Angel Slayer. Michele Hauf
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tilted his head, wondering at her.
“A joke.”
“That word is not in my knowledge.”
“You’ll understand after you’ve assimilated, I’m sure.” She inspected the glob of clear aloe on her arm. It did quell the desire to scratch.
“So I really do need to sleep. I thought I was exhausted after worrying about the gallery showing for a week, but being chased by an angel tops that. Will I be okay all alone? If the angel found me earlier, why can’t he find me now?”
“You haven’t scratched the angelkiss?”
“No.”
“Then you should be safe. The beacon is only activated with irritation. When you scratch you send out a signal only the Fallen can track.”
“Like pheromones?”
“I do not know that word, either.”
She nodded. “It’s an attraction thing innate in all of us.” And, man, was she feeling it right now.
“Attraction. Like lust?”
“Exactly.” The corner of his mouth curled. Eden had to consciously warn herself against touching the crease. Damn, they were making rescuing knights attractive these days. “So, you don’t know things? I suppose not, if you’ve been out of touch for so long.”
“I knew things, and then that knowledge was taken from me through time and—It is not important. Perhaps you should wrap a bandage about your forearm to keep it from brushing against the bed linens. Would you like me to stay and watch over you while you sleep?”
“No, uh … no. I’m a big girl.” A handsome man leaning over her while she slept? Talk about a fantasy! “No, that’s not a good idea. I don’t know you. You staying the night would be major awkward.”
He shrugged. Obviously he didn’t know. “I will return in the morning. Sleep well, Six.”
He strode toward the front door, leaving Eden wishing she could call him back, but not daring to speak the words.
Big girls didn’t invite strange men to watch over them while they slept. They could invite them to snuggle, though. But Eden suspected her knight wasn’t the snuggly sort. And she wasn’t in the right mindset to make decisions regarding sex right now.
Or maybe, just maybe, she was in the best frame of mind she’d been in for years.
Angels?
Finally.
The night moved swiftly through his brain, the world even faster. Ashur walked in a hurried pace innate to the Sinistari—they termed it flashing—from New York to California and then on to Japan, Russia, France, Africa and all the countries in between.
He listened to voices speaking, observed the customs, tasted the food, watched the transportation and analyzed the education. Knowledge permeated the costume of mortal flesh he wore and insinuated into his steel marrow.
The palette of sin the world offered had grown immeasurably since his last stay on earth.
In Las Vegas Ashur learned the pleasures of gambling. He stole a fine pair of sunglasses out of an Aston Martin in Madrid then took the car for a joyride. He inhaled opium in a dark, musty cave in Andalusia with the locals, and learned to fire an AK-47 at a wall of broken bottles outside a Palestinian army base.
Fast food in Berlin awakened his palate to the strangely tasty idea of processed food. Gluttony led him to a Chipotle restaurant three times during the night, each time in a different state. Man, did he love tacos.
He followed a diamond thief in Milan and snatched the prize for himself, then scattered the five-carat stones in the Atlantic Ocean as he crossed to Iceland.
He was Sinistari. Sin ran through his black blood.
He held the world within him now. He knew all.
By all that was sacrilege in the dark sea Beneath, the world had changed vastly. And that parts of it frightened even him was not a good feeling. The weapons were fascinating, but he could not condone putting them in the hands of children. And lust was always entertaining, but it became a sickness when viewed obsessively on the computer.
Among the evil though, yet walked goodness and integrity. Ashur was no creature of prayer, but a wish for world sanity came to his lips before he could question the unnatural concern.
He’d also gained the ability to form emotion. It wasn’t necessarily a boon to his mission, but it was unavoidable as he imbued his being with the human experience.
Ashur now saw some things in color instead of the bland grays he’d been experiencing. Not all of it, mostly the food (which he devoured) and the women’s clothing (which he desired; the women, not the clothing) and the material objects that fascinated him, such as sports cars and yachts and those fancy little iPods.
Music! How it had changed over the centuries. It was now a literal world compacted into each song. He enjoyed it all but especially the orchestral pieces and the stuff called heavy metal. Though how the little device worked puzzled him. He hadn’t the time to take one apart, but soon.
He’d acquired a pair of worn black jeans from a street seller in Paris because he liked the snug, comfortable fit. A woven long-sleeved shirt appealed to his burgeoning need for touch and to experience all the sensations of texture, weight and temperature against his skin. He retained the biker boots and black leather jacket.
Back at Six’s building, he approached her door and slid his palm over the carved wood surface. He recognized the artistic style of the carvings now: Art Nouveau. It had flourished at the end of the nineteenth century, as had absinthe, can-can and opium. Six’s entire apartment was decorated in the style. He admired craftsmanship.
Prepared to knock, he noticed the door was open a crack. He had learned mortals in the twenty-first century did not leave their doors open or unlocked. Something must be wrong.
He pushed the door inside and entered stealthily, pressing a shoulder to the wall as he scanned down the hallway. He didn’t sense Six, but something inside had a pulse.
Could Zaqiel be here? Angels and demons had no pulse, but Ashur could sense the Fallen’s presence in the vibrations that shuddered his rib cage when close to an angel, yes, even one fallen from His grace.
“Let him be here,” he muttered lowly. “Attempting his muse.”
Reaching behind his hip, he unclasped the leather sheath and drew out Dethnyht.
Chapter 5
Slinking along the hallway wall, Ashur quickened his pace toward the bedroom.
Dethnyht was the only dagger capable of piercing an angel’s impermeable flesh. He would never brandish it against a mortal—too cataclysmic. The mere strength he wielded with his bare hands could overwhelm any human.
Kicking the bedroom door open, Ashur sprang inside, Dethnyht raised to strike.
A woman screamed and dropped a stack of bed linens from her arms. She pleaded with him in Spanish not to hurt her. She had a family. Dogs. Three children under the age of ten.
Quickly assessing her attire, Ashur decided she was the chambermaid.
He sheathed Dethnyht. “Is Six home? Er, the lady of the house?” She didn’t understand English, so he switched to Spanish, a language he had assimilated only hours earlier.
The maid clapped a palm over her rapidly rising and falling chest and nodded, explaining her mistress was at Starbucks.
“Starbucks?” He searched his newly gained knowl edge. “Coffee?”
“Yes, she will return soon,” she said. Then her tone changed remarkably, shedding the fear and taking on a curious edge. “You are her lover?”
“Does