Angel of Mine by Kennedy Harkins (beach read txt) 📖

He stared out across the empty street as the woman vacated the empty church. He noted the blood on her hands with a cool curiosity.
She was gorgeous, but of course, she was supposed to be. Her fiery red hair stood in stark contrast against the dark of the night and billowed slightly as she made her way down the road. Her body was tall and lean, the perfect proportions for fighting. Not that she needed it. What being, man or woman, would raise a hand to a face like hers. To do so would be to mar a monument to beauty.
A Succubus.
He had no doubts in his mind that she was good at what she did. How could she not be? What mortal would not sell his soul at the wave of her hand? Never knowing what horrors would await them.
Not until it was too late.
She walked with cold grace, the prance of a born killer, but he knew better. He’d see the person she used to be, a woman of kindness and smiles. This was not his Jezebeth. No, this was a stranger, a soulless monster. There was no regret in her crystal blue eyes. No guilt over the life she had just taken.
In his heart of hearts, he still mourned her loss; still felt the agony of his own emotions towards this demon. Gabriel wasn’t searching for relief. This torture was his penance. As long as he suffered, she still existed. The day that ceased to be true, would be the day the battered remnants of his soul shattered.

_____

Jeze wasn’t sure how, but she knew he was watching her from the shadows. Straightening her spine, she increased her speed in an attempt of distending herself from his seductive pull. There had been a time where nothing would have kept her from him.
Not now. Never again.
She’d managed to stay away from him for over fifty years. It had been excruciating, one day without Gabriel was like a century without light. But it was necessary. She couldn’t just fall back into his arms as if hell had never happened. It had. Jeze was no longer the woman she used to be, no more softness or affection. She was a demon, no longer capable or deserving of the things she had taken for granted in her past life.
A whisper of wings at her back as she turned onto a dimly lit street. She froze and put a hand onto the brick wall next to her in an attempt to steady herself. Keeping her hands there was lesson in self-restraint, she wanted nothing more than to stroke his wonderfully unique feathers. She had always been fascinated by them their color a white so agleam, they were almost reflective. It was as if no time had passed at all, he still had an aphrodisiac effect on her, turning all her nerves into live wires.
“You can’t be here.” Jezebeth breathed.
“But I am.” It was exactly the kind of egocentric response she had expected. The velvet tones of his voice were just as she remembered them. His fingers brushed over her back in a gentle caress-
The sun was shining that day, in the movies it’s always raining and dank outside, that’s how you can tell something bad is about to happen, but that day it was sunny. There was no warning of the impending doom.
Jeze heard the door slam shut downstairs. Her face lit up; perhaps it was her Gabriel, home early from his meeting with the other Archangels.
“Gabriel?” She called into the quiet home. Sprinting down the stairs in a desperate attempt to see his face, she came to an abrupt halt.
A man was standing in front of the door; his hair was the lightest of blonds. His face held nothing but cool consideration, it frightened her. This was not Gabriel.
“Who are you? What are you doing here?” Her voice was shrill with fear. A slow, menacing smile spread across his face, and that was when she noticed his eyes. The darkest midnight, no whites.
“I am here for you, my dear. Today is your lucky day.”

_____

She flinched away from him; it tore at his heart, and then doused the passion that he felt for her in cold water. It was hard to look at her and not see the woman that she used to be. A woman who’d stroked his wings with such tenderness. A woman who loved him fiercely when he was able to stay on earth and waited patiently for him to return when he could not.
“You have to go, we can’t be seen together.” Though she still refused to turn around and face him, Gabriel felt a little of the warmth that had consumed her as a human. But of course, the old Jezebeth would have never sent him away.
He spun her so that he could see her face. A part of him wanted so desperately to believe that part of her human self was still there. Which was why he was so wary, it’d be only too easy to manipulate him in this state. Gabriel couldn’t let himself fall into the trap of hoping. False hope would destroy him faster than anything.
Her eyes were the lightest of blues, they always had been. The only difference was now where there used to be open skies and clear ocean water, there was only ice. Cold, unmoving.
She had full lips, a slightly turned up nose, and a stubborn jaw. Spatters of blood marred her beautiful features, making them look deranged.
“What have you become?” The question was silent, barely leaving his lips.
“A monster.”


