Daystar (38 page)

Andy closed his eyes.
 
“She would have told me, I think.
 
If I had really asked and been open to hearing it.
 
Maybe…”
 
He shook his head.
 
“I can’t think like that.”

Whitney kept pace with him.
 
“She’s in peace though now.”

Andy nodded.
 
“Finally, yes, I suppose she is and I’m happy for her.”
 
He nodded.
 
“I really am.”
 
He blinked back tears.
 
“She—” He sighed and clamped down on his feelings.
 
“You mentioned earlier about not knowing how to be alone.”

“Yes.”

“I don’t know how to be alone.
 
I’m a good faker.”
 
Andy wiped at his eyes.
 
“I made my home in New York City, before that it was Paris.”
 
He pointed down the street.
 
“Now they’re one in the same.
 
Before Paris I was in Rome, Babylon.”
 
He watched birds land on rooftops.
 
“And if I am truly by myself I talk to the birds.”

Whitney nodded.
 
“That’s okay; I talked to my cats when I had some.
 
They never stayed around though.”

Andy smiled and looked down at her.
 
“Cats?”

“Before Helion I was making myself out to be a genuine cat lady.”

“And now?”

Whitney frowned.
 
“Now it seems I am back on track to being a cat lady again.”
 
She closed her eyes.
 
“I think I will go take one of those islands Dahlia built and put up a stone tower like a lighthouse.
 
Then I can be dreadfully romantic and stare out at the sea, waiting for my lover to come home.”

Andy smiled.
 
“But you’d be alone.”

“With my cats.
 
I shall make a cat paradise on my cat island!”

Andy laughed.
 
“I will take the next island over, and I shall have a bird paradise, free of your cats.”

Whitney held up a finger.
 
“Ah, but what if your birds come over to my island.
 
I am afraid my cats will eat them for supper.”

Andy stared at the sky.
 
“I will save each and every one.
 
What else will I do with my time?”

Whitney laughed and twisted her fingers.
 
“I hope Helion comes back, I do not want a war of pets on our hands.”

Andy tsked.
 
“Think of the bloodshed.”

Whitney closed her eyes.
 
“I want a pizza.”

“Hmm?”

“I eat when I get depressed.
 
I’m not hungry, but I want one.”

“You’re one of those types huh.”

“Oh yeah, big and fat when I get dumped or fired.”

Andy took off walking; he hooked a finger at her.
 
“Fortunately we cannot get fat, so have a few moments to enjoy that revelation.
 
Then, you should be oh so happy that I know the best pizza place around.”

Whitney looked city.
 
“Here?”

Andy grinned.
 
“Power has been restored; the fridges will be working, same with the ovens.
 
It’s right around the block.”

Whitney trailed him.
 
“So deep dish it is!”

Andy stopped, turned, and sighed.
 
“Whitney?”

“Yeah?”
 
She batted her eyes innocently.

“I am a New Yorker.
 
I do not make deep dish pizzas.”
 
He walked away.

Whitney grinned and followed him.
 
“Didn’t Dahlia tell you?”

“What?”

“I was born in
Chicago!
”

Andy smiled.
 
“You are eating pizza my way or this friendship ends and you can go have your cat island by yourself.”

Whitney skipped behind him.
 
“Cat Island with deep dish pizza!
 
Represent!”

Andy shook his head.
 
“When I ask myself what our fallen angel posse needs, the first thing to come to mind is
not
a Chicago-born girl.”

Whitney hit him in the head with a brick.
 
“Oh, that is
exactly
what this party needs and I am glad I didn’t take my hometown apart.”

“You didn’t?”

Whitney laughed.
 
“No way!
 
I also kept Seattle and Disneyland and maybe a few other places that I liked…”

Andy smiled.
 
“Disneyland?”

She scuffed her feet on the ground.
 
“Helion had never been there.
 
I thought he’d enjoy it.”

He eyed her.
 
“
Right
.”

She stuck her tongue out at him.
 
“I am going to put my Chicago right in the backdoor to this place; we’re going to get nice and cozy.”

He glared at her.
 
“You are not messing with my New York.”

“
Your
New York?”
 
Whitney spun in a circle.
 
“I believe this entire place is called Paris now.”

They gazed down the street where the first of the Parisian buildings started.
 
He shrugged.
 
“I’ll build a wall.”

“So will I!”
 
She flapped her wings and blew dust at him.

“First I am going to eat pizza.”
 
Andy turned down a street.

“And I am going to eat it with you!”

“Beer?”
 
He pointed towards an open, empty bar.

She nodded.
 
“There had better be beer.”

***

Dahlia and Lucifer floated along the Amazon River in a small red boat without oars or sails.
 
She rested her head on his chest and traced her fingers along the shifting shadows cast by the tall trees that lined the river.
 
Her wings hung over the side of the boat and trailed in the warm water beside them, attracting a following of exotic fish.
 

