by Lisa Hughey
Asshole. Sorry, Brandt.
After Gary moved out, Angelina had been lackluster about her own fitness schedule and now she needed to hire Candy. Except, wait, she couldn’t afford her.
Angelina sat in the austere courtroom beside her lawyer, a very nice woman in a trim, efficient navy suit who was hopefully shark enough to make sure he didn’t steal her legacy from her grandmother, so her kids could go to college and she could keep a house she didn’t want, to maintain some stability for the kids.
Angelina had tried to summon the energy to dress up for the hearing but she’d woken from her nap and barely had time to shower and throw on clothes, a boring black, long-sleeved, scoop neck cable sweater and even more boring black Ann Taylor trousers that were a little too snug thanks to the weight she’d gained. She’d let her hair air dry, never a good move, and only managed to slather on lip gloss she’d left in the car as she rushed over to the court.
Grammy would be appalled.
“Good. You look fantastic,” Zoe, her lawyer, said.
Angelina assumed she was being generous, trying to get her spirits up before the proceeding started. “Thanks.”
“Seriously, you practically glow.” Zoe smoothed a hand over her sleek pageboy. “God, I have the worst headache.”
“I might have some drugs.” Angelina dug through her four-year-old Coach bag in search of a vial of Advil.
“Allergies.” Zoe waved her off. “Don’t worry about it. I have no hope of looking as good as you do today. What have you been doing?”
Angelina flushed as she thought about the nap she’d just taken. Dream sex was a good pick-me-up. Right up until the moment her dream angel had talked.
Gary didn’t make eye contact. He conveniently hunched over his smart phone, and emailed away with his thumbs. Candy gave her a friendly smile edged with triumph. She thought she’d hit the boyfriend jackpot by snagging a doctor. But Angelina would be damned if Candy took away anything from her kids.
“Court is in session,” said the bailiff. “Judge Horatio presiding in Guerisse versus Wheldon.”
The judge nodded to both tables. “Is the paperwork in order?”
Angelina had been in charge of their financial portfolio. She’d set up the accounts, monitored and maintained the records, so Gary hadn’t been able to siphon out funds, like Janine’s first husband had, before he dumped her.
The bad news....
“Your assets were supposed to have been split. Due to market conditions, your assets are listed in the amount of….” Angelina tuned out the judge. She knew to the penny what their assets had been worth and what they were worth now.
In California, equal property state that it was, she’d get half of their joint assets. Sixteen years of marriage, of dedication, love, duty (and infidelity, the pig) boiled down to fifty/fifty. Except their assets were a mess. Gary had wanted a monstrosity of a house and she had given in. Any equity they had in their house was long since gone. But her half of the assets could be substantially depleted if the house were listed at its old value.
Craig Lovell, Gary’s lawyer, and a former friend of theirs, was now firmly in the Gary camp. Friends had split along party lines. That was the truly weird circumstance of divorce. She’d seen it with Janine. No matter how hard you tried to stay friends with both husband and wife, the natural inclination was to take a side.
“Your honor,” Craig began. “I’d like to petition that my client be exempt the cost of the career consultant.” Craig’s emphasis on her court-recommended consultant placed the woman one step up from a streetwalker. The jerk. “My client has already paid for his wife’s home and her living expenses.”
This was where Gary hadn’t been truthful with his lawyer. Although they’d bought the house together, Angelina’s inheritance had paid off Gary’s medical school debts and bought him into his current practice. Gary was here because he had balked at the bill for her paralegal education as well as the career consultant, and he wanted the court to believe he didn’t have the money. Which he might not, but that wasn’t her problem.
After they’d married, she’d dropped out of nursing school at Gary’s request. She’d been on track to get her nursing credential when they’d gotten married and within two months, she’d been pregnant, and that had been the end of her medical career. He’d claimed it would be too difficult for him to finish his surgery residency while she went to school and they tried to take care of a baby at the same time.
