Possession (Fallen Angels #5)(51)
Author: J.R. Ward

Fucking bullshit.

“I’m going to let you up,” Jim said. “Okay?”

Sissy nodded and waited for him to pull back, giving him all the time in the world to misjudge how calm she was … and when he finally did—

She went back at him, flailing with her fists and kicking with her legs until the pair of them were rolling around on the sidewalk, the concrete scratching her forearms, her calves, her cheeks. She didn’t care—she was crazed again, her fire finding another corner of her emotions that had yet to be immolated.

And maybe Jim knew that. Because instead of sitting on her again, he let her go while still controlling her, fending off her attack with moves so practiced, it was as if he anticipated her strikes before she even thought of them.

Which naturally just pissed her off even more.

Eventually, even though she felt at her core that she could go on for ages, she ran out of gas, her body getting sloppy, her strength ebbing: The anger didn’t disappear; there was just no more physical energy left to provide an outlet for it—

Sissy ended up collapsing against his chest, breathing in ragged bursts, unable to lift her head, much less her fists.

Closing her eyes, she cursed long and hard inside her head … because, God knew, she still couldn’t get enough air down into her lungs.

When she finally found her voice, she said hoarsely, “Why me…”

And then abruptly, she shoved herself away from him. “And why do you care so much about me—I don’t know you—”

“Sissy, look, I know you’ve been through a lot—”

“Just leave me alone, okay? If I want to get hit by a car, let me do it—”

“Sorry, but I can’t.”

“Then actually help me! Tell me where I am—”

“I wish I could—”

“Whatever,” she derided. “You want to keep your day job as an angel? There’re another two hundred and fifty million people in this country—go save them. But as of this moment, I’m not your problem, and you are not mine.”

Getting to her feet and brushing herself off, Sissy stared into the street and felt cheated. But at least they had seen her; they really had—

A rough hand clamped onto her arm and snapped her around.

Her savior didn’t look like anything close to a saint. His eyes were narrowed into slits, his upper lip had curled off his teeth, and the rage radiating out of him was probably the only thing that could have gotten through to her.

His voice, when he spoke, was a snarl. “I saw you dead, how ’bout that. I broke through a door and found you bled the f**k out. I was too late to save you then, so call me stupid for trying to do right by you now.” He stuck his finger in her face. “You want to get all frustrated and shit because you don’t know who you are? Fine. But don’t burn down my f**king house, and don’t resent me because I don’t f**king know what your deal is.” He jabbed his finger at his own chest. “You think I know myself in this mess? I don’t. I don’t have a goddamn clue about so much of it all. Jesus Christ.”

With that, he was the one who spun off and went back for the house, all the while dragging that injured leg behind him like it hurt like hell.

How he was walking on that cast, she had no idea…

As she watched him go back across the road, she regretted the whole evening. And yet even as she calmed down, under her surface … the anger was still there, simmering along.

To think she’d assumed that Hell would be the worst thing that happened to her.

This … seemed so much harder.

Chapter Twenty-two

Jim locked himself in his bedroom. And it wasn’t because he was sulking.

He didn’t trust himself at the moment. He was beat to shit, partially starved, and angry as hell—not exactly a trifecta of healthy relating.

Rifling through his stuff, he found, through the grace of God, a pack of unopened Marlboros in his winter parka. As he lit one up and sat down on his bed, he ran through what he was going to need to cut the cast off his leg. Some kind of saw?

Underneath the plaster or whatever the hell it was, he knew damn well the bone was probably still broken, but similar to the way the scratches on the backs of his hands were healing in front of his eyes, the leg had to be doing the same. Guess it made sense. What kind of savior would he be if he was sidelined by injury?

Wonder if he cut off his arm, would it grow back?

Exhaling, he watched the smoke curl up toward the ceiling. Then he put the cig in between his teeth and went for his crystal knife—the one he had left. ’Cuz the other was in the cab of his truck—or in the CPD’s evidence room, more likely.

The weapon was as beautiful as it was deadly, the ultimate lights-out switch for minions and harpies alike—two subspecies of demon he had had the joy of coming into contact with lately. It was also handy-dandy when it came to exorcisms, as he’d learned in the first round.

Shit, that felt like forever ago.

As he turned the blade over in his palm, the prism caught the illumination from the lamp on the bureau, a rainbow of colors flashing and making him think of Eddie.

That angel wouldn’t have approved of any of this. Not the trade. Not Sissy here on this side. Not the distractions.

Jim took another drag and angled the tip onto the cast, right in front, below his knee. As he pushed down, there was some initial resistance, but then the plaster gave way, the blade cleaving a path down, down, down along his shinbone. Jim was careful to go slowly—and as he progressed, all kinds of in-the-field injuries came back to him, times when he’d been cut or wounded and had had no medical anything to fall back on.

Just like the good ol’ days. Except he wasn’t getting shot at while he was treating himself.

Things were looking up.

Although, meh … if he were honest, he felt like he’d been popped in the sternum by a forty. As long as he lived, in any sense of the word, he was never going to forget the sight of Sissy rushing into the path of that car.

Seeing her dead once had been more than enough—and then he’d had the chaser of her being in Hell. Yup, more than plenty, thanks.

Just leave me alone, okay?

Refocusing, he finished the cutting job at his foot and laid the blade aside on the messy sheets. After taking a drag on his cigarette, he turned his fingers into claws and penetrated the fault line he’d created in the plaster, prying the cast apart until it cracked free and fell off.

His leg looked just the same. So not a compound fracture, obviously.