Falling Angel

by Anne Stuart

  "Fine work."

  He hadn't heard Lars come in. The older man stood beside him, looking down at the angel. "You've got a real gift," Lars continued. "And I'm the man to recognize it, if I may say so without false modesty. She's a real beauty, she is. You've got the touch."

  Gabriel looked down at his hands. They were nicked, scratched, big and clumsy looking to his unaccustomed eyes. "I guess I do," he murmured.

  "She reminds me of someone," Lars said, lifting the figurine. "Something about her face that I can't quite place. She's a regular tartar, isn't she?"

  Gabriel looked down into Augusta's stern, judgmental face. "She is that."

  "You wouldn't think of an angel being quite such an old grump, would you? She'd scare the bejesus out of me if I had to face her on judgment day. And yet she looks just right." He clapped a hand on Gabriel's shoulder and squeezed it. "Just right," he said again.

  Gabriel looked at him. In his previous incarnation he might have thought that was mild praise. But the man he'd become was more sensitive than his old self. And Lars Swensen had given him high praise, indeed.

  "Thanks," he said. "I'll finish her up tomorrow and do the other one. If you want me to, that is. It took me a while to get started."

  Lars nodded. "It does, sometimes. It was worth the wait. What do you see for the other one? Another judge?"

  Gabriel stared down at Augusta's dry-humored face. "I'm not sure," he said slowly. "I'll have to see what my hands come up with."

  An energetic wail emerged from the house. "Someone's calling. The women haven't returned from shopping yet, so I suppose we'd better see what we can rustle up. How are you in the cooking department?"

  He thought of the cooking courses de rigueur for an upscale bachelor. Somehow he didn't think Lars would appreciate slivers of raw octopus ringed with duck pâté ravioli. "I can cook," he said. "Steak and spaghetti."

  "Sounds my speed. Except this is the day after Thanksgiving. It's un-American to eat anything but turkey hash."

  "Turkey hash?"

  "Good Lord, are they that uncivilized in Boston? You haven't lived until you've eaten real turkey hash. Prepare yourself for a culinary feast."

  "What culinary feast, Pop?" Nils demanded when they stepped into the blast furnace of a kitchen. Gabriel hadn't realized how chilly the shop was, so intent on his work that he hadn't allowed any conscious thought to enter.

  "Turkey hash."

  "Gross," Nils replied emphatically.

  "Yuck," said Kirsten as she rhythmically pounded the baby's back.

  "What a thing to do to a perfectly decent turkey," Nils added. "Couldn't we just have turkey sandwiches?"

  "You had them for lunch. Besides, Carrie bought a turkey the size of Minneapolis. Food is too precious to waste."

  "How about tacos, Pop? We've got some ground beef in the freezer."

  "Turkey enchiladas." For a moment Gabriel didn't realize the words had come from his own mouth.

  "Say what?" Nils demanded suspiciously.

  "I make turkey enchiladas." He might as well carry through with it. If he could carve something that looked fiendishly like his nemesis, Augusta, then he could probably make turkey enchiladas, as well. He'd never been fond of Mexican food. And yet suddenly he had a craving as fierce as that of any woman eight months pregnant. He wanted something rife with chili powder and tortillas, and if he had to use turkey and cook it himself to get it, then he would.

  "Sounds great to me. What do you need?"

  For a moment Gabriel drew a blank. Shutting his eyes, he went into that blank deliberately. "Tortillas, chili powder, tomato sauce, jack cheese and onions."

  "I'll go to the store," Nils shouted.

  "Not by yourself, you won't. You only have a learner's permit. I'll drive, and we'll stop and pick up Jeffie. He's alone too much as it is." Lars turned to Gabriel. "You don't mind holding down the fort, do you? Kirsten can handle the little ones."

  It wasn't panic, Gabriel told himself. It was his sheer dislike of children. He'd always found them noisy, messy creatures, and he didn't want to be trapped with three of them, alone. Except that Lars's children were the exception. Kirsten was bright, pretty, sweet tempered. The younger boy, whatever his name was, had a mischievous smile that somehow reached past Gabriel's natural reserve. And even the baby had something about her that was far too appealing.

