Kissing fate, p.10
Kissing Fate, page 10
“Did he try...” Zane hooks his thumb over his shoulder toward the back bedroom as his face reddens.
“I took care of it.” I meet his gaze. If Michael comes back out here like a wrecking ball, then he can conjure his scythe and eliminate the fool, but for now, hopefully feeling his balls in the back of his throat should be enough to tame that mother.
Zane’s lips thin and he does not heed the warning in my silent communication for him to leave it the hell alone. Instead, he turns to march down the hall and give Michael a beating.
“I wouldn’t get into a fight with him,” Damian says. “He’s kicked my ass a few times when I was a vampire, and vampires are notoriously strong.”
Damian’s warning didn’t slow Zane down, either.
“Leave it alone,” I say, and Zane turns to me with a hardness in his gaze. He does not like it when I issue an order. Especially one when I can tell he feels as though he shouldn’t have let me go down there to begin with.
He chose the scythe. He’s the one who has to obey Fate. I’m his boss for eternity and although I don’t enjoy ordering him around, sometimes it’s for his own damn good, like right now. This little glare of his is just nothing more than him mentally telling me we’d be having a talk about this later when all this angel crap was done.
I look forward to that conversation.
Michael limps back into the room, looking a little demeaned as everyone stares at him. He comes within striking distance of Zane, and although I stopped him from walking down the hall and confronting Michael, I am not fast enough to stop the punch he throws.
It catches Michael in the side of the jaw, sending him sidestepping into the living room wall. His wings flutter as he straightens and squares up for battle.
Levi moves in front of Zane. It’s the first time he’s willingly protected him without a direct order from me and for a moment all my piss and vinegar is gone, replaced by a sappiness I hate and one that earns me a side eye from Levi.
Michael eyes the dog warily.
“I would have expected that kind of behavior from my father,” Faith says to Michael, and crosses her arms. “But not from an agent of Heaven.”
Michael’s nose twitches and a sneer passes over his features, before it is replaced with the proper embarrassment. His cheeks turn a rosy hue as Faith’s words sink in. Losing is not something this being takes lightly, and he’s had his fair share of it in the past half century.
He relaxes his muscles and gives her a nod, as if he’s thanking her for reminding him what he truly represents. “I apologize. That was not...right,” he says to me with a slight bow. But he doesn’t quite meet my gaze and him not adding a litany of excuses to the end of the sentence makes his apology more acceptable.
“Fine. But if you do anything that stupid again, I’ll let Leviathan eat you.” I point to the dog sitting in front of Zane. My favorite monster would gladly take out all the angels if he could, and he’d be satiated for centuries.
“With pleasure,” the dog says in that deep-toned voice that spreads fear in every single one of his enemies. It seems the archangel is not immune to fearing my cohort, because he pales a few tones.
“You have Leviathan here? On Earth?” Uriel asks with wide eyes.
“Where the hell have you been, mate?” Smoke asks from the corner. “He’s been hanging with Death for the last fifty years.”
“And he hasn’t eaten humanity?” Gabriel asks.
“No. You really didn’t know what he was when we were in Purgatory?” I stare at them, dumbfounded. “Besides, what the hell makes you think he would eat humanity?”
“Our father said he was unmanageable,” Raphael said. “That’s why he had him chained near the gates of Hell in Purgatory.”
“I was unmanageable for your father because he was as much of a dick as the rest of you.” Levi bares his teeth in a low snarl just to make his point.
“Seriously? God chained him up?” I ask.
“Your father sounds like a royal dick,” Zane says at the same time as I gawk. “Levi’s a pussycat,” Zane adds and pats his head. Levi just looks over his shoulder at him, like are you kidding me? “Missy’s father set him free, and he’s been part of the family ever since.”
“He’s hunted demons with me,” Faith adds. “And got me through the lower realms of Hell when I closed one of the portals we jumped through by accident.”
