Angel in Training (The Louisiangel Series, Book One) (31 page)

“I didn’t think they were bad things,” Joshua
said, quietly.

I peeked my eyes open to look at him,
frowning in confusion. “You’re not going to mock me?” He shook his
head. “They’re not bad things,” I told him, realizing that his glow
wasn’t as bright anymore. “As far as I can tell, they’re pretty
neutral. They were just really bright this time.” I straightened
myself and used my knuckles to wipe the tears away.

“You want to call it a night?” he asked me,
his tone remaining soft.

“I’m fine,” I assured him, looking back to
the crowds on Bourbon Street. When it wasn’t so dazzling, it was
pretty, really. I was about to tell Joshua I just needed a minute
and I would go back in – my mouth was already opening – and then I
spotted the blue aura.

It was a wonderful royal blue – like on a
peacock, and around the edges, it flared with spots of white light.
“That’s a Potential,” I muttered as the light disappeared around a
corner.

“What?” Joshua asked, following my stares
into the crowd.

“Mama Laveau,” I told him, turning back to
face him. “She told me Preston Johnston’s aura was just like that.
It might be a complete coincidence but-” Once again I was silenced.
This time by the fact the most dazzling beam of bright white light
had shot upwards, and was showering the street in light as bright
as the sun.

“Angel?” Joshua questioned again.

I looked at him. He was staring at me,
completely oblivious to the fact the night had suddenly turned to
day. “You can’t see it?” I asked him in amazement.

“See what?” he asked me, again staring past
me on to Bourbon Street.

“
The light. It’s...” I trailed off as
Michael’s voice appeared in my head. ‘
It glows like a beacon, or the light
from a lighthouse. It glows so bright that a person looking out for
it, would be able to see it from a mile away – even with buildings
in between – because it sends a beam of light into the
heavens.
’

“We have to go,” I told him, grabbing
Joshua’s hand.

“Angel, what’s going on?” he demanded as I
tugged him along.

Ignoring the colors around me, I focused on
that beacon of light, pulling at Joshua, trying to make him move
faster, as I wound us between the crowds. “Someone is going to
die,” I told him. “I think it’s the serial killer.” At those words,
the resistance stopped and he picked up speed.

The light was beginning to dim as I drew
close. It was just as I ducked past a deserted passage, nearly
knocking over a couple, earning me a filthy look from a woman with
red hair, that I realized the last of the light was emanating from
within the blackness of the alley. “Joshua, over here!” I called to
him, darting over to the figure that was slumped against the
wall.

He was young, with cropped hair and hazel
eyes that I could barely see behind his nearly closed eyelids. I
dropped down beside him, trying to clamp down on the wound and stem
the bleeding, while behind me, Joshua was already calling for an
ambulance.

“You’re going to be alright,” I told the man,
my eyes falling on the dog tags poking out from behind the pale
blue button down shirt he was wearing. Quickly I pulled them out to
examine the markings. “Greg?” I asked, reading the name.

Greg looked at me. “Help me,” he gasped, a
trickle of blood escaping from the corner of his mouth.

“Joshua, we need that ambulance,” I called
over my shoulder, pressing harder against the warm wound. I could
feel the throb of the flow lessen beneath my hands, and suddenly I
knew what I had to do.

“Greg, I’m really sorry, but I think you’re
going to die.” There was a flash of panic and his eyes widened.

“Elena,” he gasped, painfully. “You need to
tell her-”

I quickly shook my head. “Here’s the thing,”
I told him in a quiet voice, aware that Joshua was hurrying back to
the main street to wait for the ambulance, whose sirens I could
hear getting closer. “You have a choice to make, and not much time
to make it in, so you need to listen carefully.” There was a moment
of confusion that passed through him, but he gave me a very small
nod. “Right now, you can pick eternal happiness or eternal life,
and being as I didn’t have it spelt out to me, that’s the choice of
going to Heaven or the choice of becoming an angel. It’s up to
you.”

“Heaven,” he rasped out, another dribble of
blood trickled down his chin.

I nodded, and moved my hands away from the
wound to hold his. “Okay,” I told him. “Don’t be scared, because
it’s going to be alright.” There was another nod, and then I felt
the grip on my hand disappear.