  He'd survive. "Take your time," he said grandly, pouring himself another cup of that wickedly strong coffee. And he didn't regret his words for another twenty-three minutes.

  Chapter Six

  « ^ »

  It was snowing by the time Carrie and Maggie pulled into the steep driveway outside the Swensen home. The roads had gotten slick enough to make any normal amount of speed unwise, and for once Carrie had listened to her better judgment. She didn't like the fact that she wanted to get back to the Swensens', wanted to with something close to desperation. Because she knew perfectly well what it was she was trying to get back to. Something she didn't deserve and wasn't going to have.

  "Do you suppose they were worried about us?" Maggie asked as she climbed out of the front seat, her arms laden with packages.

  "Probably. Do you care?"

  "Not enough to come back any sooner," she admitted. "I bet they're sitting around, grumpy, expecting me to cook them dinner."

  "I thought Lars was above that sort of thing."

  "Honey, no man is above that sort of thing. They all expect you to wait on them hand and foot, even the best of them."

  "Lars being one of the best of them?"

  "Absolutely," Maggie panted, straggling up the icy driveway. "I haven't decided how Gabriel stacks up in the hierarchy of perfect men."

  "Lars being a ten?" Carrie took several of the bulky packages from Maggie's icy hands.

  "I imagine Gabriel might be somewhere near a four," Maggie said thoughtfully.

  Carrie's protest was immediate, instinctive and unvoiced. "You can't get me to rise to the bait, Maggie. For all we know he could be a minus three."

  "Not when he looks like that. I'll give him four points just for looks alone. It's a good thing Angel Falls is singularly devoid of unattached women. You won't have any competition."

  "Maggie," she warned, stamping her snowy feet on the sturdy front porch.

  "Not that you should worry about competition anyway. Any man worth his salt would choose you over an entire herd of Miss America contestants." She pushed open the door, and heat and light flooded out onto the porch.

  "What's this about Miss America contestants?" Lars's voice boomed out as his sturdy frame filled the kitchen doorway.

  "No such luck, sweetheart. You've got me," Maggie said.

  "And you've brought half the stores in Saint Luke back with you." There was no missing the worry in his voice. "I thought we'd decided we couldn't afford much of a Christmas."

  "Don't give your wife grief," Carrie said, shutting the door behind her. "She spent a pittance. Just be glad we came home to feed you…" Her voice trailed off as she sniffed the air. "What's cooking?"

  "That doesn't smell like turkey hash," Maggie said in an accusing voice.

  "It's not. It's turkey enchiladas, and it's only by the magnanimous goodness of my soul and the Christmas spirit that I managed to save enough for you two."

  "You've never made enchiladas."

  "I still haven't. Gabriel's the chef." He reached out for the packages. "I'll hide these. You two go in and get something to eat before you waste away to skin and bones."

  "Impossible for me," Maggie said with a sigh, hanging her coat on a hook, "and too late for Carrie."

  "It's never too late for Carrie," Lars said firmly, giving the women a little shove.

  The kitchen was empty. Maggie looked around her in dismay. "I'm not sure it's worth it," she said as she surveyed the pile of dishes in the sink, the pots and pans littering every spare surface of the kitchen she'd left spotless.

  "Lars said he was a chef, not a scullery maid," Carrie poin
ted out, heading for the sink. "I'll just get a start on these…"

  "Oh, no, you won't." Lars was back in record time. "You sit down and I'll serve you." He scooped a pile of dishes off the table, dumped them into the sink and turned with a fatuous smile. "You won't believe what you're tasting. I didn't know leftover turkey had such possibilities."

  "I don't believe what I'm seeing," Maggie said tartly.

  "Neither do I," Carrie echoed softly, sinking down in surprise onto the chair Lars held for her.

  Gabriel was standing in the doorway. The mess from creating his culinary masterpiece hadn't left him untouched. Chili sauce adorned his eyebrow, spattered his chambray shirt and stained his jeans. But that wasn't the most surprising thing about him. In his arms rested little Carrie Swensen, cooing cheerfully, equally bedaubed in that evening's dinner.

