Angel in Training (The Louisiangel Series, Book One) (10 page)

“I’ve always believed, Angel.”

“You never mentioned it before,” I accused,
unable to resist taking another cookie.

She grew sad again. “I tried once, but it was
just after you moved here. You got angry and I decided it was best
not to bring it up again.”

I blinked, struggling to remember the moment
she was referring to, but I was drawing a blank. “You did?”

She nodded. “I tried to tell you that your
parents were being looked after by the angels now. You told me the
angels could go to hell.” It sounded like something I would say,
but I didn’t remember saying it. She sat up suddenly. “Make the
most of those cookies.”

“Why?” I asked her, instinctively scooping a
few up in my hand.

“Because I’m about to wake up.”

Angelology 101

When I awoke, I was crying. The dream had
felt so real, but at the end of the day, it was just that – a
dream. I really wanted to believe that Sarah would be alright, but
I had disappeared without a word.

There was a knock on the door and Cupid
bounded in, full of smiles. They fell from his face when he
realized that I was crying, and hurried over to the bed. “Angel,
what’s the matter?”

“I just miss my aunt,” I told him, wiping my
eyes. “It’s nothing, don’t worry.”

“Michael wants you down in the gym, but I can
tell him you’re not up to it if you want?” he offered, squeezing my
leg.

I quickly shook my head. For some reason I
didn’t want to show Michael any kind of weakness. He already didn’t
like the fact I couldn’t seem to run as fast as I should be able
to. “Just let me get some breakfast and I’ll be fine.”

“Breakfast?” Cupid asked, laughing. “You
slept through that, even when I tried to wake you. Lunch, more like
it. Although you slept through that too. Get dressed and we’ll see
if we can get to Veronica throw something together for you.”

“I really need a clock in here,” I grumbled,
throwing the covers back.

“You mean you can’t sense it?” Cupid asked in
surprise.

I sighed, half out of the bed. “Sense
what?”

“Time,” Cupid replied. “All angels can sense
the time. Have you not noticed the lack of clocks in the
building?”

“Yeah, I have,” I told him. “Hence why I need
one in my room.” So there was yet another thing I was supposed to
be able to do, but couldn’t. The joy. Perhaps I was broken.

“Maybe it’s because you don’t have your wings
yet,” Cupid mused. “It’s like a direct phone line.”

“Would that also explain why I can’t run like
a cheetah?” I asked him, my head in my wardrobe as I pulled out
another suit ensemble. I ducked into the bathroom, leaving the door
open so we could talk.

“You want to run like a cheetah?” Cupid
repeated. I swear I was speaking another language to English – and
I don’t mean a lack of American accent.

“Michael seems to think that a four minute
mile would be a walk in the park for me.”

“Oh,” Cupid called back, elongating the word.
“Yeah, you should be able to put an Olympic record to shame. You’re
also supposed to be stronger too.”

“I don’t think I have a problem with that
one,” I told him, emerging from the bathroom. As I was certain
Michael was going to try to kill me again, I wasn’t worried about a
shower before a workout. “You should have seen the fight that got
me arrested.”

“I really wish I had,” Cupid pouted. I
followed him out of the bedroom and down to the cafeteria. It was
empty.

“Where is everyone?”

Cupid shrugged. “You’re missing the man candy
already?”

“Yes,” I responded dryly. “I feel that
without their perfectly sculptured bodies to gaze upon, I will not
be able to drum up an appetite to eat.”

“You make me want to puke,” Veronica
announced, appearing from the kitchen. “They’re all mindless
airheads.”

“But they’re all so pretty,” Cupid
objected.

“You can have them, and I’ll be having me a
little bit of Liam Hemsworth. Give him a little bit of eyeliner and
he would be perfect.”

Cupid pulled a face. “Ew, he’s so young –
it’s like cradle robbing.”

“Aren’t all the men a bit young, considering
you’re older than the dinosaurs?” I asked Cupid.

He poked his tongue out. “No fair, and for
the record, we established,” he waved his hand between himself and
Veronica. “That the only way to work it was by our vessel’s
age.”

