A Shimmer of Angels (16 page)

“Was someone chasing you?” His eyes narrowed and searched mine. If he was looking for sanity, he wouldn’t find it there, not with me.

I looked away, choosing instead to watch the shadows in the park. During the day, the park was lively, beautiful. At night … another shiver skipped across my shoulders, and I dragged my gaze back to Cam’s. “I don’t know.” I cleared my desert-dry throat and continued. “I was at work … worst day ever … took out the trash … he was there, like a … vampire, stealing … blood-red smoke.”

Silence cloaked the air.

I wasn’t making any sense. He thought I was crazy.
I
thought I was crazy. It was a far too familiar feeling.

“Red smoke?” He whispered across the night. “Where?” Urgency spiked in his voice. “Where did you see this?”

My heart fought against the adrenaline. “What was it?”

His expression took on a hard edge. His gaze burrowed into mine. Like he believed me. “Where, Rayna?”

“What—what was it?”

His tongue peeked out from between the dryness of his lips to moisten them. “He … ” His brows drew together and he shook his head. After a long, long time, Cam finally dropped his head down toward his chest and sighed. “He has to be a Dark One. An angel who chose to stray from the path of light and was cast out of Heaven and away from the light of God.”

I reeled from the information, but pressed forward. “A—and what … I saw him doing?”

“A punishment handed down from on high. Or, rather, from on low.” He lifted his chin. A fight warred within his eyes. “I wish there was an easier way to tell you.”

I could barely breathe. “Tell me …?”

“Everything you need to know.” He blinked and shook his head, then pushed on. “The Fallen Ones are destined to roam the earth, feeding on that which they once defended. Souls.”

I gasped. Souls? Human souls? My thoughts swam in circles before they tipped over the edge. They really were angels. I couldn’t move, just sat there staring into the night, shock numbing everything around me. It was all too much, and my brain needed a vacation—one for which it was already packed. The world seemed to get further away. I’d spent years in this state of mind, and it seemed all too easy to give in to the familiar tug of insanity.

Cam’s fingertips brushed the backs of my hands. When I didn’t pull away, his grip firmed around my fingers, warm and soothing as his thumbs drew lazy, calming circles in the sensitive skin between my thumb and forefinger, bringing me gently back from the brink of madness. A flutter tensed in my stomach.

Finally, I found I could meet Cam’s gaze, I could bring air into my lungs without fear, and I could ask the one question I didn’t want to know the answer to. “Are you really sent from God?”

Cam closed his eyes in a pained gesture, like I’d punched him in the stomach. “There is a hierarchy, a chain of command that … I’m … not allowed to divulge the specifics of.”

“But you just did.”

He stood from his kneeling position and threw his hands up in the air. “That was information you
needed
.” He huffed and eased onto the bench beside me. “I’m not supposed to interfere in human affairs. But there are a few things you have to know.” He took my hands in his again, stroking my knuckles with the sides of his thumbs.

Wind rustled through the dying tree leaves, and a chill crept across my skin. I drew my elbows in closer to ward off the cold.

“I can’t reveal too much. We’ve never asked for a human’s assistance before, but you’re special. I’ve been instructed to answer all your questions, within reason.”

I pulled my hands free from his, not liking the sudden shift in the conversation. “Special how?”

“You can see us. Angels, I mean. And apparently Dark Ones as well.” He swallowed, his thumbs now circling over his own clenched fists. “I … truly didn’t think it was possible. A human has never been able to see us before. When I caught you staring at my wings, I didn’t know what to do. I reported you to my superiors that afternoon—I had to. I couldn’t hide something like this. I know you have no reason to trust me, but I’m asking you to do just that. You’ve seen what their kind does. How they survive. All my kind want is peace. They’ve been responsible for so much bloodshed. Including, we believe, the deaths of your two classmates.”

The weight of a bus slammed into my chest. My head spun. “Good angels, bad angels. Tony and Allison’s suicides.” My chest rose and fell, inflating and deflating faster than should be possible. Lightness filled my head, threatening to lift it off my shoulders, then slam it into the ground.

“Rayna, stay with me.”

I dug my hands through my hair, wishing I could dig in the ground instead, needing soil beneath my nails and bright petals to help me see clearly.

