On Unfaithful Wings (27 page)

“Yes.”

I wanted to get angry, yell and curse, but the simple act of standing tested my depleted energy. “You guys might have mentioned something. Kind of puts a different spin on my job.”

“Sorry, I thought Michael would have told you.”

“Never mind. He came to see me in jail --”

“Michael?”

“No, Father Dominic. He’s punishing me, and Azrael through me. He’s going to kill everyone important to me and I can’t let him do it.”

The world tilted as I staggered toward the door. Poe’s hand under my armpit righted things once more and she helped me across the floor. We left the room of files and papers and stepped into what seemed a different dimension. Children’s laughter filled the air, punctuated by the whistle of a tiny train. A soap bubble floated in front of me, popped on my nose. To my left, stuffed animals smiled from a cluttered shelf, to the right, stacks of puzzles awaited small hands to fumble them together. The police station was in a different part of the city yet I’d made it to the toy store where I’d brought Alf. Sunlight streamed through the front window; soap bubbles blown by a little blond girl floated through the sunbeams, throwing tiny rainbows across the floor. Another time, the scene might have brought a smile, lifted my spirits. Not now. The sight of the toy store brought other thoughts storming back.

“Marty and Todd.” I spun to face Poe, teetering on the edge of losing my balance again. “Did they make it?”

Poe glanced at the floor, telling me the answer before her lips moved. “No,” she said. “Sorry.”

“Damn it.” The warmth and life of the toy store fell away, leaving me shaken and cold. What kind of Hell would Marty and Todd be forced to endure? “Is there anything I can do for them?”

She shook her head.

I couldn’t let this happen to anyone else. I tugged Poe’s sleeve. “Let’s go.”

“Where are we going?” she asked, helping me totter toward the front door.

I didn’t know. How do you prioritize the people you love? How do you decide who to protect from a killer while leaving the others to their own devices?

Rae and Trevor came to mind first, but the priest said he’d save my most loved for last. Could I believe him? It was them or Sister Mary-Therese and, no matter who I chose to protect, I was risking somebody’s life.

I closed my eyes and flipped through my thinly populated mental Rolo-dex to make sure I hadn’t forgotten anyone--people with whom I’d shared drugs and booze, my divorce lawyer (he deserved to go to Hell more than the dope-sellers), anyone who ever uttered a kind word in my direction. I had the sense Rae and Trevor were okay...for now. When my thoughts settled on Sister Mary-Therese an alarm bell sounded so loudly in my head I was surprised it didn’t startle the little girl blowing bubbles.

“We’re going to church.”

Chapter Twenty

Poe perched on my shoulder as I climbed the church steps. Rather than explaining her presence, she’d taken the form of a moth in an effort to be inconspicuous. Don’t ask me why a moth. They’re nowhere near as beautiful as their butterfly cousins and it seemed to me an angel should choose a classier disguise. But it did the trick.

The door closed behind us, its thick wood shutting out the sounds of traffic and life buzzing by, leaving us in the still of the building. The silence compressed my lungs like the weight of the church sat on my chest, making me gasp. Poe’s tiny moth head nuzzled against my cheek.

“I’m okay.” I wondered if I really was.

I bowed my head and crossed myself, a once familiar act grown mildewy through years of disuse, but since recent events suggested my lack of faith might be ill-advised, reacquiring the habit felt appropriate. A few people sat scattered around the nave, heads bowed in silent prayer, each looking to have chosen his or her place as far from the others as possible. I left them to their privacy as I strode down the aisle on legs still shaky but stronger.

An unfamiliar priest--presumably Father Dominic’s replacement--shuffled about near the altar. I made a beeline for him. He looked up at our approach and smiled like a man resentful at being interrupted yet again but doing his best not to show it. He looked about my age --late thirties, perhaps early forties--with thin lips and a hairline that must have started fleeing his forehead in his late teens to have made it that far back.

“Excuse me, Father.”

“Yes, my son?”

“I need to speak with Sister Mary-Therese.”

