by C. L. Coffey
“You chose the better option,” I told him, looking in one of the containers.
“I wasn’t sure what you wanted, so I went for two Caniac combos,” Joshua said, swapping a drink for a box. We fell silent as we tucked into the chicken strips. My lost appetite had been found and it didn’t take long for me to devour everything – even the coleslaw which I normally wasn’t all that fussed with.
“That was needed,” I sighed in satisfaction after I had dumped our empty containers in the trash. I sat back down on the couch and stretched my legs out under the table. When I sensed Joshua’s gaze on me, I turned my head to face him. “What?”
He gave me a grin and then shuffled closer, scooping up the iPad as he did. “I called in at the precinct and emailed some files over. I thought you might want to cast your eye over them?”
I watched as he went into his emails and opened some attachments. I moved next to him, leaning over slightly to see what he had sent. I scanned the screen then turned, frowning. “Joshua, are you sure you can bring these home?” I asked him. They looked like electronic versions of similar files I had seen on his desk at work.
“I trust you,” he said, simply.
“That’s not what I was asking,” I told him, grabbing his hand to stop him scrolling down the document. “I know I’m not supposed to see these – I’ve been told that enough times – but are you allowed to email them to yourself? I don’t want you getting into more trouble. This strikes me as something that could make you lose your job.”
Joshua let out a long breath. “No, I’m not normally supposed to email documents like this, but I spoke to the lieutenant and explained…” he looked over at me, saw that my mouth was hanging open, and quickly shook his head. “I didn’t tell him about anything relating to angels or Potentials,” he assured me. “I just explained that I wanted to do some work, and that I wanted to make sure I was doing it correctly by looking at what the other detectives were doing. He encouraged it, actually. He said it was a good idea provided the only things to leave the precinct were the digital copies.”
I tilted my head and pulled a face. “He encouraged you to look at so many files?” I asked him.
Joshua’s cheeks reddened. “I didn’t give an indication as to how many cases I wanted to look at, but I only took the five investigations which correspond with the autopsy reports which that Angel of Death sent over.”
Five files didn’t seem so bad, and Joshua had said that he was working on two of them anyway. If his lieutenant had given him permission, then I wasn’t going to question it. Instead I turned my attention back to the reports.
The layout of the reports was slowly becoming familiar to me. We started with the investigations Joshua had been working on. He sat patiently while I caught up. Together, we then tackled the remaining three cases.
“Only one of these victims lived in New Orleans. The rest were tourists,” Joshua sighed. “Atlanta, Chicago, Munich, and apparently, Zagreb.”
“Yes, but they were all killed by their significant others, and all of them claim that they weren’t in control of their own bodies,” I pointed out as I flicked back and forth between the reports.
“Insanity plea,” Joshua shrugged. “Leon is forever telling me that’s the first thing a suspect will claim when they’re caught red-handed, like all these suspects were.”
“But what if it wasn’t a claim? What if they really were possessed?” I asked him, remembering what Malik had said to me.
“Then we’re going to have to find another way to connect them, because being possessed is as likely to be believed as angels,” Joshua said with a long sigh.
“Why don’t we just say they’re vampires,” I muttered. “I bet they would believe that.”
“Maybe we need to look at it differently,” Joshua said suddenly. “Like we did when we were trying to find Lilah.”
“You have a whiteboard hiding in your bedroom?” I asked in amusement.
Joshua got to his feet and offered his hand. “Close enough.”
I took his hand and followed him into his bedroom. I sat on the bed, as he indicated, taking the iPad from him, and watched as he disappeared into his closet. There was the sound of boxes being moved around before he reemerged with a shoebox in his hands. “Nikes are going to solve this case?”
Joshua smiled, but shook his head. “Do me a favor and send the photographs of the victims and the suspects to the printer, and then be prepared for some arts and crafts.”
“Aren’t we past them being called suspects now?” I asked him, doing as he requested. From the living room came the sound of a printer whirring into life. “Given that they all confessed to killing their partners, even if it was by possession?”
