Silence

CHAPTER 21

MY EYES FLUTTERED OPEN AND THE ROOM took shape. The lights were off. The air was cool. The most luxurious and delicious fabric caressed my skin. The memory of last night came back to me in a whirlwind. Patch and I had made out…. I vaguely recollected muttering something to him about being too exhausted to drive….

I’d fallen asleep at Patch’s.

I wrestled myself up to sitting. “My mom is going to kill me!” I blurted to no one in particular. For one thing, it was a school night. For another, I’d missed curfew by a mile and never bothered to call and explain why.

Patch sat in a chair in the corner, his chin propped on his fist. “Already taken care of. I called Vee. She agreed to vouch for you. The story she gave your mom is that the two of you were at her house watching the five-hour version of Pride and Prejudice, you lost track of time, you fell asleep first, and rather than wake you up, Vee’s mom agreed to let you sleep over.”

“You called Vee? And she agreed, no questions asked?” It didn’t sound like Vee at all. Especially the new Vee, who’d developed a death wish for the male race in general.

“It might have been slightly more difficult than that.”

His enigmatic tone clicked in my brain. “You mind-tricked her?”

“Between asking permission and begging forgiveness, I lean toward the latter.”

“She’s my best friend. You can’t mind-trick her!” Even though I was still angry at Vee for lying about Patch, she must have had her reasons. And while I didn’t approve, and intended to get to the bottom of it very, very soon, she meant the world to me. Patch had crossed a line.

“You were exhausted. And you looked peaceful sleeping in my bed.”

“That’s because your bed has some kind of spell on it,” I said, less testily than I intended. “I could sleep here forever. Satin sheets?” I guessed.

“Silk.”

Black silk sheets. Who knew how much they’d cost? One thing was certain, they had a hypnotic quality I found very distracting. “Swear you won’t ever mind-trick Vee again.”

“Done,” he said easily, now that he’d gotten away with it. Beg forgiveness sounded about right.

“I don’t suppose you have an explanation for why both Vee and my mom have consistently denied knowing you exist? In fact, the only two people who’ve confessed to remembering you at all are Marcie and Scott.”

“Vee dated Rixon. After Hank kidnapped you, I erased her memory of Rixon. He used her and put her through a lot of pain. He put everyone through a lot of pain. It was easier in the long run if I did my best to make everyone forget him. The alternative was letting your friends and family hang their hopes on an arrest that was never going to happen. When I went to wipe Vee’s mind, she put up a fight. To this day, she’s angry. She doesn’t know why, but it’s rooted inside her. Erasing someone’s memory isn’t as easy as it sounds. It’s like trying to pick all the chocolate chips out of a cookie. It’s never going to be perfect. Pieces get left behind. Unexplainable beliefs that feel compelling and familiar. Vee can’t remember what I did to her, but she knows not to trust me. She can’t remember Rixon, but she knows there’s a guy out there who caused her a lot of grief.”

It explained Vee’s suspicion toward guys and my instant aversion to Hank. Our minds might have been wiped clean, but a few crumbs got left behind.

“Might want to cut her some slack,” Patch suggested. “She has your back. Honesty is a good thing, but so is loyalty.”

“In other words, let her off the hook.”

He shrugged. “Your call.”

Vee had looked me in the eye and lied without reservation. It wasn’t a light offense. But the thing was, I knew how she felt. She’d had her memory tampered with, and it wasn’t a good feeling. Vulnerable didn’t begin to describe it. Vee lied to protect me. Was I that different? I hadn’t told her a thing about fallen angels or Nephilim, and I’d used the same excuse. I could either hold Vee to a double standard, or I could take Patch’s advice and let it go.

“And my mom? Going to vouch for her, too?” I asked.

“She thinks I had something to do with your abduction. Better me than Hank,” he said, his tone cooling. “If Hank thought she knew the truth, he’d do something about it.”

He was putting it lightly. I wouldn’t put it past Hank to hurt her if it meant getting what he wanted. All the more reason to keep her in the dark … for the time being.