“Sister Mary-Therese? I don’t believe she’s here today.”

A jolt rampaged up my spine.

“What?” I said louder than I should have. Some of the church-goers looked up from their pleas at the disturbance. I didn’t care. An urgency to find the nun forced itself into my muscles, curling my fingers into fists. “Where is she?”

“Well, I don’t know.” He took a half-step back, shifting into protective mode. People don’t really even trust each other in church.

I leaned closer to the priest, lowered my voice again. “The sister saved me from the streets years ago,” I said, making an effort to release the tension from my body, to convince him of my sincerity. “I’ve hit a tough spot and hoped she could give me some guidance.” Not the absolute truth, but within spitting distance.

He glanced at the way I listed to the right, the dark half-moons painted under my eyes by a sleepless and feverish night and nodded, his expression softening. With a hand on my elbow, he led me aside, away from the altar and the people murmuring their prayers and entreaties, away from the judging eyes of Christ looking down his nose at me from the crucifix on the wall behind the pulpit.

“I can help, my son.”

“No.”

“I’ve had experience in these areas. I can--”

“I need to see the Sister.” I grabbed a fistful of his sleeve to punctuate the words forced through my clenched teeth.

His face blanched, eyes widened and I guessed his experiences in these areas hadn’t all been good ones.

“Sh-she volunteers at the soup kitchen on Wednesdays. If she’s not there, she likes to spend time feeding ducks at the park.”

I nodded and released the priest’s robe. Neither option surprised me. Sister Mary-Therese concerned herself endlessly with the well-being of God’s creatures, human or mallard. The priest watched me, looking like he wanted to speak, but I hurried down the aisle without giving him the chance. The mercy-pleaders perched in their pews watched me go, too. Their eyes bored at my back, and I considered stopping, apologizing to the priest, but slammed through the door into sunlight instead, instantly feeling better out of the church’s guilt-filled air.

The sign down the street flashed 1:12 pm and I did some quick mental calculations: her work at the soup kitchen would be finishing up, so best to head for the park. Time pressed down on me like grave dirt on top of a casket as I hobbled toward the beat-up Escort.

The sister was the one person who cared enough to love me no matter what. I never gave Rae the opportunity to do that, in spite of what our marriage vows said. It didn’t concern me the sister loved everyone the same way, or that I’d never done anything to earn her love. I simply cared she be kept alive.

I opened the driver’s door and fell into the seat; Poe already sat in the passenger side. Her sudden presence startled me--I’d thought her still a moth sitting on my shoulder.

“How do you do that?”

She shrugged. “Angel stuff.”

I grunted, slammed the key into the ignition and cranked it. The engine groused listlessly, its uproar diminishing from dull growl to unenergetic mew before stopping completely. I tried again and the starter clicked at me as the battery abandoned it. I slammed my hands against the steering wheel, provoking a strangled honk from the horn.

“Shit.” I turned to Poe. “Can angels charge batteries?”

“Michael, maybe. He’s good with electronics. Not me.”

I looked at the uphill, traffic-clogged grade stretching away from the church and shook my head. “Push start’s out. We walk.”

At first, our quick pace felt okay, like my battered body would be able to maintain it, but my energy flagged halfway to our destination. Maybe Raph had been right, maybe rest would have been the best option, but Dominic wouldn’t wait for my recovery before offing the few people I still liked.

Poe noticed me struggling, slid her arm around my waist and draped mine across her shoulders. As small as she was--a foot shorter than me--strength radiated from her, warming and energizing my tired muscles. My chest tingled, the sensation spreading along my body’s pathways, sending the angel’s vitality coursing through my veins.

We rounded a corner and came within sight of the park. This wasn’t the kind of park where Gabe tracked me down, where people went for a quick lunch or a smoke. Instead, it was the city’s official homage to nature: a hundred acres of green patch designed to make everyone feel better about rampant over-development and a carbon footprint the size of Lake Superior. Stunted trees and gnarled bushes bounded the edge of the road, limbs mostly bare of leaves but for a few browned stragglers hanging on to summer like sun-bathers worried about their tans.

