Jude; The Fallen (The Fallen Series, Book 2) (9 page)

The Dealer flipped the sign on the window and returned to the counter, quickly going through the end of day procedure. Once the tediousness had been dealt with, he opened a drawer to the left of the register, pulling out a ballpoint pen. He set it on the counter and stared at it for a moment, a small, satisfied smile creeping across his features. It was the last thing she had touched, and he had squirreled it away, careful to ensure no other customer handled the writing instrument.

He closed his eyes, laid his hands on the counter, palms down, and blew out a deep breath. He counted to ten and reached out, curling his fingers around the tiny cylinder of plastic. Images assailed him as he opened up his mind, seeking the essence the red-headed woman had left behind. They filed past in a shuffle, a disjointed cinema in flashes of bright color. He saw sand and never-ending dunes, pyramids and tombs, wonders of worlds lost, and treasures too numerous to count.

He shuddered and leaned forward as male faces came into view, all of them terrifyingly familiar, save one. Concentrating, he paused on the image of the dark-haired man. Tall and tanned, with a whiplash smile, the man exuded confidence and the easy grace of privilege. Blue light swirled around him, causing The Dealer to gasp in alarm. An Anubis. In the flesh. Dangerous and interesting. He filed that away for later perusal and continued on.

A few glimpses later, he slowed the procession again, this time peering harder into the vision. An office. Her office, judging by the wall-to-wall library shelving and the number of artifacts ensconced in display cases. A tongue swiped out over his lips, feeling the need to wet a mouth suddenly gone dry. Staring back at him from behind glass was a perfectly preserved Egyptian death mask. Akhenaten. Yes, this he could work with.

The cool golden and inlaid visage slipped past, and the next image that came forth made him stop breathing altogether. The tall man was back, his hand wrapped around a smaller one. One that belonged to a little girl. Her long red hair and bright green eyes were a carbon copy of the woman who had been in his shop not hours before. A daughter. A treasure above all others. But she was not the treasure his Lord was after.

A few more images later, what he sought finally came into view. There on a bookshelf, under an inconspicuous glass case, lay the artifact in question. A small obsidian stone, fashioned onto a gold chain. The image was not perfectly clear, but there was no doubt this was it. It was smooth, worn down by centuries of touch, the inscriptions barely visible.

On a broken gasp, The Dealer let go of the pen and opened his eyes. The irises glowed with an intense yellow fire, and his lips curled back in a feral snarl. He would procure the object, but he would bring back more. Surely, his Lord would not object to some forward thinking on his part? After all, it was no secret that Lucifer had been disappointing as of late, and anything he could do to get into his Lord’s good graces would not be amiss.

Lucifer. The snarl on his lips deepened and a small growl escaped in a huff of breath. The arrogant tosser deserved everything he got. He was as cold as he was beautiful, icy and untouchable. As sharp as he was dangerous. The favorite flavor of the past millennia. It was enough to make his stomach turn.

The Dealer pulled open the drawer and retrieved his missive. He stared down at the envelope his visitor had left and smiled, remembering the distaste plastered across Lucifer's smooth features. How interesting that the fallen angel's name, once whispered in reverent tones, now sparked him to a satisfying smirk of pity. Lucifer, the blindingly beautiful angel who once ushered the downfall of Heaven's greatest angels with his silver tongue, reduced to delivering lower-level missions by hand. The smirk widened to a grin. Satan's personal postman in a three-piece suit.

And now the opportunity he'd waited for was handed over by the best-dressed lackey in the Nine circles. Growing ambition coiled in his belly. His orders were clear. But there was nothing said about going above and beyond this dark call of duty. He thought about the redhead and her treasures. Oh, yes. Not only would he succeed, but he would triumph on unheard of levels. The envelope crumpled in his hand. And wouldn't that just take the shine off the Morning Star's designer shoes?

Chapter Five

Coriander shut Ashtiru’s door behind her with a soft click. A flicker of movement to her left made her turn. Alex stood in the shadows of the long hallway, the light from the open door of the bedroom spilling over the crossed arms over his chest.

“She asleep?”

“Of course she is. Teir and Seph had her running all over the yard all afternoon,” she replied. “The child was exhausted.”

The long line of Alex’s body shifted into a casual lean against the door frame. It made him look inviting, and the bastard knew it. That was the problem with Alex. He knew exactly how to use his appeal to his advantage. If she were still in love with him, it would be annoying. Now it was just tiring.

“Come inside? Have a drink?” he asked quietly.

Why the hell not? Even if it was his room, it was still her house. She nodded and swept past him. His bedroom was one of the few in the house she rarely entered. It was as permanent a place as it could be for him, especially when they juggled their parental duties. Coriander wanted them to be together as much as possible when she and Alex weren’t working, so it seemed to make sense to give the man his own space in a bedroom next to their daughter’s. Christ knew she had enough room.

Alex turned and shut the door, smirking at her raised eyebrow. “Oh, calm down. I’ve no intention of trying to seduce you.” His teeth flashed in a quick grin. “Unless you want me to.”

“Subtle.”

“I try.” He went to the little cabinet in the corner of the room and pulled out two glasses and, pouring them both a drink. “Here,” he said, handing her the glass. “Drink that and tell me about your shopping trip. Your sister said something about a statue.”

Coriander took the glass and sat down on the edge of the bed, the fingers of her other hand picking imaginary fluff off the duvet. The steel-gray duponi was pebbled beneath her fingertips, and she let them drag across the silk without thought. She raised her head to look at his face. In the dim light of his room, his eyes were almost the color of the bedspread. Winston’s doing, no doubt. The butler would have ensured Alex’s room was as tailored to him as possible.