I didn’t want to feel a shred of empathy for Hank, to humanize him in any way, but I found myself wondering what kind of man he’d been when he first fell in love with my mom. Had he always been evil? Or, in the beginning, had he cared about us … and over time, he’d built his entire world around his Nephilim mission, and it had taken precedence?

I abruptly ended my speculations. Hank was evil now, and that was what mattered. He’d kidnapped me, and I was going to make certain he was held accountable.

I said, “You mean the arrest was never going to happen because Rixon’s in hell now.” Literally in hell, by the sound of it.

He confirmed this with a nod, but his eyes darkened a shade. I supposed Patch didn’t like to talk about hell. I doubted any fallen angel did.

“In your memory, I saw you agree to spy on fallen angels for Hank,” I said.

Patch nodded. “What they’re planning and when. I meet weekly with Hank to share information.”

“What if fallen angels find out you’re selling secrets behind their backs?”

“I’m hoping they don’t.”

I wasn’t comforted by his casual attitude. “What would they do to you?”

“I’ve been in worse situations and managed to pull through.” The edges of his mouth tilted higher. “All this time and you still don’t have any faith in me.”

“Could you be serious for two seconds?”

He leaned over and kissed my hand, and spoke to me with sincerity. “They’d cast me into hell. They’re supposed to let the archangels handle that, but it doesn’t always work that way.”

“Explain,” I said firmly.

He slouched back with a certain lazy arrogance. “Humans are forbidden from killing each other; it’s the law. But people are murdered every day. My world isn’t much different. For every law, there’s someone out there willing to break it. I won’t pretend to be innocent. Three months ago I chained Rixon in hell, even though I had no authority other than my own sense of justice.”

“You chained Rixon in hell?”

Patch eyed me with curiosity. “He had to pay. He tried to kill you.”

“Scott told me about Rixon, but he didn’t know who chained him in hell, or how it was done. I’ll let him know he has you to thank.”

“I’m not interested in the half-breed’s gratitude. But I can tell you how it’s done. When the archangels banish a fallen angel from heaven and rip out his wings, they keep one feather for themselves. The feather is meticulously filed and preserved. If the occasion arises where a fallen angel needs to be chained in hell, the arch-angels retrieve his feather and burn it. It’s a symbolic act with inescapable results. The term ‘burn in hell’ isn’t a figure of speech.”

“You had one of Rixon’s feathers?”

“Before he went behind my back, he was the closest thing I had to a brother. I knew he had a feather, and I knew where he kept it. I knew everything about him. And because of it, I didn’t give him an impersonal send-off.” Though I suspected he meant to remain impassive, Patch’s jaw contracted. “I dragged him down to hell and burned the feather in front of him.”

His recounting of the story raised every hair on my scalp. Even if Vee betrayed me so blatantly, I wasn’t sure I had it in me to make her suffer the way he had clearly made Rixon suffer. Suddenly I understood why Patch had taken the subject so personally.

Breaking away from the gruesome picture Patch had painted in my mind, I recalled the feather I’d found in the cemetery. “Are these feathers floating around everywhere? Can anyone stumble across one?”

Patch shook his head. “The archangels keep one feather on record. A few fallen angels like Rixon make it to Earth with a feather or two intact. When that happens, the fallen angel makes damn sure his feather doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.” The suggestion of a smile lifted the corners of his mouth. “And you thought we weren’t sentimental.”

“What happens to the rest of the feathers?”

“They rapidly deteriorate on the way down. Falling from heaven isn’t a smooth ride.”

“What about you? Any secret feathers locked away?”

He cocked an eyebrow. “Plotting my downfall?”

I smiled back, despite the seriousness of the subject. “A girl’s got to keep her options open.”

“Hate to disappoint, but no feathers. I came to Earth stripped naked.”

“Mm,” I said as casually as I could, but I felt my face growing warm at the picture that one little word had planted in my brain. Naked thoughts were not good thoughts to have while I was locked away in Patch’s ultrasecret, ultraswanky bedroom.

“I like you in my bed,” Patch said. “I rarely pull down the covers. I rarely sleep. I could get used to this picture.”

