Fallen (Seven Deadly Sins #2)(85)
Author: Erin McCarthy

How could he ever explain what he was and what he could do? There were no answers, no explanations, no human words. Gabriel just knew. “Their mortal bodies are dead. But their souls still exist inside these bodies . . . it’s an imprisonment, which is exactly what they deserve.”

“So what do we do now?”

“I have to dispose of them. Maybe you should leave. I don’t have time to take you home though. I have to do this before the cops get here.” He was surprised the police hadn’t already shown up, given the lights and the noise they had been making. But the cemetery butted up to housing projects, the residents of which probably had no interest in getting involved in any potential crime and hadn’t bothered to call the police.

Gabriel turned and opened the gate to Anne’s tomb without waiting for Sara’s answer. He didn’t want to scare her, but he didn’t want to get caught with dead bodies either. It was highly doubtful he’d be acquitted this time around. Stepping inside, he removed the front of Anne’s tomb and opened the drawer.

“What the hell are you doing?” Sara asked, coming up behind him.

“I have to hide them, and this is actually a perfect place.” Reaching into the darkness, Gabriel extracted the bag that held Anne’s ashes and set it carefully on the path outside the gate.

Sara just stood there as he went over and lifted both Marguerite and Raphael up and carried them to the tomb. Gabriel felt terrible that she was watching, and he said, “Sara, close your eyes, babe. This isn’t going to be pretty.”

But she just shook her head. “No, I have to see. And did you know—though I’m sure you know—that when the Watchers fell, God sent the four archangels to retrieve them? Raphael bound one of them hand and foot. Gabriel destroyed some of the fallen ones by inciting them to civil war. And Michael put others in a dark cave for seventy generations. A dark cave . . . like this tomb.”

Gabriel shoved Raphael into the dark opening, sweat rolling down the back of his T-shirt even as he felt a chill at Sara’s words. “I’m not an archangel. I’m a fallen one.”

“But you’re righting a wrong . . . destroying fallen ones who were well and truly evil. And I don’t think it’s any sort of coincidence that you and Raphael were named after two of the archangels. And that my last name is the name of the third.”

“I don’t think it’s a coincidence either,” he conceded, crossing Raphael’s legs at the ankles. It would have been a hell of a lot easier getting him in the tomb in a casket, but he had to make do, and as quickly as possible. Gabriel got the body fully into the hole and did the same with Marguerite.

Out of breath, he turned back to Sara. She was standing there, the flashlight slack in her hand, the beam bouncing around the ground, her face pale, eyes wide. “Gabriel. I have to close it with you. It’s you and I. We’re the ones who have to end this . . . Gabriel St. John and Sara Michaels.”

“I don’t think . . . ,” he started, not wanting her to be a part of what he was doing. Not wanting to burden her or give her further grief, or any sort of guilt. But then he trailed off when she stepped through the gate and looked up at him. She was tenacious, determined.

She was right. They needed to do this together. It made sense, brought the past to the present full circle and ended what had started all those years ago in that nasty room on Dauphine.

He nodded. “Okay.”

Her hand went over his, and they both closed the door, pushing hard. Then Gabriel sealed it shut.

The explosion sent him hurtling through the gate and crashing onto the path, flat on his back. It knocked the wind out of him and he blinked, startled, not sure what exactly had happened. His head spun as he tried to sit up, and he quickly descended again, searching in the dark for Sara. “Sara? Are you okay?”

“Gabriel!” Sara knelt down beside him, hands brushing his hair off his face. “I’m fine. Nothing happened to me. You got hit with . . . something, and it sent you flying. Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Though he felt strange. Weak. Gabriel sat up quickly and almost threw up, intense nausea rolling over him.

“Sara . . .” He looked at her, looked around him, moved his legs, tested his fingers. He was fine, but he felt different. Mortal. Jesus Christ, he felt mortal. That’s exactly what he felt like. “Oh my God . . .”

“What?” She was groping all over his shoulders and pushing his hair back, checking his temples and sliding her hands over his chest. “What hurts? You’re not bleeding.”

“There’s nothing wrong with me. I’m fine.” He was better than fine. He was mortal, a human, like everyone else. Like Sara. Freed from his punishment, freed from eternity. He looked over at her, excited, relieved, stunned. “It’s over. I’m free.”

She just blinked at him. “What do you mean?”

Gabriel stood up and dusted off his jeans, feeling a huge sense of wonder, of clarity, of hope, of awe. “I mean that I’m no longer fallen. Nor am I an angel. I’m mortal.”

Her mouth dropped open. “How do you know?”

“I know.” How could he explain the difference? It was like the world around him had dimmed, his limbs had gotten heavier, the visual chaos had cleared, the sound of humanity quiet, less deafening. And at the same time, without all the sensory overload, his mind felt clearer, stronger, acute, and he was conscious suddenly of ticking time and the finiteness of life and love and talent. He had a focus he didn’t remember ever really having before.

She put her hands up to her face. “Are you sure?” There was a tremble in her voice.

“Yes. I’m positive.” He leaned over, brushed his lips over her forehead, wanting to linger, to savor the feeling, her, but knowing they couldn’t. “We have to leave now.”

She just nodded as he walked over to Anne’s tomb and pulled the gate shut. Then he picked up the bag of ashes and secured it under his arm.

“Gabriel, look at the angel,” Sara said, her voice low and in awe.

Turning, he followed her gaze, looking up and over his shoulder. The weeping angel statue on top of Anne’s tomb had two red streaks trailing down her cheeks. Blood tears. It should have looked gruesome, but he didn’t sense that was its intent.

“In Him we have redemption, through His blood, the forgiveness of sins,” he murmured, as he felt the weight of guilt lift, the light of forgiveness wash over him.