Reckless Radiance (13 page)

“Yikes, wrong room. This looks like the honeymoon suite,” Gabriel said as he took her hand. She squeezed his fingers and chuckled at his joke. They crossed the threshold together and before she knew it, he had her on the bed. She smiled up at him and saw the beads of sweat touching his hairline.

She shook her head and put her hand to his cheek. He was cold and clammy and his eyes showed just how exhausted he really was. “You need to rest,” she whispered.

He gave her the look he always did when he didn’t like what she had to say. Gabriel hated limits. He hated being sick. He hated it more that people could tell he was so ill.

“Rest can wait, Mrs. Jarrett,” he replied.

A tremor rolled through her at the endearment. Though she knew he was tired and shouldn’t be pushed, the moment felt completely right.
One night
, she told herself,
I can stop being his nurse and start being his wife for one night.

His brow rose as he no doubt saw her loosen her grip on her control. He placed a kiss on her lips and whispered her married name again.

Valerie’s eyes opened later and she stretched her back and shoulders inward like a cat. She smiled at the sight of her wedding dress in a puddle on the floor. Gabriel had managed to give her the perfect day. She cursed herself for doubting him in the first place. Rolling over, she reached for her husband and sat up like a shot when she realized he was no longer in bed.

The sounds of violent vomiting came from the small bathroom that was attached to the suite. Valerie hustled quickly into the bathroom finding Gabriel hunched over the toilet, retching up prime rib, garlic mashed potatoes and wedding cake. She put a hand on his back and felt him shake silently for a moment before sitting back on his heels and turning to her.

His eyes were rimmed red and he had burst a blood vessel in his right eye. His lips were pale and the skin of his face looked greenish gray. This was the young man she thought she’d be walking down the aisle to. Eventually he’d shown himself.

She dampened a washcloth in the pedestal sink and put it to his forehead bringing a sigh from his quivering lips.

“I know I didn’t say anything about it today—I didn’t want it in my vows but—thank you for this. I love you for so many reasons but I love you and I’m thankful for you taking care of me.” Gabriel’s words were quiet. Valerie dabbed the cool rag at his temple and looked at the face of her husband. He would widow her before too long but she wasn’t thinking about that looking into his eyes. She said the only thing she could think of. She said the truth.

“You take care of me, too.”

Chapter Twenty

Rounding the corner to the kitchen, Valerie caught sight of Russell in his standard attire of crisp black button down shirt and dark gray dress slacks. He stood from the kitchen table and smiled at her knowingly. She wondered if it had been hard for him to leave her alone in her bed last night. How long had he stayed and listened to her breathing? She sighed despite herself and smiled back at him. Everything was different now. She knew he wasn’t an alien or one of the many other ridiculous things she’d considered. Angel never crossed her mind.

“Everybody in the car, we’re late,” Valerie’s father hollered, ushering the family to the SUV. The ride was silent. Justin was tapping away on his cell phone in the backseat, Valerie’s mother was flipping through the pages of her Bible and her father had his eyes on the road leading them to the church.

Valerie glanced at Russell. “You look nice,” she whispered.

He turned to her and smiled. “She speaks.”

She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth hiding a girlish grin.

“I know you don’t want to go but it will be all right,” he whispered.

Valerie shot him a look. He said he couldn’t read her mind. How else would he know anything about how she felt about going to church?

The car came to a stop and her stomach twisted again. The church looked exactly the same, still like a picture out of a magazine—or a wedding album. It was a little white building with the classic white steeple and two stained glass windows in the front. Watching the people stream inside, she recognized nearly every face. Almost every one of them had been a guest at her wedding or a classmate or some small part of her life before she left. Her mother and father hurried ahead, greeting their friends as they made their way inside while Valerie’s feet were dragging.

Suddenly a hand was at her back, a warm, comforting weight she had no idea she craved until she was given it. She turned and saw Russell at her side. Valerie stopped and placed her body in front of him, looking up at him curiously.