  "Baby!" Maggie cried, reaching out for her younger daughter. "Little Anna Caroline."

  For a moment the baby was torn. "I'm not sure she'll go to you, sweetheart," Lars said, placing two overfilled plates in front of them. "I think she's in love."

  Gabriel's face was a study in contradictions. On the one hand, he seemed supremely embarrassed at the baby's obvious adoration. On the other, there was a surprising competence in the way he held her, as if those arms were used to babies, despite his earlier insistence that he had never even seen a woman nurse.

  "She got upset when Lars and Nils went to the store," Gabriel said in his deep, slow voice. "I just managed to calm her."

  Carrie could imagine it. She'd seen the baby when she was in one of her tears, and it was not a pretty sight. Usually nothing outside of her mother's arms could calm her, but Gabriel seemed possessed of a magic touch. Maybe lying in his arms, listening to that deep voice rumble through his chest…

  She dropped her fork with a noisy clatter.

  "What's the matter?" Gabriel asked. "Don't you like my cooking?"

  She looked up, meeting his dark, enigmatic eyes over the baby's curly head. It was flirtation, a mild, clumsy form of it that seemed to surprise him as much as it surprised her. "It's wonderful," she said truthfully. "I just never got in the habit of eating much."

  "I keep telling her she's too thin," Maggie said, her fork scraping against her now-empty plate. "Tell her she's too thin, Gabriel."

  "She's too thin," he said in that slow, deep voice of his.

  It took all of Carrie's concentration, but she managed to shake off the slumberous effect of it. "Well," she said briskly, "I'll just have to be a disappointment to you all. Even if I ate twice as much, I wouldn't put on weight. My metabolism isn't geared toward comfortable curves."

  "You'd think she'd be proud of it," Maggie mourned. "Are there any more enchiladas?"

  "Nope," Lars said.

  "Are you going to finish yours?" She cast a covetous eye at Carrie's barely touched plate.

  "Yes, she is," Gabriel said, handing Maggie the baby and moving to loom over Carrie.

  He'd flirted with her, maybe, just maybe, she could flirt back a little. What harm would it do? "What'll you give me if I do? "

  He was too close to her. Maggie had risen, resigned to her empty plate, and Gabriel took her vacated seat, next to Carrie, "Dessert," he said.

  Carrie just stared at him, visions of all sorts of things, none of them sugarplums, dancing in her head. She opened her mouth to say something, then shut it again, pushing the still-full plate away from her, pushing her empty heart away from her. "Not for me. I'd better get back home. The roads are slick and my stove's probably out by now."

  "Spend the night," Lars suggested. "It's too nasty a night to drive all that way by yourself."

  "My pipes will freeze, and I can't afford a plumber. Besides, that's what I got the car for. Don't worry about me, Lars. I'll be fine."

  "I do worry about you, Carrie. We all do," Lars said earnestly, leaning over the table between them.

  "Don't." The word was short, raw, the pain obvious to anyone attuned to it. She didn't deserve their concern.

  "At least let me follow you back and make sure you get home safely…"

  "No."

  "Gabriel can follow you," Maggie piped up, keeping her attention on her daughter so that she couldn't meet Carrie's glare. "He can make sure your stove is going before he leaves."

  "No," she said again. "I can take care of myself, and well you know it." She rose, not meeting Gabriel's dark, steady gaze. "But if you'd like to come out tomorrow and look over the work I have for you…"

  "Tonight would be better for me," he said.

  She thought he'd missed the byplay. "Why?" she asked flatly.

  "Because tomorrow I have to finish one carving and do another, I promised Lars I'd take the stuff down to the church, and I wanted to check on my truck. It's tonight or next week."

  "Next week would be just fine…"

  "Give it up, Carrie," Maggie said. "The man wants to come tonight, let him come tonight. Let somebody do something for you for a change."

  There was nothing she could do, short of causing a scene. Lars and Maggie were the best people in the world, but they might have invented the phrase "stubborn Swedes." And if truth be told, she wasn't sure that she wanted to drive on the slick surface of the long twisting road. Four-wheel drive was all well and good, but not when it came to glare ice.

