Of Alliance and Rebellion (11 page)

Remiel blinked and steepled his fingers in front of his chin. “Hmm,” he hummed.

Compassion was known widely as a tool of the Guardians, but Warriors were not completely devoid of it. Anahita found herself wishing Remiel could have a bit more of it at the moment.

Remiel was known not just for his surplus of gifts, but for the very rare instance of resisting Temptation. Remiel’s Temptation had been a woman, and not only had he resisted her, he had literally destroyed her, seemingly with ease. This epic occurrence had taken place much,
much
before Anahita’s time, so she did not know firsthand what had happened, but in the whispers among the brethren, Anahita had gathered that Remiel’s Temptation had been a very evil woman—one who had broken some of the Most High’s most important laws. And Remiel had meted out justice despite what Anahita now knew had to have been great internal struggle.

Max had broken one of the Most High’s most important laws as well, and yet, she could not bring herself to do as Remiel had done.

Yet
, Anahita reminded herself. It would be done. “I need a small amount of time,” Anahita said, raising her chin and leveling Remiel with steady eyes. “I have only just encountered the objects of my mission, and I must make sure I proceed with caution now that more variables are known.”

The words were wise, Anahita knew, and not ones Remiel could take exception to. The damage a single angel could do when under the power of a misguided Compulsion was not to be taken lightly.

“You must not wait long,” Remiel said after a beat of silence. “This was Jayden’s downfall.” He rose to his feet, and Anahita craned her neck back to maintain eye contact. “Organize your thoughts quickly, Anahita, and get your mission underway.”

“Yes, of course,” Anahita said, rising as well so she could feel more on even footing with the imperial angel.

And without another word of encouragement or censure, Remiel vanished. His final words rang through the quiet of the apartment with what felt like increasing urgency, and as though in response, Anahita’s Warrior Compulsion rose to the forefront to accept the challenge the other angel had laid out. But then, right on cue, Anahita’s Guardian Compulsion beat the Warrior Compulsion back and nearly convinced Anahita to Guard Max before she was able to get a hold of it.

Suddenly, the thought of organizing her thoughts seemed worlds outside of possible.

• • •

Max’s ear began to heat against the metal of the door that led to the angel’s living quarters. Why he was even here, he had no clue. He’d been with Jericho, who had given him a name for what his eye did. It was called
Knowledge
, and Jericho and his wife, Dahlia, also had the ability, though only through touching one another. Turns out Max had been unintentionally wise to keep his eye’s ability from their captors. It would have been exploited in the worst ways.

Jericho had mentioned in passing that Jayden was showing Anahita where she would stay, and after nearly having a coronary at discovering she was
going to stay
, Max had found himself right outside her door.

Where he had promptly heard another man speaking to her in near-whispers. The emotions such a discovery had inspired in him did not bear scrutiny.

Okay, fine, he’d lost his shit a little. But after punching a hole in the wall across from her door, he’d gathered himself enough to listen in on her conversation—a very mature move that he steadily stood by. Especially since it had yielded some very, very interesting intel.

Anahita’s little mission of death did not seem to be her own idea. That was ... nice, Max guessed. As was the knowledge that she was hesitant to carry out her mission—at least, that’s what he was able to glean from her tone of voice and cryptic answers. Reading other people was not Max’s forte. That was more Luke’s area of expertise with his covert ops training. Max had never seen a man who could disappear by appearing ordinary the way Luke could—a stunning feat for a red-haired giant. The things people said in front of Luke because they forgot he was even there, if they’d noticed in the first place, were uncanny. And Luke’s interpretation of body language and voice patterns was almost a superpower in and of itself.

Did the others know that Anahita was under orders from a mysterious other angel? He remembered that there appeared to be an angel-who-was-not-an-angel in their midst—Jayden. Surely he knew about this in-charge angel. Could Jayden be trusted?

Max had to admit that if Jericho and Eli trusted him, then he was trustworthy. He’d found out that Eli and his “Impulse Mate,” as they were called, had a small, infant daughter named Genesis; Jericho and his Impulse Mate, Dahlia, had a baby on the way and a son named Gabriel. If they trusted the angel Jayden to be around their children, Max had no room to protest the guy’s trustworthiness.

