Chapter 6
Ilay Charlie down in the only bed I’ve found. Her head is still bleeding, and I am concerned about the concussion now that I know what it is. As much as I hate touching her and getting a rush of her memories, it’ll help me keep her alive.
In fifteen minutes, I’ll wake her up and check on her.
Until then, I need to fix her head. I back out of the room, not convinced she’s really asleep, then dip into the bathroom.
I wet a rag with soap and water, grab the first-aid kit, and return to her in bed.
She’s breathing evenly, her eyes flicking back and forth below the lids.
Exhaling slowly, I try to remind myself what I’m here for as I gently wash her face of Death’s blood and her own. She’s more than she’s supposed to be, but she’s as furious and unyielding as I expected when I was forced into this mission.
With wings, it would be easier to convince her of what I am, to guide her to the Bible and to redeem her soul, to give her the armor she’ll need. Though, I’m rather convinced she’d mock me if I read to her or she’d throw the book at me if I untied her.
Hateful little human thinks that she knows better than the angels, better than God.
When did they become so much like …
The word ‘toddler’ floats in my head, something loud, demanding, arguing with the sole purpose of being loud and getting their way even if it’s bad for them.
“Hurts,” Charlie grumbles.
I blink myself back to the present and realize I’m pressing down on the wound that mars her temple. I pull the cloth back, then put a large bandage over the gash.
“You need to eat,” I say evenly, then glance at the timer. Only because it might make her more pliable and keep her conscious.
“I need plenty. Namely, not to be stuck with some crazy person who thinks he’s an angel. A person who thinks I need to be saved from the devil,” she hisses, wedging her leg between us and trying to push me away.
Instead, I take the chance to check her ankle and knee.
One prayer won’t fix it. Not with my threadbare divinity.
If only she knew … Not that she’d believe it.
She clearly has some hang-ups on religion.
Honesty is supposed to be a virtue, however, with Charlie, virtue may be interpreted as insanity or manipulation based on how she’s reacted to me so far.
Humans are fragile, Suriel. Comfort can become a need for them, God once said to me when the humans were sweet and curious, when they were worth gentle hands.
I grind my teeth for a moment, but focus on the human in front of me, one who’s clearly never known gratitude.
“Food, water, and a change of clothing,” I list for myself, looking at the blood all over her, her jeans that are still unzipped, showing me the silky red panties she has on.
“Yeah, angels don’t drool over panties,” she argues. “If you were an angel, I’d have paradise in front of me, wouldn’t I? Your dick doesn’t qualify.”
Rather than dignifying that with any form of response, I stand and look through the dresser to find what’s available. I find a large button up and toss it in her direction. Unfortunately, I only find men’s underwear. I toss her a pair anyway.
Her face scrunches in disgust, then she notices I’m making one pile and her vicious tongue puts itself to work again.
“I’d like you to put on clothes. Any clothes. Your tattoos are making me dizzy,” she sneers. “Or, if you want to be a nudist, at least tell me what the fuck is going on. Where you came from, why you were dead, why-”
I’m no longer in the mood to listen to her criticize things she doesn’t understand or spit on my attempts at hospitality.
Grabbing some fabric, I wrap it around her head, fitting it between the corners of her mouth and tying it in place even as she squirms and curses me in muffled, unintelligible ways.
When I draw back, she actually hisses at me and tries to bite, but the sound is muffled by the thick fabric between her teeth.
I settle next to her and look her over. “Would you like help changing?”
Her gaze is pointed and unflinching, like she doesn’t want anything I have to offer her. She’s seething, boiling with a mix of fury and violent defense that’s new. It fills my mouth with something bitter. It tugs at some part of me that remembers war and hard decisions.
“Charlie, I’m not going to let anyone hurt you,” I say slowly, pushing the shirt towards her, then getting up.
I’m torn between showering to free my body of blood, dirt, and grime, and dragging on pants to take care of her determination to dress me.
“I’m an inevitable part of your future. It’s time to accept that. ”
She squirms, then hisses before looking at her wrists. Her gaze flicks to me, then lands on the clothing. She kicks them away, then snorts at me.
It’s clothing. Humans apparently require it, but her determination to make this harder than it needs to be is eroding my patience. One more attempt to be kind, to find some balance between comfort and safety, only because it may make things easier between us.
