by C. L. Coffey
“Can we talk about it at lunch?” she asked, looking around us.
The room was starting to fill, and people were getting close to earshot. “Sure.”
She gave me a grin and threw her arms around me.
“Oh, look. It’s Greenwood Prep’s latest couple.”
I glanced over Leigh-Ann’s shoulder, unsurprised to find Lottie and Harrison watching us.
In my arms, Leigh-Ann tensed before pushing me away and putting some space between us. While she was upset at Lottie’s taunt, I was unimpressed. This was the point where Leigh-Ann’s knight in shining armor should have stepped up and defended her, but apparently Ty’s armor had a chink in it. And that chink was gym class—there was no surprise that yet again, he had skipped class.
If Ty wasn’t there, that left me. I marched over to the pair, pushing past Simone and Cody. Not caring that I had shoved them out of the way in the process, I came to a stop in front of Lottie. With my hands on my hips, I glared at her. “You really need to come up with some new material.”
Lottie mimicked my pose and turned her attention from Leigh-Ann to me. “Well, look at that,” she said, a smirk appearing on her pale face. “Running to your girlfriend’s defense. Isn’t that sweet?”
“Why don’t you do everyone a favor and just shut up,” I said. “The only one who likes the sound of your voice is you.”
“Even if that were true, that would still be one more than you.”
I could feel the anger starting to build, and it took everything in me to take a deep breath and push it back down.
“You’re not even worth it,” I finally muttered. I turned, finding Leigh-Ann looking at me with a mixture of appreciation and apprehension. “Let’s wait over there.”
“Running away,” Lottie called after me.
I refused to give her the satisfaction of turning to her as I called over my shoulder. “Walking, Lottie. I’m just walking.”
“Why?”
Her voice took such an innocent tone to it, that I turned, suspicious. “Because you’re not worth it.”
“Not worth talking to, or not worth punching?” she asked, her tone still innocent. She took a couple of steps after me and smiled, poking at her cheek as she cocked her head. “Are you sure about that?”
The anger that had built in me started to seep away as I stared at her in suspicion, trying to work out what her end game was. “Both.”
“Are you sure?” Lottie asked
“Are you crazy?” Was she honestly trying to get me to hit her?
She held her hand out, and Harrison stepped forward to take it. I couldn’t help but roll my eyes.
“I get you two are dating,” I told her. “I think the college is aware of it.”
“You’d be the expert,” Harrison told me.
I stared at him, trying to figure out why his eyes looked so glazed, and what the hell he was talking about. “The expert of OTT PDA?”
“No, of crazy,” he said.
The words made my heart stop and my steps falter. “What?”
“Well, craziness runs in the family, doesn’t it?” he asked me.
My blood ran cold.
“What are you talking about?” Leigh-Ann asked, taking a step to stand beside me.
“Dora knows, don’t you,” Simone said, answering for Harrison.
I looked at Leigh-Ann, seeing my ghostly reflection in her eyes, and tried to find the words to explain, but my mouth had gone so dry, I couldn’t get any words out.
How did you tell someone that your mom’s mental health issues were all your fault?
“Oh, have we hit a nerve?” Lottie asked, forcing me to send my attention back to her. “Dora here, has gone through sixteen schools in the last eight years,” Lottie told Leigh-Ann and the rest of the class that was listening eagerly. “In fact, with a record that bad, I’m surprised she even got accepted here.”
“So what?” Leigh-Ann asked. “I’m sure you’d have been through more if your mother wasn’t paying an extortionate amount to keep you here.”
Lottie gave her an evil look, but then turned her attention back to me. “You want to tell them why you went through sixteen schools?”
“For fighting bullies like you,” I said, finding my voice about the same time as the anger levels in me started to rise.
“Now, now.” She waved her index finger back and forth. “It’s not nice to tell lies.”
“Four schools,” Harrison corrected me.
“Huh?” I asked him. What did four schools have to do with … anything?
