Page 41 of Baking and Angels

But she pursed her eyebrows as a thought occurred to her. “Is that why you pledged yourself to me, mind, body, and soul? You weren’t just beingromantic?”

He realized what she was getting at. “Just in case,you know?”

“Does that mean I have to do anything you say?” she asked, releasing one of those worried eyebrows so it could arch up inquisitively. Mischievousness returned as well.

Yet, he couldn’t find the humor in it. “I would never do that to you,” he assured. “I may have been a monster for centuries, but I wouldneverdo that to you.”

Setting down her bowl next to her on the seat, she crossed the breath of space between them and wrapped her arms around him. Then he felt her wrap her wings around as well, filling in the remaining space until they were contained in a small cocoon of feathers. He sucked in a sharp breath.

Wanting to pull away, he forced himself to stay, to let her hold him. Even as the eerie feeling washed over his skin, his long discipline of doing things he didn’t really want heldhim firm.

“I’m so sorry, Rafferty,” she whispered, his hard work keeping her oblivious to his truefeelings.

She is just trying to comfort me. She loves me,he thought, andit helped.

The sensation eased as she reverted back to herself, apparently completely oblivious that her wings, horns, and even tail had been visible. Instead, she smiled and brushed her fingers down his cheek. “Good thing I’m not really a demon, right?”

“We don’t actually know what has happened to you,” he saidcarefully.

She nodded. “I know. I’m aware that I might not be… an angel. But I don’t feel particularly compelled by anything, if that helps?” She blew out a sigh and retreated back to the double-seater to reclaim her abandoned treat bowl. “It’s probably why I want to go see Cindy so much. You know? Just focus on what I can do, what I can control, until I figure out someanswers.”

She blew out another breath. “Do you think… we should tell the BDI…about me?”

“Absolutely not,” he answered, forcefully shaking his head. “They may not have believed us about me not being a demon, but if we show them you…”

“They’ll send me back,” she agreed, finishing for him. He was grateful. The words he would have said would have been far worse. “I know. We just hadn’t said it outloud yet.”

“It is agreed then,” he said, nodding as he took up the last of his own cake, even though he didn’t really want it anymore. There was no bringing himself to ever throw away food given to him.

“Are you okay, by the way, with all my… changes?” she asked. The vulnerability in her eyes at asking the question sliced through him like a knife.

“Of course. I would be a hypocrite if I weren’t,” he lied. “You let me touch you when I wasa demon.”

“Well, if I’m honest, it wasn’t always easy. That aura you put out gave me the heebiejeebies.”

“On some level, you recognized that I didn’t belong here,” heexplained.

“But you don’t feel like that now,” she encouraged. “So that means youdobelong. That’s good.”

“Yeah,” he said, but he wasn’t sure that was true either.

“What happened to that woman, the one that you helped.” Then Helena wrinkled her nose. “If you don’t mind me asking. You don’t have to answer if…”

“She died,” he said. “Not right then. Not when she had me, but eventually, years after she sent me back. I don’t really know. I don’t know if I care. That’s what it means to bea demon.”

He wished he hadn’t said it. Helena’s face sobered, all the joy she had been feeling about their trip sucked out. He just couldn’t stand her perkiness right then, and now that he had destroyed it, he regretted it.

And if he was still a demon, he could have devoured the foul-tasting memory, and she could have gone back to being perky.

“Rafferty,doyou think angels exist?”she asked.

He had uttered so many lies up to that point, he couldn’t give her another one. “Not every demonic deal turns out badly. The people that get good results, like the woman in that memory, they herald us as angels. Our gifts are ‘miracles.’ There are no angels.Only us.”

He dreaded what she would say to that, and if she would apply those rules to herself. He would have given anything at that moment to know what she was thinking, but a voice came over a speaker somewhere, mumbling some words that he hadn’t been focusing enough to understand.

Helena appeared to, though, and she perked up. “We’re almost here!” she said, her excitement returning after their sobering conversation.

Chapter 17

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