The Timekeeper (3 page)

Lying about knowing them wasn’t plausible, it was too obvious. I might be able to pull off denying the harboring allegations, however, claiming I didn’t know Warde and Neal wasn’t an option.

I wouldn’t suffer any consequences for the lie, but I couldn’t have them tailing me either. The thought of these Angels as critter-under-foot, no matter how attractive, didn’t do anything for me. Regardless of my unavoidable attraction to them, I considered being around the Seraph as quite repugnant.

“Oh, those Angels. Of course I am very familiar with Warde and Neal, I’m pretty sure everyone is blessed with some knowledge of the twins. To tell you the truth, I haven’t seen them in thirty years or so, and I probably won’t for another sixty. I’m a bit taken aback the Seraphim believe I harbor divine creatures, gentlemen.

“There are better things to do with my time than babysit entities who are already in trouble. You should be aware of what my job is here, I stay on top of the balance keeping the Veil up the best I can. Harboring Angels and Demons doesn’t fix into the plan.” I held Gideon’s beautiful blue-eyed stare. He didn’t believe a damn word. This time, Chester decided to take the lead in questioning me, much to my dismay.

“Cut the shit, Azri… Ilana. We received information that you helped them get to the Aliis Mundi and you’ve been keeping them off our radar. As far as occupation is concerned, I’m not so sure the High Council is going to appreciate the fact you’re smuggling God’s creations in and out of Veil. I’d venture a guess this little activity violates everything the title stands for.

“You’ll lose your position, or worse, the precious life you hold dear. Are those two bastards worth the risk?” I didn’t like this guy. Beautiful face, too bad his personality matched a rotting duck.

“Chester, you’re a professional grade asshole. Any one ever told you? Threaten me all you want to, but let me explain something to you. I’m not a smuggler, in or out of Aliis Mundi makes no difference to me, like I said, better things to do. Creatures of all types manage to slip through the holes in the Veil more often than not and there’s not a damn thing I can do about it, other than check Visas. Which isn’t my current profession, border patrol is below my pay grade. For the record, I don’t give two shits about my title with the High Council. Remember this,
Melek
, I’m doing them a favor by working for them in the first place.

“If I lose this shitty, unrewarding job over something so trivial, then they find someone to replace me. Whoever gave you the idea that I’ll allow myself to be executed needs to get a clue, you had better start checking your source’s credibility. No one’s got the nerve, perhaps you should remember it.” We were seconds away from going nose to nose with each other when a voice boomed through the room.

“And if you think I’m going to allow anything to happen to her you’ve got something entirely different coming. Step away from my wife, gentlemen. If Ilana says she doesn’t know where those two knuckle heads are, then Ilana isn’t going to tell you.” Oh, that would be my husband.

I don’t need to explain how or why everything in the universe is afraid of him, it will become apparent in a minute. He’s one of the oldest, most ferocious, and seriously bad tempered Dragon Lords in Aliis. Even here, he is pretty freaking scary.

“Azul, we meant no disrespect. We hoped she would be able to give us the information we needed to find them. Our apologies.” I watched Gideon back pedal quickly on behalf of Chester, as my large, shaven headed husband made his way toward us.

The thing about Azul, aka Darius in the mortal world, is he’s got kind of a short fuse when it comes to people insulting or threatening me. It never mattered who, the culprit was in for a bit of severe bodily injury.

I found my husband to be a handsome man, but even he couldn’t compete against the beauty of the Seraph he went head to head with. Darius stood noticeably shorter, and about four inches broader than Chester. Obviously packed with muscle in comparison to the leaner Angel.

Darius had a five o’clock shadow that never seemed to leave and his hazel eyes were ablaze with rage. Even his skin clashed with his opponent’s, a sun-kissed warrior in opposition to a pale winged monster of God. Gideon and I watched as Darius backed Chester up against the bar.