“It was a good find,” she said, watching him move to stand with his back against the wall. She frowned. “Do you have something against the furniture in my house? You seem to do nothing but drape yourself in doorways.”

A long fingered hand raised the glass to his lips, and he smiled at her over the rim of the crystal tumbler. She watched his throat bob as he swallowed a mouthful of scotch. “I’ve always been a bit of leaner, you know that.” His smile softened as he lowered the glass. “We used to lean on each other.”

Coriander sighed, wanting to close her eyes against the truth contained in his words. Instead, she stared into the amber depths of her glass. “We still do, just…not like that anymore.”

“I’ve noticed.”

“You said you weren’t going to do this,” she countered, irritation stiffening her spine.

“This isn’t seduction, Coriander,” Alex huffed. “You’ve made your thoughts clear on that.”

“Then what are you doing?” she hissed.

“Maybe I want more.”

She barked out a harsh laugh, but controlled herself at the raise of his eyebrow and jerk of his head toward Ashtiru’s room. She shook her head. “No, you don’t. You haven’t wanted that for a long time.” Her eyes bore into his, and his challenging glare made her burn. “Admit it, the only reason you’re talking about this is because you think I’m interested in someone else.”

“Aren’t you?” She couldn’t ignore the bite to his tone.

“What does it matter, Alex? We admitted it wouldn’t work between us. Hell, we weren’t even together when I got pregnant with Ash. It was a last-ditch drunken hot mess of a mistake.”

His eyes narrowed and he leaned forward, muscles tight with a slight menace. “Are you saying Ash—?”

“Don’t be stupid,” she snapped. “And don’t put words in my mouth. Ash is not the mistake. Thinking we could try to fix it was the mistake. And if she’s the reason we came together that last time, fine, I can reconcile that. For fuck’s sake, I can rejoice in that. She was meant to be. Not the rest of it. It won’t ever happen again,” she said with conviction. “Ever.”

“You don’t mean th—“

She cut him off with her hand. “I do mean that. I love you,” she said on a sigh. “I will always love you. You are the father of my child, and I will never begrudge you that or try to keep you away from her. But we are done. You do things—you take risks that I can’t. And I can’t be there for you because I have to be there for her. One of us has to always come home.”

“Says the woman who plunders caves in the heart of the Iraqi insurgency,” he shot back.

Coriander’s eyes flashed as she sneered, “At least I’m not the one trying to dick over the Sunnis and the Shiites at the same time.” It tugged at her heart to hear the hurt in his voice, but she couldn’t go on like this. “Look, we could argue about this from now until the end of time. I made my choice. You’re going to have to live with it.”

“And that’s what you chose? What did you call him? Ah, yes, ‘a drunken pigeon’?” He took another gulp from the glass. “Sounds like a winner, dear. You sure know how to pick ‘em.”

She leaped to her feet, thrusting a finger at him. The jerky movement sent scotch splashing out of the glass and over her hand. She paid it no mind and curled her lip at him. “Don’t,” she warned. “Don’t start something that you will regret. I meant what I said, I won’t keep you from Ash, but don’t make me let you go this way.”

Alex pushed off the wall and moved to stand over her. He was more than a head taller, but his height had never fazed her. She glared up at him and met his narrowed gaze.

“What did you expect me to say?” he growled. “Did you think I would just roll over and play dead for you while you fall into bed with someone else?”

She poked a finger in his chest and he frowned, his hand coming up to rub the injured spot. “No. This is not about me and sex. I’ve been with others since we split up, and so have you. This is about Jude and whatever you think is going on. Your problem isn’t with me. It’s with him.”

Alex grunted and stepped back, his features twisting into a mask of emotion she had only seen twice in their years together. His hand came up and she saw his knuckles tighten around the glass.

“You throw that glass, and I swear on Zeus’ flaming balls I will kick your lanky Greek ass from here to Crete and drown you in the Mediterranean.” Her voice held an undercurrent of violence she knew he would understand.

They both went stiff, each waiting for the other to breathe, when finally Alex blinked and handed her the glass without a word. He turned away from her face and mumbled under his breath.

“What was that?” she asked.

Alex’s dark curls hung over his face as he looked back over his shoulder. “He will not replace me.”

Coriander’s breath came out in a rush. That’s what this was about? She never imagined that Alex could see it that way. “You’re her father. You will always be her father. No one can replace you in her heart.”

He turned to face her, and she could see every emotion within him plastered on the smooth, tanned skin of his face. His eyes burned with want, love, need, and fear.

His voice registered barely above a whisper. “What about yours?”

There was so much she wanted to say to him. After all, they shared a child and a past, and were looking down the long road of a future of some sort. She wanted to tell him that things would work out the way they should, give him every insipid platitude she learned from Persephone. Some hope of…something. In the end, all she could manage was a broken, “I’m sorry.”

“No, you’re not.” His voice was like ice, cold and cutting, straight to her heart.

“I am,” she replied. “But if you keep this shit up, you’ll never get to understand how much I mean it. And that’s your loss, Alex.” She pushed past him and set both glasses on the dresser by the door. She faced him one last time as she yanked open the bedroom door. “You can either make your peace or burn your bridges. Whatever you decide is on your head, not mine.”

Jude looked up from the book he was reading as Coriander high-tailed it down the stairs and across the living room to her office, slamming the door behind her so hard it rattled. A sigh filtered down from above, and his gaze looked up to see Alex’s drawn face staring down at him. The dark-haired man said nothing, but walked down the stairs and out the front door without a backward glance. Jude set his book down and followed after Coriander.