“Yeah, so I’m not cradle robbing, am I?”
Veronica asked, rolling her eyes. “And your vessel isn’t much older
than he is.”

“Fine,” Cupid sighed, melodramatically. “You
have the Hemsworth. Stephen Amell is all mine.” Both pairs of eyes
turned to me.

“What?” I asked. “I thought men were off
limits?”

“You humans have a term for it,” Cupid
informed me, one arm snaking around my shoulders while the other
waved out in front of us, as though he was pointing at something
along the horizon. “Window shopping.”

“You can look, but you can’t touch!” Veronica
grinned.

I thought about Joshua, and sighed. “Ian
Somerhalder.”

Veronica and Cupid shared a look. “Who?”

“I’m going to sit you down with a few box
sets of The Vampire Diaries,” I informed them. Who, indeed.

“In the meantime, can you rustle up something
for Angel?” Cupid asked Veronica.

Veronica shrugged and then leapt up onto the
counter, swinging herself through into the kitchen. “Shrimp
Po’boy?”

At the appreciative rumble my stomach gave, I
quickly nodded. I pulled myself up onto the empty serving counter
and looked at Cupid. “You never did tell me where all the man candy
are.”

“Here, they’re all messenger angels,” he
shrugged before jumping up on the counter beside me. “We tried for
guardian angels, but those that don’t make that pay grade are
messengers.”

My eyes widened. “There are pay grades?” I
asked, hopeful.

“Please,” Cupid responded, rolling his eyes
at me. “You don’t think Veronica’s eyeliner magically appears out
of thin air, do you?”

“My clothes seem to,” I told him.

“That’s your uniform. Guardian angels have to
look smart. You don’t have to wear it all the time.”

“Well why aren’t you two wearing a uniform?”
I asked him, nodding back at Veronica whose creation was beginning
to smell delicious.

“The Cherubim were issued with a uniform, but
the white made them look too cheerful,” Cupid explained, quickly
winking at me.

“Bite me,” Veronica called. She appeared at
my side, handing me the most delicious looking po’boy I had seen
for a long time. “Cupid, on the other hand, decided that archangels
didn’t need to wear a uniform.”

I nearly choked on the sandwich. “You’re an
archangel?”

Cupid clutched at his heart. “It wounds me
right here, that you are so surprised at that fact. Yes, I’m an
archangel. Were you sleeping when I showed you my archery skills?
There is no way a lowly angel would be
that
good.”

“I’m sorry,” I quickly apologized, hoping I
hadn’t offended him. “You just don’t seem…” I trailed off, trying
to work out what to say that wouldn’t offend him further.

“As grumpy and uptight an ass as my brother?”
he offered with a grin.

This time, I did choke on the sandwich.
Veronica kindly thumped me on my back, and when I could finally
breathe, I looked up at him through my watering eyes. “Michael is
your brother?”

Cupid patted me on the head. “Never mind
introducing us to
The
Vampire Diaries, I think we need to fill you in on Angelology 101
first. Yes, Michael is my brother. All the archangels are my
brothers.”

“Or sisters,” Veronica added. “Or they would
be if there were some still.”

“Think of it this way,” Cupid began. He
leaned over and stole a bite of my sandwich, chewing it slowly to
prolong the agony, before he finally finished. “If Michael is the
number one, I’m the number two.”

I was completely speechless. “But you thought
he was yummy!”

Cupid mimicked sticking his finger down his
throat. “I was trying to see what you thought of him. As if I’d
think that – that would be wrong.”

That made me feel a little better, but the
thought of them being brothers, and Cupid an archangel, was still
mind boggling.

“I know,” Veronica said, excitedly. “Tonight,
after dinner, we’ll go out – a little bit of dancing, maybe some
virgin hurricanes – and then you can ask us any questions you
want.”

“I think that would be a good idea,” I
agreed, snatching my sandwich back off Cupid who was trying to eat
it before I could. “And this is the best shrimp po’boy I have ever
had.”

* * *

After taking a mere couple of minutes to
inhale the sandwich, I left Cupid and Veronica, who had gone back
to bickering over who was the ‘hottest guy’, and headed down to the
gym. I quickly changed with the intention of warming up before
Michael appeared. I was thwarted in the plan before I had taken a
step into the room. He was already waiting for me, next to the
treadmill, busy reading Paradise Lost.