“Listen to me, you terribly named fuckhead, you ever speak to my wife like that again, I’ll tear off your head and wings, and I’ll shove all three up your ass. If you look at her wrong, those eyes will be ripped right out of your face and scrambled with eggs in the morning for my breakfast. Call me Azul again, and I’ll come up with something new just for you. The name is Darius until the next lifetime. Are we clear?”

The two men were in each other’s faces and Darius wasn’t going to concede until Chester acknowledged the warning. I could see Chester debating on whether he should give in or not, before he finally spit out a reply.

“Yeah, I got it Darius. It won’t happen again.” Gideon let out a breath, relieved nothing had happened.

“Good. Gideon, it was a pleasure to meet you. Please take your partner out of this establishment and keep him far away from the Princess.” Gideon nodded quickly at Darius, took my hand and bowed.

I grinned as he collected Chester from against the bar. I heard Chester start to cop an attitude with Gideon, speaking in a hushed voice when they got to the door, but I couldn’t catch what he was saying. My senses on this side of the Veil were diminished and almost useless. Darius took Chester’s seat next to me at the counter, giving a nod to Drake.

“Thanks for taking off and not letting me know where you planned on going today. I keep having this dream where you start telling me things, like I don’t know, goodbye. Every day I wake up and realize that it’s nothing more than a fantasy. I walked outside and surprise, you and your car were gone.” I grinned at him, I was in trouble but I wouldn’t acknowledge his hovering. I couldn’t take his hanging over me today. I had too many other important things on my mind.

“You looked busy and I didn’t want to bother you. Besides, it’s not like it’s difficult to track me down. I’m always in the same places. You’d be able to hunt me down without a hitch anyway. You’ll never have a problem finding me, love.” My location choices were consistent, to work, court ordered NA meetings, and the club.

When I wanted to be left alone I wandered into a cemetery somewhere, but that happened rarely. Darius still had enough Dragon in him in this world. He wasn’t above sniffing me out as needed.

“I wish you would tell me when you’re taking off. I never know if I should be worried or not. You drive me demented with your disappearing acts, Ilana. One of these days you’re going to be taken, and I won’t know the difference.” He tapped the black lacquer and Drake slid him a double shot of Jack Daniels and he slammed it down. Drake promptly poured him another and went back to wiping down the bar.

“Sorry, I’m a pain in the ass, honey. I certainly didn’t think it merited hitting the JD this early in the day.” He shot me a glare and snorted.

“I’m not sure I believe that, Ilana. We’ve been married for too long, I know you better than that. Everything you do is Jack Daniels worthy.” He had good reason not to listen to a word that came out of my mouth. I studied his profile. His broad shoulders made him considerably wider and forced him to take up more space than a man of his height should.

Even after shaving both his face and head this morning, the stubble was making it’s return. Forcing his already dark complexion just a little darker. He glanced at me and his hazel eyes were strikingly beautiful against his well-tanned skin. I would take him over the Angel any day.

“Drake informed me that Dante’s kid is in a bit of pickle. Aural got a hold of him, and she seems to need help with some things. I might need to take off later.” Darius’s eyes, more brown than green right now, met my chartreuse ones, quickly dropping back to the shiny jet bar.

“Which kid? I can’t see Aural helping Jayden out of a jam, putting him into a mess, definitely. She hates that boy with a passion.” I nodded, Jayden was a little on the irritating side of the spectrum of personalities.

“Think girl for this one, Mr. Blue. Jaylynne has a Norse Goddess after her.” Darius slammed the next double down, still a bit early to be attacking the Jack so ferociously in my opinion, and I wondered if something besides my disappearing act was bothering him. Now, the more I thought about it, he had been a little moodier than normal lately.

“Interesting, a Goddess from her own pantheon is after her. Doesn’t make much sense, but stranger things have happened.” I nodded in agreement. Something else was going on, but there was no telling what. If I had to point fingers at someone, I would’ve picked the High Council. I blamed them for everything.