And, yet, it was not Jericho and Eli who Max wanted to take this new-angel information to first. Years of being cooped up with Luke and Oliver had built up a near-family feel between them all. He could not think of two different men he would want to have his back than them. But he also could not keep this from Jericho and Eli.

Max shuffled around and began to leave the wing of the compound that housed the living quarters. As he passed through the main room with the—Holy God—
Trees
that had changed his life forever, he muttered a soft, “Come with me,” to Jericho and Eli where they stood talking. He continued through the room to the medical wing, Jericho and Eli in his wake, following him without question: a move he appreciated.

He paused outside of the closed door of Oliver’s hospital-like room and squinted through the metal checkered pattern of the door window to see Luke sitting beside Oliver’s bedside, staring at the man’s slack face. Oliver was due to wake up in the next few hours, and he was always so disoriented when his eyes first opened. Now those eyes would be opening to a whole new environment. Max knew Oliver could not be alone today. He or Luke needed to be at his side at all times to reassure him when he awoke.

Max sucked in a breath and opened the door, which emitted a soft click. Luke’s head snapped around, and he smiled easily at Max. It looked like he was partially forgiven for ...
playing
with the angel. But Max’s expression must have been grave, because Luke’s expression sobered.

Luke’s brown eyes flicked over Max’s shoulder to where Jericho and Eli stood. “What’s wrong?” he asked, a small waver to his voice.

That waver caught Max right in his gut, and he realized he hadn’t checked on Luke to see how he was handling all of the recent changes. He needed to step up his caretaking and stop focusing on the angel, who he needed to stay far, far away from anyway. He walked over to Luke’s side and squeezed the man’s shoulder before turning to the other two men.

“Are you aware that an angel in some sort of position of power is ordering Anahita to kill Oliver, Luke, and me?”

Eli and Jericho shared a loaded glance. “Kind of,” Jericho said.

Max raised one eyebrow before he remembered to shake his hair into his face. He turned away from them slightly, showing them his left side and then saying, “Explain.”

“Well, we know that she has a mission to kill you,” Eli said. “We just didn’t know she was under orders from an actual person.” Eli shook his head. “Angel,” he corrected. “I keep forgetting they’re not quite people.”

Max’s jaw went slack. “How on earth can you forget they’re not
people
?” he asked.

Jericho shrugged. “Jayden seems so normal to us now.”

“Normal,” Max repeated. “The huge man with a robe and wings seems ‘normal.’” He dropped his air quotes and had to resist the urge to roll his eyes.

“Grumpy,” Luke murmured for Max’s ears alone.

Max grunted. Of course he was grumpy. What the hell? Who
wouldn’t
be grumpy in his position?

“It’s okay,” Eli said softly, and Max was reminded that they would have extraordinary hearing just like he and his guys did thanks to the fruit. Max didn’t have the good sense to be ashamed of his grumpiness. He didn’t have time for good sense right now.

“He
didn’t
seem normal to us when he was holding us hostage in the medical wing,” Eli continued.

Max’s jaw dropped again. “And you’re
friends
with this thing?”

Jericho dipped his chin and leveled Max with a no-nonsense look. “Yes.”

The single syllable was a challenge, and everyone in the room knew it. Max held out his hands. “Okay,” he said carefully. “Obviously a sensitive subject. But
why
are you friends with something that tried to kill you?”

Eli smiled lopsidedly. “For all of his bluster, he’s really just a big softy.”

Max knew this did not merit a reply. He settled for raising one eyebrow, the pull of skin across his forehead reminding him he was displaying his scar. He resisted hiding his face with all of his might.

“An angel around his—or
her
—Temptation is just about the most conflicted being in existence,” Jericho said, pointedly emphasizing the word
her
for Max’s benefit, he was sure.

Max grunted, but Jericho was already continuing. “Once Jayden saw Grace, there was no chance he was going to kill us. We knew it, even if he didn’t. It was just a matter of waiting him out until he knew it, too.”

Max opened his mouth to speak, but Eli cut him off. “The real danger is in the Compulsion. Angels have no free will, so if they fall into their Compulsions, they complete their missions blindly. It was the only challenge with Jayden, and as we understand it from him, Anahita has not allowed hers to set yet. She’s no threat.”

