy next to me, Kohl behind me, playing the RPG du jour.”
“That would be which one, now? There’s so many, you know,” he asked lazily.
“Skyrim, of course,” she shot back, refraining from adding ‘duh’ to the end.
“Of course, how didn’t I guess that?” He replied sarcastically, rolling his eyes for good measure.
“Because you don’t play video games?” She asked, wondering if the angelus did play, since she wasn’t sure just what angelus actually did when they were alone with time to kill.
He laughed, “Oh, I play them. Actually, I prefer first-person shooters, but I do like a good role-playing game. Mass Effect, Fallout, WOW, Elder Scrolls,” he listed, “love them all.”
“So, I’m guessing that’s why you’re single,” she jibed, “The only reason that you aren’t fat and living in your mother’s basement is because you have to have a job to buy the games.”
He narrowed his eyes at her, dark lashes framing the light eyes.
She’d noticed that his eyes seemed to go from light gray to dark gray from moment to moment, mood to mood.
With a smirk, he replied, “I haven’t lived in my mother’s basement for at least ten years. Give me some credit. And as for me being fat? Well, be glad you didn’t see me then,” he shot back, “Because I put Jared to shame.”
She started giggling, unable to stop herself from picturing him as an overweigh, pimply nerd. “Oh, I’m sure you did. Your poor mother.”
“Yep. She practically had to roll me up the stairs,” he said blithely.
The giggles turned into a laugh at that image. “You really play games?”
He looked at her, a smile covering his face. “Yes, m’lady. I really do play the games I told you. I’ve never been fat, but the angelus all have high metabolisms, especially compared to most humans, so it’s harder for us to get that out of shape. Though some seriously try their best. I knew one who had an obsession with Twinkies and pixie sticks. I don’t think I need to say anything else on that.”
Huh, she thought to herself. So he wasn’t just smart and well-read. He also played video games. If only she’d had that much in common with Eric. If she had, the relationship might not have ended. Although, with as much as he loved sex, especially with everyone but her, it probably still would have. Just probably not as dramatically.
Breaking her thoughts away from her straying ex, she moved on to questioning him about his living quarters. “Did you really live in her basement?”
“Nope. She wouldn’t let me. It was my brother’s,” he replied.
She wasn’t sure if he was still teasing her, so she just grinned and shook her head.
“So what do you play? A supremely good character? Always does the right thing?”
“Nope,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m like that in real life-“
She snorted, cutting him off. “Yeah. A regular angel.” She mockingly put her hands together in prayer and mimed a halo above her head.
For that dig, he gave her the stink eye, but didn’t respond. “I prefer a chaotic neutral. Makes the game interesting, and I get to play how I feel without the real-world consequences.”
She nodded, guessing, “So, you’re a thief?”
He grinned, “That obvious, huh? What about you? I’m guessing a mage. Women are always mages,” he said as he turned down a damaged but still paved driveway. Abandoned looking, she decided. She wondered if it actually was.
She gave him a look of disgust and snapped, “No, an assassin-thief-fighter-type person. Mages are for people who don’t like to get into the thick of battle, and my person always likes a good, bloody fight. Especially if I can rob the body after I’m done killing it.”
He suppressed a grin, but she saw the corners of his mouth twitching. “Remind me not to piss you off, then. But, just so you know, I don’t carry cash or cards on me.”
“Then how do you pay for gas? And, where’d you pull that twenty out of yesterday?”
“You don’t want to know,” he shot back with a grin.
She grinned at him, laughing a bit. “Yeah, well, I think you’re so full of it that your eyes should be brown! You’re just telling me that so I won’t rob your body if you die while we’re together.”
He sneered, “As if. I’m a bit harder to kill than you think darlin’.”
“Only a bit? Can we test that theory?” she asked sweetly, her smile fading as he parked the car in front of a decrepit mansion. Large oak trees loomed overhead, branches full of dead, brown leaves that waited for the harsh wind to strip them of their safe attachments. She looked all around, taking in the overgrown driveway.
Dead weeds clustered in the cracks of the chipped and broken cement. Wooden posts held up the sagging balcony, the gingerbread trim half missing or falling off. Windows in the upstairs were boarded up haphazardly, giving her a glimpse of a darkened interior.
With a grimace, he said, “This house has just fallen apart in the last few years.”
“What do you mean?” She wondered aloud, hoping that he thought it was supposed to be slightly more normal, and a lot less scary.
“Well, for one it used to be habitable, and it didn’t look like I was going to fall down around my ears,” he replied, carefully making his way to the front door. “Last I saw it, it wasn’t nearly this bad. I didn’t think the architecture could decline so much in only a few years.”
“You know, even an old hospital wouldn’t be as creepy as this place. It’s probably haunted, and I know I should be staying out in the car. Away from the ghosts and goblins and weeping angels,” she said as she cautiously trailed behind him. She pointed. “See? There’s one, right now.”
A weeping angel statue sat in the middle of an intact, but mossy fountain that graced the center of the circle drive. She shuddered, just thinking about it coming to life creeped her out.
He gave her an odd look before making his way across the broad porch, complete with a broken swing. “Weeping angels? You watch entirely too much TV; you do realize that, right?”
She snorted, “I don’t watch nearly enough if you ask some of my friends, and according to others, I watch just enough.” She paused as he peered through the windows. He walked through the overgrown flower beds as he peeked in the dirty windows. What he was looking for, Amalia couldn’t begin to know. “Are the weeping angels offensive?”
He glanced at her again as a question played on his lips. “Are zombies offensive to you?”
She favored him with a saucy grin. “If I say yes, what will you say then?”
He returned the grin with a nod of acknowledgment but ignored the question and continued, “I’m going to guess that, based on that poorly executed act of avoidance, that they’re not offensive to you. That’s pretty much how they are to us. But they are a wicked prank to pull on humans,” he finished with a wicked laugh.
She play-frowned at him, hoping that he’d tell her that story. “You mean to tell me that you pulled that on some poor, unsuspecting human?”
A smirk covered his face as he left the windows and started towards the large porch. “I had a human that kept snooping around my house. Nothing I tried made that human leave me alone,” he spat out human as if it was a dirty word as he remembered the girl who’d spied on him. “So, with Matt and Aimee’s help, and a bunch of makeup that was damn hard to get out of the feathers, we made ourselves up as two weeping angel statues. Matt hung around with the video camera. She came around that night, with a friend, that time. So we acted the part.”
“Scared the shit out of her?” Amalia asked, curious.
“Definitely. Luckily for us, she was with a friend who’d seen every Doctor Who episode, including the ones with the weeping angels. The stalker still flipped her lid, afraid to turn around and run, but her friend finally convinced her that we were just messing with her. Matt, uh, unconvinced her, and somehow convinced her friend that the weeping angels were real. That the Doctor Who episode was based on reality. They both ran out, screaming bloody murder, and she hasn’t been back. On the upside, now there are rumors that my house is haunted,” he said, a satisfied tone in his deep voice.
