“The lady deserves the best, and you can’t give her that,” Cookson said, his voice calm and very certain.
The boyfriend whirled and yelled, “I can give her plenty!”
Cookson laughed, and he was definitely laughing at the boyfriend.
Apparently that open mocking laugh crossed a line for Shelby, because she stood up, wrapping her arms around the boyfriend’s waist from behind. “Don’t get mad, honey, it’s you I want to spend the rest of my life with, not him, no matter how cute he is.”
Boyfriend smiled and turned in her arms so they could kiss. “I love you, babe.”
“I love you, too,” she said, and seemed to mean it.
“Are you sure that’s your choice?” Cookson asked.
I almost wished I could have told Shelby to lie and choose Cookson until my backup arrived, but I couldn’t think of a way to tell her, or to keep her boyfriend from losing his temper if she did.
At least the uniforms should have been here by now. I prayed for help to save everyone in the shop and to make sure that demon or human, Cookson never hurt anyone else again. Warmth breathed through me and voices like an unfelt wind whispered, “Angelus Lucis.”
I almost said yes out loud, then realized the angels weren’t calling me by my title, they were reminding me what I was, and what that could mean, if I would allow myself to embrace my truth instead of hiding from it.
Cookson sniffed the air like a dog on a scent. “Better get busy before the other side gets their wings under them.” He didn’t know it was me that smelled of angels, he just thought the angels were coming for him. Good.
The saleswoman said, “What’s happening?”
I focused and I could see everyone’s Guardian Angels at their backs. They were all soft shining light except for Cookson’s. It hurt me to see his angel tortured and dimmed at his back. I’d never seen a Guardian Angel that needed its own rescue more than it needed to rescue its person.
For the first time in years, I broke the rule that the Angeli Lucis are forbidden to break: I didn’t just give the Guardians permission to help their people—I told the elder salesman’s angel to take him and the saleswoman to the back room. We weren’t allowed to dictate to people’s angels, because that interfered with the human’s free will. Most, even among the Angeli Lucis, couldn’t command an angel to do anything, but I could.
“Come, daughter, let us give them room to decide these things.” I was betting if anyone had asked the elderly jeweler what things they were leaving their customers to decide, he wouldn’t have been able to answer the question, but I didn’t care, I just wanted them safe.
He held out his hand and his daughter went to him, looking at us as if she knew something was wrong, but she wasn’t sure what.
“Angels, angels, why do you care about the jeweler and his daughter?” Cookson asked, watching them go toward the back door. He still wasn’t talking to me, but to the air, to the listening angels.
“Let’s go, babe, we can pick the ring another day,” the boyfriend said, trying to lead her toward the front door.
“Oh no, boyfriend, you don’t get to take Shelby away from me.”
“What do you mean, take her away from you?” He looked at Shelby. “You didn’t fuck him, please tell me you didn’t.”
“No, I promised you I wouldn’t sleep around, and I haven’t. I don’t even know this guy,” Shelby said.
“Get the hell out of our way,” the boyfriend said.
“No,” Cookson said. The angel trapped at his back opened its misshapen mouth and wailed soundlessly to the other people in the room, but the sound stabbed through me like a spear to my heart. I put a hand out and caught myself on the glass display cabinets. If Cookson’s human body died, the angel would be free to go back to the light of God. He would cleanse it and make it whole again, but first Cookson had to die.
“I won’t leave you,” I said to the angel. I didn’t realize I’d said it out loud until Cookson spoke.
“Shelby, you must be even more special than Mark told me for a stranger to stay and risk his life for you.”
“I wasn’t talking to Shelby,” I said, and drew my gun underneath the oversized tank top.
CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
Police, don’t move,” I said, and I sounded like Detective Zaniel Havelock—Hank and his flirting and ring searching were gone. But for the first time since I’d become a cop, I was also Zaniel the Angelus Dictum, and Angelus Lucis. I was a light against the darkness, but this time I had a gun.
“Wait, we know that voice,” Cookson said. He started to look back.
“Hands on your head, lace your fingers together.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I will shoot you in the head if you move. You won’t survive that.”
The demon laughed, the sound of it echoing so that the hair on my arms rose in goose bumps from the sound. “I won’t die.”
“Mark Cookson’s body will, and that sends you back to Hell,” I said.
The demon laughed again. “You still don’t understand what we are, do you?”
“I know you’re a demon and he’s a college student who thought you’d give him his heart’s desire for the use of his body.”
“Well, you aren’t wrong as far as that goes,” Cookson said.
“Demon, what do you mean, demon? What are you talking about?” the boyfriend asked.
Shelby was pulling him farther away from Cookson. She looked frightened. I don’t know what Cookson’s face looked like because all I could see was the back of his head, but she was seeing something that made her want them both out of his reach. I approved, one less thing to worry about. Where was my backup?
“Lace your fingers on top of your head, now,” I said.
“And if I don’t, are you really going to shoot me in the head for just standing here with my hands raised? Will you honestly shoot me, kill me, just because I won’t follow every order to the letter? You’re a good man, Detective. Good men don’t shoot unarmed civilians in the head when their arms are raised in the air.”
“I will not let you hurt anyone else,” I said, holding the Sig Sauer P238 in a steady one-handed grip aimed at the back of his head. The gun was so small in my hand that a standard two-handed grip was awkward.
“A bad cop that doesn’t want to spend the rest of his life in jail doesn’t shoot unarmed civilians, even murderers, when he’s on security camera,” Cookson said.
I glanced up and there it was: a camera angled exactly right to see me shoot someone that looked human. If I shot him before he did something threatening, and he died, losing my career was the least of my worries.
“I can smell your hesitation, Detective—Havoc, wasn’t that what they called you at the hospital?”
I ignored him and said, “Shelby, take your boyfriend and stay as far across the room from us as you can; do not let him grab you, but go out the front door. There should be uniformed cops out there in a marked car.”
“I won’t let them leave,” Cookson said with his hands raised at the elbow as if he were doing the minimum to look cooperative. Most security cameras didn’t have sound, or not good sound, so his hands up were clearly visible; me yelling for him to lace his fingers might not be clear in the video. It would look like I shot him after he gave up. Heaven help me, but I needed him to look dangerous on the security tape before I fired.