When Death Loved an Angel Read Online Free PDF Page B

annoyance. “Your job ?” There was obvious disdain in her voice. “You kill people and you call it a job?”
    He gave her a curious look. “What else would you call it?”
    Flabbergasted, she backed off, giving him much needed space to get his thoughts in order.
    “I don’t consider being a guardian angel my job,” she finally said after a few minutes of silence.
    He didn’t look at her ; he pretended to study Gregan’s motionless form instead. “A job is a particular task performed toward a specific purpose for a designated amount of time. What would you call it?”
    “I t’s not my job to be a guardian angel,” she said with a slight upturn to her words that made them ring with annoyance.
    He glanced at her sideways, inexplicably pleased for having riled her. “But if you didn’t do it, you would no longer be able to exist in your current state of being.”
    He felt her stare. “Being?”
    He chuckled at her frustrated tone. “You know; your existence. Being a guardian angel is your job because if you didn’t do it, you wouldn’t be able to call yourself a guardian angel. You would merely be Nyra, angel of unknown occupation.”
    She blew out a breath of extreme annoyance. “I guess this is what I should have expected when arguing with Death.” She glanced at him. “What is your name?”
    The question caught him off-guard. He met her green gaze and a strange tremble ran through his limbs. “You just said it,” he said softly.
    “Death?” At his nod, her eyebrows pinched together.
    She studied him and he shifted uncomfortably under her gaze. He was definitely not used to being uncomfortable. The name on his arm gave a resounding throb. He cleared his throat even though he had never done so before. “I, uh, I’d better get on with what I came here for.”
    “No!” she said. She darted in front of his outstretched hand.
    He shied back quickly and stared at her. “Are you insane? Do you know what would happen if I touched you?”
    She shook her head, her eyes wide, but she didn’t move from her place in front of Gregan.
    Death dropped his gaze. “Me either.” He studied his hand, feeling a dislike for the limb he had never known before. He looked back at her. “I might have killed you.”
    “Can angels die?” There was something in her voice, a hint of wistfulness that might have been his imagination, but he was almost certain was there.
    Baffled, he shrugged, the motion almost lost within his shadows. “I’m not sure.”
    Nyra looked back at Gregan, then met Death’s eyes once more. If he looked a little unsettled, she didn’t appear to notice. “One more day,” she begged. “Please.”
    “It’s just prolonging the inevitable,” Death told her, but one more day meant one more visit with this strange angel who turned his whole world upside down. He had almost hoped she would ask.
    “Just one,” she said.
    He stalked the length of the room as if debating. After a few minutes of pure silence in which the beeping of the monitors sounded like a dissonant choir clouding his thoughts with unease, Death nodded. Before Nyra could say anything else, he stepped through the door. Once in the hallway, he leaned against the wall and held his head in his hands. He didn’t know what she did to him. He didn’t understand what drove him to be compassionate when Death had lost his empathy long ago.
    His heart gave one tiny flutter. He pressed a hand to his chest, willing his heart to stay still. It obeyed.

Chapter Six
    ANGEL
     
    Nyra stared at the door Death had passed through. She wasn’t sure what had just happened, or why he gave in, but there was something in his gaze, something lost and searching. He wasn’t what she had expected Death to be at all.
    When he almost touched her, the look of dismay on his face had been colored with something that almost looked like fear for her safety. Why would Death fear for the safety of a guardian angel? If anything, she got in the way of him