Adrian Phoenix - On Midnight Wings

“Now you have,” Von growled, not even bothering to keep the irritation from his voice. “So be sure to note the occasion in your diary with a smiley face and a kiss. I’m a little busy here, darlin’. What the hell do you want?”

Looking completely unfazed by his surliness, she replied, “To help you keep busy. It’ll be dawn in a few hours, but I have a way to keep you from Sleeping.” She offered him a small purple pill. “A stay-awake,” she informed him. “Created for vamp agents in law enforcement divisions.”

“How well does it work?” Von asked, studying the pill pinched between her thumb and forefinger.

“Perfectly. You’ll be awake all day. But there’re consequences.”

“Ain’t there always?” Von plucked the pill from her grasp, tossed it into his mouth, and washed it down with a warm swallow of a beer someone had kindly left idling on the table.

Merri folded her arms over her chest, then slung her weight onto one rounded hip. She arched an eyebrow. “Don’t you even want to know what those consequences are?”

Von shrugged. “Not really. I’ll take my chances. You’ve used them, right? And you’re still upright and breathing. That’s good enough for me, darlin’.”

“I hope you remember that when you’re twitching on the floor.”

“If I don’t, I trust you to remind me,” Von drawled. Merri’s quick smile told him that he’d pegged the situation right—she would rub his face in those repudiated consequences for all she was worth.

“Not to be rude, but . . .” Von closed his eyes again and directed his attention inward. A moment later he heard the soft whisper of suede, the deliberate tap of boot heels against oak as Merri turned and walked away.

“By the way, Emmett isn’t the only one who’s sorry to have missed that wet boxers contest, Mr. Champion,” she purred, her voice all silk and amusement, as she walked out of the kitchen.

“Holy hell,” Von muttered.

Jack was going to eat the goddamned shirt, one tiny gator at a time.

With Merri’s scent still spicing the air, Von returned his focus to Heather. < C’mon, doll. >

Minutes multiplied into hours. And, for the first time since he’d been turned, Von was awake to witness the sunrise he’d willingly sacrificed forty years ago. Or could’ve, if he’d opened his eyes, hauled his ass out of the chair, and twitched the curtain aside for a peek.

But he didn’t.

Dawn came and went unlamented, then noon slipped past. The strength of his link to Heather was beginning to thin and weaken, when the static suddenly dissipated like smoke in the rain.

And Heather reached back.

THEY DUMPED HER BLACK-HAIRED angel on the concrete floor, as if he were a piece of curbside junk, a banged-up gift for the donation truck. Dumped him right underneath the big metal hook hanging like a sharp and scary question mark from the ceiling of chalk-white squares.

Meat hook , the little voice in Violet’s tummy had told her when the smiling orderlies in their white ice-cream-man uniforms had ushered her—black paper wings taped (after a bunch of pretty- pretty -pleases) to the back of her Winnie-the-Pooh sweater—into the empty room with its soft padded walls.

“Go ahead and color, sweetie. We’ll be back in just a little bit.”

Violet had stared at the hook, her fingers clenched around the box of crayons in her hand, her gaze fluttering like a hummingbird along the glittering curve of metal.

What’s it for? she’d asked uneasily, her tummy suddenly full of fluttering moths.

But her little voice had become silent.

Violet was busy coloring the pictures she’d drawn on the soft padded wall when the orderlies had come back, minus smiles and nice words this time as they dumped Dante onto the cold floor.

He hit the concrete with a soft thud, his long black hair fanning across his snow-white face, hiding his closed eyes and the faint blue smudges beneath them. He almost looked like he was sleeping. But Violet knew better. The metallic smell of pennies folded into the air as blood trickled from his nose. From his ears. Smeared his lips. Again.

Violet sucked in a breath. “I think he needs to go back to the doctor. He’s still hurt. His owies are still bleeding.” She couldn’t believe she needed to point that out. They were grown-ups. Couldn’t they see the blood glistening on his white skin?

Yes, the little voice in her tummy said. They could and they do.

Then why don’t they help him?

They aren’t supposed to. But someone else can.

“Me,” Violet whispered. “That’s why I’m wearing wings.”

One of the orderlies kicked Dante from his side and onto his tummy, revealing the pale, pale hands twisted behind him at the small of his back. Metal gleamed around his wrists.

Bad-guy handcuffs. For her angel.

Violet felt the crayon she was holding—Fire Engine Red—snap in two against her palm. She let the crayon fall to the floor, the paper wrapper holding the broken halves together.

Bad-guy handcuffs for the angel who’d reeled her in like a lost kite from among the blazing stars when she’d floated away from her body.

Mommy turns on the TV in the motel in Oregon—the motel with the picture of a winking beaver chewing on a twig, outlined in glowing color—and is searching for the Cartoon Network when Violet hears firecrackers pop-pop-popping outside in the parking lot. Hears the sound of breaking glass. Then her mommy’s scream, jagged and raw.

“ My baby! ”

Violet tries to tell Mommy that she’s okay, but she can’t. She just drifts up and away, leaving her body, with its wide, staring eyes and the new dark and bleeding hole above them; leaving behind her wailing mother, and wishing she could stay.

Then Dante catches her.

“Don’t kick him!” Violet raced across the room, her paper wings rustling at her back. Crouching beside Dante, she glared up at the orderlies. “Stop being so mean! Mr. Purcell and the doctors promised that they’d make him happy, promised that they’d take care—”

“Hush, sweetie, don’t you worry none,” one orderly, a man with curly brown hair and a name tag reading Joe , said. “He’s tough. He can take it, trust me.”

“It’s still mean,” Violet insisted. “And he isn’t even awake.”

“Not yet, but he will be soon,” the other orderly—blond ponytail and a name tag that read Tyler —said. His eyes darted toward the thick, heavy door like he wished he stood on the other side. “Almost sunset.”

Violet nodded. “He’s a nighttime angel.”

She’d never actually seen his wings, but she knew deep down that they were there because she’d caught a glimpse of them—like black shadows outlined in Fire Engine Red at his back and arching above his head—when he’d lassoed her down from the sky and tucked her back into the body he’d held in his arms.

She’d known that it was her body, even though it was different now, her black hair, golden skin, and jade green eyes (a color her mommy always said she loved) angel-magicked into red hair, freckles, and blue eyes.

“Wake up, princess,” Dante had whispered.

Blood had streaked the skin beneath his nose that night too.

And his hands had glowed with pretty blue fire.

Joe and Tyler exchanged a look, one bristling with secrets—grown-up secrets—then Tyler swallowed hard and looked away. “Do it already and let’s get out of here.”