  "All right, I'm not going to keep fighting," she said wearily. "All I want to do is go home and go to bed. If you insist that Gabriel follow me to make sure I get there safely then I'm sure I can't stop you, even though there's absolutely no need. But I'm tired, I don't want to drag Gabriel all over the house in an ice storm showing him what needs fixing. He can follow me home, watch me get safely inside the house, and then go home. Satisfied?"

  "Satisfied," Lars said. "Take my pickup, Gabe. She's old and rusty but she runs like a top, and you're going to need the four-wheel drive on a night like this." He turned to Carrie. "Sit yourself back down, have some dessert and a cup of coffee before you go out into the night."

  Part of her would have killed for coffee, but the longer she delayed getting home the more she'd be playing into the Swensens' heavy-handed matchmaking. Besides, she was exhausted. She needed to collapse in her own bed as soon as possible, and accepting Gabriel's help was the path that would lead her home the quickest.

  "No coffee, no dessert."

  "No coffee?" Lars echoed, horrified. "Some sherry, then? Something to warm your bones."

  "A kiss good-night," she said, leaning over and kissing his burly cheek. "I'll get you both for this," she whispered in his ear.

  Lars didn't look the slightest bit chastened. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do."

  Gabriel followed her out into the hall, Lars's keys in his hand, an unreadable expression on his face. She braced herself, waiting for him to make some comment, but he was silent, looming over her. He didn't help her on with her coat, a wise move on his part. She was already in a bad mood, having to accept help when she was the one who wanted to offer it, and if he'd been fool enough to be oversolicitous she would have lashed out at him, she who seldom said a harsh word to a living soul other than herself.

  But he didn't say a word, didn't try to touch her, simply waited as she struggled into her coat, and she reminded herself she was being paranoid. He didn't know a thing about her and her myriad problems. No one knew all her problems, or the depths of the harm she'd done. No one needed to know. Her own conscience was punishment enough.

  "You don't need to do this, you know," she said. "Lars and Maggie are overprotective. I've been driving these roads since I was sixteen, usually without the benefit of four-wheel drive or even snow tires."

  "They care about you."

  "A little too much, if you ask me."

  "I didn't know that was possible," Gabriel said.

  It was useless to argue. "It's fairly direct to my house—you shouldn't have any trouble retracing the path, unless you have no sense of direction."

  An odd expression flashed into his eyes. "I don't
know," he said simply.

  She didn't stop to consider the ramifications of that statement. "Well, I guess you'll find out tonight, won't you? Have you done much winter driving?"

  "Last night," he said, the faint trace of a smile curving his mouth.

  God, she loved his mouth. Immediately she slapped down that thought. "That's not much of a testimonial."

  "It was a fluke. I'll be fine."

  "I don't want to be pulling you out of a ditch. Maybe you ought to stay home."

  He took her arm. Major mistake, she thought. She liked the feel of his hand on her arm, strong, forceful without being bullying, protective. She didn't let people protect her, she was too busy protecting them. But, Lord, it felt good, if only for a brief, self-indulgent moment.

  "I think," he said, "that we ought to stop arguing and get on the roads before they become impassable. Assuming you haven't changed your mind and decided to spend the night here?"

  "I haven't changed my mind." He still hadn't released her arm, and not for a moment was she tempted to yank it free. "I hope I made myself clear—I want you to stay in the truck until I'm safely in the house and then drive straight back home."

  He didn't answer. Instead, he opened the door, letting a blast of damp, icy air into the house. "Let's go," he said.

  And since his warm, strong hand was still clasped around her upper arm, she had no choice but to follow.

  Gabriel drove slowly, following behind her on the icy roads as he considered his course of action. He was glad to see some sign of temper in her. He'd begun to think of her as the saint of Angel Falls. A hell of a combination, he thought with a sour smile. A saint, and a broken-down angel. He was the one who was supposed to be the good one, wasn't he?

  He wasn't sure of anything anymore. There were times when he felt like Gabriel Falconi, comfortable and familiar inside a strange body, a strange head. Emerson Wyatt MacVey III was a dream, someone he'd read about in a book. Not a very good book, at that. One of those depressing anti-yuppie novels he'd struggled through in a previous life.