Chapter 5 #3
“She’s not here. She had some other business to attend to.” He frowned, as though he didn’t approve of whatever it was.
I beamed at him and leaned close. “She’s so adorable. We’ll miss her while she’s gone.”
He gave me a squint. “Sure. Who else will you objectify the males with?”
“Not you.” I cocked my head as I studied him and his bare chest. “Unless…”
“Not me,” he growled, disappearing back into the shadows.
I hesitated and then ate another cookie. If he was going to try and poison me with his blood, that meant they were mine.
Heavenly deliciousness. Without the angel to distract me, I could really focus on the baked goods. More like baked best. So, so good. Maybe it was the angelic blood that added a little euphoria to it.
By the time I’d eaten half of them, I was slightly dizzy, woozy, and blissed out, and then the angry camerawoman came in to gesture at me.
“Why aren’t you in the library?”
Somehow I didn’t roll my eyes. She’s the one who had kicked me out.
This segment would be live, so hopefully Pearly White didn’t eat anyone.
I checked my dress, slung my basket over my arm, and then checked my teeth to make sure there wasn’t any chocolate or angel’s blood on them.
Did that count as assassination attempt?
Even if it had affected me, that much blood wouldn’t do much more than make a vampire sleepy and lethargic.
Maybe he was just curious to see what his blood would do to me.
You know, ‘what is a born vampire, anyway? And what risk is she to the rest of the world?’ that kind of thing. That’s probably what it was.
Why did my heart fall thinking that the odious angel would only be here to satisfy his curiosity about the kind of threat I was?
It’s not like he’d ever come on a dating show to actually date and then marry me.
Anyone who did that would be crazy, even crazier than baking cookies with a dislocated shoulder.
The dislocation kind of explained why he hadn’t shaken the werewolf’s hand or agreed to do weights, though.
He was here on a mission, and the mission was me.
In the library, everyone was in one of two groups, but it wasn’t grouped heavenly versus infernal.
The incubus, the werewolf, and the angel were all in a group looking tense, I mean, the angel looked like a cat who’d eaten a canary, but the other two looked tense.
In the other group, the devil was showing the layout of his most recent casino to the fairy and the elf, drawing with markers on a napkin.
Seriously? Even in the meet-and-greet he was selling?
Weren’t devils supposed to be more subtle than that?
If he was being subtle, the selling would be a cover for something else. But what?
“Welcome, Princess! You look stunning,” Pearly White said, taking my hand and drawing me towards the devil’s group. “Who would like to get the lovely princess some hot cocoa?”
“I just got this cup,” the annoying angel said, pushing in to stand on my side opposite the siren.
“It has teddy bears,” he said, holding up the cup and the adorable saucer.
There were little pink and red hearts painted around the scalloped rim, so it really did match my dress beautifully.
And the teddy bears on the mug were absolutely adorable.
I wanted to smash the cup on the floor and punch Richard the Lion’s face, but instead I smiled sweetly and took it.
If he thought he could poison me with his blood, he'd soon realize that he had to do it with his personality.
I sipped the hot liquid and then smiled at the gentlemen around me. “Mr. Fellicci, how do you like your chocolate?” I asked the fairy.
He smiled back at me, his heart in his eyes. “It tastes miraculously better since you entered the room. You must be an enchantress.”
“Don’t insult the poor girl,” Richard said, scowling at him. “Enchantresses are terrifying.”
Monterose ignored him, just kept beaming at me.
Right. I cleared my throat. “Thank you. It’s very good chocolate. Have you been getting a lot of hits on the duet?” Was that okay to say in a meet-and-greet, or would talking about our platforms be in as bad taste as the Devil drawing diagrams?
“It had a very good response from the viewers. I hope that you’ll allow me to duet with you again. Perhaps we could make it a regular feature?” His eyes twinkled, and sparkles around him sparkled. He was definitely creating those effects.
