Reckless Radiance (14 page)

“Yes,” Russell whispered.

He watched as her face flickered between sadness and anger. Waves of realization seemed to hit her and finally she asked him the question he’d been dreading.

“Were you with him when he died?”

Russell closed his eyes and took a breath. When he glanced at her again he knew he didn’t have to say it. She knew. Her hands were balling into fists at her sides and he could sense the aggravation growing within her.

“Valerie …” he started.

“I don’t get it. You’ve been here all along? What is this?” Her words spewed out and he wanted to reach out to her to calm her but he resisted. Using his Serenity to pacify her would be wrong.

He took in another heavy breath. It would all have to come out. Tension settled in his chest and shoulders as he braced himself for her reaction. “He—asked me to take care of you.” Russell shut his eyes again before he continued. “I would’ve been able to stay away … I should’ve just taken my next assignment but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I owed it to him to find you.”

He saw her eyes welling up with tears and it tore his insides to shreds.

“I’ve known you for so long,” he said. “I searched for you,” He shook his head and covered his face with his hands. There was too much to explain and none of it was coming out right.

“I had to find you because I made a promise to Gabriel and because I—love you.”

She was staring at him as his words hung in the air. Finally he had confessed what in his mind was more important than what he was. What was that look in her eyes? Russell couldn’t place it. He kept his eyes low and his mouth shut.

The silence ached in him and he finally glanced up at her. Standing in the sun in a sweet blue dress she looked so young. Her pale lips parted and he thought she might speak.

A sudden burst of chatter came from the church doors and a crowd of people emerged. Service was over. He met her stare and didn’t know what he saw in her eyes other than tears. She quickly smeared the moisture off of her cheeks and turned away from him. Her parents and brother were headed toward them and Russell knew the conversation was over for the meantime. Truthfully, he wondered if it would ever continue.

Chapter Twenty One

Being in the car with him was torture. She wanted to jump out and walk home alone. Valerie shot Russell a sidelong glance and shifted in her seat. Her heart was pounding in her chest and conflicting words were screaming inside her head. The devil and the angel you might say.

He knew Gabriel. He knew her, in a sense. Her stomach twisted as the car stopped outside her house.

“Russ, I could use a hand in the barn if you wouldn’t mind,” her father said as he pulled the key from the ignition. Valerie let a huff slip out and Russell looked at her as he stumbled to answer.

“I, uh,” he started.

She narrowed her gaze and felt her jaw stiffen. “It’s fine,” she said through her teeth.

She saw his shoulders slump when he looked up to her father in the drivers’ seat. “Happy to help, George.”

Their conversation wasn’t over and they both knew it. But after a year away she couldn’t deny her father a little free work to take care of their room and board. Her parents had already been too kind and more importantly, they’d managed to keep their questions about Russell to a minimum.

Valerie nodded at him starkly and darted out of the car heading straight for the tree line. Her feet were fast and determined. “Valerie?” He called out behind her.
No
. She didn’t want to talk. She wanted him to go do his work and leave her be. Maybe a moment alone would help her understand. She heard his footsteps in the dry grass as he reached her. His hand landed on her shoulder for an instant, spinning her around to face him. Russell looked down at her with no certain expression on his face but if she had to guess, it was vigilance.

“Can we speak later?” he asked.

The tension in her chest started to fade and the worry in her stomach slowly melted away at the sound of his voice. She lifted her eyes to his and was once again reminded of Gabriel. A sigh rolled out of her as she finally made the connection. His eyes were a near perfect match to Gabriel’s. Though they didn’t share the same shape or setting, she knew the flecks of gray and pale azure that made up the icy tone.

“Later,” she said.

He gave her a stoic glare and headed to the barn where her father was already waiting. Watching him walk away, her uneasiness came back swiftly but she tried her best to push it down as she trekked into the woods. Not far into the trees she found what she was looking for. A log no more than four feet wide lay planted in the dirt in a small clearing. She took a seat on the bench nature made long ago and put her head in her hands. For years she and Gabriel had claimed the log as their own. It had been everything from an imaginary car when they played as children to their most coveted make-out spot as teenagers. Now overgrown with weeds and wildflowers, the ground around it not having been tended in some time, the place still filled her with warmth. It was a simple tree trunk on its side but it was more than that to Valerie. It was the home of many laughs and kisses, serious conversations and secrets. It was their spot.

