LITMIR.BIZ

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I can’t see anything but tourists.

      With nothing better to do, I go across the street and wait between an army-surplus store and a tattoo parlor, hoping to catch Charlie going into the restaurant or heading home. I check the time and settle in for a tedious wait. No matter how long Charlie sits in his backroom booth swilling martinis, I’d rather be out with the hustlers and tourists on Hollywood Boulevard than stuck watching Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous in Willem’s man cave.

      I smoke a Malediction, then another. Down some Aqua Regia from my flask and start on my third cigarette when who comes staggering out of Musso’s but the birthday boy himself. Which is a little surprising. No one goes in there to have just one drink. Unless Charlie teleported here, he can’t have been inside very long. Why the hell go to all the trouble of navigating Hollywood on a weekend night just to pop into Musso’s if he wasn’t going to stay?

      Charlie misses a step and staggers against a blonde young enough to be his daughter, but expensive-looking enough to probably be his mistress. When he stumbles, he drops something. Jean Harlow leans him against the restaurant’s front wall and goes to retrieve whatever he lost.

      That’s when I start running. And it’s when I stop because of the bus that almost turns me into a human speed bump. But the pause actually works in my favor. When I get onto the sidewalk, Harlow is leading Charlie toward the parking lot and I get a good look at what she’s holding. It’s a box.

      It’s just like the one Karael gave me.

      Charlie fucking Anpu didn’t stop by for a martini. He came here to pick up some black milk. For what? Is he going to do the bacon trick for Jean?

      While they head around the side of the restaurant for the parking lot, I run back to the Catalina. White zones are supposed to be for passenger loading and unloading, mostly during certain hours. Me, I chose one that’s the twenty-four-hour variety. It doesn’t matter. There’s a ticket on the windshield when I reach the car. I snatch it off and cram it in my pocket, gun the car, and pull the most idiotic, dangerous, and unsubtle U-turn since Junior Johnson was still a stone-cold rumrunner.

      What the hell is a creep like Charlie doing with angel poison? And where did he get it? Are rich Sub Rosas keeping celestial beings in the backyard as pets these days? There’s no way I am letting these assholes out of my sight.

      I double-park a couple of doors down from Musso’s, waiting for the Rolls to emerge from the lot. Stopping does not endear me to the other drivers on Hollywood Boulevard. People shout at me in a fascinating variety of languages. They give me the finger. Threaten to call the cops. I want to shout at the morons that I’m trying to save their souls, but all they want is for me to move my ass.

      Without the Room, this is what I’m reduced to: sucking up abuse and dodging thrown coffee cups.

      Soon the Rolls-Royce appears from the side of the restaurant, easing its way into traffic. I don’t want to close in on Charlie and Jean too fast. I want them to feel safe and anonymous, so I gently lift my foot off the brake and let the car roll forward.

      I get about twenty feet when the Catalina slams to a stop. It feels like I hit a brick wall.

      I should be so lucky.

      Because it’s much worse. There’s an angel in front of me with one armored boot on my front bumper, and she looks pissed. No point hesitating. I floor the accelerator, hoping to knock her out of the way, but she leans into the car and I just end up burning rubber. I let up on the pedal, throw the car into park, but leave it running. By the time I get out, a crowd is gathering around us. Even on Hollywood Boulevard, a six-foot-plus woman wearing armored boots stopping a muscle car is something people will notice.

      She slams her fists onto the Catalina’s hood and screams, “Give me the box.”

      I stab a finger at her.

      “Hey, sister. You dent my car, you’re paying for it.”

      She punches the hood again. I look past her. The Rolls is out of sight, disappeared into the general flow of traffic.

      “Return it to me,” she shouts.

      “You want the box?”

      I point past her.

      “It’s going that way in a silver Rolls. Why don’t you puff out your wings and flutter after it? You’ll love Charlie.”

      She comes around the side of the car.

      “Not that one. The one you stole.”

      “Guess again. It was a gift from one of your kind. Ain’t that a kick in the teeth?”

      I shouldn’t have said that last part. It gives her ideas. She lunges for me, but even though I’m only half angel, I’m as fast as her. I dodge her and slide across the hood of a Camry aiming for the curb. With one hand, the angel shoves the Camry out of the way, smashing it into an SUV full of kids in soccer uniforms. What sounds like all the banshees in Hell letting loose at once fills the street as the kids in the van completely fucking melt down. The boulevard crowd, who’d been digging the show up until then—probably thinking we were a publicity stunt for a shitty action movie—starts running at the sound of breaking glass and the kids wailing.

      I can’t outrun an angel, but I’m about as strong as she is, so I can sure as hell hurt one.

      It takes a couple of kicks to knock over the parking meter. When she comes for me, I swing it at her head like a baseball bat. She doesn’t even try to get out of the way. Takes the full force on the side of her head. The blow knocks her down, but I can tell I haven’t really hurt her. When she gets up, her hands and shoulders are shaking, but not from fear or pain. Her eyes are rimmed in dark circles. Her lips and fingernails are cracked. She clicks her lower jaw against the upper, then bares stained teeth at me. I swear, if she wasn’t an angel, I’d peg her for a meth head.

      She has scars on her cheeks and her armor is dented and battered. She’s seen some heavy action, so my parking-meter stunt isn’t going to impress her. Before she can come at me again, I bark some Hellion hoodoo and the car she’s leaning against explodes in flames, knocking her through a camera-store window. Now the last few hardcore cases in the street abandon their cars and head for higher ground.

      When she comes out of the store her face is singed on one side, which doesn’t improve her looks or her mood. But the flames don’t intimidate her. She sticks her face into the burning car, takes a breath, and exhales a goddamn wall of fire in my direction.

      I dive between a couple of parked cars, letting the flames pass over my head.

      Who the hell is she? She’s sure as shit acting like a Hellion, but fallen angels are trapped Downtown. They can’t come up here. That means she’s come here from Upstairs, which is infinitely worse. It means that whatever angel war is going on in God’s backyard, I’m now part of it.

      I’m still hunkered down behind a car when it splits in two in a shower of heat and sparks. With her free hand, the angel shoves the rear end of the car out of the way while holding her Gladius, her angelic sword of fire, in the other hand. I get up and manifest mine. She twitches. Opens and closes her eyes like she’s not sure what she’s seeing. However, it’s not the Gladius that has her vibrating, it’s whatever is wrong with her. But that’s not my problem. She bellows and runs at me, her Gladius held high. I didn’t want to be here before and now I’d like a big fat shadow to disappear into, only I can’t, so I bellow right back at her and charge like the stupidest bull who’s ever been stuck on a matador’s sword.

      When her Gladius crashes into mine it sends a shock wave up my arms. She’s goddamn strong. Maybe too strong for me. The fiery explosion from Gladiuses colliding blows out the windows on a nearby shop, setting a row of mannequins and Valentine decorations on fire. An alarm goes off. She doesn’t notice and comes at me, thundering chopping blows down at my head. I get my Gladius up and hold her off, but she’s not stopping, deep into some kind of berserker rage.

      I back up under the strength of her blows, but I can’t keep playing defense. When she

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