Enough
. “I disagree with you there,” Max said. “You’re both overconfident. You’ve encountered one angel—
one
,” he spit out. “To say you know that all angels who encounter their Temptations are no threat is not only naïve, it’s damn ignorant, and it could get my men killed.”

Eli and Jericho leaned forward simultaneously, but before they could speak, Luke said quietly, “I agree with Max.”

All three of their heads snapped to Luke’s direction. Max tried to hide his surprise.

“
You
think Anahita’s a threat?” Eli asked with both brows launching into his hairline. “The creature you’ve been following around like a puppy dog since we arrived?”

“Hey, now,” Max said, not sure exactly what he was protesting.

“I agree that you don’t have enough intel to judge this situation correctly,” Luke said, his eyes darting to Max’s in what could be described as a guilty move.

Tense silence filled the room. Finally, Jericho sighed. “So, it’s two against two in the angel-threat area.”

“
Three
against two,” Max corrected.

“Oliver’s still out,” Eli said. Max had fully disclosed the man’s situation, and both Jericho and Eli knew what a soft spot Oliver’s condition was.

“He’s with us,” Max said firmly. “Trust me.”

Luke nodded his agreement.

Eli blew out all of his air through pursed lips. “Hell, what a clusterfuck.”

“It doesn’t have to be,” Max said. “Luke here,” he clapped the man on the back—perhaps a little too roughly, “is the best at collecting intel.
And
he and the angel already seem to have a ... friendship of sorts in the works.” And that did not bother Max at all. Fuck no.

And because they’d been imprisoned together for so long and knew each other so well, Luke picked up Max’s train of thought right where he left off. “I can find out about this other angel,” he said, straightening with the excitement of a new plan of action. “Put feelers out as to her intentions
and
this other guy’s intentions. Then, and only then, will I feel comfortable deciding Anahita’s not a threat.”

Max wanted to take it all back. When he’d developed this plan for Luke to talk to the angel, he hadn’t fully comprehended that Luke was going to have to
talk to the angel
. Spend time with her. Alone.

A cold sweat broke out along Max’s spine. He had yet to look in a mirror, but he knew there was no contest in the looks department between them. Though Luke had the kind of talent that allowed him to disappear into the walls and keep women from noticing him, if one ever got close enough and Luke let his guard down, they would discover that the red-haired man was freaking attractive in this obnoxious I’ll-always-protect-you way that Max just couldn’t manage himself. Not even when he had been handsome. Max was the kind of man who put women on edge, and now, with a scar carving up his features, he was the kind of man who repulsed them.

This was a bad idea. Bad, bad, bad. The word pounded through Max’s skull, but just as he opened his mouth to call it all off, Eli beat him to the punch.

“That’s not a bad plan,” he said begrudgingly. He looked at Jericho who nodded his agreement. “But we cannot,” Eli continued, returning his attention to Luke and Max, “under any circumstances, let Jayden know. To say he would be ... peeved ... is an understatement.”

“I thought you said he was not a threat,” Max said.

“Not to
us
,” Eli said with an apologetic smile that only tipped one corner of his lips.

Jericho turned toward the door, but then turned back just as quickly. “You should probably know,” he said, looking directly at Max, “that Jayden can read thoughts. Sooo,” he drew the word out, “lusting after the angel he considers a sister in his presence is probably not a good idea.”

Max ran a hand through his hair. “Fucking great.”

“We’re leaving now so we won’t know the plan and Jayden won’t get it from our thoughts, but you should avoid him until we have the information we need since hiding your thoughts takes some practice.” With that final directive, Jericho and Eli exited the room, leaving Max and Luke alone with Oliver.

Luke wasn’t quite meeting Max’s eyes, and Max knew Luke well enough to guess that it had something to do with the angel. Alarm sprang through him instead of just mere annoyance. Just how hung up on the angel
was
Luke?

Max cleared his throat, which brought Luke’s eyes to his face. Max didn’t try to hide his scar this time, feeling more comfortable with Luke than all of the new faces he’d seen since they’d arrived here at the compound. That he’d ever felt the need to hide it from Luke now seemed laughable. The man had been there from the beginning. Hell, maybe Max should do the right thing and let Luke have a chance at the angel. He deserved it, and he’d be much better to her than Max could be.