Even though I felt bad about their dismissal, I was also grateful to no longer have anaudience.
I turned my glare back down to my plate, the pinkish liver, yellow bread, and muddy paste smearingtogether.
“Leigh?”
“What?” The word snapped out of me like Cupid’s arrow—not that Cupid existed. Angels only dealt in souls, not inhearts.
“Let me worry about my soul, okay? Let it be my burden, notyours.”
I lifted my wet eyes to him. Great Elysium, how this man could infuriate me! “It’s too late forthat.”
His face had been scrubbed clean of anger. In its stead was confusion. “What do you mean, it’s toolate?”
I closed my eyes and palmed my cheeks. When I opened them again, he was right there, his chair tucked in next tomine.
He captured one of my wrists and towed it off my face. “What do you mean it’s too late?” he askedagain.
“Do you know how celestial missionswork?”
He twisted his lips. “You earn feathers for helpingpeople.”
I nodded. “But we only earn them for the people we sign up to help on the Ranking System. Sinners are ranked by degrees of sinning, the worst rank being one hundred.” I locked my eyes on his, and slowly, like a ripple smoothing, he came back into focus. “ATriple.”
“What I am,” he saidslowly.
“Exactly. If I’d managed to get your rank down, I would’ve earned your number in feathers, and since I was only missing eighty-one before taking you on, I would’ve ascended. But your score is locked, because the Ishim—the rankers—are certain you killed a Nephilim—a fallen angel—and even though, in my world, Nephilim are detested, especially those who choose to give up their wings . . . like your mother.” I paused, allowing him a moment to digest all I was sharing. “Spilling angel-blood is the gravest and most unforgivablesin.”
A flurry of emotions took flight over Jarod’s face. “Whether I killed her or not, Feather, my soul is far fromshiny.”
“I can work with far fromshiny.”
He lowered his eyes to the starched white tablecloth. “It’ll be a waste of yourtime.”
I cupped his prickly jaw to bring his gaze back up to mine. “No deserving soul is a waste of mytime.”
He laid his hand over mine, and the heat of his palm penetrated into my knuckles and warmed my chilledskin.
“Don’t tell me to let you go, Jarod. Because I can’t. Iwon’t.”
He glided my hand off his jaw but didn’t release it. “You said it was too late. What did youmean?”
“I can only earn feathers for the mission I’m signed on to. If I don’t sign off from you, I don’t complete my wings. If I don’t complete my wings, I can’t ascend.” I left out the part about them falling off my back in fourteen months’ time. I’d laid enough on his plate for onenight.
His grip became bruisingly tight on my fingers before slackening and vanishing altogether. He moved his hand to his armrest. “Why?” His voice simmered with rage again. “Why would you sacrifice your wings for astranger?”
“Because my people—ourpeople—robbed you of your right to access Elysium. I will not let them rob you of yoursoul.”
“Feather . . .” he whispered, but his voice carried no moreheat.
Before he could plead for me to let him go again, I said, “I want no part in a bigotedworld.”
“This one’s not muchbetter.”
“At least humans don’t pretend they’re something they’renot.”
His lips bent a fraction. “Somedo.”
I tossed my hands in the air, then banded my arms in front of my chest. “Fine. You win. This world isn’t better than ours. Is that what you want tohear?”