“And those angel dicks locked him up and had their griffin guarding him,” I add. “But we took care of that god-awful thing.”
Raphael’s brow arched. “You dispatched the griffin?”
“Yes, sir, we did.” I smile. “The three of us are a force to be reckoned with.” I stare at Archangel Michael as I speak.
“That is because you are Fate,” Michael snaps back at me.
“Dude, she was a force long before she became either Fate or Death.” Zane moves across the room to sling his arm around my shoulder in a way that shows his claim.
I shake his arm off my shoulder. Although I announced I was his in no uncertain terms, that he has to physically mark his territory in some way is irritating. I give him the side eye in case he tries that again.
I glance around the room. “Now that we are all playing nice with one another, and the archangels are all graced up, we need to focus on a plan.” When no one offers an immediate idea, I sigh. “The angels are coming back, and they are coming in full force. So how do we play this?”
Ty leans forward from his spot at the dinner table and rubs his chin. “We have some key points of surprise and if we stage it correctly, it likely will overwhelm them.” He turns the pile of papers he has in front of him around so we can all see.
I cross to the table and look down at the stack he’s turned our way. His elaborate drawings are impressive, to say the least. I can only draw stick figures, so seeing the likenesses of all of us makes me glance at him.
“How long have you been drawing those?” I ask.
“I’ve been doodling for a while. Basically, since you left to get them.” He points at the angels.
“That’s what, only a couple of hours?”
He shrugs. “It was tough to figure out the right progression, and I think this approach is the best out of all my thoughts.” He doesn’t even acknowledge that his drawings are beyond perfect.
I stare at his thought-out approach, still awed by the detail. Zane isn’t on the front line with me. Neither is Levi. And the archangels are missing. The only ones standing with me drawn in intricate detail on the first piece of paper are Papa, Ty, Tom, Alex, and Faith. The powerhouses.
“This is what they expect.” He taps the paper. “They probably expect Zane, but they do not expect this.” He flips the top page over and there is a likeness of Zane, along with Levi. Even the scale seems right, with the cross between Godzilla and a dragon representing Levi’s native form. Next to them are other beasts. A tiger. A hawk. I blink at the third drawing. That can’t be right.
“Is that a saber-toothed tiger?” I point at the prehistoric death machine that probably could give Levi a run for his money. “Where the hell are we going to get that?”
Ty points at Smoke and raises his eyebrows. “If I’m not mistaken,” he says.
Smoke shrugs. “That’s a pretty good likeness.”
Both Phoebe and I spin to look at him.
“I assume you can still shift,” Ty says. It isn’t so much a question as a statement.
And damned if Smoke shrugs. “Beats me. I haven’t tried since Fate released me from being a housecat.”
Phoebe still stares at him with an open mouth. “You were that? Why didn’t you ever turn into that while we were hunting demons?” She’s still blinking fast, like the dots are not connecting right.
He chuckles. “Fate cursed me into a housecat,” he says. “If I could have had my natural form, I would have gladly donned it to protect you from those damned demons.” He wraps his arm around her waist and pulls her into a tender kiss. “But I’m no ordinary saber. I’m twice the size of any in recorded history.” His grin is infectious, and I smile in response.
We have a mammoth saber-toothed tiger at our disposal. I can’t help the feeling of hope that intertwines with the dread. The last paper shows the archangels descending between us and a sea of angels as far as the paper will allow. It’s daunting, at the very least.
If raw numbers determined the winner, we are sorely outnumbered based on his drawing. Even if I call upon the reaper federation, the numbers are still too skimpy.
Ty reaches out and covers my hand. “Trust in yourself,” he says softly, while Phoebe and Smoke still chatter about his secret shifter form.
“Show me. Shift now.” Phoebe waves to the living area and captures my full attention.
I want to see this, too.
“You really want to see me in fur again?” he teases and steps away from people. “Please have a blanket ready for when I shift back because I’ll be naked, and I don’t need all the alpha males in this room jealous of my endowments.” He winks at Phoebe. His grin fades as he dips his head in concentration.
