Carry On Wayward Son(10)

Clutching the back of Claire’s jacket, Hillary spoke against her shoulder. “It said it wanted my life, it deserved to live my life . . .” She buried her face, shaking in Claire’s arms.

“Hush now. You told me more than enough. Annie, I want you to take them out of—” A figure flashed past the doorway. Too solid to be a ghost. “Get them out. Now, Annie.”

“Claire—”

“Go.”

She handed Hillary over to her mother, stood between them and the doorway leading to the rest of the house. Behind her, Annie spoke in a soothing voice, their footsteps moving away from her. “She’ll be okay—she knows what she’s doing. We’ll just wait for her out—”

Claire spun when the door slammed shut. Cursing, Annie yanked at the ornate knob—and snatched her hand away with a pained cry. She stumbled backward, Regina catching her around the waist to keep her from smacking into the wall.

Turning back to the doorway, Claire wasn’t surprised to find the figure standing there, the edges of his body wavering. He was nearly transparent, like a ghost, but he didn’t give off the cold, or the eerie sense of the recently dead.

“They don’t need to stay,” she said, her voice low, even. “I am the one who can help you. Let them go and I will—”

“Who are you?” He floated into the room, hovering in front of Claire. “You are—wrong, somehow. I am unable to see beyond, and that is—never mind.” His gaze moved past her. “They stay.”

“Not here. Annie, take them upstairs, lock yourselves in one of the bedrooms. Stop them,” she said, when he let out a snarl and started to move, “and you will become a smear on the wall.” When he faced her she had the shotgun out of the duffle and aimed at him. Rock salt may not stop whatever he was, but it would hurt.

They stared at each other as footsteps echoed around them, faded. Silence stretched out, the shotgun starting to weigh down Claire’s arms. She simply tightened her grip, ignored the ache. And watched him gradually become solid.

“Look at me,” he said, the beauty of his voice wrapping around her heart. Heat flared through the amethyst at her throat. Heart pounding, she lowered the shotgun. It had been centuries—more than she wanted to remember—since she heard one of them speak. “Look at this.”

Closing her eyes briefly, she looked at the arm he held out. And saw the mark, on the inside of his right wrist. A pair of wings surrounding a flaming sword. Something she had not seen for those same centuries.

God above—

She was right. What they faced was no ghost.

He was a guardian angel.





FOUR



Simon dropped the pen on his desk, stared at the letter he was writing to console yet another veteran’s family. He rubbed his eyes, fighting the despair these letters always dredged up. Too many memories, too many friends he’d lost, both in war and on the force.

He thought entering the priesthood would help soften that grief. And for a while, it did. When he had been immersed in his religious studies, the real world faded into the background, along with the pain he carried. But once he was assigned to his first church, life invaded, and he understood it would take more than prayer and solace to heal the wounds on his soul.

Time helped, and the care of people he respected. Claire and her friends had been a surprising addition to his life. But his connection to them led him here, to Santa Luna, and a congregation that not only listened but supported him. Even after learning about his past, his ability to see power.

Pushing to his feet, he went in search of coffee, and a break from his task, to ease the weight of the grief. The time on the kitchen clock surprised him; it had been more than an hour since Claire stopped by. She usually called when she was done, and she didn’t expect this job to be an actual haunting.

Simon pulled out his cell and tapped in her number. It rang once—then static poured out of the phone.

He jerked it away from his ear. And dropped it when the static began to form words. In Latin.

“God—what did you walk into this time, Claire?”

Simon grabbed his car keys, the duffle he always kept beside the door and ran for his car.



*



Claire backed away from the figure, the shotgun at her side, looking as harmless as possible.

“What do you want with a child? Did she ask for your help?”

He paced her, step for step, the black shirt and trousers setting off his height, his shoulder length golden brown hair. His bare feet made no sound on the old oak floor, where Claire made each wide plank squeak with her weight. Rage surrounded him like a gathering storm.

“You question my presence?”