The Crimson Pinion. The single red feather Sam bore in his wings for the last six millennia. The totem that elevates an angel to a seraph, enabling him and him alone to preside over death.
Where is it now? Is Sam about to—
“Rafael.” Sam frowns. “You know I can’t.” The mercy in his voice makes Rafe feel nauseous. “You have to earn it. Hell, the way things are, you may have toseizeit. With both hands.” He looks down at his napkin, the sketch. “Of course, the others will want it, too.”
Rafe’s fists tighten. “Who else knows?”
“You’re the first. I owe you that much at least.”
“I don’t understand. You’re a dead man walking?”
“Don’t be so dramatic. I’ve got my whole life ahead of me.”
“But, Samael,why?”
Sam settles back against the booth and smiles. “I’ll show you.”
A waitress approaches. She’s thirty-seven and two-thirds if Rafe had to guess, with good bones and tired eyes, chewing faintly scented grape gum. When she faces Sam like he’s any other customer, Rafe breaks out in a sweat. She canseehim.
The motherfucker isn’t lying.
“What can I get you, sugar?”
Sugar. She’stalkingto him. To Samael, the Angel of Death.
Former Angel of Death.
Rafe’s oldest friend, his mentor, has gone mortal. Has actually, honestly, given it all up. Rafe can’t believe it.
Sam gives Rafe awatch thislook, then cocks his head toward the waitress.
“Heaven must be running out of angels if you’re down here.”
“Oh God,” the waitress groans. “Nobody wanted that.”
Sam straightens his spine with an earnestness that horrifies Rafe. “Let me try again—”
“Please, no,” the waitress says, treating Sam like any random nobody hitting on her. “You want coffee or what?”
“Coffee,” Sam says, delighted. “My friend will have one, too.”
The waitress glances across the booth, in Rafe’s direction, but notat Rafe. And the blankness he feels under her unfocused gaze makes him think of the woman on the pier. The way it seemed like she saw him. How that had felt inside.
He pushes her out of his mind to focus on Sam, this news, and its shattering implications. Rafe must use this advantage. He must take control. He can’t fuck it up this time.
Seize it, Sam said. Sam who looks so content now having just made a fool of himself with a waitress. If it were anyone else, Rafe wouldn’t be curious, but this is Sam.
“Help me understand,” Rafe says. “You … retired so you could hit on waitresses?”
Sam shakes his head. “Good old Rafe. No one else can make the transcendently profound sound so infinitesimally small.”
“It’s just, there’s no shortage of sex in—”
“It’s not about sex.”
Rafe blinks.
“Love, asshole. I wantlove.”
