“We aren’t.” She sighed. “I admit, I’m a work in progress. I have to bite my tongue a lot. Really, I suck at being a proper angel.”
“I believe you.” He poured himself a mug of coffee. Its thick chicory aroma filled the kitchen. He moved the pot over her mug, then stopped. “Are angels allowed to drink coffee?”
“I’m going to need it to deal with you.”
He glanced at her as he poured. “I thought you said I wasn’t that bad.”
“Considering where your mind went when I said ‘bite my tongue’?”
He chuckled and offered her the mug. “Point taken.”
“Jerk,” she muttered and, coffee in hand, set herself to work. Anything was better than letting him tease her.
Rebecca opened a nearby box and began stacking dinner plates and soup bowls on the counter. “Where do you want these?”
He shrugged. “Anywhere. It doesn’t matter. I don’t really give a damn.”
“That’s your problem,” she snapped, then made herself lower her voice. “You don’t give a damn. Only you do. You just keep trying not to, and it’s tearing you apart.”
He sighed and started on another box. Opening it revealed utensils bundled together with rubber bands. “Not with the lectures again.”
“It’s why I’m here. I’m good at unpacking boxes. I’m better at fixing things. Fixing you.” She took a sip of her coffee. It scalded her tongue. “Shit!”
“…might want to work on fixing that potty-mouth first, Rebecca.”
“Shut. Up.”
Tony chuckled again, but thank God he didn’t say anything else.
They worked in silence for a time, falling into a rhythm and learning to maneuver around each other without dropping anything breakable. Tony’s thoughts, when she dared to look, lingered less on groping Rebecca’s ass and more on worrying that the rattling dishes might wake Miranda. He seemed mostly dazed, and struggling to accept that this was really happening. That he was calmly unpacking his kitchen with a strange woman who could read his mind, claimed to be an angel, and wouldn’t get out of his apartment. He lingered on the sunstroke excuse, and worried over who was taking care of Miranda if this was just a fever-dream.
So he could think about something else.
They’d managed to clean off the right side of the counter before Tony stopped, giving her a thoughtful look. “I really don’t think you have to worry about me, Rebecca. I’m serious. I won’t kill anyone. You can move on to someone else and know you did your duty.” His rough voice was low, sincere. “Search my thoughts. It’s true. I swear it.”
She looked at him. The way he watched her made her chest tighten. Tentative, she dipped into his mind. There was nothing there but raw, painful honesty, and an almost desperate need for her to believe him. Believe that he wasn’t that kind of person. Believe that he was normal.
He was, she thought. More normal than Rebecca.
Which didn’t mean much, considering how messed up she was. Had been. She wasn’t that Rebecca anymore. That part of her life was over.
And if she was going to do things right in her new life, she couldn’t leave until she was sure.
“I’m staying,” she said. “I haven’t even done anything to help you yet. I’ll know when it’s time to leave.”
He frowned. She smiled. With a disgruntled sound, he turned back to the last box he’d opened. “You’re stubborn.”
“An angel has to be.”
“Isn’t ‘thou shall not be muleheaded and annoying’ one of the Ten Commandments?”
Rebecca laughed. “I’m pretty sure it’s not.”
“It should be.”
Shaking her head, Rebecca opened another box. Tony’s thoughts flitted at the edges of her mind, mostly centered on plots to get her out of his apartment without touching her. He thought if he touched her he’d—
“Damn it, Tony, stop that!”
“Stop listening!”
“I can’t!”
She could hear him grinding his teeth from across the room. “Try harder.”
“No, you try harder. It’s your perverted brain. Get it under control.” She turned and glared at him. “Look, it’ll never happen. I’m not giving up my wings just so you can get your rocks off. I need to do this right. I need—I need—” She let out a frustrated sound. How could she make him understand? “I need…to make a difference. I need to be able to help people. If I become an angel, I’ll be able to save lives. Make the world a better place. People will actually need me.”
The admission left a painful hole inside her. It grew when Tony only stared at her. She couldn’t stand to see his thoughts. He was probably thinking what a sad, pathetic little girl she was.
Yet his voice was gentle when he said, “Hasn’t anyone ever needed you before?”
She thought of her old life. Of moving from a dreadful foster home to the first piss-poor apartment she could call her own. Of the men who hurt her, in one way or another. Robbie had liked to make her feel small and stupid. Derek had liked to pinch. Jason was the only one who’d actually beaten her. Jason was the last before Sally had saved her.
Never again.
“It doesn’t matter.” She turned back to the box, and nearly dropped a soup tureen when his warmth appeared behind her. His hands curled against her shoulders, firm and reassuring.
“Don’t you have any family?” His voice was a deep rumble, almost in her ear.
“My parents died in a plane crash when I was seventeen. There’s no one else.”
No one who would miss me.
Was that the real reason Sally had chosen her?
Tony’s grip tightened, almost kneading at her tense shoulders. “I’m sorry.” He said the words without any pity, just sincerity, and it affected her more than she’d care to admit. If he’d shown even an ounce of pity, she’d have pushed him away.
Yet this was somehow worse. The way he touched her, the way his body heat enveloped her in comfort. She felt too exposed, and she couldn’t stand to face him.
“Rebecca.” He said her name that way again, and she closed her eyes. “What about your own life? Don’t you want a job? A husband? Children?”
“Please don’t ask me things like that.”
“Why? Is it so wrong for you to want something for yourself?”