So she had no job skills. After she consulted the career counselor, she’d chosen the paralegal field. And if it wasn’t the most fascinating job in the world, so be it. She could get an education and a job within a couple of years.
But she needed Gary to step up and pay for the tuition and the mortgage. At the look on the judge’s face, Angelina slowly curled her shoulders in, and her collarbone bowed toward her hips. He was going to win.
Zoe placed her perfectly manicured hand over her wrist, her fingers curled around Angelina’s sunspot, and she smiled. Energy and power surged through Angelina. Her face and body heated as she took in Zoe’s smile.
It wasn’t a pretty smile. It was a shark smile. And she remembered why she’d hired her.
“Your honor,” Zoe paused delicately and then moved in for the kill.
Angelina straightened in her chair, pushed her shoulders back and relaxed.
Half an hour later, Gary had to pay the mortgage until she was back at work and pay for her rehabilitation back into the workforce. Candy let out a little gasp, probably upset at the loss of income. Angelina couldn’t bring herself to care. Candy and Gary glared from across the aisle. If Candy’s glare were a dagger, Angelina would be dead on the floor, knife between her eyes.
Angelina ignored them, and shook Zoe’s hand. Huh, the lights in here must be really flattering. Zoe’s hair seemed a bit shinier, her skin a little more luminous. “How’s your headache?”
Zoe smiled, her face sparkling with pleasure. “Hey, it’s gone. Must be the thrill of victory.”
Angelina smiled back, but the tension from the negotiations had started a throb right between her eyebrows where she’d imagined Candy’s blade and made worse by Candy’s now strident complaints.
Too bad Ms. Fake Boobs couldn’t get a quick case of food poisoning. Angelina let her imagination run wild, and envisioned Candy as she puked on Gary’s Cole Haans, her abs heaving, those fake breasts not moving, and her face contorted in pain. He hated vomit and had always managed to be somewhere else whenever their kids had the stomach flu.
She let the little fantasy go. She had to focus on her reality. Her headache increased when she realized she still needed to talk to Gary about the pot in Brandt’s bag. She really didn’t want an audience for that one. “I need to talk to you.”
Gary opened his mouth. She shot a quick glance at the woman who’d been the catalyst for today. Of course that wasn’t really fair. It took two. “In private.”
“She can hear whatever you have to say,” Gary said defensively.
Angelina really didn’t want to have Candy listen. But suddenly Candy pressed a hand to her stomach. “Ex-excuse me.” She shoved out of the chair and ran for the courtroom doors but Gary’s lawyer was in the way. Suddenly she bent over and spewed all over Craig’s shoes.
Huh, sometimes the Universe did listen.
SEVEN
Rafe was in trouble.
He’d managed to keep his hands, if not his cock, mostly to himself as he’d transferred more power to Angelina. But he still hadn’t explained her abilities to her.
He had to soon.
She had healed her lawyer without even knowing what she’d done. He’d felt her lift the lawyer’s headache, which fortunately wasn’t too bad. If she healed someone accidentally and they were mortally ill, she could end up dead.
He had to talk to her. Explain her responsibilities. Explain to her how to heal. Except every time they were together, he ended up touching instead of teaching. This last time, he had final
ly spoken to her but that hadn’t gone well.
Michael, the head Archangel and Rafe’s leader, walked into the workout room where Rafe tried unsuccessfully to eradicate some of the demons that dogged him by benching four hundred pounds. Rafe planted his feet on the floor, braced for the weight, and then heaved the barbell toward the ceiling.
His best friend Uri was on the treadmill, pounding through miles while Linkin Park blasted from his iPod so loudly that Rafe could hear the music across the room. Uri had been dogging him the last few days. He knew something was wrong and he wanted Rafe to spill.
“How’s the promotion?” Michael asked. He was a legend, even among the Seven. His fierce protector spirit was encased in six feet seven inches of pure muscle and badass.
Being an Archangel wasn’t all fun and games. The physical demands could be brutal. All Archangels were required to train every day. Although their warrior skills had not been needed in thousands of years, they maintained readiness. Michael oversaw all of the Archangels and Angels and answered only to the highest in the Angelic Realm, the Seraphim.
