Page 152 of Lourdes & the Mafia
But even as I command him to do it, I know the impossibility of it.
He is the angel of death.
Not the angel of life.
And as I look into his eyes and see his own despair mirroring my own, I know there is absolutely nothing any of us can do.
Lourdes is dead.
Gone.
Taken from us in an inevitable fell swoop, in a way that not even the angel and demon of death could control. Because while he might be able to kill without a thought, he cannot actually stop someone from dying.
Not even the love of our own lives.
“No. No. No!” I shove him aside and turn back to Lourdes, dropping to my knees beside her. My body covers hers, and the darkness envelops us, pulling us away from this shit-stain of a place. I hear a curse, Naomi’s sobs as she begs us to wait, but I don’t listen to her, I don’t give a fuck what claim she thinks she has.
I transport us back to the Underworld, arriving at her home. Our home. Where she was our queen. Where she was loved and protected and cared for.
When I look up again, we are no longer in that place. I’m hovering over her body, and the demons that went up with us to fight are here, in a circle, staring at their three kings and their queen with tears in their eyes.
And nothing, no torture inflicted, no wound, could ever compare to the devastation of losing her.
Ramiel
KaneandLorenzosobover her body. I do not think even Kane realizes he is doing it, showing emotion. Everything he’s kept locked up so tightly within him, everything he dared not show before is pouring out now in heartbreaking slides down his cheeks.
Meanwhile, I stand away from the scene, a fissure in my chest splintering, opening. A boom of thunder cracks along the Underworld sky and I’m not sure if it’s the storm, or the sound of my heart shattering to pieces.
I cannot bring myself to walk towards Lourdes’s body, because I know I will surely fall to my knees and destroy everyone within my path as retaliation against the cruel hand that dealt this fate. I am no stranger to death. I’ve wreaked it out of pure spite and necessity. It breathes through my veins like fire breathes through a scaled dragon’s maw.
Yet this situation is some terrible sense of irony.
The angel of death, forced to watch his mate die, and unable to do anything about it. Nothing but watch as her last breath left her body. As demons crowd around her to pay their respects to their queen. For she was their queen, even if she hadn’t wanted to admit it to herself.
She was ours.
And now she’s gone.
“Her body needs to be prepared.” I taste the salt of tears on my lips the moment I speak. They make my stomach churn with bile and I take a deep breath to keep myself together. To not let them see me fall apart.
Because I want to.
More than anything, I want to fall apart. Yet I am still the leader of the Underworld. I just fear that if anyone looks upon my heartbreak for too long, I will obliterate the entirety of them all.
Maybe I should. After all, why should they live while Lourdes is dead? She deserves life more than they do. Especially after what she did. Sacrificing herself to save everyone and everything from Thuriel’s wrath. Wiping him from existence.
The only thing stopping me from murdering them all is the fact that I know she would not want me to.
The vidente and her kind heart.
Kane’s body slowly unfurls from the ground, rising to a stand. When he turns to look at me, my breath catches at what I find in his eyes. A toiling storm of emotions, clashing together in a violent wave. His gaze skirts away just as quickly.
He takes a step back and the surrounding demons flee from his presence, even though he does not unleash his magic on them. Like he’s in a state of numbness, he does not retaliate or lash out. It just goes to show how far he’s fallen.
Lorenzo doesn’t get up from his place, but he does turn his tear-stained face in my direction. And when he speaks, his voice cracks. “I’ll do it. I’ll prepare her soul for the passing.”
Lorenzo
