I shut the file. “And you wish for me to handle this assignment?” I asked carefully. I would have stolen it from the others anyway. So, it didn’t truly matter what he had to say about it.
“Yes. Can you find time in yourbusyschedule to deal with it?”
I nodded, ignoring his bite of irritation, and stood. “Of course, dearest father. That’s what we were created for, is it not? To handle the things you don’t wish to dirty your hands with.”
His eyes hardened. “I’m busy with things you have no business knowing about.”
My smile sharpened. “Of course.” Soon we would. We would know every piece of ‘business’ he decided to hide from us for no other reason than control, and I so hated when others had morecontrol than I. “Would you like a percentage of success for those grunts you have sitting in our cafeteria?”
“No.”
“Less than 10,” I said anyway and turned to find Beckett standing in the doorway.
He looked less than pleased to be here. “Uncle,” I greeted.
“You parked in Greyson’s spot.”
“Oops,” I hummed on my way into the hall. “It’s not like they’re labeled. Must have just slipped my mind.”
He shook his head. “Goodbye, Azrael.”
“Toodaloo,” I sang and headed back down the hall. I pulled out my personal phone and brought up the cameras in Scarlett’s home. I was curious to know how she would react knowing that she would have no visitors tonight.
She was in that dress and her boots, her hair falling around her shoulders, still damp from the shower she had just taken. She was spinning around the room, dancing, some might have thought. Her hair and that dress were spinning around with her, her hair whipping her in her face every time she stopped suddenly.
She spun around, hopping across her small living room and then stopped, the hair slapping her in the face. She was breathless, and went to pull the hair from her face, pushing it back, and that’s when I saw it.
Her smile.
My heart suddenly had a palpitation, my lips parting, eyes trained on that smile. Wide and unencumbered. There was no audio, but I knew she was laughing, her eyes filled with light, shifting her entire face into something I hardly recognized.
Heaven.
It was real.
32
Azrael
March 12th, 2023
Ishut the last drawer and sat back in my chair. No records of anyone from the Ruiz family ever having been connected to the Church of Daylight. So, perhaps he was part of one of those branches, an undisclosed church somewhere close that he attended.
I haven’t been to any of the branches, save for the one we burned down in the woods near Colorado Springs. The transporting only ever took me between churches and daycares, never anywhere else.
Perhaps the good Judge was highly involved in a branch somewhere in Seattle.
Which meant I had to do some more research.
I pulled out my pocket watch, checking the time. It was late, nearing 11, but perhaps my little sinner wouldn’t mind a visit.
Thirty minutes after rechecking my motorcycle for a tracking device, I was parking it directly in front of her house, after, of course, putting every camera they had installed in and out of the house on a loop. Thomas may not have been worried about what they thought of his late-night visits, but me? I didn’t need watchful eyes studying my every move.
I exchanged my helmet for a hood and mask before heading for her door. The key, an old-fashioned brass one, hung aroundmy neck by a chain. These kinds of keys weren’t so easily replicated, so there was no worry of anyone from that church getting one in their covetous hands.
I flipped the lock over and stepped inside, the scent hitting me first.
It smelled of Thomas and semen. Of ramen and salt.