Joshua disappeared back into the living room. “Until they’re proven guilty by a jury of their peers, they’re still suspects,” he called. He reappeared moments later with a pile of printing which he handed over with a pair of scissors. While I got busy cutting out photographs, he took the iPad from me.
A while later, the large mirror in his bedroom was doubling up as a whiteboard. Joshua had disappeared to his car and returned with a map of New Orleans he’d had in his glove compartment. With some tape, he stuck it in the center of the glass. I remained perched on the edge of the bed, calling out locations as he stuck the photographs around the edge of the mirror and marked on the map where their bodies had been found. Finished, he sat down next to me and we stared at the mirror.
“Even laid out like this, I just don’t see a pattern,” he said, eventually. He brushing a hand through his hair.
I tilted my head. “Actually,” I said slowly. “I think I do see a pattern.” I got up and took a marker from the side. Starting from the first victim, I drew a line to the second, then on to the third and fourth. “Or not,” I muttered, hesitating in drawing the line from the fourth to the fifth. “I’m sorry, I thought I saw a star,” I said, returning to the bed.
I had barely sat down when Joshua was on his feet. “That last location is wrong.”
I reached for the iPad and flicked through to the relevant report. “Nope, the body was found at the Canal Street Station,” I said.
“Found,” Joshua agreed. “But the victim was killed on a streetcar, and I see where you were going with these murders. I’m willing to bet my savings that he died right here.” He marked a spot on the map which I knew to be just down from the Ursuline stop. From there he finished linking up the murder locations.
My eyes widened as I realized what I was staring at. Wordlessly, I took the marker from his hands and drew the final line – a circle around the outside, connecting all the marks.
“It’s a pentacle?” Joshua said.
I nodded. “And look what’s at the center,” I added, marking a point in the middle. “Bee’s.” The pen came to rest on my lips as I stared at the mirror. I was absolutely convinced that this wasn’t due to Leviathan or the Plague of Snakes, but I wasn’t sure how best to broach this topic with Michael.
“What are you thinking?” Joshua asked, taking the pen from me.
“I think there is another angel behind this. One of the Fallen,” I told him. “I’m fairly certain it can’t be an angel who still has their wings. Once an angel kills a human, they fall. I just don’t know which.”
“Could you ask Michael?” Joshua suggested.
That was a good question. Michael had said I could ask him anything, but that wasn’t entirely accurate. I was forbidden from broaching the subject of Lucifer. I didn’t think this was anything to do with Lucifer, but if it was to do with the Fallen, I didn’t want to upset him, just when we were starting to get on. “I think it might be better if I talk to Veronica,” I shrugged. “Would you mind running me back to the convent?”
“Are you going to talk to her now? It’s late,” Joshua asked, surprised.
It was past midnight. “I know,” I replied. “I probably won’t speak to her tonight, but I should be there so I can speak to her before breakfast.�
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“You know you can always stay here?” he offered.
“I know,” I told him with a smile.
* * *
I was up before dawn. I knew I would be spending the morning training with Raphael, so I dressed in my workout outfit before heading downstairs. There was already noise coming from the canteen – chatter and pans clattering behind the hatch. I made my way through the tables to the kitchen door and stepped in.
You know those nightmares you have where you walk into a classroom and it goes quiet and you look at yourself and realize you’re naked. For a moment, I thought that was actually happening to me.
The cherubim closest to me saw I was there, then the next lot, and finally, the kitchen was silent of chatter. The only noise was the food cooking. “Hi,” I said, awkwardly as I gave myself, what I was hoping was, a subtle once-over just to make sure I wasn’t standing there naked. “Is Veronica here?”
There was a pause, and I gave myself another check, before Veronica stepped out from behind a counter brandishing a potato peeler. “Angel?”
“I come in peace,” I offered, my hands extended out in front of me as I tried to give her my brightest smile.