My plan had been to somehow hold onto his
soul until Michael arrived, and I shut my eyes, somehow trying to
send some form of silent message to the archangel, but as soon as
my eyes closed, the sounds of Bourbon Street disappeared around
me.

“Where are we?”

I opened my eyes, surprised to find myself
and Greg standing in the middle of a baseball field, the sun
shining down brightly upon us. “I want to say Heaven,” I told him,
turning full circle – we were in a baseball stadium, right by the
home plate. My eyes drifted to the large, white Z in the grass just
behind the home plate. “Z?” I muttered, looking up in the stands.
“Did I just bring us to Zephyr Field?” I asked, more to myself, as
I rolled my eyes at my incompetence. I turned back to Greg with a
sigh. “Sorry, I’m new at this.”

“You’re in the right place,” a new voice
informed me. I whirled back around to an umpire walking towards
us.

“Zephyr Field?” I scoffed. “This is hardly my
idea of Heaven.”

“But it is mine,” Greg informed me, a large
smile on his face as he looked around the stadium of the New
Orleans’ minor league baseball team, the New Orleans Zephyrs.

I couldn’t help but pull a face. “Seriously?”
At his nod, I turned back to the umpire. “Who are you?”

The umpire smiled at me. “We’ve met before.
You didn’t recognized me then either, but then again, I change my
appearance for whomever you bring me.”

I glanced around again, and it clicked.
“Saint Peter?”

“The one and only,” he nodded.

“But you’re so... young looking,” I blurted
out before I could stop myself. Saint Peter who looked like Father
Christmas I could buy, but a Saint Peter who looked like a middle
aged guy who had one too many beers in his life, well that was a
little harder to believe.

“What’s going on?” Greg asked me, poking my
arm.

It was Saint Peter who saved me from
answering. He wrapped his arm around Greg’s shoulder. “Come with
me, son. We need to have a talk.” Saint Peter gave me a nod, and
then he and Greg began walking towards the bleachers.

Somehow I had gotten us here, but I had no
idea how to get myself out of there. I closed my eyes, screwing my
face up in concentration. When I opened them, I was still standing
next to the home plate. With a sigh, I sank to the ground and
glared at my surroundings. I hated baseball.

Confession

“Angel, what are you doing here?”

I looked up from my position on the
ground, using my hand to block out the sun that was shining around
Michael’s head like a halo. Or maybe it
was
a halo?

“Trying to work out where the exit is,” I
offered. “I tried the gates, but they led right back here instead
of the parking lot, which is weird.” I got to my feet and brushed
the dry grass blades from my legs.

It was definitely sunlight – when I was
nearly eye-level with him, I could see his face clearly, and those
chocolaty eyes of his were angry. I opened my mouth, ready to
explain myself, but he grabbed my wrist and in a flash, we were
back in his quarters with the contents of my stomach trying to make
their way out.

I ran for the bathroom, deciding not to play
with gravity. After rinsing my mouth out, I marched back into his
office. “A heads up would be nice, you know,” I shot at him.

“You should never have been there in the
first place,” he snapped back at me.

“What the hell was I supposed to do?” I
asked, angrily. “I couldn’t just leave him there!”

“An Angel of Death would have appeared when
the time was right,” Michael retorted, just as angrily. “Angels are
not supposed to take souls to Peter, much less Potentials.”

“Well I would have called but I don’t have a
phone, and look at that,” I cried, my arms flying wildly around me.
“Those god damn bells of Michael don’t work both ways.”

“DO NOT TAKE THE LORD’S NAME IN VAIN!” he
bellowed at me, suddenly appearing inches from me.

“Or what?” I yelled back. “You’re going to
send me off to work for the postal service? Hand over the letter
now and I can get out of this hell-hole!” I demanded, holding my
hand out for an envelope. “You were the one who was harping on
about there only being a small window of time in which you could
ask a Potential the question!”

He raised his hand and I flinched, expecting
him to hit me into next week, but he stopped himself at the last
minute. “Get out,” he told me, only just keeping his voice
even.

“Gladly,” I told him, through gritted teeth.
I stormed out of the room, slamming the door as hard as I possibly
could behind me.

