Angel

Page 85

 

  The muscles in his arms were rigid. I hesitated, not sure whether to ask — but it was something that had been bothering him for so, so long. “Alex . . . how did he die?”

  At first I thought he wasn’t going to answer; then he looked down and cleared his throat. “We, um — we were on a hunt in Los Angeles,” he said. “Jake and I would play this game sometimes, where one of us lured an angel in and the other shot it. We weren’t supposed to put ourselves at risk like that; Cully would have killed us if he’d known. Anyway, we were right beside one of the canyons above the city, and Jake was the lure. And . . . the angel went for him, and I shot it — and then I went over to Jake, and we sort of — high-fived, you know. . . . ”

  He stopped, and I had another flash of the dark-haired boy with Alex’s eyes, sitting on a wall beside a canyon. He was grinning, lifting his hand. Good one, bro. She didn’t even see it coming. I could feel Alex’s dread just remembering this, and I wished I hadn’t asked him. I kissed his cheek.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered. “You don’t have to tell me. ”

  “No, it’s all right. ” He took an uneven breath. “Um . . . so basically, there was another angel — they’d been hunting in a pair. I didn’t scan again before I put my gun away; I didn’t even see it. It came flying out of nowhere at us, and Jake jerked backward — and I managed to get the angel, but Jake had fallen. . . . ”

  Alex trailed off and my heart twisted; I’d never seen him look so young, so vulnerable. Fighting tears, I hugged him as hard as I could and felt his arms tighten around me. “It was my fault,” he got out. “He trusted me, and I let him down. We got him to the hospital, but it was too late; he was too —” He stopped.

  “It wasn’t your fault,” I said. “Alex, the same thing might have happened if Jake had been holding the gun. It was just a mistake; it could have happened to anyone. ”

  When he spoke, his voice sounded flat, weary. “You can’t make mistakes on a hunt. Not like that. ”

  I drew back, looking into his eyes. “All right,” I said. “But if it had happened that way, if it had been Jake who’d made the mistake — would you forgive him?”

  He stared at me without answering. I saw his throat move.

  “Alex, you know you would,” I said, stroking his tattoo. “So please, forgive yourself, OK? Please. ” I kissed his cheeks, his brow, his mouth.

  He sat very still as I peppered him with kisses, as if he was hardly breathing. Slowly, I felt the tension in him ease. Catching my head in his hands, he gazed at me; neither of us moved for a moment. “I love you,” he said.

  The words didn’t seem like enough, but they were all I had. “I love you, too. I love you so much, Alex. ”

  He kissed me, so gently at first that I melted. I pressed close against him as the kiss deepened, curling my arms around his neck and tumbling into pure sensation. The softness of his hair as I ran my fingers through it; his warm hands on my skin, caressing me. It felt so, so good. I’d been afraid that I’d never have this again — this sense of being so achingly alive that every nerve ending was on fire.

  When we finally came up for air, we were lying facing each other, both of us smiling. Alex touched my eyebrow, lightly sketching its curve. Under the covers, my foot was against his bare leg; I tickled my toes up his calf. From outside I could hear the faint drone of traffic, a bird singing.

  Then I thought of something not so funny and almost laughed.

  “So . . . I guess we don’t really have any clothes, do we? Except what we had on yesterday. We don’t have much of anything else, either. ”

  Alex shook his head and sat up a little. “No, the truck’s probably been towed by now with all our stuff; we wouldn’t be able to get it back without our names on the registration anyway. My bag’s still at the cabin with our clothes. We could try going up there on the bike, I guess, but . . . ”

  “It doesn’t really feel safe there now,” I finished, sitting up, too.

  “No. It doesn’t to me, either. ”

  Sadness touched me as I thought of the cabin — all the hours that we’d spent talking there, playing cards, holding each other. But it was only a place; it wasn’t important. The important thing was being together.

  “So what now?” I said.

  He smoothed my hair away from my face, playing with its strands. “Well, the first thing — the main thing — is that I’m never letting you out of my sight again. Whatever happens from now on, it’s together. ”

  I touched the pendant on my chest, feeling its smooth facets. “Always,” I said softly. And joy flooded through me, that we still had a chance at it.

  “As for a plan . . . ” Alex rested his forearms on his knees, his eyebrows drawing together as he thought. “Well, we know that Project Angel still exists — barely. I guess Sophie will start it up again, once she gets tired of her safe location. ”

  I pulled my own knees to my chest as I watched him. “Would you want to be involved with her again?”

  He snorted. “No. I don’t trust the CIA; I don’t like how they work. What about you?”

  I shook my head. She hadn’t given me any contact details, anyway, I realized. She’d been that certain that I was going to die.

  Alex tapped his fingers on his knee. “To be honest, Mexico still sounds pretty good to me,” he said. “We’re going to need a safe base, and I don’t think we’ll find one in this country anymore. Plus, it’s pretty cheap; I’ve only got about six hundred dollars left. We could find someplace safe down there, and I could try to get some new AKs together, get things started. ” He linked his fingers through mine. “How does that sound to you?”

  I hadn’t wanted to think about this, but I knew I had to ask it. Gazing down at his hand in mine, I said slowly, “Alex, do you think that I might still be the one to destroy the angels? I mean, it could happen, even though it didn’t this time. Not that I really want to try again anytime soon, but . . . ” I stopped, knowing that as unspeakably horrible as the last few days had been, I would go through it all again, if it meant that the angels would be destroyed. I didn’t want to; I hated the thought. But I would.

  Alex rubbed his thumb against my fingers. “I don’t know,” he said. “But, Willow, if it happens, I’m right there with you. ”

  Alarm jolted through me. “I don’t want that! Alex, I’d want you safe —”

  He touched my cheek. “Forget it,” he said. “I will never, ever, let you face anything like that alone again. ”

  My chest clenched. Moving closer, I leaned against him, hugging his waist. He wrapped his arms around me, and I nestled against his solid warmth, so grateful that we still had each other. Finally I cleared my throat, trailing a finger along his forearm. “Mexico sounds . . . pretty good, actually. ”

  He pulled away, peering into my face. “Are you sure? We wouldn’t have anything great there, but we should have enough to survive for a couple of months — long enough to get things going, with luck. ”