Her eyes looked absently in the direction of the barn as she couldn’t keep Russell out of her head for very long. She’d been curious about him, even on the border of being enraged with questions. But now, knowing the whole truth, and what she imagined was still just the tip of the iceberg, her inexplicable fondness for him was clearer somehow.

If what he said was true then it all made perfect sense. Only someone who understood everything she’d shared with Gabriel could know her completely. And Valerie knew she could only open her heart to someone who really knew her.

With her head in her hands she let the tears well up in her eyes and spill down her cheeks silently. Her heart had been telling her all along. Russell’s inviting and familiar blue eyes, that same sweetness she’d loved so much about Gabriel … Russell was right in front of her and exactly what she’d been wishing for. It was so clear. How he so easily fit in everywhere. How he knew what to say and when to stay quiet. The way he kissed her and didn’t push her. The way he
loved
her without ever saying the word.

“May I join you?”

She heard his voice and lifted her head, sniffing and quickly brushing her tears away. Valerie swallowed hard and turned from him. “I thought you were helping my dad,” she said.

“He decided he didn’t need me after all.”

She felt like snapping and telling him she didn’t need him either. She didn’t need him to drudge up old memories and new stories that would make her question everything she’d had with her husband and everything that happened after she’d lost him.

But like every other time she felt like losing it and firing off at Russell, she couldn’t. And it wasn’t a matter of not being confrontational. It wasn’t about not wanting to hurt his feelings. She actually couldn’t. She didn’t want to lie and tell him she didn’t want him around because she did. As completely screwed up as the last five days of her life had been, she was hard pressed to recall a time when she’d smiled as much since Gabriel became ill.

“Could you … say something?” Russell’s voice broke the stillness between them. She cracked a sad smile and shook her head. What was she going to say? Valerie wished she understood it better. She wished he hadn’t used
that
word. It had been so long since a man looked at her and told her he loved her. Gabriel’s weak voice had been the last. Nearly choking on the breath that whispered the words, Valerie remembered still feeling chills at the admission he’d shared with her time and time again. She shook his confession from her mind and decided it was time to press him for full disclosure. If he already knew her story then she needed to know all of his.

“I want to know everything.”

“Where should I start,” he said and she sighed, thankful for his compliance. He sat down next to her and for the first time she felt a wave of the guilt she’d been waiting for. Russell knew Gabriel and now he was essentially taking his place. She inched away from him as he settled beside her. She barely glanced at him from the corner of her eye and saw the pale rejection on his face. She tried not to care and a breath stuck in her lungs before she asked the first question. The one she wanted to know most. “How long were you with Gabriel?”

She stared at his profile and watched him chew on his bottom lip for a second before giving a long pause. He turned to her and she saw so much and yet nothing she could define in his eyes. “I was with him for exactly five years. For four years and three hundred and sixty-four days I was his Guardian,” he said, stopping to rub harshly at his forehead. Valerie felt a sinking pit in her stomach. Gabriel had only been diagnosed less than two years before he died.

“And for the last day of his life, I was his Usher,” he added.

Usher,
she thought,
someone who leads you to where you need to go
. The sinking feeling intensified. “What does that mean? What’s a Guardian and what’s an Usher?” she pressed.

“I watched over him. Long before he knew he was ill, I was there. As his sickness worsened, I tried to ease his emotional pain with my Serenity,” he hung his head and she felt herself burn with anger. “I do not choose my jobs. I am called. I hear a ringing from within and when I arrive in the angel’s realm, I am told what to do next. Sometimes I’m only on a job for a day, other times it is years. It’s out of my hands. The day before Gabriel died I got called for a new job. I was sent back to him as his Usher—his guide to The Gates.”

