Chapter Thirty-Five
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CATERINA DIDN’T WANT to get up yet. Lying on her back, she closed her eyes and visualized the night sky and the stars she’d always loved so much. “My destiny sucks even more now,” she murmured too quietly for Ramiel to hear her. The knight was downstairs and she wasn’t up to facing him yet.
Sensing her companion leaving the bed and breakfast a few minutes later, she finally got up.
Caterina got dressed and headed downstairs to eat breakfast. When she was done, she walked over to the map that was spread out on a coffee table.
Isolated properties had been circled here and there. They were scattered all over the place.
“He has no idea where his squad is,” the cambion figured with a sigh. Did Fate really expect them to drive all over the state searching randomly for his brothers?
She hadn’t heard the truck leave, but looked through a window at the huge carport. The vehicle was still there.
“Where did Ramiel go?” she muttered. None of the properties nearby had been circled on his map. “Maybe he didn’t bother to circle them, since they’re so close,” she guessed.
Instead of being glad to have some time to herself, Caterina had a niggling feeling that something was going to go wrong. She paced up and down in the parlor, waiting for the warrior to return.
Pain suddenly coursed through her head about an hour after she sensed Ramiel leave.
She fell to her knees, coming close to blacking out.
“What the hell was that?” she asked groggily.
She touched her head, but couldn’t feel a lump forming.
“Ramiel!” she exclaimed, figuring it was his pain she was feeling again.
Her instincts told her to rush to his rescue, but she held back. He’d been created to be a fighter and he didn’t need a borderline evil cambion’s assistance. Despite her reassurances to herself, her concern was growing by the second.
Searing pain came a few minutes later. Caterina gasped in agony and yanked her right sleeve up. Her shoulder looked fine, but her flesh felt like it was burning. The pain didn’t have time to abate and grew even worse.
“He’s being tortured,” she realized, tears stinging her eyes from the overwhelming agony.
That spurred her to action and she unlocked the front door, then sprinted in the direction she could sense her knight.
Hearing an agonized scream a couple of minutes later, Caterina summoned her power.
Her shoulder felt like it was boiling by now.
Enraged that someone was causing her warrior pain, she sped towards the church where she sensed Ramiel.
Her throat felt like it was being crushed by something and it was hard to breathe.
Vaulting over the low brick wall, Caterina pointed at the human who was holding a metal rod against Ramiel’s tattoo. With a scream of fury, she blasted him with white-hot fire. The bandit was flung away from their captive and was immolated before he even knew he was about to die.
Four more fireballs streaked towards her targets, then Caterina grabbed hold of Ramiel’s muscular thighs. She lifted him up high enough for the chain around his neck to ease. They both sucked in some air.
“I didn’t think you were coming this time,” Ramiel said in a raspy voice.
“I didn’t think you’d want my help,” she replied. “I could turn evil at any moment and you’d have to kill me.”
He winced at her bitter tone. “I know you won’t turn evil, female,” he said.
“You could have fooled me,” she muttered. “Can you hold yourself up long enough for me to get you down from there?” she asked.
“Yeah,” he confirmed, then grasped hold of the chains around his wrists. A small stool lay on its side a short distance away. Two of the legs had been broken off during a scuffle.
Cautiously letting him go, the cambion made sure he wasn’t about to choke again.
She strode over to the tree the chains were anchored to and saw they were secured with a huge padlock.
Taking the padlock in her hand, her magic rose.
The metal melted and the lock fell apart.
With a loud rattle, the chains came loose and Ramiel fell.
He landed on his feet and unwound the chains from around his neck.
“Your arm,” Caterina said in horror when she got a good look at his shoulder. His tattoo had been obliterated and his flesh was a mass of melted, charred flesh.
“I’ll heal,” he said gravely, loosening the chains around his legs next.
She knew how much pain he was in, since she shared his agony. “This might help,” she said and crossed to him. She gently placed her fingertips just beneath his injury and drew the heat out of the wound. The pain eased a bit and he gave her a grateful look.
