Crazy in the best way. Nero brushed a strand of hair from my face. The key to being an angel and running a territory is delegation, Pandora. In other words, you need to assign people to do the things you don’t want to do.
That does sound like more fun.
“Lucy,” I cut her off as she moved on to petition number nine. “I’m assigning you the very important task of answering my fan mail.”
“Your…fan mail?” She sounded confused.
“The petitions, Lucy. That fan mail.”
“Oh, of course. I can do that.”
“Great.”
“And what about your actual fan mail?” she asked.
“I have actual fan mail?” This was the first I’d heard about it.
“Yes. It’s been accumulating in the mail room. Letters to Pandora, the Angel of Chaos, from your adoring fans. Most of the letters contained—” Lucy cleared her throat. “—pictures of your fans. Naked pictures.” She cleared her throat again. “What should I do with them?”
“That depends.” I cast a mischievous look at Nero. “Are any of my fans particularly sexy?”
In a flash, my phone was in his right hand, and my hands were pinned under his left. “Burn the photos.”
“General Windstriker?” Lucy’s voice had jumped an octave.
“You heard me,” he replied crisply, in a tone that harbored no room for discussion.
“Yes, sir,” Lucy squeaked.
“Leda will talk to you later.” He hung up, then set my phone back on the nightstand.
When his gaze returned to me, I was ready with a glower. “You know, I’m pretty sure the angel handbook states that I should kill you for usurping my authority in my territory.”
He released my hands. “Then it’s a good thing for both of us that you’re not very good at following the rules.”
“Maybe not.” I sat up in bed. “But I do retaliate in other ways.”
His brows drew together, and he gave me a flat look. “You’re going to shut off all my hot water again.”
“Of course not,” I said, setting my hand over my heart. “I never pull the same prank twice. It wouldn’t be very genteel.”
Chuckling darkly, Nero wrapped his arms around me. “I love you, Leda Pandora.” His words fell against my lips. “Even though you’re completely crazy.”
“Love is crazy.” I smiled against his mouth and hugged him tightly to me. “But did you really need to be this crazy and burn all my fan mail?”
“Yes.”
“Haven’t your fans ever sent you naked pictures of themselves?”
“Of course. All angels get them.”
“And do you burn the pictures?”
“No.”
Ha!
“So what do you do with them?” I asked.
He shrugged. “My fan mail is probably all stuffed in boxes in a Legion mail room somewhere. I’ll have the boxes sent to you so you can burn them if you’d like.”
The rational person in me said burning those pictures would be childish and petty. That voice wasn’t nearly as loud as the deeply possessive angel in me; she wanted to burn them all.
“Leda?”
I looked at him. “Yes?”
“For a little while there, you had a funny look in your eyes.”
“It was just a momentary lapse of sanity,” I told him. “It will pass.”
“You’re still worried about Faris, aren’t you?”
“I’m always worried about Faris,” I said. “What he’s planning. When he’ll come calling again. And why he made me his emissary to hell.”
“He believes you’re the best person to convince the demons to ally with the gods.”
“And I will convince them. Somehow. I’ll come up with something. Something good. You know, I do excel at out-of-the-box thinking.”
His eyes twinkled. “I thought we’d agreed it was best if you refrained from opening boxes, Pandora.”
I flashed him a grin. “Ah, you’re no fun.”
Caught between the perfectly orderly armies of heaven and hell, between gods and demons, Earth was suffering from a serious shortage of chaos and fun.
“I assure you, I am a lot of fun,” he said. “Now, close your eyes.”
“Why?”
“It’s a surprise.”
I did love surprises, so I closed my eyes. I felt the shift of the mattress as Nero moved. I heard the smooth swish of his nightstand drawer opening and closing. The mattress rocked again. Something cold and metallic touched down on the soft, sensitive skin of my throat. I opened my eyes and looked down at the necklace he’d set around my neck.
It was a band of precious stones, dipping just below my collarbone. The necklace’s metal links were platinum-like in color, but there was an ethereal sheen to the metal that told me it wasn’t platinum—or any other precious metal I knew. The gemstones were also not of this world. Their color was in flux, shifting color, twinkling like the stars in the sky. It was so much like my hair. And my wings.
“Where did you get this?” I gasped, brushing my fingers over the otherworldly necklace. “I’ve never seen anything like it before.”
“I made it.” Nero’s gaze ensnared mine.
The air crackled with our magic.
“It’s beautiful,” I told him. “And a much better present than a bunch of old boxes to blow up.”
“Burn.”
“I’d have burned the boxes, then blown them up for good measure. I don’t like women sending you nude selfies.”
“Some of them were men.”
I snorted. “I guess everyone loves an angel. And speaking of angels, did you make a matching necklace for my Angel?” I teased him.
He humphed. “You spoil that cat far too much, Pandora.”
“And so do you. I caught you giving her a belly rub last night when I came in.”
“Petting a cat is oddly soothing. With you gone for so long, I was in need of being soothed.”
“So you’re grateful for my cat’s presence.” I smiled. “In her debt even.”
He slanted a hard look my way. “Don’t push it, Leda.” But even so, he reached into his nightstand drawer once more and pulled out a cat collar of matching magic stones.
I beamed at him. “I know she’ll love it.” Tears pooled in my eyes.
Nero brushed them away. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Absolutely nothing. You’ve given me such a beautiful gift.” I glanced down at my new necklace, then back up at him. “But I have nothing for you.” I took a short, resolute breath. “I’m going to remedy that. I will find you something special.”
“I don’t need a gift.” He wrapped his arms around me, drawing me closer. “You are all I need.”
Smiling, I cuddled up to him. But my smile soon faded to suspicion. “Why are you so concerned about my getting a gift for you?”
He kissed me on the forehead. “Your gifts tend to explode.”
“Angels like things that explode.”
He yawned. “Not when we’re off duty.”
I couldn’t help but laugh. “I will get you an amazing gift, Nero. You’ll see.”