Wounded Angel (The Earth Angels) - By Stacy Gail Page 0,57
with an efficient mention of the time and a promise to be back. But she’d been gone longer than seemed necessary, and he’d been out of the room with bag in hand the moment the fire alarm had gone off. His ability to move like lightning had never been needed more, and though he logically acknowledged it had only taken a handful of seconds to reach the ground floor, they had been the longest seconds of his life.
Now, miles away from that chaos, he had no idea what it meant that he’d become that rattled over not knowing if Ella was safe or not. Irony of ironies, he was still too shaken to figure it all out.
“Damn.” Huddled in the passenger seat and looking as gray as the overcast day around them, Ella stared at the down-to-the-quick tear in her nail as if it were the most depressing thing that had ever occurred in the universe. “I guess I broke it when I pulled the fire alarm.”
“Ella, I’m sorry.” He didn’t know what else to say.
“It’s just a nail.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t take the possibility of being found more seriously.” That was what he’d meant, and the regret echoed through him until he thought he’d go nuts. “If I’d been with you—”
“Don’t be ridiculous, we can’t walk around for the duration of this...this madness like we’re conjoined twins.”
“I don’t see why not.”
“Because then we would look like that bad condom commercial where the man and woman can’t seem to physically separate. I refuse to be a cliché. Or a bad condom commercial.”
He fought the need to smile. It would mess up his bad-mood groove. “I still should have been there.”
“Why? The same events would have happened.”
“Yeah, but I might have been able to see which way the bastards ran off.” The only thing on his mind had been getting to Ella. That need had been the glue holding his world together, a world he strongly suspected would have fallen apart if he hadn’t been able to find her. But he had, running unerringly to where she’d made it out into the parking lot amidst what appeared to be a sea of traumatized Boy Scouts. Seeing her safe and sound had been such a beautiful moment of relief he had no doubt he’d remember it to his dying day.
And only later did it occur to him that he’d known exactly where she was without even thinking about it.
Kyle had been right; his mojo was coming back. But it was coming through on an altogether different frequency. If he didn’t figure out how it worked—fast—it was going to be worse than useless. It could wind up being a hindrance of the deadly kind, and he’d had enough of that to last him a lifetime.
“I don’t get it.” She’d brought her finger up to her mouth to nurse the damaged tip, then examined it closely. “Why were they there? I mean, why roll up like you mean business, then turn tail and run the moment you’re spotted? What was the point of Rainier and his pet demon even showing up at your hotel like that?”
“Make no mistake, they did have an agenda. I’ll be sure to ask them all about it before I rip them apart with my bare hands.”
He felt her glance brush over him. Then he realized how bad he had it if he was capable of feeling the weight of her gaze. “You might recall from your police days that ripping people apart with bare hands—or anything else, for that matter—is usually referred to as murder.”
“Justifiable homicide in Richard Rainier’s case, and it’s nothing at all for the demon since it wouldn’t technically die—it’d just go back to where it belongs.”
“Uh-huh. I think I read about that in Hellboy.”
God help him for having a weakness for women who made him want to laugh and curse at the same time. “As of now, whether we look like a bad condom commercial or not, we go everywhere together. Understand?”
“We don’t have to walk belly to belly, do we? I have a healthy sense of humor, but even I draw the line at absurdity.”
“Just think how much fun that would be, though.” His hand sought hers before he gave it a thought, and a knot he didn’t know was there loosened in his chest when her fingers laced with his with a welcome squeeze. Bottom-lining it, it was his presence in her life that had dropped this madness on her doorstep, when she’d