“I know this is a lot to take in.” He kneeled in front of me, pulling me back from the edge with his hands. A strange, bluish-white light beamed from his eyes as he looked at me, into me. The spinning stopped.

He blinked, and the light disappeared. I felt calmer somehow. I only had a second to wonder what he’d done before he continued. “Your world is in peril.” He rushed his words, probably trying to get them out before I lost it completely. “That’s why we’ve been sent down. Evil is here. The Fallen have been in search of souls to add to their army for centuries. Lost souls. What better way to send a soul to Hell than by making its last act on Earth a sin? Now, though, the situation here is different. We’ve heard rumors that these souls, your classmates, are being used to build something specific. We think it could be a weapon.”

“What kind of weapon?” Cold fingers encircled my heart. I couldn’t shake the image of demonic … angels using Allison and Tony, sucking up every soul they could like the proton packs in
Ghostbusters
. A smaller twinkle of sadness reminded me of the first time Lee and I watched his favorite ghost movie together.

Cam pried my hands from my hair and waited for me to blink. “We don’t know for sure.” I lowered my head, ready to retreat. “Stay with me.” His voice was smooth, calm. He cupped my face, tilting my head up to look at him. “I’m here. I know it’s shocking. Ask me anything. It may help.”

Demons
. Demons were real. Bad angels. A weapon. No.
No.
None of it was real. Couldn’t be. Not real.
Not.
Real.
I whispered those words to myself, over and over, as I rocked on the bench, back and forth. Back and forth.
Not real. Not real. Not
…

“Rayna,” he drew out my name in a whisper. “I need you with me.” The solid steel of his irises strengthened me. His eyes reminded me of a tropical, silver-blue hibiscus called Feelin’ Blue. Especially when they lit up in that unnaturally bright way again. The light flooded into me, calming me.

I straightened up. His fingers fell from my face and wound around my hands again. This time I moved my fingertips along his hand, my heart pounding with each stroke.

“How did you do that?”

A small smile brightened his face. “I told you: people are at ease with me.”

“They
are
at ease, or you use that thing with your eyes to
put them
at ease, like some kind of angel … magic?”

“You can
see
when I do that?”

I nodded, releasing his hands again. He rested them on the knees of my pink uniform.

“We shouldn’t be having this conversation. I shouldn’t be interfering.”

Now that Cam’s liquid calm had been injected into my veins, I took advantage of his willingness to answer questions, and tried an easy one first. “So these … Fallen,” I tested the word on my tongue. Didn’t like it. “They’re responsible for the suicides?”

Cam nodded. “I don’t know how, but we think they’re forcing your classmates’ hands.”

I left the bench, testing the stability of my legs. They were good enough to pace on. “How do I know this isn’t a trick?”
How do I know I’m not completely off the deep end?

“I can’t answer that for you.” He hesitated. “Does it feel real?”

I scratched my palms. They burned. I remembered the cuts I’d made. Red coated the inside of my hands and wrists. I checked Cam’s and found dried blood on them too. “My blood—I’m sorry.” With my clean forearm, I tried wiping it away furiously. The friction of our skin burning like fire.

He stopped me. “It’s nothing to worry about. Maybe if you tried to focus …”

Like I wasn’t trying already. “You’re sure Tony and Allison’s deaths were … murders?” It made no sense.

He took his time answering. “Unfortunately.”

“How many of …
them
are there?”

“Here? There could be one, or … twenty. There’s no way for us to know. We really have to—”

“There was a picture. Allison saw—drew—the dark silhouette of a man with wings. Tony drew the same thing in his notebook, and Luke told me he’s been seeing it in his dreams. Is that why they’re after him?”

Cam stood. He turned his back on me and ran a hand through his hair. “Rayna, I …you can’t just expect me to—” He huffed and turned back around. “I was sent for Luke specifically, to guard his life. He’s strong, which is why they want him. I have no idea about the drawings.”

“You were sent? Like a … guardian angel?”

“Something like that.” He pressed his hands down in the air. “Listen, after I spoke to my superiors about you being able to see me, they ordered me to find out if you could see the Dark Ones. My kind can’t. Their wings are as invisible to us as ours are to them.”