“We checked. It was only four schools you were kicked out of for fighting. It was nine for your abysmal attendance.”
They checked? How?
Wait, Harrison had known I was Leigh-Ann’s roommate because his father had done a background check on me. Did he have that information?
I felt sick.
“She got kicked out of a few schools. So what?” Leigh-Ann said, again, finding the words for me. “She’s here now. College is different,” she added, giving me a friendly smile. The warmth in that smile was wonderful.
“That’s what happens when you take in charity cases. Frankly, I think it’s clear you shouldn’t be here. I know I don’t want you here.” Harrison shook his head in a way that almost seemed like he was being sympathetic as he turned to me. “Though you’ll only be here for so long, until you go completely crazy like your mother. How many times did she try to kill herself?”
Something in me snapped. It wasn’t that I completely forgot about my acceptance of protecting Harrison. It was that I simply didn’t care. A red haze settled over my field of vision, but it didn’t stop me from launching myself at Harrison. My palm struck his face, the sound echoing around the room.
Somehow, I’d manage to retain a degree of control over myself and the slap could have been considered dealt with ‘human’ strength, but as I stepped back, ready to hit him again, ready to completely let go and hit him with everything I had in me, I was roughly pulled back.
I don’t know who I expected to have done it. Logically, it would have made sense that it was Leigh-Ann, protecting her brother.
The problem was that logic had vacated my brain at that point. I turned and smacked my fist into whoever had grabbed me.
The ‘whoever’ turned out to be Gabriel.
He staggered back without making a sound. Instead, he kept his grip firmly on my shoulders. As he stared at me, the muscle in his jaw twitching, the anger and the red haze seemed to increase.
I felt like I was having an out of body experience, not completely inside my own mind, but somehow separate and watching it as rage took over. I was so close to losing control.
Gabriel seemed to be aware of it. “Class is cancelled,” Gabriel said quietly, though he never took his eyes from me.
“It wasn’t her fault,” Leigh-Ann said, instantly jumping to my defense.
“I said, class is cancelled,” Gabriel repeated. “Unless anyone wants to join Kennedy in detention, I suggest you leave now. You can get your things at lunch.”
Leigh-Ann was the last to leave, looking torn between staying and not wanting to get into trouble. I wanted to tell her to go, but I just couldn’t bring myself to look at her. My hands were shaking as I fought to control the anger in me. The last thing I wanted to do was hurt her.
It was only because Gabriel ushered her out the door that she finally left, calling something about speaking to me later. Gabriel locked the door behind her. Suddenly, we were all alone.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
“You need to leave too,” I told him, barely keeping the rage from consuming me. I desperately wanted to lash out and hit anything—hit him.
Instead of leaving, Gabriel curled his hands into fists and held them in front of him. “I can handle myself against a nephilim.”
I didn’t have the strength in me to hold back any longer. If he was a big enough fool to stay here, it was going to be on him when he got hurt.
As something between a sc
ream and a feral growl left my mouth, I launched myself at Gabriel. All of the pent-up rage was escaping me in each swing and kick I made. Hardly any of them hit their target. Not only was Gabriel trained in using a sword, someone had taught him how to fight.
The only thing going for me was the raw power in my blows. The few that did hit Gabriel had him grunting, but mostly, he blocked me.
Not once did he attack.
Every move he made was defensive. Dodging a kick, blocking a punch … like he knew I needed to release everything.
I dove at him with a snarl, and he ducked, his shoulder hitting my stomach as he allowed the momentum to flip me over his head. I landed on the wooded floor with a loud thud. The pain shocked me, but I shook it off, recovering quickly. I grabbed his leg, pulling it out from under him, and before he could roll out of the way, I jumped on him, pinning him to the floor.
I brought my fist back and swung it as hard as I could. Gabriel caught it and held on. As I was trying to break free, he reached up and grabbed the other, holding them both by my wrists, and brought them to his chest.