Walking back to the drawers to see what we have, I find something that makes me pause.
I don’t recognize these items. They’re phallic in some instances, others are shaped as little more than a small, curved cylinder.
There’s one that appears to be a rose, but there’s a button on it.
Another that appears to be a tentacle, halved, and captured in silicone.
I hold it up and find a button that makes the tip of it swirl.
A choked laugh draws my attention back to Charlie.
She’s laughing?
I glance at the item, then to her. I toss them towards her. “What are these?”
Her face goes red, her eyes are genuinely delighted as she chokes and laughs again and again. I walk towards her. “Answer me.”
She opens her mouth, her lips looking raw and inviting in a way that I can’t process before I realize she’s reminding me she can’t speak.
I pull the gag out just enough and she giggles.
“My poor depraved angel. Those are pure orgasmic bliss in the right hands. Need me to teach you now that we’re in the apocalypse? ”
I glance at the items, then at her as she spreads her legs despite the pain it causes her. Her eyes are wicked, more tempting than plenty of pure things I’ve seen. “No one wants to die a virgin, Angel. And I can show you how to use them all if you just let me get a shower. Just one shower and-”
I force the gag back into place, then clear the items from the bed. I walk back to the drawer and find something that would probably work better as a gag, but I’m tired of her voice, tired of her jokes at my expense, tired of the mean-spirited laughter that seems natural to her.
Finding a larger shirt and slightly different under clothes, I walk to her. She shakes her head as I set them next to her. She glowers at me, all traces of joy gone, despite the fact her cheeks stay pink.
“This is God’s plan, Charlie. Believe it or don’t. It doesn’t change that it’s real and unfolding exactly as He wrote it. I will uphold it.”
When I work on adjusting her clothing, her shirt first, she squirms and hisses at me. The heat of her soft skin sinks into me and I get a very clear message from her mind.
If God does exist, he has a list of apologies to make. For his shitty plan, for his negligence. Him and any fucking angels.
I stare at her, taken aback by such open hostility.
Whatever she sees in my eyes she must misconstrue as a lust I refuse to let myself feel because she brings her legs up to her chest despite the obvious pain it causes her.
Then she bites at her gag while tugging at her restraints, twisting until the knot loosens.
I grab the leg of her jeans that’s still intact and loom over her. “I will keep you safe.” That apparently needs to be said. “Even if you do get free, you’re not leaving painlessly.”
She glances at the door, then back to me.
I see her mind working through her eyes. She’s falling back into human thinking. Police, laws, rules that can never apply to angels and stopped applying to the world the second demons walked freely on earth. Nothing she knows matters anymore.
It all has to change.
My hand coasts up her calf, hooking under her good knee and tugging her towards me. Fury tries to leave her mouth, but it can’t. I lower my tone. Humans are little more than animals. Easy to startle, easy to anger. I just have to settle her, make her realize this is safe.
“Protecting you from yourself and the world is my job now. You stay here and you will be taken care of. It’s simple. You stay, you obey, and I take care of everything else,” I explain.
She shudders, then looks away. When her eyes fall on me, they’re soft, pleading, watery. She trembles and leans towards me, tugging at her arms, like she wants to tell me something, wants to promise me something.
Charlie may have once been innocent, sweet, even gentle, but something changed her. Perhaps living in a world that forgot God’s plan changed her, shifted her beyond repair. She leans back, her head against the headboard, right between her arms.
She stares at the ceiling and I watch her throat work as she swallows. If she weren’t so hateful, I’d be concerned about my ability to withstand temptation unchanged.
As of right now, she’s making it easy for me to focus entirely on what must be done, even if the outcome becomes more difficult with every word that drips venom from her admittedly attractive lips.
“When I know you won’t run, I’ll release you,” I say evenly. “That simple. Obey, stay, and the next few days will be easy.”
Her eyes flicker between emotions, and my patience is slipping through my fingers. My gaze lifts to the ceiling, asking God again why I have to endure this.
When she shifts slightly, my eyes return to her. She’s too quiet. I know she has something planned, something other than a shower, but I’ll give her that. She does have human needs and I will take care of them and her.
Perhaps that will be enough to redeem us both.