Broken Wings (An Angel Eyes Novel) Read Free Page B

foundation’s looking to do some publicity in the near future. I wonder if I could convince you to help us out with some print work, maybe a commercial or two?”
    She’s not the first one to ask. My agent’s called no less than a billion times over the past several months. I tell Olivia the same thing I tell Susie.
    “I don’t think so. Dance is really my thing. I can get you the numbers of a few girls in Portland who might be interested, though.”
    She shrugs off my offer. “Models in the city are easy enough to come by, but I’d like the opportunity to work with you .” She produces a business card. “Take it. If you change your mind, give me a call.”
    I don’t want her business card. I don’t plan to change my mind. Still, politeness demands I take it. But the minute her fingers touch mine, I jerk away. The halo flames red-hot against my wrist—angry hot.
    Her face pales and her caramel eyes narrow.
    She felt it too. She balls her hand into a fist but leaves it hanging there, the business card wrinkled.
    “Probably just static electricity,” she whispers. “This dry weather and all.” But her eyes are on my hand, and I have a sickfeeling, like I’ve just given up a friend’s secret. I slide both arms behind my back and twine my fingers together.
    “There,” she says, placing the card on the bathroom counter. “Don’t want another shock, do we?” And then she takes a step back and grabs the door. “I’d appreciate you taking the card, Brielle. Just in case.”
    But I leave the card on the counter and walk away.
    Because she’s right.
    Another shock is the last thing we need.

3

Pearla
    P earla watches the demon chained to the floor. He struggles to stand as the Fallen assembled round about bite and snap at him from a distance.
    The Fallen are a species who eagerly devour their own kind. Cannibalism, the humans call it. Yes, they specialize in cannibalism. Only here, in the depths of hell, the beings are spirit. Not flesh and blood. And death doesn’t come easily to spirit beings.
    The chewing lasts for ages.
    But the blistering, smoking wounds on this one weren’t inflicted by another demon. The Fallen don’t use fire as a weapon. They fear it. The demon waiting below is nursing wounds that could only have come from the pit.
    The abyss.
    The eternal fire created for the devil and his angels.
    Pearla’s seen it—navigated the cavern on occasion. It’s a place that cannot damage her. When the Prince’s stronghold was formed, the Creator confined the celestial light that was displaced to a chasm just beyond the black walls of Abaddon.There holy fire reflects itself eternally, magnifying in that ever-brightening divide.
    The pit is a glorious thing to the angels of light. It is God’s goodness multiplied. But for those who chose darkness, the abyss is feared above all. Because even the Fallen heal.
    Angelic beings are eternal; regardless of the damage they sustain, their spiritual bodies cannot be destroyed. Those sent to the abyss for punishment are burned by the Father’s radiance again and again, only to spontaneously adapt and scar, healing in their own twisted way to be singed and charred once more.
    It’s hell.
    And ironic, really. The very thing that energizes Pearla and the other angels of light is devastation to their adversaries. All because of a choice they made long ago. A choice none of them has the capacity to regret.
    Pearla has surfed the abyss, searching for answers, for clues. She’s watched the Fallen count their time there in licks of flame, wondering, between screams of misery, when and if the Prince will summon them from its cavernous depths.
    Silence consumes the assembly now, imposed on them by the sight of an icy white figure dropping into the hall from above. His wings, spread wide, are white, save the tips, which retain a char he’s never rid of.
    Black-tipped wings for the Prince of Darkness. Healthy wings. Strong wings. His skin shines like polished marble.