In an instant, the gap between us swallowed up, and with it, my anger evaporated. I lay on top of him, breathing heavily as he stared up at me. “You have anger issues.”
“I don’t.”
Gabriel arched an eyebrow.
“Sometimes I have anger issues.” And a lower tolerance threshold. “Most of the time, I can control it, but it seems to get worse when someone is going to get hurt.”
“You certainly have inherited the strength of a fallen angel. You need some training to hone that in and use it effectively.”
I didn’t move, still locked in place on top of him.
My heart was pounding, but it wasn’t from the fighting. As I stared down at Gabriel, something seemed to change in his eyes. It was like there was a charge between us, and I could tell he felt it too.
“Are you done?” he finally asked, his voice thick.
He definitely felt it.
“Are you done?” he repeated.
I slowly nodded. Any trace of anger lingering there had been pushed out with the look Gabriel was giving me.
Carefully, as though he wasn’t sure if I was going to pick up where I left off, Gabriel released me. But it wasn’t anger I was fighting now.
I closed my eyes, took a deep breath, and rolled off him. Unable to look into his eyes, I crossed my legs and focused on the bleachers. Beside me, Gabriel sat up but didn’t stand. “Don’t you have anything to say for yourself?”
The reason why we had been fighting returned to me, and I shook my head.“What’s the point?”
“The point is I want to hear from you. Tell me why I had to pull you off the person you’re supposed to be protecting.”
“What does it matter?” I asked again. “I’ve done exactly what you thought I would do, and if the same circumstances were to happen again … and considering how much of an asshole he is, it’s likely … I’ll probably do it again. So why make this any more painful than it has to be and just end it now?”
His eyes narrowed slightly at that. “End what now?”
“My life. That’s why you locked the door, isn’t it?”
“Kennedy, why do you always assume I’m still going to kill you?” he asked me, instead of answering my question. When I gave him a pointed look, he sighed and raked his hand through his hair. “Okay,” he said. He got to his feet and offered a hand down to me. “Let me make something completely clear: I am not going to kill you.”
My mouth fell open as I stared up at him, my eyes wide. “What? Why not? I thought attacking a human was unforgivable?”
He met my gaze, his eyes momentarily flashing that mossy green, before he shook his head. “Do you really think, after all this time, I would kill you?” He arched an eyebrow. “Detention, on the other hand...”
He was still offering me his hand, but I didn’t dare take it. My hands were shaking, whether from fear or relief, or simply from lingering rage. Instead, I got myself to my feet and put some space between us. For something to do, I reached up and pulled the band from my misshapen ponytail, playing with the elastic between my fingers.
“So why did you hit him?” Gabriel asked.
“The same reason I’ve hit everyone else,” I mumbled.
He took a moment to size me up, then led me over to the bleachers, setting me down next to him. I kept my gaze on the elastic band, but he turned in towards me.
“Your mother,” he said simply.
My face burned in shame as I nodded. Not at my mother being crazy—not even at the fact she’d tried to get rid of me—but because both of those things were my fault. “Yes.”
“I think it’s time you told me everything,” he said, gently.
I gave him a sour look. “I thought you knew everything. You’re an angel after all.”
“I’m an angel, not God. When I first met you, I thought I was hunting a nephilim. Not a potential, if you remember.” He shifted his weight. “Angels know a lot of things, but we’re not omnipotent.”
I didn’t know where to start. I wasn’t even sure there really was a beginning to start at.
“I suppose things were fairly normal until my thirteenth birthday,” I began, keeping my eyes locked firmly on my hands. “It wasn’t long after that when I started getting in trouble at school—I’d lose my temper easily. About the same time, I think, my mom’s attitude towards me changed.”
I took a deep breath, surprised at how shaky it was, then continued.