A tear rolled down her cheek remembering that day. Waking up next to his lifeless body and feeling so much resentment toward the universe for taking him though she knew in her heart he was no longer suffering. Russell buried his head in his hand for a moment then glanced at her. A part of her wanted to thank him. She was glad he’d been with Gabriel. She was glad he wasn’t alone like she’d always imagined. Another part of her wanted to curse him for being weak to whoever controlled him.

Just as she swiped the tears from her eyes, she felt Russell’s fingers barely touch her chin. The glow of his halo was just a small sparkle from his fingertips where he tenderly touched her face. She turned to him instinctively and saw the same amount of sadness in his eyes as she knew must have shown in hers. Her heart had been wrenching for days over the emotions Russell brought to the surface in her but looking in his eyes in that moment was the worst. What she saw on his face comforted her and wounded her all at once. Russell had loved Gabriel, too.

Chapter Twenty Two

He remembered the day of his reassignment perfectly. The ringing sounded and it set him on edge. Anxiety was something he had never fully understood until that day. The acid he knew resided in his digestive system seemed to jump to the back of his throat, alarming him. Gabriel didn’t have much time. Why would they call for him now?

Willing himself to be hidden from sight, he rested his hand on the boy’s head one last time before returning to the only place he had ever known as home.

It was his privilege as an angel to bypass The Gates and enter the angel’s realm with just the help of his thoughts. Though some chose to remain in their natural form, the majority of his brethren had chosen a human appearance long ago and stayed that way even within the confines of their exclusive realm. Russell was greeted by one of the many Proxies the minute he arrived. He knew her. She’d given him his last assignment as Gabriel’s Guardian. Her human form was rather striking. She was tall with curls of interwoven blondes and browns, pale skin and an angular nose.

“Brother Russell, I have your newest assignment,” Brianne said with a soft lilt to her voice.

“Pardon my annoyance Sister Brianne but I cannot understand why I’ve been reassigned at this time,” Russell replied. She looked at him with surprise in her brown eyes and cocked her head to the side.

“You know just as we all know the assignments are planned with great reason and intent. It is not an angel’s place to question.” Her eyes tightened on him and he felt the eyes of others on his back. He was on the verge of insubordination and it had clearly been noticed.

“Your next assignment is in your current town of Greensburg. You will be an Usher for one Gabriel James Jarrett,” she said plainly.

Russell expelled air from his lungs as if someone had hit him in the stomach. The bitter acid made itself known in his mouth again. His eyes flared at Brianne but she didn’t react. She simply placed her hand on his arm and willed him to be where his newest assignment was waiting for him.

His head was reeling and he was overcome with a wealth of emotions, some of which he had never experienced. Guilt and sadness rippled through him strongly as soon as he arrived back in Gabriel’s bedroom. He swept his eyes over the room and took in the sights of everything he’d never needed to notice. A stack of comic books still sat on his desktop though he hadn’t had the strength to read in months. A red pennant from some sports team was tacked to the wall askew. And a picture of
her
as a young and spritely thing was taped to the mirror above his dresser.

The sky grew dark outside the two windows of the bedroom and Russell was having trouble breathing. He didn’t need to breathe. He’d done without it before. It wasn’t that he couldn’t get oxygen, it was stress and worry that gave him fits of breathlessness. He watched by the window as the boy’s mother came in and touched his forehead sweetly.

“Goodnight my love,” she whispered before cozying herself into the recliner in the corner of the room with a blanket and a book with a light attached to the hardcover. Gabriel hadn’t budged. He was asleep, barely conscious. It was time and Russell knew it. But Valerie wasn’t there. She hadn’t seen him yet. He couldn’t take him until she arrived.

Russell watched the sun set and the stars protrude in the sky all while he remained invisible to the sight of his former charge and the boy’s mother. Where was she? No sooner did he think the words than Valerie crept into the dim room. Breathing became easier as he gazed at her. She took the folded book from the sleeping mother’s chest and repositioned the blanket around her gently. She flicked off the only small lamp that had been on and pushed the door closed ever so slightly.