Angel of Chaos (Imp Book 6) (3 page)

“Sam’s hotel, huh?” He walked across the room and kissed me on the forehead. Wyatt smelled of sunshine and hay — so human.

“What’s this?” He pulled away and ran a finger over my bottom lip.

“Bit my lip.” I didn’t say
who
bit it. Gregory and Wyatt had come to an odd sort of friendship during my banishment in Hel. Wyatt seemed to be accepting of my relationship with the angel, but I didn’t want to rub his face in it.

“Ouch. Are you heading to the gym? I won’t keep you. Just wanted to stop by before I go up to Baltimore.”

Wyatt had suddenly become motivated. He had all sorts of contracts now with different gaming companies, and a few dealing with network security stuff. I was glad he was busy and not moping around while I raced off here and there with my crazy Iblis duties.

“I’m back in the angel jail tomorrow morning.”

He grimaced. “I kinda figured that was going to happen. How long this time?”

“Just the one rotation cycle, thanks to Rafael. I’ve got forty–eight hours to do two four–nine–five reports, though.”

I looked up and met Wyatt’s eyes, trying for a pleading, helpless expression. He sighed.

“Okay. Give me their names and what you know about them and I’ll get started on the reports.”

Wyatt was the best. It was like having a smart kid do your homework for you. I gave him all the information I knew about Joseph Barakel and Tyrone Cochran.

“On it. But you owe me for this one.” Wyatt grinned good–naturedly.

“Hot wings?”

“Charity work.”

Fuck, I hated when Wyatt made me do charity work. “The nursing home again?”

He frowned. “Not after Boomer bit that guy.”

“It wasn’t his fault,” I protested. “They’re always giving him doggie biscuits; he thought the staff had provided a special treat. Honestly, the guy looked dead to me, too.”

“The soup kitchen is no longer an option either.”

I’d put hallucinogenic drugs into the soup. A good time was had by all — at least until the cops arrived.

“Can’t I just buy you some hot wings?”

Wyatt looked stern. I could see him thinking through all the charitable activities on his list and weighing his desire to reform me against what sort of havoc I would cause.

“Steak and lobster.” The guy wasn’t cheap. Still, it was better than picking up trash alongside the road, or cleaning dog kennels at the animal shelter.

“Deal.”

“Go to the gym. And call me when you get out of jail. I’m already dreaming of a juicy prime rib.”

I grabbed my bag, tossing him a smile over my shoulder. “Make reservations. I’ll throw on the little black dress and we’ll celebrate my bail with food.”

–3–

W
hen I returned home, I pulled the Suburban around to the barn and unloaded the various sacks of feed and mineral blocks. Grabbing the shopping bags off the rear seat, I kicked the barn door closed behind me and headed toward the huge French doors that flanked the rear of my house. There, slouched in a lounge chair by the pool, was an angel. This one I recognized.

Rafael looked hardly angelic in his snug khaki shorts and silky, black t–shirt. His ebony hair shone deep purple in the sun, his wings a tracing of gold light extending beyond the sides of the chaise. He lowered his mirrored sunglasses as he saw me and wiggled his eyebrows.

“What’s cooking, good–looking?”

That had to have been the worst pick–up line I’d ever heard, although for an angel it was pretty hip. Slang wasn’t exactly a strength for them.

“Dinner. And I’d like to eat it, so tell me what the fuck this visit is about and take a hike.”

I liked Rafi. I should have been a bit nicer to him, especially since I needed to count on his vote in Ruling Council matters, but I just couldn’t summon the teasing, friendly Sam Martin. I was sexually frustrated, burdened with stupid work shit, and I’d spent most of the day shopping for my new houseguest. The thought of Harper sent my eyes scanning the nearby bushes for humans — particularly female humans. If Rafi was going to try to stick me with another angry, hostile woman seeking asylum, I’d run his wings through the chipper–shredder.

The angel swept the sunglasses off his face, and they vanished from his hand. “Aaru is falling apart. Some groups want to resume contact with the demons, others want to subject demons to a forced breeding program, and others feel we should be able to breed with the humans. We can’t keep up with all the violations of our laws. Even the Ruling Council is divided on what our future should look like and how we should achieve it.”