“It didn’t happen a lot to start with, but every now and then, she’d look at me like she didn’t recognize me. It was as though I was someone else—something else. Then she turned up at school one day, in the middle of a class, and announced to the teacher that I was to stay there and that she didn’t want me anymore. They called in Social Services but when they spoke to my mom, she told them that she hadn’t had much sleep and had been under a lot of stress. When they announced they were going to keep an eye on us, we just upped and moved to another city.
“It was fine again for a while, and then she slipped back into that person who didn’t know who I was. I got her to go to a doctor who gave her some pills. They helped for a while too.” I couldn’t help the bitter laugh that escaped me. “They would have worked if I wasn’t there. Hell, she wouldn’t have needed them if I wasn’t there.”
I could feel my jaw shaking as I fought to hold back the tears. Sensing that wouldn’t be enough, I closed my eyes.
“You’re not at fault, Kennedy,” Gabriel said softly. “And whatever guilt you’re carrying over your mother, you need to let it go.” They were words that I so desperately needed to hear, but I knew they weren’t true. “Those that fell, they …”
Gabriel sighed deeply and shifted his weight so our knees were touching. There was a jolt of warmth that shot through me, and I opened my eyes to find his face close to mine.
“They fell because they chose to follow Lucifer. They all thought they were better than man. Amongst them, their abilities made them seem like gods and the power and the arrogance that followed twisted their minds further. They started sleeping with humans, not because they loved them, but because they wanted to create an army to destroy Heaven.”
I stared at him through teary eyes, trying to follow what he was saying.
My father used my mom just so he could have me to be a soldier?
“But my mom used to tell me stories of when they met,” I mumbled, my voice thick from tears I was still trying to fight back.
Gabriel gave me an apologetic look and reached over for my hand. “I’m not going to pretend I knew what kind of relationship your parents had, and it is possible that he loved her, but the fact that she saw you as something other than what you are tells me that he at least acted in a way that had her worried. So worried, that she couldn’t see what you really are.”
“And what’s that?” I managed to choke out.
“A potential,” he said simply. “If
you truly were evil, there would be no way you would have been given the opportunity to earn your wings.” He gave my hand a squeeze and leaned in closer. “It seems to me that while you don’t always make the best decisions, you do make them with the best intentions. If we can harness that anger into something positive, we’ll make a good guardian angel out of you yet.”
“But my mom–”
Gabriel released my hand and reached for my chin, tilting it up carefully, but in a way that I would have no choice but to look at him. Then, cupping my face, he gently wiped the tears from my eyes.
“Kennedy,” he said firmly. “Your mother’s illness is not your fault. When I brought you here, I went back to her, and I told her you had been accepted into an exclusive college. She was proud of you. I promise you, I will find her, and you can see for yourself.”
A rush of emotion flooded me. With a sob, I flung myself at Gabriel. He seemed surprised, but his reactions were quick enough to catch me and wrap his arms around me as I cried against him. I don’t know if I was crying over sadness, happiness, or sheer relief, but I clung to that black T-shirt of his and let it all out.
Eventually the tears ran dry, and I calmed down, helped by Gabriel’s hand gently rubbing my back. For a few minutes I allowed myself to relax and feel safe, and then I took a deep breath and pushed myself away before getting to my feet.
“Can I say goodbye to Leigh-Ann?”
Once again, I managed to confuse him. “Why would you need to say goodbye to anyone?” he asked. “I thought I’d made it clear that I wouldn’t kill you.”
“I know.” I nodded. “But Dean Pinnosa also made it clear that any fighting would get me expelled.”
“Ah.” He nodded. “There is that.”
“Do I get to say goodbye?” My words bordered somewhere between miserable and hopeful.
Gabriel got to his feet and resumed the position I was familiar with. Behind his folded arms, he considered me. “I think, by definition, a fight indicates that at least two parties were partaking in the scuffle. At worst, what I witnessed was a one-sided act of violence.”
I couldn’t help but arch my eyebrow. “I think I see why you’re a gym teacher and not an English teacher,” I told him before I could help myself.