“Are you offering me a permanent place?”

“Already put a spare key in your pocket.”

I patted my pocket. Sure enough, something small and hard was snug inside. “How charitable of you.”

“I’m not feeling very charitable now,” he said, holding my eyes, his voice deepening with a gravelly edge. “I missed you, Angel. Not one day went by that I didn’t feel you missing from my life. You haunted me to the point that I began to believe Hank had gone back on his oath and killed you. I saw your ghost in everything. I couldn’t escape you and I didn’t want to. You tortured me, but it was better than losing you.”

“Why didn’t you tell me everything that night in the alley with Gabe? You were so angry.” I shook my head, remembering every caustic word he’d directed at me. “I thought you hated me.”

“After Hank released you, I spied on you to make sure you were okay, but I swore to end my involvement with you for your own safety. I’d made my decision and I thought I could deal with it. I tried to convince myself there was nothing left for us. But when I saw you that night in the alley, my argument fell apart. I wanted you to remember me the way I couldn’t stop thinking about you. But you couldn’t. I’d made sure of it.” His gaze dropped to his hands, clasped loosely between his knees. “I owe you an apology,” he said quietly. “Hank erased your memory to keep you from remembering what he did to you, but I agreed to it. I told him to erase it back far enough that you wouldn’t remember me, either.”

I snapped my eyes to Patch’s. “You agreed to what?”

“I wanted to give you your life back. Before fallen angels, before Nephilim, before me. I thought that was the only way you’d get through the worst of what happened. I don’t think either of us will deny that I’ve complicated your life. I’ve tried to make it better, but things haven’t always gone my way. I thought it through and came to the difficult decision the best thing for your recovery and your future was for me to walk away.”

“Patch—”

“As for Hank, I refused to watch him destroy you. I refused to watch him ruin any chance you had at happiness by making you carry around those memories. You’re right — he kidnapped you because he thought he could use you to control me. He took you away at the end of June, and didn’t bring you back until September. Every day during those months you were locked up and left by yourself. Even the most hardened soldiers can break in solitary confinement, and Hank knew that was my greatest fear. He demanded I show my willingness to spy for him, even though I’d sworn an oath. He dangled you over me every minute of those months.” Patch’s eyes glittered with a hardened edge. “He’ll pay for that, and on my terms,” he said in a low, deadly voice that sent a chill up my spine.

“That night in the shed, he had us surrounded,” he continued. “The only thing on my mind was keeping him from killing you on the spot. If I’d been alone in the shed, I would have fought. I didn’t trust you to handle a fight, and I’ve regretted it ever since. I couldn’t handle seeing you hurt, and it blinded me. I underestimated everything you’ve already been through and grown stronger because of. Hank knew that, and I played right into his hands.

“I laid a deal on the table. I told him I’d be his spy if he’d let you live. He accepted, then called in his Nephilim men to take you away. I fought as hard as I could, Angel. They were mangled by the time they managed to drag you away. I met Hank four days later and offered to let him tear out my wings if he’d release you. It was the last thing I had to bargain with, and he agreed to hand you over, but the best I could get out of him was by the end of summer. During the next three months, I searched tirelessly for you, but Hank had planned for that as well. He went to great lengths to keep your location secret. I caught and tortured several of his men, but none of them could tell me where you were. I’d be surprised if Hank told more than one or two handpicked men he assigned to make sure your basic needs were met.

“A week before Hank released you, he sent one of his Nephilim messengers to find me. The messenger smugly informed me that Hank intended to erase your memory once he let you go, and did I have any objections? I wiped the smirk off his face. Then I dragged him, bloody and battered, to Hank’s home.

“We were waiting for Hank when he left for work the next morning. I told him if he wanted to avoid looking like his messenger, he would erase your memory far back enough that you’d never have flashbacks. I didn’t want you to have a single memory of me, and I didn’t want you waking up with nightmares of being locked up and completely alone for days on end. I didn’t want you screaming out in the night without knowing why. I wanted to give you back as much of a life as I could. I knew the only way to keep you safe was to keep you out of everything. Then I told Hank to never lay eyes on you again. I made it clear that if he crossed paths with you, I would hunt him down and mutilate his body beyond recognition. And then I would find a way to kill him, no matter the cost. I thought he was smart enough to hold up his end of the bargain until you told me he’s hooked up with your mom. Instinct tells me this isn’t just about his amorous affections. He’s up to something, and whatever it is, he’s using your mom, or more likely you, to accomplish it.”