The transformation from playful, lighthearted Rafi to this serious one was disconcerting. Not as disconcerting as his words, though. I knew there had been an uprising, but had thought the rebels had been taken out, or at least scattered and rendered ineffective. No wonder Gregory was distracted. No wonder he’d had to run back to Aaru this morning. This was interesting information, but I wasn’t sure what Rafi expected me to do with it.

“So?” I shrugged. “Why should I care about what happens in Aaru? I’ve got Hel. Heaven is your problem, not mine.”

Rafael shot me a perceptive look and sat up, leaning his arms on his knees. “Maybe because the angel you love cares about Aaru? With Uri out of the picture indefinitely, I’m the only progressive on the Council. It’s you and me, babe.”

Gregory was progressive — sometimes. Sometimes not. Two against four wasn’t a majority. Even if Gregory did vote our way, it would just deadlock the issue. I still didn’t see what I was supposed to do about any of this. Or why I should care. Yeah, I wanted Gregory to have his beloved homeland, but he surely didn’t need an imp’s help on that front.

“Don’t you want demons and angels to be able to form partnerships, to join, perhaps even to breed? You have a voice on the Council — don’t you want to have an equal say in matters here with the humans, and in Aaru?”

I didn’t give a shit about matters in Aaru, or here with the humans. Or did I? Dropping the shopping bags on the flagstone patio, I plopped into the lounge chair next to Rafi. It drove me nuts how the angels hovered over the humans, watching for any slip in their collective vibration level, any backsliding in their evolution. I hated their constant obsession with Nephilim, their heavy–handed treatment of the werewolves. I did want a say in those things, even with my already–overloaded schedule. And demons joining with angels? A thrill ran through me remembering the sensations I felt just being next to Gregory. Leethu had begged for an angel of her own — how many others would want the same?

Plus I saw us with clear eyes now. The rigid stagnation of Aaru, the devolving and brutal state of Hel — this would be good for all of us. But in spite of being the Iblis, I was still only an imp. And two, possibly three, on the Ruling Council weren’t enough to enact the kind of dramatic change Rafi was proposing — even if some factions wanted it.

Rafael got to his feet, sunglasses appearing in his hand with a snap. “Think about what I’ve said. Let me know if you have any ideas. I may be an Angel of Order, but I’m eager for some chaos in Aaru.”

With a flourish, he put on the mirrored shades and vanished, leaving me sitting on a slightly damp lounge chair with an armful of shopping bags beside me. Ideas? Like the dating game for demons and angels? I had a vision of that television show The Bachelor, only for beings of spirit. Who would Gabriel present the rose to? Leethu? Dar? One of the Low in my household? I laughed just thinking about that staid angel wooing a demon and scooped up my bags to head inside.

Harper was in the kitchen, chatting away with Nyalla as they cut vegetables. The smell coming from the stove was amazing, and I sniffed appreciatively. Nyalla’s cooking skills tended toward re–heated leftovers and microwaved eggs. Clearly, Harper was feeling more at home and less the angry psycho she’d seemed when she first walked through my door. Or not. As I walked in, the woman fell immediately silent and tensed, her grip on the knife alarmingly firm.

“Oh, did you pick up some things for Harper?” Nyalla put her knife down and took the plastic bags from my hand. “I’ll run these up to her room.”

“No. I will.”

Either my new guest didn’t want Nyalla in her room, or she was unwilling to be in the kitchen alone with me. I was betting on the latter. Harper took the bags from Nyalla with a tense smile, knife clutched tight in her other hand. I edged out of her way and watched her walk up the steps, thinking that the knife was probably going to stay in her room, under the pillow. This woman was dangerous. I had no idea whether she planned on sticking me with that piece of cutlery, or was preparing for the angel’s return visit. I hoped it was the angel.

“You are so sweet to take her in like this.” Nyalla beamed at me. I looked guiltily down at my new boots. I was probably going to have to give them back. The loss of an awesome pair of Steve Maddens versus a disappointed Nyalla … yeah, I’d have to return them. Eventually.

“She’s really angry right now and worried about the future, but she’ll settle in. I know how overwhelming life changes can be. Can we use the other bedroom as the nursery? I know that will leave you without a guest bedroom for Dar and other demons, so maybe we should just put an addition on the house instead.”

If there was one thing Nyalla was good at, it was spending my money. I couldn’t seem to be mad at her though, even with my Corvette broken beyond repair and my safe half empty. It
was
a good idea. My household had reached astronomical proportions, and I needed to have more space to put people up. It would probably be wise to have a guesthouse to separate my demon family from the others.