“What do you want?” Garret demanded, appearing beside Veronica, watching me with narrowed eyes.
“To talk to Veronica,” I told him, looking at the cherub in question.
She blew her hair out of her face and shrugged. “About what?” she asked, coolly.
Okay, I deserved this. “Just to be clear, I do not think Lucifer has risen. I’ve spoken to Paddy. She told me about how she defeated the Plague of Snakes, and I believe her,” I quickly told her, ignoring the glares I was receiving from every angel in the kitchen. Awkward. “But, I’ve been looking at some recent murders with Joshua and we think there’s a pattern. I think there’s a pattern.” I quickly explained what we had discovered. “It all circles around Bee’s.”
“We thought Bee’s had something to do with it,” Veronica muttered quietly. She glanced at Garrett, who just folded his arms and gave her a pointed look. Veronica rolled her eyes and turned to me. “We have information, but unless you swear you will not repeat to anyone, we’re not sharing.”
“What about Joshua?” I asked her. “I’m not prepared to make an oath which could potentially put him in harm’s way. He’s a cop and he’s investigating these murders. He’s also my charge.”
Veronica and Garrett shared another look before Garrett nodded. “You can tell him.”
“I swear to God I will not repeat anything that is discussed here with anyone other than those in this room, or Joshua,” I shrugged.
There was yet another look shared between Veronica and Garrett before Veronica finally spoke. “We don’t think it’s the Plague of Snakes, either,” she admitted.
“Are you kidding me,” I growled, stamping my foot in frustration.
She held her hands up. “But we do think there’s someone else attempting to gain power.”
“If you spoke to Paddy about the Plague of Snakes, I take it she told you about the Princes of Darkness?” Garrett asked me. He folded his arms, glaring at me as he waited for my response.
“She told me that Leviathan was one of the seven Princes,” I nodded. “And that she killed him.” I frowned. “You think one of the other Princes is trying to accomplish what Levi couldn’t?”
Garrett nodded. “We think that he is trying to gain the power, rather than send it to Lucifer.”
“Well, some of us think that,” Veronica said, shooting Garrett a glare. “I still think that they’re trying to empower Lucifer.”
“Either way, we think it’s going to happen tonight,” Garrett said, rolling his eyes at Veronica.
“So you need to go get that fake ID off that guy pronto,” Veronica informed me.
I glanced around the room. “And what about the rest of you? How are you going to get in? I’m sorry, but Ty was right: not a single one of you looks remotely old enough to get into a bar. Plus it has taken this long to get mine, which I still don’t have, I might add.”
Veronica’s mouth turned down in the corners. “She’s right,” she said to Garrett.
I tapped my hands on the aluminum counter and frowned. “What if I got in, then found a free cubicle in the bathroom and let you pop in when the coast is clear?”
“That won’t work,” Veronica said, shaking her head.
“It might be more problematic for the guys…” I trailed off when Garrett looked at me like I was an idiot. “What?” I demanded. “Veronica was the one who suggested it in the first place,” I pointed out, folding my arms.
“That was before it was the center of a sigil,” Veronica explained. She shrugged her shoulders and gestured that I join her. “I need to get these potatoes peeled so I can get the hash browns cooking. You help and I’ll explain.”
The rest of the kitchen took that as a sign to continue with whatever part of breakfast they were cooking, and I took the peeler off Veronica. She pulled open a drawer and took out a second peeler, and joined me attacking the large pile. “For a convent full of angels who don’t need to eat, that is a huge pile of potatoes,” I muttered.
“It’s lamb shanks and Dauphinoise potatoes for dinner,” Veronica told me. “It’s a huge building to maintain so we try to get as much of the food prep done in the morning.” She handed a potato to me, and took one for herself. “There are two types of sigils; light and dark. Light sigils are at their strongest in the shape of a cross, but any shape will do, provided it has been blessed. The problem with them is that they’re limited in size, usually to a building – cathedrals and mosques tend to be as big as they can go. They’re powerful, though. The Fallen wouldn’t be able to willingly cross the line, unless the sigil was broken, and that has to be done on the inside.”