“Is there something you’re not telling me?” she asked gently.

She felt his fingertips leave the fabric of her dress and sighed. His exhaling breath seemed more like a grumble and he shifted uncomfortably looking at her with dark eyes.

“
What
are you not telling me?” she pleaded.

Russell leaned closer to her and she felt her breath catch.

“The same thing you’re not telling me,” he replied.

Valerie stepped back but didn’t have a chance to fully comprehend. Her mother turned around and motioned them inside, seemingly annoyed at their lagging pace. “Come on you two,” she ordered.

Valerie nodded and they headed inside. The aisle didn’t look the same. Gabriel wasn’t standing at the front and there were no white roses and violet hydrangeas for her to hold onto. She stared crossly at Russell as he casually slid into the pew next to her mother.

A few people she knew caught her eye but all she could manage were tight smiles in their direction. She could only hope they could get out before there was a chance for small talk after the service. She and Russell clearly needed to talk.

Pastor Clemens started the service and in a matter of minutes, Valerie’s mind wandered back to kissing Russell in her bed. He’d told her the impossible. He’d shared his truth, his halo, his Serenity. So what else could there be? Valerie glanced up at Russell as they stood to sing the first hymn. He read the words in the aged leather bound book and sang out with the crowd. Valerie couldn’t stand not knowing what was going on in his head. She was done wasting time.

She grabbed Russell’s hand and yanked him out of the pew. Pulling him along behind her not listening to his whispered objections, they got to the back of the sanctuary and finally out the main entrance.

With the sun shining down on them, Valerie took a second to look at his face. He was staring at her like she was crazy. Their eyes were locked without a word between them. Russell’s brow knit together then softened as his hand rose to slip through his dark hair.

The softness of his eyes suddenly registered with her. He was, for once, vulnerable. He was still scared of something. He was holding back more than ever before. Cryptic was one thing but seeing fear in his eyes was truly disturbing.

“Enough. I want to hear it all,” she demanded.

His eyes met hers and his shoulders went slack in submission. “There is more than what I made you believe last night. To tell you is to risk you. More than that, I am so afraid of what you’ll think of me.”

***

Russell saw her stunned face and he immediately pulled up a vivid memory.

The boy was stirring, waking from a deep sleep. Russell placed his hand on the edge of the bed. The eyes he had known for nearly five years turned to him and smiled. It was only a year ago he’d shown himself to the boy. Man. He supposed he was a man now. He was out of school and engaged to be married. He was a man.

“Hey,” Gabriel said in a croaking voice.

Russell smiled half-heartedly and nodded at Gabriel. Five years prior he’d been assigned as his Guardian. A few days in when Russell saw the changes in the boy’s body, he understood. He watched, invisible to all those around him, including Gabriel, as the cells in Gabriel’s brain started shifting and turning black. It wasn’t his place to intervene. He couldn’t heal him or even whisper in his ear to see a doctor immediately. He was there to watch over him and when he needed it most, he was to share his Serenity with the boy and will away his fear.

Russell showed himself to Gabriel a few days after Valerie learned about the tumor. Gabriel was distraught, afraid of losing her. When the boy laid eyes on Russell’s human form for the first time, he wasn’t confused or in denial about Russell’s explanation. He accepted it and expressed gratitude for Russell immediately.

Russell had never had such an experience with a human. He had only ever shown himself to one other that he had Guarded and she was very frightened in the last moments of her life. He ended up overdosing her on his Serenity as a fellow angel, Cassandra, a member of the message and judgment department called The Order, came to Usher her to The Gates. Gabriel was so different from the other mortals Russell had known. Gabriel was brave and his strength and faith remained unshaken by his disease. He had but one care in the world. Valerie.

“I know it’s not time yet. I even think I may have a while but I need you to do something for me,” Gabriel said as he sat up in bed. His hair had already been shorn close to his scalp so the hair loss from his chemotherapy would be less noticeable but Russell’s supreme vision picked out the patches of bald skin.