Nursery
?

My heart lodged somewhere in my esophagus, and my eyes locked on Nyalla’s thin waist and flat stomach. Holy shit on a stick, what had the girl gotten herself into?

“I’ll fucking kill him,” I snarled. Nyalla stared at me in surprise, far more composed in the face of my temper tantrum than she would have been this past summer. “Who knocked you up? That cop? The guy at the beach? Who got you pregnant?” If she refused to answer me, I’d kill both men just to be thorough. Nobody messed with mine. Nobody.

“Me?” she squeaked, her eyes round. “I’m not pregnant. I use the condoms that Candy bought for me. It’s Harper who’s pregnant. Didn’t you know? Isn’t that why you gave her asylum?”

Although I wanted to explore the notion that my prudish werewolf friend was supplying Nyalla with birth–control devices, my mind locked onto the other of the revelations.

“Harper? Pregnant?”

“Uh, yeah.” I heard the implied ‘duh’ in Nyalla’s voice. “She’s
showing
, Sam. How could you not notice? The woman looks ready to give birth any month now.”

It wouldn’t be the first time I’d been blind to something right in front of my face. Gregory often told me I needed to pay more attention to details, to examine the obvious first before chasing improbable scenarios. Not that I intended on taking an angel’s advice on that one, even if it was an angel I loved and admired.

“Pregnant? I thought she just had really bad taste in clothing. I mean, her boots aside. That top is hideous. You could hide two linebackers in that thing. How the heck was I supposed to see a baby bump under twenty yards of gathered paisley fabric?”

Nyalla sighed and turned back to chopping bok choy, muttering under her breath about obtuse demons.

Harper, pregnant. I could think of only one reason an angel would have been so eager to gain asylum for a pregnant human that he would agree to my outlandish demand for three favors. No wonder he hadn’t wanted to tell me his choir or name. Blondie in the blue jeans had been a bad, bad boy. And I was so keeping these boots.

“Yes, she’s pregnant. She’s not too happy with the father right now either.”

Neither was I. My mind whirled, and I plopped down on one of the kitchen stools to think. Harper hadn’t looked pregnant to me, and I wasn’t sure how accurate Nyalla’s estimation of the woman’s due date was. Hopefully she was terribly wrong and the baby wouldn’t be arriving for another six months or so. What the fuck was I going to do with a human baby in my house? From what I’d seen, they seemed to require a whole lot of specialized crap, and they ate and pooped all the time. And screamed a lot. I couldn’t kill it, not after I’d sworn to protect the damned thing for its entire life.

“He just ditched her here, never to see her again?” I asked, half to Nyalla and half to myself. “Got her pregnant then dumped her off at Satan’s Home for Unwed Mothers?”

Nyalla stifled a giggle. “That’s funny, Sam. I don’t really know the details, just that she feels betrayed by him and is angry with herself for thinking she loved him. She’s confused.”

She’s
confused? I didn’t know how to take care of a baby, let alone a Nephilim baby. Did I need to hire a couple of dwarves to foster the child? Bring them over from Hel? Would the kid be like the half–demon humans I’d seen over the centuries, or sort of angel–light? Shit.

“I guess we better start a nursery,” I said slowly, a little worried when I saw Nyalla’s radiant expression. “Do you know exactly when she’s due, or are you just guessing?”

“I don’t know exactly. I think maybe a few months, unless she’s having twins or something.”

Twins? My breathing went into overdrive, and I felt a panic attack close in on me. Paper bag. I needed a paper bag to breathe into before I fucking passed out. Two infants? There better not be two babies in that woman or I was going to lose it. Baby Daddy was in for a serious hurting the next time I saw him.

“Ooh, I can introduce her to Shelly and baby Jack, and Candy and Michelle. We can have a baby shower for her. Isn’t that a funny term? Like we’re going to drop babies down from the ceiling.”

Nyalla’s voice faded into the background, and I nodded, sure I was agreeing to all sorts of things I’d regret later. An angel had fucked around with a human and left me holding the bag. That pissed me off just as much as Gabriel’s unbending stance on those stupid reports. Angels. Only one of them wasn’t on my shit list right now — although Gregory tended to bounce back and forth between lists. And I guess Rafael was okay at the moment. The rest of them could go to hell.