Phoebe grabs the throw blanket off the back of the couch and holds it tight to her chest as she keeps her gaze locked on Smoke. Every set of eyes is on him, including all the angels. I think the raw curiosity has us all holding our breath.
The cords on his neck stand out with the effort to shift, and his hands clench. When his eyes open, they’re decidedly the golden green of a feline with elongated pupils. His eye teeth grow to razors in his mouth and he tilts his head back, letting out a roar. Fur spurts from his skin and an instant later, he drops to all fours and lowers his head.
It looks just as painful as having the essence of Death stripped from your cells. I shiver. When he finally completes the shift with a bone-grinding crunch, the beast takes up most of the living room and his mouth is head height for most of us in the room. He flexes his front paws and his nails glisten like deadly knives.
He roars at us and then purrs at Phoebe, rubbing the side of his head against her until she giggles and pushes him away.
Despite his endearing feline actions with Phoebe, he still is terrifying. I wouldn’t want to be on the opposition. Between Smoke’s alternative form and Levi, I would be running for the hills while trying to control my bladder.
“Damn glad you are on our side,” Zane says. “He’s almost as terrifying as Levi.” Zane says exactly what was running through my mind.
“And I assume you two can still shift,” Ty says to Naomi and Damian.
They nod. “Yes. That’s inherent in our blood.”
“Well, let’s see.” He nods to the living room where the saber-toothed tiger takes up most of the space.
“I’m not sure we’ll all fit in here,” Damian says.
“Humor me,” Faith says. “I’d really like to see what our backup team looks like outside of what’s on paper.” She looks over her shoulder at Ty. “Despite the exemplary detail of your drawings.”
“Fine,” Damian says with an eyeroll.
Their transition lacks the effort Smoke displayed. One second they were in human form, and the next they transform. Naomi is a fraction of the size of Smoke, but her white tiger is especially intimidating, especially with the bright-blue angel eyes.
Damian’s hawk is nearly the size that the griffin was, but when he caws, it’s exactly the sound I expected from the griffin. Fierce. There is no room for him to spread his wings to give us an idea of his wingspan, but based on his size, he could carry a full-grown man in his talons with no problem.
It’s humbling. They are an impressive lot, and I can only imagine what they will look like when Levi joins them in his native form. We can’t see that until the time comes, because the cottage would be demolished if Levi snapped into his natural state. I glance at him, and he gives me that tongue loll of a canine laugh.
Even the archangels seem to shrink away from the beasts in the center of the room. After all, they were made to destroy immortal scum like demons and now the lot of lower angels.
“That’s awesome,” Phoebe says. “Now change back so we can finish looking at Ty’s strategy and see if we need to tweak it.”
Damian and Naomi flip back, fully clothed, just as fast as they shifted. But Smoke’s transition back to human seems just as painful as his original shift. Bone grinding on bone and tendons snapping back in place makes me shiver.
And he wasn’t kidding. His sweat-soaked body is completely naked when it finally snaps back together. At least the view of him is limited to a quick flash before Phoebe throws the blanket around him. But what I do catch makes me envy Phoebe for a second. I glance away until he’s properly wrapped.
Smoke remains kneeling on the ground, catching his breath as he clings to the blanket around him. When he finally looks up, his face is drawn with exhaustion. He climbs to his feet unsteadily.
“You okay?” Phoebe puts her arm around him.
“I just need a drink and a little nap.” He turns away from us and disappears into the back hallway, with Phoebe helping him.
She comes back and grabs the nearly full carton of orange juice and gives us all a tight smile before she heads back to wherever he is laying down.
Two of our mighty warriors are down for the count, and I trade a glance with Ty.
“They’ll be fine by the time this battle begins,” he says, easing my worry. He is very good at reading people without the benefit of telepathy, although he possesses that gift, too. But his tap into the human condition is much more subtle, like his so-called glimpses into the future.