“I think Hel has officially lost her mind. The fact that she thinks this is a good idea, sacrificing a Seer in the first place proves she’s off her rocker. She’s after the Vala for her own Pantheon, I can’t imagine the rest of the Pantheon is on board with this plan of hers.” I downed what was left of my rum and coke. If he was going to hit the booze hard, I didn’t see any reason I shouldn’t as well.

“I’m headed home. There are some things I need to take care of. Mainly, Aural’s favors. Jaylynne’s important in the grand scheme of things. If I can do anything to stop her untimely death, I mean to. Besides, I’ve never been able to say no to my granddaughter.” I stood up and nodded to Drake.

“Good afternoon, Princess.”  He bowed his head, it didn’t matter where I was, I would always be royalty to the creatures of Aliis Mundi Idem.

“I’ll be around in a little while, Drake and I have some catching up to do. Oh, and I gotta pick up Fruity Snacks on the way home. We ran out this morning and Nita eyeballed me like I’d committed treason.” I rolled my eyes and kissed him on the cheek, then turned to walk out the door. I wasn’t sure which was more irritating, Darius and Drake’s betting, or Darius and the dog’s obsession with Fruity Snacks.

The two men had a series of strange bets going on. I had no idea what they bet on, who was winning, or why they even bothered. I never would understand why guys did the things they did. If you asked me to explain fate strands and future events it wasn’t a problem, but don’t ask me to comprehend anything about the opposite sex.

I didn’t want anything to do with their business, and the less I knew, the better. They couldn’t drag me into their arguments. I wanted no part in their mess, husband and friend aside.

As I drove home, up and out of the mile high city and into the mountains to the west, I couldn’t help but think about what the Council would do to me if they found out I had been helping people over to the Aliis when it suited me. Those assholes would execute me, they’d want to, but they couldn’t risk war with my colony. Between my husbands and father, they would cause the Council’s lives to closely resemble a living hell if something happened to me.

It wouldn’t make my life any easier, but I could deal with it if I had to. I wasn’t worried if Chester did actually inform them. Although, I’m sure Gideon would explain to him it was nothing more than an empty threat, and there wasn’t a chance in hell that the Council would unseat me. They simply couldn’t afford to.

I needed to put the whole scenario out of my mind and worry about it when I was actually forced to. For right now I should’ve been concerned with Aural’s request, and making Warde and Neal aware that they were being tracked by the Order of the Seraphim again. They had done this before, when the brothers had first taken off. I hadn’t been implicated in the incident, no one had a clue about what I was doing at the time.

It had been centuries ago, I’m sure by now they had figured out that I didn’t come close to being a law-abiding citizen. My favorite Angels were safe where I had stashed them, the Seraphim held no jurisdiction in the Aliis Mundi and they were well aware of it. I simply needed to make sure the brothers stayed put, or we were all going to be in some serious shit.

I laid my head on the pillow. If possible, I needed to get the errand running done before Darius got home. Few situations made him nervous, and one of the things, which worked its way to the top of that very short list, was his wife lurking around the world without him in tow. However, I needed to get this done alone.

Darius didn’t deal well with my Angel entourage, they had the same goals between the three of them
,
but he loathed them
,
and Warde felt mutually about the situation. Neal seemed to be more agreeable in the matter, and in general, possessed a bit of resentment toward Warde
.

All the men in my life wanted me well; to protect me from everything, including myself, and each of them loved me more than I was worth. Darius lived on the possessive side, which explained his hatred for the two brothers
.

On a normal day, I would’ve taken him with me, but I still needed a break from him. This shouldn’t be misunderstood. I love him more than almost anyone else
,
except I required a timeout. After our marriage had reached the thousand-year mark, I figured I deserved a smidgen of R&R from him every once in a while.

He had a bad habit of being controlling, but only when he didn’t need to be. If I needed him to keep me in line because I planned on making a serious mistake, well, he allowed me to carry on with whatever bad I idea I came up with. The man was completely backwards.