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Pyx blew on her talon as if blowing the smoke from a gun—something she’d seen on a movie poster pasted in a video-shop window—then resumed complete mortal costume.
She dashed up the stairs to the third floor. Naturally, the apartment door was locked. No talons necessary this time. One kick loosened the lock in the wood door frame. Pyx marched inside.
The apartment was furnished sparely with modern glass-topped counters, unbleached pine wood, and a coffee table and leather furniture. It smelled vaguely of pine air freshener. The black leather sofa looked comfy. Pyx made a jump and landed on it with her hands clasped behind her head. She crossed her legs at the ankles.
“This’ll work. Furnished and everything.” She dug in the pocket of her jacket and pulled out the iPod she’d nicked earlier. “Music in my hand. How cool is that?”
She played around with the small jewel-colored device. Lots of music. Movies. A pedometer? Why would anyone want to know how many steps they have walked? “Mortals are strange.”
The video camera proved intriguing. Zooming it about the room she recorded … nothing.
Searching the previously recorded clips, she clicked on one. It featured a woman with a blond ponytail standing in a kitchen making deli-meat sandwiches. She looked at whoever was holding the video camera and said, “I love you.”
The holder asked, “Is that all?”
“Yep. I just love you.”
“Aww.” Pyx flicked off the device. “Sweet as sin. But that sandwich did look good. I wonder if there’s food in the fridge.”
It had been hours since she’d eaten. Gluttony was definitely her favorite mortal sin.
Kicking off her boots, Pyx then wandered into the kitchen while itching at the fresh tattoo on her back. It had already scabbed and she could feel the new skin beneath. Mortal flesh was so freakin’ sensitive. She felt everything, even a breeze across her cheek.
She’d never experienced such novelty. Dancing in the club had overloaded her new-experience radar. She’d shut herself off to touch, but now, alone, she connected to it again.
She grabbed a shiny apple from an elegant glass bowl. It was cool and slick. Smelled, hmm … not how she expected fruit to smell. Kind of … oily. Before she took a bite, she realized it was wood. “Tricky.” She tossed it over her shoulder into the living area.
The fridge was empty, as were the cupboards. “How’s a demon supposed to survive in this realm without sustenance?”
The front door banged inward and someone clattered down the parquet hallway into the kitchen. A man wearing only blue-striped pajama bottoms, his tumescent belly hanging over the waistband, and his white hair tousled upon his head, eyed her up and down.
“What are you doing here, mademoiselle? This is not your apartment?”
“Of course it is.” Pyx sauntered over and laid her palm against his forehead. “And I paid you a month’s rent already. Remember?”
He nodded, shrugged, then nodded again.
“I think someone tried to break in. The lock is jammed on the door.” She removed her hand.
The man nodded. “I’ll have a look at it first thing in the morning. Do you need a new key?”
“Darn right I do. Talk about shoddy upkeep. I wonder, should I find a better place that has a more studious custodian?”
“Oh, no, I will see to it at first light. It was surely an isolated incident. This is a lovely building and our custodian is a gem.”
“All right, but if it happens again, I’m out of here.”
“So sorry to have disturbed you, mademoiselle …?”
“Pyxion. I’ll see you bright and early with a new lock. Good night, funny little man.”
“Bon nuit.” He shuffled out and tugged at the door a bit before finally getting it to click securely shut.
Pyx crossed her arms and smirked. Mortals. So easy to influence.
From this angle she could see the front of Cooper’s building and would notice when he left and could even see the light on in his apartment. She would keep the light off so he wouldn’t see her.
“If he goes near the muse, I’ll be right there, ready to kill him.”
Cooper poured a cup of green tea and sat down at the kitchen table before the laptop. He put his bare feet up on another chair and leaned back, shrugging his fingers through his hair.
He’d washed away the vampire blood. The smell of vamps put him off, and he felt sure now he’d sense the next one before he saw it because it was an unmistakable scent of dust, metal and ash.
The kilt was a loss, but it didn’t matter. He didn’t need a closet of clothing because if he required a new shirt he simply imagined it on himself, and it became so. Nice trick of the trade.