“I can’t do this.”

“You can help save lives.”

“You’d say just about anything to get me on board, wouldn’t you?”

He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the gray that swept over me was softer than silk. His stony expression was gone, leaving only kindness. “No. The last thing I want to do is mislead you.”

A shiver crept up my arms. “A liar would say that, too.”

His jaw clenched beneath a half-day’s worth of blond stubble. “I can’t make you trust me. You must make your own choice.”

“But you can make me
feel
something.”

“That’s an artificial calm. It won’t hurt you.”

He couldn’t really expect me to trust him. Them. Angels. Especially when every appearance of their wings had sent me back to that place, stripped me of my freedom, and basically brought me back to square one with my therapy. Therapy I’d never needed, if they were real. And now he wanted me to seek them out. Purposely. How crazy did he think I was?

What if Cam wasn’t an angel at all, but some sicko who got off on messing with the clinically ill?

I knew nothing about him.

I needed to test him, to know if I could really trust the things I’d been seeing. But if he was messing with me, he’d just lie. I stepped closer. He didn’t move, but watched me warily. Before I was aware of what I was doing, I touched his arm. His breathing stalled. I tentatively removed my hand. Emptiness welled inside me. I tested a theory, pressing my fingertips to his chest. There was nothing. Cam didn’t have a heartbeat.

Yeah, that certainly helps the fight for sanity.

Then again, those lips didn’t help, either. Especially now, when they were so close I could touch them with my own. If I’d wanted to. Did I want to? I’d never done anything like that before. What would angel lips taste like? Sunshine? Marshmallows? Or something altogether different? Maybe buttered-popcorn jelly beans.

Could he be influencing me? Distracting me? Christ, he doesn’t even have a heartbeat!

I almost pulled away, but I had to know. I rose to the toes of my horrid nurse shoes and skimmed my hands toward his shoulders. He tensed.

“What are you doing?” His voice was a rough whisper.

I shook my head, reaching farther over his shoulder. Soft feathers and numbness brushed my fingers.

Cam stumbled back, shuddering.

He’d given me answers. Now it was up to me to believe them.

When he spoke, his voice was thick, affected. “Can you tell me … where you saw The Fallen?”

“Roxy’s Diner, where I work.”

The night shaded his face as he looked down at me. “Can you tell me anything about him?”

I nodded, fighting back flashes of soul-sucking and sparkling black wings. “Tall, dark hair, dark eyes. His name’s Kade.”

“Kasade.” His voice adopted a rough edge.

“Kass-aid? What, do you know him or something?”

His fists balled by his side, the action creating an odd pressure inside my head. “Yeah, I know him.”

“Did he kill Allison and Tony?”

The disdain in his face bloomed, intensifying the pounding behind my eyes. “Maybe.”

I swallowed and pressed a hand against my right eye. “Well you obviously know who he is and what he looks like. Why don’t you just take him out or whatever? Why do you need me?”

“There could be more than just him. And if there are, you could be instrumental in helping us save lives. More than just Luke’s.”

I shuffled two steps back, fighting to get a handle on the pain.

Cam looked up at me and blinked. He was different again, softer. In a moment, my headache faded.

“Did you just … give me a headache?”

“I’m sorry. I … guess I have to watch my feelings around you. You’re more sensitive to them than others. Which is how I think you ended up here.”

“What do you mean?”

“I was … thinking about you just before you showed up.”

“Nuh-uh. No way. I was running from that monster.” I checked over my right shoulder, then the left, unable to believe I’d let my guard down enough to forget that he might have followed me here.

“It’s okay if you don’t believe me. Eventually, you will.”

“Right.” I nodded. “Wait, why were you thinking about me?”

A small smile broke across his face, but was gone in a blink. “It’s late. Can I walk you home? His fingers pressed against the middle of my back and gently led me forward.

Great. I was caught in the middle of an angel war and
both
sides scared the crap out of me.
Figures
.

“Yeah, okay.”

Cam wanted my help and unwavering trust while he gave me next to nothing, except a headache. But with Kade out there, I was grateful for the escort. I angled toward home, no longer afraid to show Cam where I lived. If he wanted me dead, he’d already had two chances, and I was still alive.