“Of course,” Russell replied. He wasn’t necessarily in the business of granting favors. He wasn’t even sure it was allowed but if putting Gabriel’s mind at ease about something would help him then Russell would try to do his best.

“I need you to watch out for her when I’m gone,” he said, his eyes staying firmly locked to Russell’s. Russell marveled at the crystalline sky blue color of his charge’s eyes until the day he took it upon himself to replicate the color in his own form. When he was initially choosing a form he thought he had found the most aesthetically pleasing combination until he saw the unmatched beauty of Gabriel’s eyes. He wanted the color for himself not only for their beauty but also as a tribute to the boy.

Before Russell could answer he heard the creak of the floorboard outside Gabriel’s door and he made sure his form stayed hidden from all but Gabriel’s eyes.

“Hey, Baby. How are you feeling?” Valerie said as she breezed in the room. Russell examined her closely for the first time since he’d become aware of her presence in Gabriel’s life. She was a tall girl with long legs and honey colored hair that always tended to wisp around her face like an ethereal frame. Her eyes were hazel, a color Russell was not particularly attached to but in the light of day he likened her eyes to the mixture of hues he had seen near the ocean once. They were somehow all at once the blue of the sky and the pale green of the sea flecked with the brown of California sand. She perched on the edge of Gabriel’s bed and caressed his forearm as he repositioned his pillows to sit up comfortably.

She was a kind and caring girl. Russell had always known that. But looking at her after Gabriel’s request of him left Russell seeing her differently. She turned her head to glance around the room and looked right through Russell. She couldn’t see him but it almost felt like she had. With her eyes right on him she smiled for an instant. It was so brief and while the smile was not for him, he felt a deep burn in his chest looking into those doe eyes as they sparkled and her lips curled up at the ends. Her head turned back to Gabriel in what felt like slow motion, her face blurring in his mind as she left his sight.

The burning expanded in him then turned into a tingle, a ripple of electricity moving through his limbs. He looked down at his own form and saw the amber light seeping out of him and was shocked. He tried to will it away but he couldn’t. The aura was building—blinding. He caught Gabriel’s eyes and saw his shock.

The light finally subsided. Valerie left the room to make something for Gabriel to eat and Russell felt as though he could breathe again.

“Dude,” Gabriel whispered. Russell glanced at him, his head still reeling from the new sensation. “You totally glowed.”

***

He’d been filled with some sort of unknown emotion that day so long ago. He’d struggled with understanding his feelings the rest of the time he spent with Gabriel. All the while, he watched and waited. He was still doing his job, taking care of the boy but one day it happened.  He named the emotion he felt for her. He had fallen in love with Valerie from afar. Even Gabriel noticed.

“You don’t have to hide it, you know,” Gabriel said off handedly one day. “I’m actually thankful you care about her as much as I do.”

“How did you know?” Russell asked and Gabriel laughed at him, something Russell hadn’t seen him do in days as he’d grown weaker since the wedding. “I’m not dead yet. I know when another man looks at my wife with love in his eyes.” A coughing fit followed the quip and Russell rushed to Gabriel’s side to ease a small amount of his suffering.

Russell had never been called a man. He wasn’t a man. Until the title had been put upon him by Gabriel, he hadn’t known how much he wanted to be a man.

Valerie was still gawking at him while he pulled himself away from the distant memory. He could hear the congregation singing another hymn through the walls of the church and his eyes drifted to the white building. Her heard her sigh impatiently, waiting for him to snap out of his restless thoughts and speak.

“It’s about Gabriel,” he said with a strangled voice.

Her eyes turned to daggers and locked on him tightly.

“How do you know his name?” she growled. He saw the wheels turning in her mind. The whole reason he wanted to keep her from the truth was that, the look of pain on her face hearing Russell say his name.

“I was his Guardian while he was ill.”

The color drained from her face. “Gabriel’s guardian angel?” Her voice wavered a bit when she said his name.