"I want to do a lot of things to your body, but that's not one of them."
"What's wrong with the body you have?"
"My body is a lot like glass. Real, but outward, reflecting the world around me. You see and hear me, and I see and hear you. When you touch me, you feel it. I don't experience you in the same way. I can't feel you. I experience everything through a sheet of glass, and the only way I can cut through that sheet is by possessing a human body."
"Or part-human."
Patch's mouth tightened at the corners. "When you touched my scars, you saw Chauncey?" he guessed.
"I heard you talking to Rixon. He said you possess Chauncey's body for two weeks every year during Cheshvan. He said Chauncey isn't human either. He's Nephilim." The word rolled off my tongue in a whisper.
"Chauncey is a cross between a fallen angel and a human. He's immortal like an angel but has all the mortal senses. A fallen angel who wants to feel human sensations can do it in a Nephil's body."
"If you can't feel, why did you kiss me?"
Patch traced a finger along my collarbone, then headed south, stopping at my heart. I felt it pounding through my skin. "Because I feel it here, in my heart," he said quietly. "I haven't lost the ability to feel emotion." He watched me closely. "Let me put it this way. Our emotional connection isn't lacking."
Don't panic, I thought. But already my breathing was faster, shallower. "You mean you can feel happy or sad or-"
"Desire." A barely-there smile.
Keep moving forward, I told myself. Don't give your own emotions time to catch up. Deal with them later, after you have answers. "Why did you fall?"
Patch's eyes held mine for a couple of counts. "Lust."
I swallowed. "Money lust?"
Patch stroked his jaw. He only did that when he wanted to conceal what he was thinking, the giveaway to his thoughts being his mouth. He was fighting a smile. "And other kinds. I thought if I fell, I'd become human. The angels who'd tempted Eve had been banished to Earth, and there were rumors that they'd lost their wings and become human. When they left heaven, it wasn't this big ceremony we were all invited to. It was private. I didn't know their wings were ripped out, or that they were cursed to roam Earth with a hunger to possess human bodies. Back then, nobody had even heard of fallen angels. So it made sense in my mind, that if I fell, I'd lose my wings and become human. At the time, I was crazy about a human girl, and it seemed worth the risk."
"Dabria said you can get your wings back by saving a human life. She said you'll be a guardian angel. You don't want that?" I was confused why he was so set against it.
"It's not for me. I want to be human. I want it more than I've ever wanted anything."
"What about Dabria? If the two of you aren't together anymore, why is she still here? I thought she was a regular angel. Does she want to be human too?"
Patch went deathly still, all the muscles up his arm going rigid. "Dabria's still on Earth?"
"She got a job at school. She's the new school psychologist, Miss Greene. I've met with her a couple times." My stomach gave a hard twist. "After what I saw in your memory,1 thought she took the job to be closer to you."
"What exactly did she tell you when you met with her?"
"To stay away from you. She hinted at your dark and dangerous past." I paused. "Something about this is off, isn't it?" I asked, feeling an ominous prickle make its way down my spine.
"I need to take you home. Then I'm going to the high school to look through her files and see if I can find something useful. I'll feel better when I know what she's planning." Patch stripped the bed bare. "Wrap yourself in these," he said, handing me the bundle of dry sheets.
My mind was working hard to make sense of the fragments of information. Suddenly my mouth went a little dry and stick). "She still has feelings for you. Maybe she wants me out of the picture."
Our eyes locked. "It crossed my mind," Patch said.
An icy, disturbing thought had been banging around inside my head the past few minutes, trying to get my attention. It practically shouted at me now, telling me Dabria could be the guy in the ski mask. All along I thought the person I hit with the Neon was male, just like Vee thought her attacker was male. At this point, I wouldn't put it past Dabria to deceive us both.
After a quick trip to the bathroom, Patch emerged wearing his wet tee. "I'll go get the Jeep," he said. "I'll pull around to the back exit in twenty. Stay in the motel until then."
After patch left, I put the chain on the door. I dragged the chair across the room and rammed it under the door handle. I checked to make sure the window locks were in place. I didn't know if locks would work against Dabria-I didn't even know if she was after me-but I figured it was better to play it safe. After pacing around the room for a few minutes, I tried the phone on the nightstand. Still no dial tone.
My mom was going to kill me.
I'd sneaked behind her back and gone to Portland. And how was I supposed to explain the whole "I checked into a motel with Patch" situation? I'd be luck) if she didn't ground me through the end of the year. No. I'd be luck) if she didn't quit her job and apply to substitute teach until she found a full-time job locally. We'd have to sell the farmhouse, and I'd lose the only connection to my dad I had left.
Approximately fifteen minutes later I peered through the peephole. Nothing but blackness. I unbarred the door, and just as I was about to tug it open, lights flickered on behind me. I whirled around, half expecting to see Dabria. The room was still and empty, but the electricity was back.
The door opened with a loud click and I stepped into the hall. The carpet was bloodred, worn bald down the center of the hallway, and stained with unidentifiable dark marks. The walls were painted neutral, but the paint job was sloppy and chipping.
Above me, a neon green sign spelled the way to the exit. I followed the arrow down the hall and around the corner. The Jeep rolled to a stop on the other side of the back door, and I dashed out and hopped in on the passenger side.
No lights were on when Patch pulled up to the farmhouse. I experienced a guilty squeeze in my stomach and wondered if my mom was driving around, looking for me. The rain had died, and fog pressed against the siding and hung on the shrubs like Christmas tinsel. The trees dotting the driveway were permanently twisted and misshapen from constant northern winds. All houses look uninviting with the lights off after dark, but the farmhouse with its small slits for windows, bowed roof, caved-in porch, and wild brambles looked haunted.
"I'm going to walk through," Patch said, swinging out.
"Do you think Dabria's inside?"
He shook his head. "But it doesn't hurt to check."
I waited in the Jeep, and a few minutes later Patch walked out the front door. "All clear," he told me. "I'll drive to the high school and come back here as soon as I sweep her office. Maybe she left something useful behind." He didn't sound like he was counting on it.
I unbuckled my seat belt and ordered my legs to carry me quickly up the walk. As I turned the doorknob, I heard Patch back down the driveway. The porch boards creaked under my feet and I suddenly felt very alone.
Keeping the lights off, I crept through the house room by room, starting with the first floor, then working my way upstairs. Patch had already cleared the house, but I didn't think an extra pair of eyes would hurt. After I was sure no one was hiding under the furniture, behind the shower curtains, or in the closets, I tugged on Levi's and a black V-neck sweater. I found the emergency cell phone my mom kept in a first-aid kit under the bathroom sink and dialed her cell.
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