“I owe you for saving my life again, female,” he said.
“What were you doing here?” she asked. “I can’t sense anyone else in this town.”
“I didn’t come here looking for my brothers,” Ramiel said.
He swiped sweat off his forehead with his arm and the chain that was attached to the shackle rattled.
It was hard for her not to stare at his shirtless body.
Well-defined muscle coated him like living armor.
“I was searching for a ham radio when the humans ambushed me,” he explained.
“Did you find one?” Caterina asked.
“I heard something in one of the houses and was attacked when I broke in to examine it,” he said.
“Which house was it in?” she queried. He described it to her and gave her the name of the street, but he hadn’t noted which number the house was. “Wait here, I’ll be back in a second,” she said. He nodded and started searching the bodies to find the key to unlock his shackles.
“Where the hell do people keep getting these shackles from?” Caterina murmured to herself as she hurried to the house.
Finding the correct home, she entered through the now unlocked front door.
The sound of static drew her to the living room.
“Found it,” she said when she saw the device sitting on the coffee table.
It was battery operated, so she didn’t need to worry about taking any cords or cables with her.
She found a backpack in one of the bedrooms and stuffed the device into it.
Ramiel had freed himself from the chains when she returned to him. “Will your tattoo regenerate?” she asked.
He nodded. “Rahab and his unit have tried to remove our tattoos in the past. They always return. They’re a part of us, just as their red-tinted eyes are a part of them.”
Caterina grimaced at that news. “I’ve got the radio. We should head back to the bed and breakfast,” she suggested, holding the backpack out to him. He took it, then they sprinted the ten miles to their temporary base.
“I hope this is set to the Mad Prophet’s channel,” Ramiel said, putting the ham radio next to his map. He sank down onto the couch, wincing in pain. The thick red welts around his neck were rapidly fading, but his shoulder would take longer to heal properly.
“I’ll get you a new shirt,” Caterina volunteered, then walked down the hall to the stairs before he could reply.
It was impossible to concentrate with his gorgeous body on display.
She entered his bedroom and grabbed a t-shirt from his duffle bag.
He’d left the alien warrior romance novel he was currently reading on the nightstand.
Caterina quietly snickered to herself before descending the stairs again.
“Here you go,” she said, offering it to him.
“Thanks,” he said, searching her face for any traces of amusement. He was clearly worried she would ridicule him for his choice of reading material.
“I’m going to make some coffee, since the bed and breakfast has a gas stove,” she said to give him time to recover.
Using a bottle of water from the pantry, she filled a small kettle and boiled the water on the stovetop.
She found a thermos in a cupboard and filled it with hot black coffee that would last her for a few hours.
Ramiel was wearing the shirt when she returned to the parlor. He stared at her as she took a seat on an armchair. “What?” she asked, meeting his somber gaze.
“Why did you save me again, Caterina Blaze?” Ramiel asked. “You know what I’ve done to your kind in the past eras. Why didn’t you just leave me to my fate?”
Looking down at the thermos she was holding, she decided to tell him the truth despite how badly he’d hurt her feelings last night.
“Even though you don’t trust me and my kind, you’re still my destiny,” she said, meeting his green eyes again.
“Granny Blaze is never wrong. She told me we’re supposed to find each other.
Now that we have, we need to stick together.
” She didn’t add that she was ridiculously attracted to him.
It would probably make him run in the opposite direction.
“Agreed,” Ramiel said. His tone was so rueful she glanced up at him again.
“The world is far more dangerous than the previous eras now,” the knight said.
“The majority of humans who were left behind appear to have black souls. I’ve been captured by their kind twice now and I can’t allow my guard to fall again.
We’ll both be far safer if we work as a team. ”
Her hope that he was coming around flared up at his admission. Maybe he was finally seeing that she would never be evil like the cambions he’d encountered in the past.