What an interesting night he’d had. Vampires and Sinistari after him?
He’d hoped to spend more time in this world free of such trouble. But he wasn’t stupid. The Sinistari came with the territory when one chose to Fall. And he couldn’t argue with the chance to get out some aggression.
It had felt sweet to rip the vamp’s heart from its chest. Yet now, he felt a twinge of regret. He’d killed far too often when serving in the angelic ranks. Killing had been as natural as taking a breath. Smite this village. Slay that wrongdoer. All because he had been ordered to do so.
The stench of death had reeked on him; it had never been absent. And as an angel he’d not been attuned to the senses like touch, taste and smell. So the fact he’d eventually noticed that stench had screwed with his ideas of right and wrong.
Rather, it had become the catalyst to his developing a sense of right and wrong.
Angels weren’t supposed to choose sides. They were unfeeling entities that served Him without question. But Juphiel had changed. Another angel had allowed him to see that he had a choice. That is why he’d Fallen. Juphiel could no longer kill with abandon.
And yet, Cooper Truhart was still doing it.
Was it because death had been ingrained in his being?
“No, I will change. I must.”
With a gesture of his fingers, the laptop slid across the table to rest at the edge before him. He tapped the keyboard, thinking to type vampire in the search box, but figured that wouldn’t route him to any feasible answer on why the bloodsuckers were tracking him. Instead, he opened the email program and was pleased to find an answer to a message he’d sent to Eden Campbell two days ago.
He’d discovered Miss Campbell after an afternoon of searching the internet for halos and anything at all related to the Fallen. It was all myth and religious dogma to the mortals. They hadn’t a clue regarding the truth of it. Yet, he’d found a correspondence between Eden Campbell and Cassandra Stevens from months earlier that indicated both women were in the know. Eden had promised to send Cassandra a halo she had found because, as she’d written, it would give her hope. Eden definitely knew she had the real thing in hand.
Cooper had written to her, asking if he could take a look at her collection. He hadn’t given details like “Hey, I’m a Fallen and need to find my halo.” No, he didn’t want to scare her off until he could feel her out, sense if she might be worth trusting. A mortal may believe in halos, but in real angels? That was a long shot.
He clicked on the email. Campbell’s reply read: How did you get my email address? I don’t collect halos anymore. Do not contact me further.
Cooper sat back, and blew out a breath. “That’s it? No, ‘Sorry, can’t help you’? No, ‘I think I know of someone who can help’?”
He opened the file of saved emails between Cassandra and Eden and scanned them. “There.” He leaned in and began to type a reply.
What about MD?
MD were the mysterious initials Eden had mentioned in a post to Cassandra, a man who had helped her recently with the halos.
Hitting Send, Cooper hoped this trail would lead him somewhere.
Finding a halo on earth would be like looking for the proverbial needle in a haystack. Only this needle was made of ineffable substance and had been lost on earth millennia ago. But if he could find someone who sought halos for a hobby, then he’d be ten steps closer to his goal than he was now.
By morning, starvation roiled Pyx’s gut. She picked up the cell phone she’d stolen, and scanned the address list. “No pizza delivery numbers.” Though a lot of spas and wine dealers were listed. She tucked the phone in a pocket and skipped down to street level.
A figure appeared in the big window on the third floor across the street. Cooper’s apartment. The sun was rising and she could plainly see the man standing in the window, gesturing she should come up.
Really?
“Don’t need to ask me twice.”
She rushed across the street. First the angel pushes her away and now he’s pulling her closer? Worked for her. Men had fallen for lesser reasons than a sexy woman.
And yet, angels had Fallen for that very reason.
Pyx smirked. “I can so work this one.”
He buzzed her in, and she navigated upward, following his scent instead of the angelic vibrations he put out. It wasn’t a particular odor she could compare to anything she had learned about the world, other than that it was simply and uniquely angel. And sexy.
“Bloody Beneath, Pyx, buck up. The angel is not sexy.”