My heart pounded in double time. “That snake!”

Patch laughed grimly. “I would have used a stronger word, but that works too.”

How could Hank do those things to me? Obviously he’d chosen not to love me, but he was still my father. Didn’t blood mean anything? How did he have the audacity to look me in the eye these past few days and smile? He’d ripped me away from my mom. He’d held me captive for weeks, and now he dared step inside my home and act as though he cared about my family?

“He has an endgame in all of this. I don’t know what it is, but it can’t be harmless. Instinct tells me he wants his plan put into motion before Cheshvan.” Patch’s eyes sliced to mine. “Cheshvan begins in less than three weeks.”

“I know what you’re thinking,” I said. “That you’re going after him alone. But don’t rob me of the satisfaction of bringing him down. I deserve that much.”

Patch hooked his elbow around my neck and pressed his lips fiercely to my forehead. “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

“So what now?”

“He’s had a head start, but I plan on evening the score. Your enemy’s enemy is your friend, and I have an old friend who might be useful to us.” Something about the way he said “friend” implied that the person in question was anything but. “Her name is Dabria, and I think it’s time I gave her a call.”

It seemed Patch had decided his next move, and so had I. I swung out of bed and scooped up my shoes and pullover, which he’d laid out on the dresser. “I can’t stay here. I have to go home. I can’t let Hank use my mom this way and not tell her what’s going on.”

Patch let out a troubled sigh. “You can’t tell her anything. She won’t believe you. He’s doing the same thing to her that I did to Vee. Even if she didn’t want to trust him, she has to. She’s under his influence, and for now, we have to leave it that way. A little longer, until I can figure out what he’s planning.”

My resentment boiled up, flaring at the very thought of Hank controlling and manipulating my mom. “Can’t you march over there and tear him to shreds?” I demanded. “He deserves a lot worse, but at least it would solve our problems. And give me some satisfaction,” I added bitterly.

“We need to bring him down for good. We don’t know who else is helping him and how far his plan extends. He’s assembling a Nephilim army to go against fallen angels, but he knows as well as I do that once Cheshvan starts, no army is strong enough to defy an oath sworn under heaven. Fallen angels will sweep in by the droves and possess his men. He must be planning something else. But where do you fit in?” he pondered aloud. Suddenly his eyes narrowed. “Whatever he’s planning, it all hangs on information he needs from the archangel. But to get her to talk, he needs an arch-angel’s necklace.”

Patch’s words seemed to smack me. I’d been so caught up in the rest of the night’s revelations, I’d completely forgotten the hallucination of the caged girl, which I now knew was a real memory. She wasn’t a girl, but an archangel.

Patch sighed. “I’m sorry, Angel, I’m getting ahead of myself. Let me explain.”

But I cut him off. “I know about the necklace. I saw the caged archangel in one of your memories. And I’m pretty sure she tried to tell me to make sure Hank doesn’t get it, but at the time I thought I was hallucinating.”

Patch watched me in silence for a moment, then spoke. “She’s an archangel and powerful enough to insert herself into your conscious thought. Clearly she felt it necessary to warn you.”

I nodded. “Because Hank thinks I have your necklace.”

“You don’t have it.”

“Try telling him that.”

“That’s what this is about,” Patch said slowly. “Hank thinks I planted my necklace on you.”

“I think so.”

Patch frowned, his dark eyes calculating. “If I take you home, can you face Hank and convince him you’ve got nothing to hide? I need you to make him believe nothing has changed. This night never happened. No one blames you if you aren’t ready, least of all me. But first I need to know you can handle this.”

My answer to his question came without hesitation. I could keep a secret, no matter how difficult, when the people I loved hung in the balance.