“It’s already programmed. You just need to
press start,” he informed me without looking up.

“Of course it is,” I muttered, stepping on
the machine. I prepared myself for a roadrunner’s speed, but it was
a nice manageable pace.

“It wouldn’t be unusual for you to run at
yesterday’s speed for several hours. At this pace, you should be
able to last a day.”

“Are you expecting me to run all day?” I
asked in alarm.

He looked up from the book and frowned. “With
that attitude, I would be surprised if you lasted longer than an
hour.”

“I’d like to see you do better,” I
grumbled.

Michael’s eyes clouded over, and for a moment
I thought he was going to speed my machine up. Instead, he got on
to the one next to me and hit the start button, quickly speeding it
up to its fastest setting – making my steady jog look like a walk.
Wordlessly, he set the book in front of the control and continued
reading.

I stared. I couldn’t help it. He was
breathing normally, there wasn’t a trace of sweat on him, and he
was casually turning the pages.

I made myself run at that pace for two hours,
and it was only because Michael was next to me, looking like he had
just stepped on the machine that I managed that. I was determined
to beat him.

In the end, I had to hit stop. The machine
slowed me to a walking pace, and finally ground to a halt. I
stumbled backwards off it, but managed to keep my balance. I did
end up keeled over, trying to catch my breath.

Beside me, the machine stopped and Michael
hopped off, book still in hand. “This isn’t good enough, Angel,” he
told me.

Still doubled over, I glanced up at him and
brushed the sweaty hair out of my eyes. “Does it look like I’m not
trying?” I gasped.

“It doesn’t look like you’re trying hard
enough. There are going to be people who depend on you – not just
your charge. How would you feel if something were to happen to them
and you were not able to protect them effectively?”

I made myself stand upright, one hand on my
hip attempting to seem defensive, but really there to clutch at the
cramp. “I don’t see how running is going to protect them. I thought
you were supposed to be teaching me to use a sword?”

Michael’s eyes clouded over, a hint of red
marking his cheeks. “The ones coming at you will be able to move at
a supernatural speed,” he told me, managing to keep his voice
level. “They are older than you. They will have more experience
than you, and they will not fight fair. If you want to stand a
glimmer of a chance against them, you need to be able to match
their speed. There is no point in teaching you the basics if you
will be disarmed before you can blink.”

He left, leaving me staring after him, trying
to catch my breath. There had been anger there and I wasn’t
entirely sure where it had come from. I was trying, damn it. Who
the hell was I going to be up against, because this was striking me
as the small print I should have read before I agreed to
anything.

I headed back to the changing room and
scooped some of the workout clothing into my arms. It made sense to
me to keep a set or two in my bedroom, rather than use the locker
room.

The angels were back in their rooms when I
hit my floor. Maybe the trick was to do this the other way around
and take a towel downstairs, rather than experience the stares of
the model angels as I walked past still red faced and sweaty. Or
maybe this was Michael’s punishment for not being as fast as he
wanted me to be. I shook the idea from my head. He was an angel –
he wasn’t capable of being that mean.

I had another cool shower, spending the extra
time in there to allow the water to massage my muscles. I got out
when I heard a muffled bang come from my bedroom. I quickly wrapped
a towel around my body, leaving my wet hair dripping everywhere,
and searched for a weapon. My hands grabbed the only thing
available – the hairdryer – and I leapt into my room, brandishing
it in front of me.

I was greeted by the stunned looks of Cupid
and Veronica. Their surprise quickly melted into fits of giggles,
collapsing against each other to keep themselves upright.

“Why don’t any of the rooms have locks?” I
huffed as I marched back into the bathroom to turn the shower off.
I took another towel and wrapped my hair up in a turban before I
re-entered the bedroom.

“We come bearing gifts,” Cupid offered,
indicating to a pile of clothing on the bed.

“There are no locks because angels are
supposed to be trustworthy,” Veronica said, doing her best to look
innocent.

“Whoever decided that never met you,” I
informed her as I investigated the clothing.