The door opened to reveal Cooper standing in loose, dark jeans that hugged his hips. Cut muscles veed toward his jeans, pointing in a direction she couldn’t take her eyes from. Stunning, virile and—
Not sexy. Not sexy. Not … well … maybe.
“Hungry?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah, er—” She shrugged. “For food? Yes, food. Nothing else weird, or anything.”
“No, nothing weird,” he said with a secretive smirk.
His attire made her take stock of her own. Still wearing the same blood-smeared shirt and men’s jeans and boots. She needed to do some shopping to get a feel for what women wore, and then she could assume their costume with ease.
“You inviting me in?” she asked, feeling a bit sheepish, and that feeling was so new, she went with it and shrugged her elbow up against the wall, hands tucked in her pockets.
“Why not? You were lurking.”
“Yeah, but—” Had he been watching her? Hope not, because she was the one watching him.
Cooper strode down the hallway and called over his shoulder, “Ever hear the one about keeping one’s enemies close?”
“Who said that?” Pyx wandered after him. “Some guy who took a knife in the back while his enemy was hugging him? So what’s changed? Last night you were eager to put distance between us.”
“Call it a change of heart.”
“Didn’t think an angel’s hard glass heart was capable,” Pyx said, entering the kitchen.
The high ceilings lent a feeling of vastness. Glass-fronted cabinets and black granite counter-tops gave it a modern flair. Blue and green tiles backed the counter, and gleaming appliances sat here and there.
Most significant were the stained-glass windows over the sink. The doors leading into an adjoining bedroom were also intricate stained glass; the design touted flowers, trees and peacocks.
Cooper slapped a palm over his chest where Pyx knew his heart did not beat. “You pick up a lot walking the earth. Emotions. Ideas. Humility. You’ll learn soon enough.”
“Oh, I picked up a great sandwich last night and a tattoo.”
“A tattoo?” Cooper smirked and wandered to the stovetop where a delicious scent wafted. “I’ve got crepes with fresh bananas and Nutella. That’s chocolate hazelnut spread, kind of like peanut butter, but … not.”
“Sounds fancy. You going to kill me with kindness?”
“Perhaps. So show me the tat.”
Turning and lifting the back of her shirt, Pyx displayed her artwork. Pride prickled her ego sweetly.
“A burning angel, eh?”
“You got it. Can’t wait to see you burn.”
Cooper redirected his attention to the cooking. “Nice.”
Pyx plopped onto a kitchen chair and propped her boots up on another chair. She leaned an elbow on the table. “How’s a guy who’s only been around a few weeks afford something like this? You get a job as a gigolo in those nightclubs you frequent?”
He chuckled sarcastically. “Could if I wanted to. But, no. The owner of this apartment was looking for someone to watch it during the summer while she vacations in Greece with her lover.”
“Good for you. Haven’t had to sell your body yet. I got a place, too.”
“Did you?”
“Fully furnished. Rent is paid for the month.”
She took the iPod from her pocket and switched it to video. Scanning it around the room, she recorded, for the heck of it. Zooming in on Cooper standing before the griddle, she moved the screen up and down his bare back. The muscles flexed with his motions. His skin was tan too, which appealed to her in ways she couldn’t quite process.
“It’s in the neighborhood, actually.”
“In the—” With a dripping spatula in hand, Cooper dashed into the nearby bedroom and looked out the window. “The sign is down. You didn’t,” he said, marching into the kitchen.
She caught video of his frustrated huff, and the splatter of crepe batter that drooled down his pant leg.
“The place across the street? But I saw you last night. How did you …? So quickly? You stole that place.”
Pyx shook the iPod at his accusing shake of spatula. “Dude, it’s my nature.”
“Poor excuse. You want to fit in with the humans while you’re here on earth? You’re going to have to work on your morality.”
“Look at you, all high and mighty.”
His smile was neither high nor mighty. It was genuinely appealing. Pyx wondered if morals had given him that appeal. But then, she knew better.
“Cruising the clubs for booty doesn’t sound so moral to me.”