Rafe couldn’t tell Michael about his problem. There were rules. Rules that would mean bye-bye ascension and Archangel of Healing, and hello, immediate ‘relocation’ to the Banished Realm.
“I, ah, have to do one more task.”
“Yeah. I know.”
Rafe had to be careful how he phrased this. “It’s an extra annoyance but if that is what the Virtues decree then I’ll accede to their wishes.”
“It’s a good idea,” Michael said. “I knew you wouldn’t be crazy about it.”
“Wait. You put them up to this?”
Michael straddled the weight bench next to Rafe, rested his elbows on his knees and clasped his hands, before he aimed his laser gaze straight at Rafe. “Yeah.”
“Why?”
“Because we’ve all become a little too complacent. Too out of touch with the human realm. The last fifty years or so have gone so well that we lack awareness of the very people we’re supposed to protect.”
“You’re kidding.” Rafe tensed, his body ramped up into fight mode as if he’d encountered a threat. “Couldn’t you have waited until after I ascended to try out your little science experiment?”
“You, of all of us, should understand the human psyche, Rafe.”
Rafe snorted. “I understand them just fine.” They were weak, whiny and always wanted more. They looked out for themselves and destroyed others with their own wants. But Angelina didn’t seem to be like that, so maybe he didn’t really understand them. He understood that Angelina was sad but he couldn’t figure out why. He only knew that when they touched, she had relief from her sorrow.
“Have you felt anything different lately?”
Shit. Could Michael know? Could this conversation be a set up to get him to admit he’d had inappropriate contact with Angelina? In technical terms he had not violated the Law of the Realm, but emotionally he had committed the most grievous sin in the Angelic Realm.
Fear wrapped around his lungs like a boa constrictor. The temperature in the room had risen. Steam and mist swirled around the weight equipment. Uri continued to run at a punishing pace on the treadmill. His feet thumped, the sound reverberated in Rafe’s head. Rafe’s vision tunneled to focus only on Michael.
Did the Council know?
Forget his promotion. He could be Fallen. And although he didn’t want to stay an Archangel, he definitely didn’t want to be fallen. To be banished.
Ba-bump, ba-bump, ba-bump, the percussion of his heart pounded with a heavy counter beat to the hiss and thunk of the weights as he executed a lateral pull-down.
“Different how?”
“I don’t know.” Michael clenched his fists, and his biceps bulged with frustration. “There seems to be some sort of disturbance but I can’t pinpoint a specific cause.”
Could his indiscretion create that kind of ripple in the Cosmos? Reality check, Rafe. The Cosmos would not slip out of balance just because you boinked your transitionee.
“I’ll look into it.” Rafe placated Michael. He wanted Michael gone before Rafe revealed his mistake. The buzz of the lights seemed inordinately loud, almost accusatory as he waited for Michael’s response.
Michael inclined his head and pushed off the weight bench with his powerful thighs. “Don’t be in so much of a hurry to ascend that you forget to do your job.” With that parting shot, he was gone.
Rafe had been so wrapped up in his conversation with Michael that he’d completely missed the fact that Uri had finished his run and now stood in front of Rafe. His skin gleamed with exertion. His chest puffed out, his blond hair was dark with sweat and his bright blue eyes shaded with concern. “What’s doing?”
Rafe was amused. “You trying to intimidate me?”
“Naw. Just trying to figure out what’s wrong.”
“I have a task to complete before I ascend.”
“Yeah. Heard about it.” Uri rubbed a white towel over his hair and face. “But that’s not what’s bothering you.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ve known you for seven hundred years, boy chick.” Uri dropped down onto the mat next to the weight bench. “We fought the plague together and survived. And I haven’t ever seen you this unhappy.”
The temptation to confide in Uri was strong. Too strong. “I have...a situation.”
Uri smirked. “What kind of situation?”
“Can’t talk about it.”