We plunged through the thicket and emerged on a rocky swath where only vegetation most people considered weeds grew. Beyond that: paths for walkers and joggers; lawn to accommodate picnickers and Frisbee-players; flower gardens; a quaint pond stocked with ducks and over-hung by a willow tree as old as the dirt in which it grew. I’d find Sister Mary-Therese sitting under the willow, plumping the ducks with crusts of bread.

My spirits wanted to lift with the fresh air, the lingering feel of summer revelers, but the immediacy of Sister Mary-Therese’s peril had settled too convincingly into my gut to allow it. Poe’s reassuring support disappeared from under my arm and moth wings flapped close to my head, gusting a tiny wind against my cheek. I wanted to tell her not to worry, if anyone would understand the presence of an angel, Sister Mary-Therese would, but I required all my focus and effort to keep my limbs moving.

I stood at the edge of a rocky outcropping and looked down the long hill, which flattened at the bottom into a patch of grass yellowed and beaten after a season of picnic-eaters and Frisbee-tossers. Poe’s silky wings beating beside my ears, I hurried down the rough path, my shoulder aching and throbbing in a spot roughly the size of a bullet.

The duck pond came into view. Half-a-dozen water fowl paddled across the algae-green water accompanied by the single swan that resided in the park and never seemed to leave; the rest of the duck population trampled the muddy bank at Sister Mary-Therese’s feet. She sat on a bench, hand extended, offering crusts of bread like giving communion to her flock; a peaceful scene until a black cloaked figure loomed from behind the willow’s broad trunk.

My flesh went cold.

***

The boughs of the ancient willow hung low, dipping into the pond to offer the ducks respite from the heat on summer days. Though the sun shone bright today, the crackle of fall in the air precluded any need for shade. Sister Mary-Therese enjoyed the autumn sun on her face as she sat on the end of the bench farthest from the willow, where decades of sun-worshipers had worn the paint away and the wood beneath smooth. She lounged a minute before the clucking and shuffling ducks crowding close by her feet brought her attention to the task at hand. Leaning forward, she pulled a bag of bread crusts out of her coat pocket, the sight of it eliciting a ruffle of feathers as ducks accustomed to her visits jockeyed for the best spots.

“There’s plenty for all.”

She took the first slice from the bag, tore a chunk off the corner and tossed it to the crowd. They said you shouldn’t feed ducks like this: the diet fed them by park visitors didn’t provide proper nourishment. Sister Mary-Therese saw their point, but these visits made both her and the ducks so happy, she didn’t have the heart to stop. What did we have in life--human or duck--without happiness?

She ripped pieces of bread and threw them to the ducks, sometimes close, sometimes farther away so they’d have to scuttle after their snack. The way they waddled and quacked brought a smile to her lips. The innocence and purity of animals was an example from which mankind should learn a thing or two.

As she contemplated the ducks’ competition for scraps and the majestic swoop of the swan’s neck as it glided across the pond, a movement on the slope of lawn leading to the bleak, rocky section of the park caught her attention. She looked up and saw three men, two dressed completely in black; one tackled the mismatched man and they rolled across the grass.

A game of football.

She watched for another minute, hand dangling, a piece of bread between her fingers drawing an anticipatory press of ducks. It took a moment to realize she wasn’t watching a friendly game. The men exchanged punches then the man who’d been tackled spun toward the pond and began to run.

***

“Sister.”

I waved my arms over my head and broke into a loping run. She didn’t look up.

“Sist--”

The man slammed into my side cutting the word short, the impact forcing the air from my lungs. Pain flared down my arm as his weight pinned my injured shoulder to the ground. Why did my attackers always want to fall on top of me? Breath wheezing in my throat, I struggled to right myself and glimpsed a second man move impossibly quick, a glass jar and lid flashing out, capturing the moth fluttering in mid-air.