Page 15 of Night in a Waste Land

But this kiss – their first in five years – was gentle as thistledown. A brush of closed lips against hers; the soft, warm rush of a breath across her face, while he held her by the chin with the barest pressure. It was sweet, and bristling with restraint – on both their parts. Like their first kiss ever, in the library of the old Gothic townhouse. When he’d told her to tell him to stop, because he didn’t know if he could.

She was surer of herself now, though. Wanted to take his face in her hands, and tease his lips with her tongue, and show him that it was okay; that she wanted anything and everything.

But.

“Rose,” Lance said behind her, his voice strained.

Beck pulled back first, eyes narrowed to golden slits as he stared over her shoulder at Lance.

“We need to go.”

She sighed, and nodded. “Right.” To Beck: “There’s a plane waiting to take us back Stateside. If you want to come.”

He shifted his gaze to her face, and studied her a long moment. “Wherever you are, that’s where I’ll be.”

“The city – our city. Things are really, really bad there. Our orders were, if we could bring you back, to head there next. The military’s all but given up on it. But we – we said we’d try to take it back.”

“It’s probably a suicide mission,” Lance said, gruffly. She could envision his scowl, and his folded arms, the way his biceps would be straining his shirtsleeves. “Little chance of success.”

Beck cocked his head, and grinned with all his teeth; a smile that didn’t begin to touch his eyes. “Well. I specialize in those sorts of missions. When do we leave?”

FOUR

Before

The conduit said her name was Morgan. She refused to tell them the name of the angel occupying her consciousness, but not in a defiant way.

“That’s not important now,” she said, prosaically, with that odd, ringing voice.

Standing behind their chairs, Rose watched Lance and Tris share a guarded look.

“Okay,” Lance said. “We’ll skip that for now. Tell me why we should trust you.”

“Well. I didn’t kill you.”

“She has a point,” Gavin murmured.

Lance said, “I heard that.”

Morgan claimed not to know the specifics of the Rift; it was all very nebulous and idealistic, rather than practical. But she was adamant that she disagreed with the conduits they’d encountered so far: she didn’t feel it was her role to punish mortals for their mortal sins. “It isn’t up to angels to pass judgement and then deal out a sentence. Our feud is with the armies of hell.”

“You fought with one of your own kind,” Lance pointed out.

“He was beyond reason.”

She wouldn’t speak to a master plan. There were no secrets to divulge, she said.

“I will help you, if I can.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re fighting with hell, too. And have been for a long time. I believe it’s a losing fight, without divine intervention.”

She showed not one ounce of ill will or violence, but still, Captain Bedlam ordered her contained. She was put in a windowless, lead-lined cell with the barest creature comforts.

“She’ll burn through that body, eventually,” Rose pointed out. She could still close her eyes and see Daniel phasing his hand into a man’s stomach; could still see the man whither and crumple and turn to greasy ash.

“I’m not feeding her people,” Lance said, harshly, mouth curved downward in a frown she’d come to learn meant he felt helpless.

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