Although Jennifer Williams had been a natural clairvoyant, Ty gets his from his angel heritage. Papa once told me that even before he and Tom were born, their father had made arrangements for their guardian to be Steve Williams. That was some eight years before Steve came into their lives. I remember the goose bumps that spread over my arms at that story.
I glance up from the ornate pictures and over my shoulder at the rest of the folks gathered around Damian and Naomi. They are still fawning over the shifters, and I have to let out a quiet laugh. I turn back and stare right into Ty’s frank gaze.
“Are we going to survive this?” I ask outright, because of all the people in the room, he’s the one with foresight. Even my Book of Fates won’t show me who lives and who dies. At least not those in this room because, believe me, I’ve scrolled through it several times over the years, trying to read the Fates of my family and found nothing.
He takes a deep breath and shuffles through the papers. He has many more drawings than what he showed us, and I pluck them from his hands. His wide-eyed gaze jerks up to mine.
I slowly shift from one page to the next. The pages show so many outcomes—from an explosion that cracks the earth in two, to the bloody battlefield and only Zane sitting by himself with his head in his hands, to me nearly breaking apart with light.
I stare at that one, because it isn’t on the same battlefield. I’m alone in Paradise Cove, but not the burned-out husk it currently is. In the picture, Paradise Cove is reinstated.
Ty takes the drawings and pulls out the one with the archangels, placing it on the table as he rips the rest of them into little pieces without breaking my gaze.
“So, the archangels next,” I say, trying to not let the tremor break my voice.
He nods. “If the Heavenly host doesn’t back down, yes, the archangels come next,” Ty says.
Our conversation seems to pull people back into the strategy talks. Neither Ty nor I mention his other drawings. I trust he has seen every possible outcome and has chosen the right one. If not, we are all doomed.
“There’s one particular angel who I’m not letting leave alive regardless of whether or not he waves the white flag,” Zane says, and everyone turns to him. “The rest of them, if they yield, then I’m okay with letting them go back to Heaven with the promise they will never step outside those gates again. But the one who tortured me—Gadrel...he’s mine.” He presses his lips together and his eyes flash a warning against any type of argument.
I’m okay with his need for justice, especially considering I want to skin the asshole alive just to relish his pain. And then use Heaven’s blade to snuff him out of existence when I think he’s sufficiently suffered.
I glance at the clock. The witching hour just passed, and I look around the room. “I think you all need to get some rest.” I cross to the curtain and push it aside. “I’ll keep watch in case they decide to attack while it’s dark.”
“I’ll keep you company until my father gets up,” Alex says as he picks up the drawings that Ty left on the table.
Ty and Jessica, along with Faith, Damian, and Naomi start down the hall.
“You sure you don’t want some help?” Tom asks as he looks at Alex and twirls his finger. Raven waits with Hannah at the entrance to the hallway.
“I’m good, Uncle Tom.” He gives Tom a hug and then shoos him off to be with Raven and Hannah.
Quiet descends on the living room, leaving me with Alex, Zane, Levi, and the four archangels in what looks to be shaping up to be a very long night.
Kissing Fate Chapter 14
“I’LL SEE YOUR BET and raise you a...” Zane looks at the pile of junk next to him. An assortment of paper clips, staples, and pens lay in a pile. He pulls out a pen and drops it in the growing pile of desk supplies and counts out a dozen paper clips. “A dozen paper clips.” He drops those on the pile and cocks an eyebrow.
Uriel frowns at the five cards in his hand and then folds them in front of him with disgust. “I’m out.”
I look at my cards, biting my lower lip at the three aces, queen, and seven in my hand. I toss a pen and ten paper clips from my pile into the kitty in the center. “Call.”
Michael fans his cards out, studying his hand. He toys with a pen and then sighs as he folds the cards and tosses them into the center. “Fold.”