“So why not create light sigils around houses?” I asked. “Seems like something mankind would benefit from.”
“They’re ridiculously hard to make and maintain. You remember that protective circle we cast over the city during Tabitha?” Veronica asked. I nodded. “Ideally a smaller version of that needs to be in place when the structure is built, but we would still need a dozen angels and time. These days, they’re limited to holy buildings.”
I finished off the potato I had peeled and reached for a second. At the rate buildings were popping up, that was a no go. “Alright, so there’s a sigil around Bee’s now. How does that stop you appearing in there?”
“Dark sigils are created by the Fallen. They’re created through death, usually in the shape of a five pointed star. The dark sigil will protect a dwelling or small area from being stormed by angels. Like a light sigil, they are used as power conduits.”
I paused in the peeling, staring at the white flesh, before looking over at Veronica. “You can’t teleport yourself in there, but you can walk through the door? Surely all I have to do is find the back exit and open the door for you?”
She shook her head. “It’s not that simple. Yes, we can cross the line, but only when we’ve been invited in.”
“How do you expect me to get in?” I asked her.
Veronica shrugged, looking sheepish. “We figure buying a ticket will do it.”
“You figure?” I repeated, dubiously. I was about to go walking into potential enemy territory based on the guess it could be done by buying a ticket? “What if that doesn’t work?”
“We’ve not exactly tried this before,” Veronica told me. “But buying a ticket is essentially accepting an invitation. If it doesn’t work, then we’ll try something else.”
I set the potato down and turned to her. “Assuming that it does work, how are you going to get in?”
“You buy extra tickets,” she suggested, as though that were obvious.
I tried hard to keep my face neutral, but failed at keeping the sarcasm from my tone. “Sure, I’ll just buy seventeen extra tickets, because that’s something people do all the time and won’t look the slightest bit out of the ordinar
y. Then, after that works, I’ll just stick my head over the balcony and throw them down like beads so you can all walk in. Obviously, because once you have tickets, none of you will be ID’d.”
“Okay, so the plan needs a little more work,” Veronica snapped.
I took a step back and wiped the dirt from my hands onto my shorts, forgetting that they were white until the smear marks appeared. I glanced down and sighed. “I need to meet Raphael. I could probably get one ticket without it looking too odd, and then let you in through a back door, but you guys need to work out how the rest of you are going to get in there. And don’t forget that the majority of you look like you’re stuck in puberty.”
The last comment wasn’t necessary, but I couldn’t stop myself. I left the kitchen to find Raphael waiting for me in the gym, two swords in his hand. “Is everything okay?” he asked me.
I looked at him, ready to tell him that everything was fine, but found concern in his eyes. Combined with his easy going nature, I wanted to spill everything to him. Only when I tried, nothing came out. The oath was a good idea: Raphael would have gone straight to Michael and told him what I was up to, and then Michael would have forbidden me from going to the bar. I still hadn’t gotten inside of Bee’s and found any concrete evidence.
As Raphael looked at me, expectantly, I gave him a small smile. “My charge is a detective. I’m helping him with a murder case.”
Raphael’s expression remained serious. “Your charge must come first. If you need to go, you should.”
I quickly shook my head. “Learning to protect him is what I need to do,” I told Raphael. “He’s at work at the moment and he’s safe there.”
“Very well,” Raphael conceded.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Home of a Diablo
“You should not be trying to attack me, you should be trying to defend yourself,” Raphael pointed out as the tip of his blade touched my side.
I grunted in frustration and stepped out of his reach, brushing the stray strands of hair out of my face. I puffed out my cheeks and glared at him. We had started out with the usual of me being flung around the room and righting myself with my sword drawn, but Raphael had finally moved onto the next step. This consisted of me using the sword to shield off a blow. “I thought the point of a quick recovery was to get up, take advantage of it, and attack,” I pointed out.
