Cross. They were beautiful. There was no getting around it. Surreally, unnaturally
stunning.
But what the hell were they doing here?
"Right on time," Roland murmured.
On her other side, Shelby asked, "Who invited them?"
"My thoughts exactly," Luce said, but she couldn't help swooning a little at the
sight of Daniel. Even though things between them were a mess.
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"Luce." Roland was chuckling at her expression as she watched Daniel. "Don't
you think you should answer the door?"
The doorbell rang.
"Is that Callie?" Luce's mom called from the kitchen over the whir of the stand
mixer.
"Got it!" Luce shouted back, feeling a cold pain spread through her chest. Of
course she wanted to see Callie. But more overwhelming than her joy at seeing her best
friend, she realized, was her hunger to see Daniel. To touch him, to hold him and breathe
him in. To introduce him to her parents.
They would be able to see, wouldn't they? They'd be able to tell that Luce had
found the person who had changed her life forever.
She opened the door.
"Happy Thanksgiving!" a high southern voice drawled. Luce had to blink a few
times before her brain could connect with the sight before her eyes.
Gabbe, the most beautiful and the most perfectly mannered angel at Sword &
Cross, was standing on Luce's porch in a pink mohair sweater dress. Her blond hair was a
gorgeous frenzy of braids, pinned up into little swirls on top of her head. Her skin had a
soft, lovely shimmer--not unlike Francesca's. She held a bouquet of white gladiolas in
one hand and a frosty white plastic ice cream tub in the other.
Next to her, her bleached-blond hair grown brown at the roots, stood the demon
Molly Zane. Her torn black jeans matched her frayed black sweater, like she was still
following Sword & Cross's dress code. Her facial piercings had multiplied since the last
time Luce had seen her. She had a small black cast iron kettle balanced in the crook of
her arm. She was glaring at Luce.
Luce could see the others walking up the long, curving walk. Daniel had Callie's
suitcase hoisted up over his shoulder, but it was Cam who was leaning in, smiling, his
hand on Callie's right forearm as he chatted with her. She didn't seem to know whether to
be slightly nervous or absolutely charmed.
"We were just in the neighborhood." Gabbe beamed, holding out the flowers to
Luce. "I made my homemade vanilla ice cream, and Molly brought an appetizer."
"Shrimp Diablo." Molly lifted up the lid of her kettle, and Luce breathed in a
spicy garlic broth. "Family recipe." Molly slapped the lid back down, then pushed past
Luce into the foyer, stumbling over Shelby in her path.
"Excuse you, " they said gruffly at the same time, eyeing each other suspiciously.
"Oh, good." Gabbe leaned in to give Luce a hug. "Molly's made a friend."
Roland took Gabbe into the kitchen, and Luce had her first clear view of Callie.
When they locked eyes, they couldn't help themselves: Both girls broke into involuntary
grins and ran toward one another.
The impact of Callie's body knocked the wind out of Luce, but it didn't matter.
Their arms were flung around each other, each girl's face buried in the other's hair; they
were laughing the way you laugh only after too long a separation from a very good
friend.
Reluctantly, Luce pulled away and turned to the two guys standing a few feet
back. Cam looked as he always did: controlled and at ease, slick and handsome.
But Daniel looked uncomfortable--and he had good reason to be. They hadn't
spoken since he'd seen her kiss Miles, and now they were standing with Luce's best friend
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and Daniel's enemy-turned-... whatever Cam was to Daniel now.
But-Daniel was in her home. Within shouting distance of her parents. Would they lose
it if they knew who he really was? How did she introduce the guy who was responsible
for a thousand of her deaths, whom she was magnetically drawn to almost all the time,
who was impossible and elusive and secretive and sometimes even mean, whose love she
didn't understand, who was working with the devil, for crying out loud, and who--if he
thought showing up here uninvited with that demon was a good idea--maybe didn't know
her very well at all.
"What are you doing here?" Her voice was bone-dry because she couldn't talk to
Daniel without talking to Cam, too, and she couldn't talk to Cam without wanting to
throw something heavy at him.
Cam spoke first. "Happy Thanksgiving to you, too. We heard your house was the
place to be today."
"We ran into your friend here at the airport," Daniel added, using the flat tone he
spoke in when he and Luce were in public. It was more formal, making her yearn to be