I headed straight back out the front door,
making sure to slam that one too. I didn’t know where I was
heading. I did know I wasn’t going any further in the heels I was
wearing. I yanked them off and hooked them over my fingers, before
I continued walking.

At some point it dawned on me that I had
disappeared from a crime scene. When I worked out that I had walked
several blocks in the wrong direction, I turned and made my way
back to where I had left Joshua.

He was busy coordinating uniformed officers
when I arrived, but the second he saw me, he ducked under the crime
scene tape and hurried over. “Angel, what happened to you?” he
asked, grabbing my shoulders. “I turned around and you’d
disappeared.”

All trace of anger in me disappeared then, at
about the same time the realization and implications of what had
happened appeared. So I did the most embarrassing thing I could,
and burst into tears.

Joshua took a deep breath. “Wait here,” he
muttered, hurrying back over to the swarm of police cars. He
returned moments later, carrying a CSU jacket which he draped over
my shoulders. He then walked me away from the crime scene, across a
street and up some steps to an observation point over the
Mississippi.

I hadn’t realized how close to the river Greg
had been murdered. It was quiet up here now. No one in their sober
mind would be out and about at this time. I drew the jacket around
me, more for comfort then for warmth, and watched one of the barges
slowly travel along the river.

“You gonna tell me what happened?” Joshua
asked me, leaning his back against the railing.

“I screwed up,” I muttered. “I well and truly
pissed an archangel off and now,” I shrugged. “I think being
forbidden from seeing my aunt is the least of my worries.”

“How?” he asked.

“I asked Greg the question,” I admitted. “The
reason I disappeared was to take him up to Heaven. Or at least, I
think its Heaven. It really could have been the Zephyr Field for
all I know, but it turns out I’m not supposed to do that. Not that
I knew that because Michael doesn’t like to tell me anything.”

Joshua turned around to face the water. “So
how do we fix it?”

I gave him a small smile. “I don’t think you
can do anything. I’m not even sure what I can do,” I sighed,
turning around. My eyes fell on the clock tower on the St Louis
Cathedral that stood opposite. “Except maybe pray and hope for
forgiveness,” I muttered. “Although I’m not sure I know how to do
that.”

“What?” Joshua asked in amusement.
“Pray?”

I shrugged.

“If you don’t want to go back to the convent
tonight, you can crash at mine. I’ll even take the couch?” he
offered, gently.

“Thanks, but I shouldn’t,” I replied, shaking
my head. “I’m already in enough trouble. I really don’t think I can
push my luck any further.” My mouth fell open in horror as I
realized what he had just said.

“Relax,” Joshua sighed, misreading my
expression. “I was not trying to pull any moves on you. I was
simply offering you somewhere to sleep.”

“You know I live at the convent?” I
whispered, staring up at him, begging him with my eyes to tell me I
was wrong. I could feel my hairline prickling. “How do you know I
live at the convent?” I asked, slowly. My eyes narrowed. “Did you
follow me?”

Joshua shook his head. “I checked your
number,” he replied, like it was no big deal.

“I don’t have a phone,” I told him
slowly.

“No, but you called me on one when you got
back safely the other night. It wasn’t hard for me to run a check
on the number.”

“Oh crap,” I muttered, feeling suddenly
light-headed. Joshua grabbed my elbows and lowered me to the
ground. Propping my elbows on my knees, I allowed my head to sink
into my hands, squeezing my eyes shut in the process. “Oh crap, oh
crap, oh crap.”

Beside me, Joshua crouched down to my level.
“Angel?”

I raised my head just high enough to pinch
the top of my nose. This wasn’t going to end well. “I’m not
supposed to tell anyone about the convent,” I mumbled.

“You didn’t,” Joshua told me. “I worked it
out for myself. I’m a detective – it’s kinda in my job
description.”

If it wasn’t for the fact there was now
nothing in my stomach, I would have thrown up again.

“Let me walk you home,” Joshua offered. “I
can explain to Michael that it wasn’t your fault that I found out
where you live. I just wanted to make sure you got home safely.” He
reached over and took my shoes from me then helped me to my feet.
“You know, you probably should put these back on,” he suggested as
we walked down the steps back to the street.