“I’d love that!” Of course I would, but he seemed so over-the-top fake, it was hard to take him seriously.
“He sings,” the devil said, pushing the elf towards me while his eyes glimmered with amusement. “He’s an elf. Elves always sing, and much better than fairies.”
“I’m not a singer,” the elf said quickly, looking embarrassed.
“But surely to please the lovely princess, you will pretend.”
The evil angel, who looked ridiculously good in Mitt’s shirt, frowned at the devil. “You sing as well. We all sing, or she wouldn’t have chosen us.”
“I didn’t technically choose you. I chose Lorien, the Cupid.” I kept my smile sweet, but it was an effort.
The fairy snorted a laugh and then covered it with the worst fake cough I’d ever heard. “Yes, a pity the cupid couldn’t make it. The scent of war doesn’t really belong in the library, does it?”
“Princess,” Mini said, pushing between the devil and the elf. “Could I have a word with you? It’s about a restoration project Sultry is obsessing about.”
I blinked at her. She’d chosen now, on live television to talk about restoration? The weirdness had me frozen when I should have moved. She raised a gun and and discharged it into my chest then leapt at me, pointed teeth bared, clenching a buzzing blade in her green fist.
I stumbled back from the force of the ball, pain flaring while the moment stretched out, slowing even though it was already too late to stop her. She’d shot me in the heart and now she was going to cut off my head so I couldn’t survive her attack.
She pulled up with an enormous sword coming out of her chest, heavenly flames flickering over the gold. In a moment she was covered in flames, screaming, consumed while Richard the Lion stabbed the sword in the floor so Mini stayed there, burning.
I gasped to protest and blood came up my throat. Right. This was probably going to kill me, and then I’d be a turned vampire, and which of my suitors would stay around for that?
Richard knelt over me, shoved his hand into my chest and pulled out the large, barbed bullet that had been in my heart. “Since you healed me without asking for my consent, I’ll do the same,” he murmured in a low voice that was everything delicious and forbidden.
Lines of gold spread over me, healing that fought back the blood pumping out of me. It was no good. I was losing blood too fast for the healing spell to kick in. It was only my life, why had he killed Mini?
He’d killed one of my only friends! I snarled and sank my teeth in his nearest limb, which was an arm, up near the elbow. He inhaled sharply, but didn’t stick a sword though me, just continued working on the spells like I wasn’t more than a mosquito.
My anger flared, that he thought so little of my threat, but then his blood really hit me, and heaven wasn’t a strong enough word for how good he tasted.
So good. So sweet and alive, like all the love songs swirled into one elixir of perfect happiness.
I didn’t notice the pain of healing when I could drink his life into myself.
Such a sweet life. Such a beautiful soul.
Such a shining, glorious, marvelous world where he was in it, and so was I.
Someone picked me off the floor and moved me to the couch by the fire, but I kept my jaws clenched around the angel’s arm, drinking in bliss, loving absolutely everything about my existence.
For a long time I was like that, curled on the couch drinking the angel’s arm, until the spells in me clicked, and my heart lurched like it was starting fresh. I wasn’t dead, and the angel killed Mini!
I spit out his arm and tried to sit up, but I was wrapped in his arms with golden soft feathers over both of us, like the softest, fluffiest, best duvet in the world. We were lying on a lovely red couch, now covered liberally in my blood. Happily, I was very good at getting blood out of things.
Around the room, quiet conversations continued, and there in the center, still burning with heavenly flame, was the sword. But nothing was left of Mini. My heart lurched, that time from emotional pain. She’d been a friend of mine. Why did she shoot me? And why did the angel kill her?
Said angel stood up, bringing me to my own feet.
“It’s been a pleasure,” he said, giving me a smirk that had me wanting to rip his face off and throw it into the fire.
Then he left me, pulled his sword out of the floor, extinguishing the flames, and then walking out, wings still fluffy and delicious, framing his golden head.