Lucifer stared into the sunlit sky as iridescent dragonflies flew over their heads.
 
He hummed her creation song and his eyes and hair shifted between brown and blue.

Dahlia kissed his collarbone.
 
“You have not asked me any questions about my wings, my escape, none of it.
 
Why?”

He met her gaze and ran his fingers through her hair.
 
“I did not see it of importance at the time.
 
Now we can discuss it if you would like.”

She pinched him.
 
“Are you not curious?”

He shrugged.
 
“Curiosity is your driving force, my beloved, not mine.”

“What is yours?”

“See?
 
You immediately run into questions.
 
Even your statement was a question.”

Dahlia frowned.
 
“Huh.
 
I wonder why that is?”
 
She blushed.
 
“Oh, it just keeps happening.”

Lucifer smiled and his eyes sparkled.
 
“Please, regale me with your planning and cunning.
 
I can only imagine it was brilliant.”

“You are teasing me.”
 
She flicked him in the nose.

“I am not.
 
You truly must have done something brilliant.
 
You fooled Him.”

She propped herself up on her elbows.
 
“That is not that hard.”

“He is omniscient.”

“No He is not, nor is He omnipotent.”

Lucifer perked up.
 
“Do tell.”

She pressed her hands into his chest.
 
“If I do, I want a promise that you will not tear out of here and go straight to Him.”

He grinned.
 
“Why do you think I would do that?”

Dahlia rolled her eyes.
 
“Oh, I do not know, perhaps because you
never
look before you leap.”

“Fine.
 
I promise you this.”

Dahlia smiled.
 
“He cannot enter my realm now.
 
I locked Him out.”

“How?”

“It is not His, it is mine.”

“But He is the creator.”

Dahlia shook her head.
 
“Not of Hell.”

“But of Heaven?”

“Yes.”
 
She hesitated.
 
“Yes that is correct.”

He caught her reaction.
 
“You hesitate.”

She frowned.
 
“I do not have the full story there, only theories.
 
But I do know for sure that He cannot enter my realm, just as I now cannot enter His.”

“You cannot?”

“Not even if I tried my hardest.
 
So keep that in mind if you run in there with guns blazing.
 
I have no access in.”

Lucifer nodded.
 
“Can you lock Him out of this place?”

Dahlia shook her head.
 
“Not that I know of, but I have been relearning things it seems hourly.
 
I did not know that only God or one of us could restore our third set of wings.
 
That information came from Raphael.”

He looked thoughtful.
 
“Then you
had
to go to Him to get your wings back.”

She nodded.
 
“Yes and that is why Raphael and I switched places.
 
She took the risks and got our wings back and I hid in Heaven to step in and save her.
 
I
would have gone without the trickery, but she refused to let me do it myself.
 
She said she owed it to me.”
 
Dahlia shook her head.
 
“At the time I could not believe that we could switch appearances and fool Him, but I trusted her and we did.
 
Now I know that He
can
be fooled.”

“How did you do that?”
 
Lucifer searched her features.
 
“He looked into her mind, saw her fully, and yet still was tricked into thinking her you.
 
I
thought she was you.”

“Raphael is the keeper of my original memories and the more devious aspects of myself.
 
She gave all of that back to me on the ice for safekeeping.”
 
Dahlia made a face.
 
“You are right in that He would have seen it if she had kept it while they joined, there is no doubt in my mind of that.
 
So I held on to it for her, disguised as her.
 
With our disguises in place, I went to Heaven, but no one questioned me.
 
They ignore her regularly and so did He.”

“Allowing you to slip into Heaven unnoticed.”

“I would not have believed we could be so brazen until I experienced it.
 
They lack suspicion, they only respect power.
 
And she had worked this entire time on seeming powerless, weak, and spineless.”
 
She sighed.
 
“Her act allowed her to stay hidden in plain sight, all of this time.
 
I do not believe He ever questioned her creation or appearance.”

Lucifer nodded slowly.
 
“I did not question it either.”

She jabbed his chest with her finger.
 
“You did not question
anything
.
 
In certain respects you and He are alike.”

He made a face.
 
“This is true.
 
But would He not have seen the plan in her thoughts?”

Dahlia smirked.
 
“He had His healer remove the memories.
 
And that I did, I peeled back what she already had.
 
He would find no tampering besides what He had ordered me to do.
 
So with her memory wiped in Heaven, she was reduced to me, the Ladriam-self I had allowed Him to see in Hell.”

Lucifer’s brows furrowed.
 
“How could she be reduced to you?
 
You are you.”

“And so is she.
 
Our memories and experiences up until that split where she became my second are the same.
 
He thought He had Ladriam, but He just had the carbon copy.”
 
Dahlia smiled.
 
“You were right when you said I was paranoid, but even
I
did not know how much so until her and I reconnected on the ice.”