“Why not?”
“It has repercussions.”
“Does it affect the fate of the Earth?”
Rafe shook his head. “Ah, probably not.” Just his fate.
“Can I help?”
Rafe knew he couldn’t burden his friend. Uri’s job had been to bind the fallen. If Rafe didn’t get his shit together, Uri might have to contain him. He refused to put his friend in that position. “I wish you could.”
“Let me know if you change your mind.”
As Archangel of Birth and Renewal, Uri’s talents were manipulating fire and promoting peace through brotherhood. Somehow Rafe didn’t think Uri would feel so brotherly if he knew Rafe was on the verge of becoming Fallen.
And if ordered, Uri would bind Rafe in a heartbeat. “You’ll be the first to know.”
EIGHT
How had she let Janine trick her into a visit to this witch doctor?
Okay, okay. Acupuncture and Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners weren’t really witch doctors. And hadn’t she always been convinced that her own Grammy had a natural healing ability with herbs? A little bell jangled over the doorway as she let herself into the unassuming office located in a set of quaint, old Victorian houses. Three people occupied Asian-inspired chairs that lined walls covered with bamboo wallpaper. A fountain tinkled soothingly on the counter top and mellow flute music floated from a boom box on the floor in the corner.
The chair behind the check-in desk was empty. So Angelina took a seat and tried not to look like she was on the verge of bolting.
She was on the verge of bolting.
Why was she here? And since Angelina let Janine talk her into this visit, why wasn’t Janine here too? Angelina tried to calm down by studying the other patients, who turned out to be an eclectic lot. An old man, older than Grammy, sat in one chair with a cane resting lightly against his leg. In another, a young girl Lina’s age was seated with a bandage wrapped around her knee. And finally, a man who constantly touched the Bluetooth at his ear and thumbed through emails on his smart phone sat in the last chair.
Somehow she’d thought that the clients would be more ‘out there’ in appearance, tie-dye, Birkenstocks, long hair, love beads. Angelina didn’t believe in hocus-pocus, supernatural, metaphysical hooey. She had her feet firmly planted in reality, but also believed in the healing power of herbs. That did not translate to also indulging in woo-woo, think happy thoughts, and find The Secret beliefs. She knew better than to wish for more than she was able to handle.
>
She waited for almost half an hour. As people came and went, the muscles in her back tightened with every trickle of supposedly soothing water. She knew what was wrong with her. She was depressed and likely pre-menopausal. And that had manifested in some extremely erotic dreams. She sat in this office and listened to the fountain and prayed she wouldn’t fall asleep-- since lately whenever she went to sleep, her sexy dream man appeared.
Wouldn’t that be embarrassing?
Her cell buzzed. She looked at the text display. Janine. “Don’t back out!”
Apprehension clogged her throat when the practitioner finally came for her. He was a small Asian man, possibly Vietnamese, but younger than she’d expected.
“Come in, come in.” He led her down a hallway.
She tried not to focus on the giant mason jars full of dried herbs and mushrooms and--was that a snakeskin? Eeeww. She averted her gaze from other items she didn’t even want to identify. The juxtaposition of modern office and ancient practice was just a bit of an odd disconnect, as if she were trapped between the logic of medicine and the romance of magic and miracles.
Once they were inside a small room that looked like a cross between a doctor’s exam room and a spa room, Peter introduced himself, but didn’t shake her hand. He didn’t even look at the paperwork she had filled out, which was fine since she didn’t have a valid reason for this visit. A few night sweats were nothing. She’d get over her depression. And she certainly wasn’t about to tell him that she dreamed about angels.
The paper crinkled as she hopped up on the exam table. Her palms were sweaty from the unknown.
Then Peter settled down to business. He leaned over, and peered into her ear. Her ear.
She had this moment where she thought she might blurt, “What are you looking for, the Elephant in Horton Hears a Who?”. But laughing at your acupuncturist-slash-Traditional-Chinese-Medicine practitioner was probably not the best way to start the relationship.
