db1bd484fe8700408f51338793ca8c56

He merely stood there. She might as well have tried to command a rock.

“I’ll hitchhike, then, and get picked up by a mass murderer, and then how will you feel when they find a broken bleeding body by the side of the road.” It wouldn’t be her broken, bleeding body, but he didn’t need to know that.

Harry shook his head.“Not even mass murderers would stop for you. Not at these speeds. You’ll be walking all the way.”

“I don’t want to walk!”

“Then apologize.”

The car rocked as four transports passed, belching diesel fumes. She contemplated kicking Harry into traffic, but Eva would likely fall apart and be totally useless and although she knew how to bring plagues and pestilence, she didn’t know how to drive.

“Make up your mind, Byleth.”

“Fine.” Anything to get her into the city where she could ditch these losers. “I’m s…” Her very nature fought with the word. “I’m sorr…” She had to form each letter independently, forcing it out past reluctant lips. “I’m sorry. Okay?”

“Eva?”

“Apology accepted, dear.”

“Now was that so hard?” Harry asked, smiling at her reflection as he slid back behind the wheel.

“Yeah, it was.”

“Don’t worry. It’ll get easier with time.”

She was afraid of that.

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_6]

“Excuse me.” Braced against the movement of the escalator, Samuel reached forward and tapped the heavyset matron on one virgin-wool covered shoulder. “The sign says that if you stand on the right, then people in a hurry can walk up the left.”

“There’s no space on the right,” she pointed out sharply.

“Then you should have waited.”

“And maybe you should mind your own business.”

“You shouldn’t let the fear of being on your own keep you in a bad relationship. Your husband is controlling and manipulative, and just because he doesn’t love you anymore, doesn’t mean you shouldn’t love yourself…”

The sound of her palm connecting with his cheek disappeared into the ambient noise. In the fine tradition of mall crawlers everywhere, those standing too close to have missed the exchange either stared fixedly at nothing or isolated themselves from the incident behind a loud and pointless conversation with their nearest companion. As they reached the second level and the heavyset woman bustled off to the left, Diana smoothed the tiny hole closed, grabbed Samuel’s arm, and yanked him off to the right.

“What wasthat all about?”

Rubbing at the mark on his cheek, he looked confused.“I was just trying to help, you know, do that message thing.”

“And what help is a message telling that woman her husband’s a creep who doesn’t love her anymore?”

“She knows that. Now she needs to move on.”

“Andyou know that because…?”

He shoved his hands in his front pockets and shrugged.“I have Higher Knowledge.”

“Which gives you personal information on the life of a perfect stranger but neglects to tell you what a stoplight means?”

“Yes.”

She’d never heard such a load of sanctimonious crap. “Just don’t do that again, okay?”

“Sure.”

[Ęŕđňčíęŕ: img_5]

“Did you know that with the price of those boots you could feed a Third World child for a year?”

Something in the gold-brown eyes compelled an honest answer.

“Yeah, I do.”

“So…?” Samuel prompted, smiling encouragingly.

“So why don’t you mind your own fucking business, dude?”

“That’s the guilt talking.”

“Yeah?” A very large hand wound itself into the front of Samuel’s jacket. “And in a minute you’re gonna feel my fist talking!”

Diana handed the shoebox to the clerk and reached into the possibilities just in time to keep an innocent Bystander from committing mayhem on an angel—as justified as that mayhem may have been. Freeing Samuel’s jacket, she shoved him out of the store and started things up again.

“I was just…”

“Well, stop it.”

“But…”

“No. People like to have their moral failings pointed out about as much as they like to have their personal lives discussed in public by strangers.” She tightened her grip and dragged him quickly past a couple playing what looked like the Stanley Cup finals of tonsil hockey. When she finally slowed and took a look at him, he seemed strangely restrained. “What?”

“Those two people…”

There were thousands of people in the Center, but she had a fairly good idea who he meant.“Yeah? What about them?”

“They had their tongues in each other’s mouths.”

“I didn’t notice.”

He snorted, a very unangelic sound.“They looked like they had gerbils in their cheeks.”

“Okay.” She had to admit she was intrigued by the image. “So?”

“So isn’t that unsanitary?”

“Gerbils?”

“Tongues.”

“Not really. And don’t get any ideas—our relationship is strictly Keeper/Angel.”

“I wasn’t…”

“You were.”

“I couldn’thelp it.”

He sounded so miserable, Diana found herself patting his shoulder in sympathy.“Come on, we’ll duck out at the next doors—a little cold air will clear your head.”

“It’s not my head.”

“Whoa. Didn’t I make myself clear? We’renot discussing other body parts.” If the last pat rocked him sideways a little more emphatically than necessary, well, tough.