Envy (Fallen Angels 3)

"I would have joined you," Colin said as he floated down the stairs and then walked across the steaminglack-stained ground. "But as you pointed out, I am here to take care of our dearly departed."

"Eddie okay?"

"Yes."

Ad shook his head. "Thank God you were here."

"Indeed."

As the archangel strode through the remains of all those minions, his boots remained pristine even though the ground was a sloppy mess.

He and the other Adrians all looked impressed. And then he realized that they were steaming: Every Adrian had tendrils of smoke rising from their shoulders and backs, the corrosive blood eating through the leather, heading for skin.

On that note ... Adrian ripped off the duster -

Not even a split second afterward, a chorus of flapping went off, like a flock of geese had gotten goosed and taken to the sky. And then the Adrians tossed their coats down on the ground with disgust just as he had.

Colin stopped in front of them all. "Would you like to keep your little friends?"

Adrian looked around at himselves. "They're great backup - I wonder if they do windows? And if you don't mind me asking, how'd you pull this off?"

Colin extended his hand. At some kind of command from him, the surface of the inky sludge covering the driveway and lawn began to vibrate, and then here and there, tiny objects rose, dripping with -

They were shards, Adrian realized, as they shed their coating of minion. Glass - no, mirrored shards.

"Tricky, tricky," Ad murmured.

"Say good-bye to your crew, mate."

He glanced around. And found that he wanted to tell himselves thank you -

In perfect synchronization, all of the other Adrians put their right palms up to their hearts, those dark heads dipping gravely.

And then they were gone, along with their coats.

"Can I have them back if I need them again," Ad asked. "Like if I have to lay some carpet, or move a piano."

"You know where to find me."

"I do." He reached out, but then dropped his hand when he saw the condition of his gloves. "I gotta know something."

"What."

"Why'd you do it?"

"You were going to lose."

"Are you going to tell Nigel?"

"Probably. I subscribe to the notion that it is better to apologize than ask permission."

"Know that one well."

There was a period of silence. "Thank you," Adrian said roughly.

The archangel bowed with grace. " 'Twas a pleasure. Now, I think we should get this cleaned up. Not many neighbors about, but it would be hard to explain, don't you think?"

Good point: If there was just a skirmish, there wasn't a lot of reason to worry about the icky aftermath. God knew that humans left plenty of oily messes around, and smudges on the ground soon disappeared with enough sunlight. This?

"The only option," he muttered, "would be to tell peo the oil tanker exploded on the front lawn."

"And does that not require a permit or some such?"

"Probably. As well as a lot of gunpowder." He shook his head. "Damn, we're going to need a lot of - "

Cleaning solution was the term he was going to use, as he started to wonder how much of that witch hazel concoction he could pull together. Enough for a fire truck would do the job.

Colin, however, took care of it all: Sweeping his hand in a circle, he disappeared every trace of the tremendous fight.

Adrian whistled under his breath. "You wouldn't be in the market for a second job, would you?"

Colin smiled with a dark edge. "That would be against the rules, dear boy."

"And God forbid we bust those bitches."

Adrian yanked off one of his gloves and matched the archangel's cynical expression as the pair of them clapped palms and shook hard.

"Jim's probably waiting for me," Ad murmured, glancing up toward the garage.

"And at the moment, I have nothing better to do."

The relief that Eddie wasn't alone was so profound, he was tempted to hug the motherfucker. "Then I'll just get back to work now."

"And so shall I."

As Adrian nodded and took to the air, he was prepared for Devina in ways he hadn't been before.

Good thing, as it turned out, considering what he walked in on when he got to Veck's.

Chapter 45

When Veck's phone went off at quarter to nine, he was so keyed up, he almost didn't bother answering the f**king thing.

He'd been marching around his house, waiting for something, anything to go down with Heron, that he was practically vibrating off the floor, all live wire with nothing to plug into.

"Aren't you going to answer it," Jim asked from the other end of the kitchen. The angel had been smoking quietly in the chair he'd sat down in, like, frickin' days ago.

Okay, it hadn't been days. This stretch of nothing happening felt like decades.

As the ringer went off again, Veck glanced over. He'd tossed the cell on the counter and it was on vibrate, the thing inching closer and closer to the edge with every trembling ring-a-ding-ding.

He was quite content to let the POS walk itself right off into a free fall. Except then he saw that the screen had one word on it: Reilly.

Veck all but ped across the countertop. "Hello! Hello? Hello!?"

He had no idea why she would be calling him, but he didn't care. Maybe she'd misdialed, or maybe she needed the pizza guy's number. Or, hell, even if she just wanted to cuss him out, he was down for -

"You sound so pent-up there, DelVecchio."

He frowned at the male voice. "Bails?"

"Have I told you how much I love your name? DelVecchio ..." The guy drew out the syllables. "Mmm, just the sound of it gets me off."

"What the f**k are you talking about?"

"DeeelllVeccccchiooo."

Abruptly, Veck felt a shot of blind aggression nail him in the heart. "Why are you on Reilly's phone?"

Although it wasn't as if he couldn't guess. Christ, here it was again, he thought. Another snow job by someone he'd assumed he could trust - only this time, he was terrified of the consequences.

He looked over to Heron, who had put his cig out in the ashtray and gotten up - as if this was what he'd been biding his time for. "Why, Bails?"

There was a grunt and a scraping noise ... the kind of thing that a pair of feet made over the earth.

"Sorry, just moving the body."

Veck squeezed the phone so hard, one of the dial keys went off with a screech. "I'm going to kill you. If you hurt her - "

There was a slapping sound. And then a groan. "Wake up, bitch. I want you to talk to him."

"Reilly." So help them both, Veck was going to rip Bails's head off his shoulders and bowl with it. Then he was going to disembowel the body and cut off the arms and legs.

But first, he'd castrate the motherfucker.

"Reilly - "

"I'm ... sorry ..." a weak voice said.

Veck closed his eyes. "Reilly, I'm going to get you - "

"I didn't ... believe you ... so sorry ..."

The words were slurred, as if she had a swollen mouth, or maybe - God forbid - had had some teeth knocked out.

"I'm going to come and get you. Don't worry - I'll - "

She cut him off. "I know ... you didn't ... do it... . Bails ... lied - "

Her scream was so loud, Veck had to jerk the phone away from his ear.

"Reilly!" he shouted, his voice ringing around his kitchen. "Reilly - "

"Sorry," Bails cut in. "I had to introduce her to my girlfriend. They're going to have some fun together - at least until you come join us."

"Tell me where you are, motherfucker."

"Oh, I will, but I have someone who wants to say hello first. But not to you. She says for you to give Heron the phone now."

"Fuck that - "

There was a rustle and then a female came on the line. "Hello, little Tommy."

Oh, shit, that voice was ... all wrong. Like someone had one of those distortion filters over the receiver. But that wasn't the only problem.

His father had called him that when he was young.

"Now listen, Tommy, I want you to give the phone over to that big, beautiful man who's standing across your kitchen from you. Then I want you to grab your coat and get nice and armed - I'm talking your guns, your knives, whatever you like. By the time you come back to where you've been pacing around for the last few hours, Heron will tell you where to go."