Immortal (Fallen Angels #6)(30)
Author: J.R. Ward

In the end, he decided to lead with the big one … even though the only woman he’d said those three words to had been his mother—so he was beyond rusty.

Except he didn’t get that far. Just as he started speaking, the one person he never wanted to see or hear from again piped up.

“Get the fuck away from him.”

As he looked across the parlor, the extent of the damage they’d done registered dimly—the place was trashed, great holes in the lineups of the bookshelves, windows broken, drapes shredded. Plus ninety percent of the furniture was somewhere else, natch. But none of that mattered as he watched Devina get to her feet.

The fact that the demon was in the house at all was a surprise, given the additional protection spell he’d put up—then again, maybe the thing hadn’t survived his second “death.” Oh, wait, make that third. And yet, even though her presence wasn’t a good thing, it was amusing to see her look so disheveled, her brunette hair a ratty mess, her leather pantsuit smudged with ash, streaks of oozing black on her face and shoulders from where she’d been cut.

What was not a shocker or funny at all was how pissed off she was. Those shark-like eyes of hers were glowing in an unholy way, and her talon hands were curled into claws. She wasn’t looking at him, though.

She was focused on Sissy.

And what do you know, that was a match to his ignition, lighting him up from the inside. Shuffling his woman behind him, he got to his feet and faced off with his enemy.

“What the fuck are you doing here, demon.”

Her eyes swung over to his. “I’m the reason you’re out, asshole.” She pounded on her chest. “So show some respect.”

“Actually, it was a group effort, bitch.”

At the sound of Ad’s hoarse voice, Jim became aware that there were two other people in the room: the other angel, who was trying to unpretzel himself over by the windows, and Colin, who was still pretty out of it.

“Jesus,” Jim breathed. “You didn’t use her to—”

“Get away from him!” Devina lurched forward. “Get away from my man.”

Yeah, screw that, Jim thought. In spite of the fact that his body felt like it had been through a meat grinder, he was more than ready to hit her. Just haul off and clock Devina so hard she—

A rhythmic sound broke into the room, strident and loud enough to get even the demon’s attention. And it was as Jim twisted around to look behind himself that he realized who and what it was … and how he’d managed to find Nigel in that dusty, torturous place.

Dog, who was not actually a dog, was parked between the doorjambs of the parlor, his scruffy little body braced, his muzzle working as he barked at the demon.

It was that noise he’d heard in Purgatory, Jim thought. That beacon that he’d followed in a place with no compass points and no destinations.

Holy shit, the Creator Himself had been the one to lead him to the archangel.

Snapping back to attention, Jim found Devina frozen in place, clearly caught between a jealous urge to rip Sissy limb from limb and a serious sense of self-preservation.

“But it’s not fair,” the demon bitched. “It’s not fucking fair.”

Dog kept up with the barking, like he was talking at her. And then Devina looked at Jim, her expression changing into something that seemed a lot like hurt.

With four deliberate steps across the bare, dusty floor, she came up to him, raised her hand over her shoulder, and slapped him so hard both of his ears rang.

“You are too cruel,” she said numbly. “And you do not deserve me.”

One more nasty glare at Sissy and the demon was gone, poofing it out of the room.

“Well, that could have been worse,” Ad muttered. “Although, man, we’ve so lost our security deposit on this place.”

Chapter Fourteen

Nigel regained consciousness in the opposite way from the manner in which he’d lost it: slowly and in stages. First came a hazy awareness of being, then a rudimentary thought that he was drawing breath. Next was discomfort … that expeditiously ramped up to full-on pain.

Amongst the many aspects of life that were straddled by an entity such as himself, the duality of his nature, both corporeal and ethereal, meant that he was not entirely free of contending with the physical travails of possessing flesh. And such was the case now.

Especially as the shell he had left behind in Heaven reestablished itself over his core, sprouting from the essence of his energetic being.

Naturally, this made the suffering even more acute, and he parted his lips to release a moan.

“His arms are broken,” someone said from above him.

“His legs, too.”

And then that voice, that special, sacred voice that had both kept him sane and made him crazy, spoke up: “How unfortunate. I shall have to wait until they heal first so that I may break them anew.”

Nigel opened his eyes and sought the male who had uttered the words. And there he was, Colin, the archangel, standing off to the side, his arms crossed as if in disapproval, his brows down, as was usual. That stare of his, however, was the very antithesis of the male’s typical dispassion: It glittered with a sheen of tears.

It was a death anew to see the hurt he had caused. The betrayal and the injury.

Nigel lifted his hand, as he could not speak—the gesture the only way he could beg. Colin tracked the movement … and shook his head.

The rejection was then completed as he addressed Jim and Adrian, speaking some combination of words that Nigel was incapable of understanding. Indeed, he would have withstood the pain he was in ten thousand times over to have a chance of his apology being accepted. But he knew his lover too well to be surprised.

Colin did not spare him another look as he disappeared, leaving nothing in his wake but a pair of footprints in the fallen ash upon the floor.

Nigel closed his eyes and found himself wishing for a permanent death.

“Nigel,” Jim said. “Nigel, you still there?”

No, he was not. “Aye, savior,” he rasped.

“Listen, we gotta … we gotta do something about the shape you’re in. We can’t leave you like this.”

“Aye.”

There was a long pause, like the two angels and the transient soul Sissy Barten were waiting for some instruction. He had none to give them. His direction had just left him for a very rational reason as Colin was not the type to make mistakes more than once.

Nor give his heart in that fashion.

“Nigel, can you fix yourself?” Jim asked. “Can you take care of this?”