Page 63 of Angels Don’t Date

“Where are you going?”

His shoulders stiffened. “The show is over. Back to life. Back to war. Back to baking Vesper ridiculously opulent mini cakes that he doesn’t appreciate. Unless you wanted me to do something else…” He glanced up at me with the most come-hither anyone had ever hithered. “That’s right. You probably want an annulment. I’ll pay for a lawyer for you. You can’t be forced to marry someone against your knowledge and will.”

If he needed me to buy his fantasy wardrobe, what could I do? I yanked on his shirt, pulling him closer to me. “I don’t think it was against my will, exactly. Didn’t I message you once that I’d marry you if you were a man?”

He stared at me for a long time before giving a tiny shake his head. “I forbid you from forgiving my father so easily. It’s too late, you’ve already forgiven him. You’re just too quick to let things go. You need to make him suffer. Make me suffer. He married us against our wills. And I life-bound us against your will. We deserve pain!”

I rolled my eyes and let go of his shirt and took his hands instead. His responding grasp around mine was so perfectly like home. “I think having you for a son is enough suffering.” I winced. “Also me for his daughter. Do you think the Vampire King is going to try that again, using me as a weakness against all the angels?”

“No.” His brow furrowed. “Did you just suggest that you wouldn’t be the best, most angelic daughter anyone could possibly hope for? You did. That’s heresy!”

I rolled my eyes. “So much drama. Are you sure you don’t want to become an opera singer or some kind of stage performer? Think, you could outshine Fellicci! That would be moderately satisfying, right?”

He tilted his head as he studied me. “You really don’t see how absolutely precious you are. Do you mind if I fly you to the cottage? The atmosphere here lacks walls and roofs. I feel like angels are hiding behind every broken turret, nosily listening in.”

I looked around, but there was no sign of an angel or anyone else. “My cottage?”

He swung me up in his arms like that was consent, and then spread his wings, and flew me in a blink, and then we were in front of the small building. He carried me through the front door like he lived there while my head spun from the speed of the flight. Not that I couldn’t handle speed when I flickered into smoke, but it was a very different thing to have someone else carry you so quickly.

“What are you doing?” I asked as he walked to the small overstuffed couch and flopped over on it, still holding me so I ended up on his lap.

“I’m trying to persuade you to stay married to me. Do you mind?” He tilted my chin so I was looking into his soft blue eyes.

Being so close, knowing that he wanted to stay married to me, it was enough to make it hard to swallow. “I mean, it’s strange to have you in my cottage. It doesn’t feel appropriate without a chaperone.” And now I was thinking of the music video. Was it warm in there?

He smiled sweetly. “That’s one of the excellent reasons to stay married: we don’t need a chaperone. Another reason: I couldn’t help but notice that your father lacks a certain warmth and positivity. My dad is a wonderful father. Pushy, stubbornly believing in you when you don’t believe in yourself, and always there when you need him, at least if you let him be. He is likely slightly more diabolical than your father, but that means he’d be an excellent choice of babysitter if we were to have fifteen angelic terrors. Plus the pets.” He got a gleam in his eyes as he considered the torture his children would inflict on his father. There was more than a streak of sadistic monster in my husband.

My husband? Had I actually thought of him like that? But…

Richard brushed his nose against mine. “If you stayed married to me, you could keep my dad. He gives really excellent chicken feather hugs. And he makes a really nice chicken noodle soup when you’re pretending to be sick because you’re depressed. That sounds like cannibalism, but what’s a little chicken between family?” He frowned. “Speaking of chickens, Miracle will turn you into a diva if you let her. Your singing has a lot of potential, and there’s nothing she hates worse than untapped musical potential. I don’t suppose you’d like an unhinged musician as a sister. She always wanted a sweet, adorable, sun-born vampire sister. No, she just wanted someone interested in music, and since you put that interest directly after baking, you’ll pass.” He frowned. “It’s hard to sell Miracle. You either love her, or you don’t, and I realize that as a set, we’re a bit much.” He sighed heavily. “No, I don’t suppose my family would convince you to stay married to me.”

I stared down at our hands, my heart beating faster and faster in my chest. “I’ve always wanted a sister, and I like unhinged musicians better than divas.”

His eyes glowed as he brushed his thumb over my cheek and murmured, “If you find the idea of living amongst the angels untenable, we could have the cutest cottage pastel-princess-and-pet-baking platform. War as a purpose is distinctly hollow. You see, I’ve found a new purpose in you.”

I stared down at our hands tangled together and my heart beat faster and faster, his golden skin mottled with scars, my hand much less marked by war and violence. He was going to be a commander. That would be a much safer position, much less likely to lead to decapitations than his current ‘fight in every battle however impossible it is to win’ attitude. Three beheadings? I couldn’t even…

I swallowed hard while the silence grew heavy and thick between us. Could I accept a life with him? He was such a public figure, and I wanted…What did I want? He was offering me everything and asking for nothing in return. Except that I stay married to him, that I not reject him.

My words came out slow and hesitant as I looked up at him shyly through my lashes. “I don’t think being a pastel princess is a very worthy purpose. I’d like to try that ambassador thing you were talking about. I mean, if you’re representing angels, you need someone to make sure you don’t start a war by doing something…rash.”

He studied me, still, intent until he raised a brow, lips quirking, lightness above the dead serious. “Rash? You’ve elevated me from idiotic to rash? How diplomatic of you. We could do both. We could have a cottage with our adorable pets and also do state dinners and balls and so on. In fact, there’s a little cottage in the woods behind my father’s house. It’s currently full of pans, but I could build a shed for them. And your dresses. Probably my weapons.”

“And my notebooks. I’ll need to keep up my studies.” I looked down at our hands again, terrified of being seen, of wanting so much that I didn’t deserve.

“No! Don’t tell me that I’ll come home to my wife with gouged out eyeballs from translating ancient texts. Although you’d likely look adorable with gouged out eyeballs.”

I held my breath while those words, ‘come home to my wife,’ pounded in my brain. I finally raised my eyes to his, and saw in that gaze the same terrified uncertainty I felt, wanting so much of what he didn’t think he deserved, but asking for it anyway. He was so brave to ask for what he wanted. Maybe I could be brave too.

“Okay,” I whispered, heart beating faster, and faster, wanting to take off and fly away.

He leaned closer, hope and terror growing in his eyes. “Okay?”

I nodded. “Okay. I’ll stay married to you and live in a little cottage behind your father’s house. On one condition.”

“Did I say it was little? It’s not. Right. What’s the condition? It doesn’t matter. It’s done.” He looked at me with so much intent, so much longing. “I will try my best to be less stupid.”

I grinned at him and shook my head. “That’s not my condition.”