“With those blades, do we even need Lucifer’s help?” Danika asked.
“I think we’ll need all the help we can get,” I told them. “To use those blades, we have to get close to him, and he’s...he’s strong and fast.”
“But Lucifer?” Dez repeated.
“With or without Lucifer, we need to be able to actually find Gabriel—”
“I know how we can find Gabriel,” I announced, the idea taking shape. “All we need is me.”
“Going to need more detail there,” Zayne said.
“Gabriel has sent demons for me. The imps? He sent them before, and I bet he sent the Seeker demons,” I said. “He’s not going to let me sit and chill between now and the Transfiguration. So, we set a trap—”
“I know where you’re going with this,” Zayne interrupted. “And no.”
The corners of my lips turned down. “Excuse me?”
“You’re going to suggest using yourself as bait and I cannot get behind that.”
“I didn’t know I needed you to get behind—” I squeaked as Zayne spun me and the bar stool around. I stared up at him, eyes wide. “That was like one of those carnival rides. The kind with those little teacups that spin and—”
“You’re not using yourself as bait, Trin.” He glared down at me, the glow behind his eyes intensifying. “No way. That’s too dangerous.”
“Anything we are about to do is too dangerous,” I argued. “We need to be able to find Gabriel, and as far as I know, there’s no archangel private investigator we can hire.”
“You’re right that everything we have to do is dangerous, so we don’t need to go out there with the mentality on how we can make this even more so.”
“He’s not going to kill me, Zayne. Spoiler alert, he needs me alive until the Transfiguration.”
The white light flared behind his pupils. “Death isn’t the only thing I’m worried about. Bael is most likely with him, and that is one demented, pain-loving demon.”
“It’s not like I don’t know how to defend myself. I have grace and those angel blades.” I struggled not to get too angry since I knew his refusal to hear this out was coming from a place of love and fear. “I could easily be tagged with a tracer or something, and you can follow me to where he is—”
“And what if something goes wrong? The tracer doesn’t work or they find it on you?” he shot back. With his hands still on the sides of the bar stool, he lowered his head so we were almost eye level. “What if I don’t get to you in time?”
I took a deep breath and released it slowly. “Just a reminder—he needs me alive.”
“And just a reminder, he can hurt you. Bad. He could hurt our—” He cut himself off with a sharp breath. “Death isn’t the only thing we have to worry about.”
But he didn’t need to finish what he was going to say, because I knew what he was thinking of. Our child. Our possible child. My stomach dipped sharply. I hadn’t even thought of that.
Which was yet another indication that child-rearing was not going to be something I excelled at.
Like at all.
God, I didn’t even know if I wanted a child, sooner or later. I didn’t even know if Zayne was really okay with the possibility of one or he was just being a good...fallen angel, but I didn’t want to hurt...it until I knew.
Referring to a child as “it” was probably another good indication that I should not even be considering a child.
“He’s right,” Dez chimed in with that voice—that too-gentle one. My back stiffened, and I immediately regretted going to Dez about the whole baby thing, because I now recognized that voice. “It’s too dangerous, Trinity.”
I opened my mouth, but snapped it shut as my stomach decided to take another dip all the way to the floor. Was Dez weighing in because he’d discovered something? Panic blossomed in my chest, but I shut that down before it could take root. Even if Trueborns could reproduce, that didn’t mean I was automatically pregnant after having unprotected sex one time. My reproductive system wasn’t a bad Sex Ed video. I needed to calm down.
Because pregnant or not, I still had a duty, a dangerous one, and Zayne needed to understand that.
“I know what the risks are. All of them.” I placed my hands over his. “And you know what the risks are if we fail. Even if we managed to disrupt the ley lines, we still have to deal with Gabriel. He has to be stopped, because he won’t. He’ll keep killing and he’ll keep plotting. You know that.”
His jaw hardened. “I do.”
“We just need to be careful.”
“That’s what I’m saying.” His gaze searched mine. “Getting yourself caught isn’t being careful.”
“It’s better than getting captured unprepared,” I pointed out.
“He’s not going to capture you,” he swore.