Looking into his wondrous eyes, she knew he didn’t believe her. Gabriel would never think her capable of the evil she had done. Which was exactly why Jeze had to stay away from him. If she let herself fall back into those old patterns, she’d let him think the best of her and that was dangerous for them both.
Jeze opened her mouth and said the very words that she knew would tear him up from the inside out. “Don’t get any romanticized notions about me. I stopped loving you a long time ago.” He flinched as if she had physically hit him, probably would have hurt less if she had.
Turning, she walked further into the alley, stopping only when she reached a door. Jeze slammed it behind her without looking back.
“You’re late,” Alexander reprimanded her. Staring into his coal colored eyes; she was struck with the same fear as the day they had first met. After breaking into Gabriel’s home, he had proceeded to kidnap her, taking her away from the only happiness she had ever known.
“Sorry,” she held up her bloody hand as proof, “I got distracted.” The apartment was plush, as was his style. He sank into a leather couch, patting the spot next to him in invitation. Jeze really didn’t have much of a choice. Sitting down next to Alexander, she tried to distance herself from him, to no avail. He was like a leech.
He reached behind him and pulled out a vanilla colored file, putting it down on the table in front of them, he motioned for her to open it.
“I’ve got a job for you.”
“Who’s the target?” She opened the file up and froze, it contained pictures of Gabriel.
“Oh, I think you’ll recognize him.” His voice was full of contempt. “Is this going to be a problem? Someone might be very...displeased if this isn’t completed in a timely manner.” Ergo; get it done fast, or it’s your head on the chopping block.
“It won’t be a problem.”

_____

There was no point in trying to hide from the angelic spymaster himself. Five-hundred years ago, when they first met, Gabriel hadn’t had half the skills he did today, and even then, he could always find her. Nothing had changed.
No, that wasn’t true, everything had changed. Everything that mattered.
Popular mythology was that Hell burned hot, which wasn’t necessarily a lie, because Hell wasn’t just one place. In fact, technically, there was no Hell. Hell was in the hand of the beholder, a non-corporeal abyss that was fitted to each specific person who ‘entered’ it. Like putting on special glasses, the kind that only show you pain, suffering, and creatures out of your worst nightmare. That’s Hell. And when you were there, you were nothing, no hope of escape, of rescue. You couldn’t save someone who didn’t exist. You felt real, you could bleed, agonize. The one courtesy that eluded you was death. That’s what makes it Hell. There, you get to find out just how much torture, how much suffering, you can experience and not die.
You’re already dead.
Jezebeth’s Hell was cold. Heat represented the world she had lost....The angel she had lost.
She curled around herself; the freezing rock she rested on made her skin numb. Jeze had always hated the cold, but now, she welcomed it, anything to keep the pain at bay. She was sure never to make a sound, never to give away the depth of her misery. They would only use it against her. More so, she couldn’t open her mouth without the risk of crying out, of screaming his name. Jezebeth wouldn’t let them soil his memory; it was all she had left.

Gabriel soared high above the clouds, the cold no longer affected him, but he wished that it did. Any feeling, any other emotion would be preferable to what he felt now. Her were words still ringing in his head, a broken record playing over and over again.
I stopped loving you a long time ago.
His heart contracted painfully, was it possible to break something already tattered beyond compare? It was inconceivable to him that she could still hurt him this way.
“Jezebeth?” His voice echoed through the house. When she didn’t immediately answer, a hard pit lodged it’s self in his stomach. “Jeze?”
Gabriel had left a couple days ago for Heaven, he didn’t often visit, but was an archangel, and attending the annual meetings was expected of him. He didn’t like being away from her, but such things were necessary. Besides, it was no hardship to come home to her loving embrace.
Iron hinted in the air, he froze for a millisecond, and then sprinted towards the smell. His heart was beating overtime, a fist of dread closing over it. He turned the corner into the spacious kitchen and saw the blood, ruby red against the white of the floor. Too much, Gabriel thought, there was too much. Far more than a mortal could lose and still breathe. Still live.
A stray piece of parchment lay strewn by the lifeblood. His hand shook as he knelt to pick it up.
Perhaps you should have taken better