AN:// HAPPY FRIDAY LOVELIES! I hope you're all having a fantastic week and looking forward to the weekend! Thank you so much for 200 reads on this book - you guys are honestly the best and I'm so happy you're liking it!
All my love x
E x
As a child, Bonnie had never really believed in the whole 'higher power' or religion side of things. Growing up in a place that was so saturated in differing opinions on the matter meant that often it was easier to have no opinion at all, rather than try to navigate the murky waters of what people stood for. But she'd always been a fan of the mythical. That maybe there was more to life than the everyday existence of just surviving. Perhaps somewhere there were creatures who could change shapes, or babies with wings who caused people to fall in love. It made life seem a little more exciting, more enjoyable.
And she found comfort in that; if everyone was missing this secret part of the world, then maybe she wasn't truly alone in it.
That may be why, after making the startling revelation that the person in front of her wasn't human at all, she went with him to his home.
She had thought about it for a minute. After all, she wasn't completely naïve. But he'd made a good argument: did she want to know more or not?
Of course she did.
That, combined with the fact that he hadn't quite told her whether she could be attacked again, made the option of staying at home alone not so favourable. At least if she was around Gremory, he might protect her.
Right?
She didn't know what she'd imagine an angel to be, but a chatty guy who threw smiles at every person they walked past seemed like a good start. The walk wasn't that far—Gremory lived not even a half hour away, and the sun shone the entire time, letting it pass quickly. She struggled not to question him. Apparently, it was dangerous to speak about the topic out in the open, and after cheating death once today already, she wasn't going to take that chance. Funnily enough, although she had to refrain from questioning, he did not, and was taking great amusement in pestering her the whole way.
He'd started off trying to ask her about her family, but quickly realised that anything too personal was off the table. Bonnie wondered if, him being an angel and all, he already knew everything. A part of her kind of hoped he did.
"Well, here we are," Gremory proclaimed dramatically, his arms expanding with pride as he waved over the building that they'd had almost walked straight past. "Mi casa!"
Settled amongst scaffolded buildings, the older, intricate designs on the red bricks looked out of place. Yet it had been there much longer than anything else.
"It's..." She looked over at the water stained stone with ivy poking out from the cracks and then at the discarded mattress leaning on the wall, "Lovely."
Gremory snorted at the word.
"It's not as much of a shithole inside, I swear." He grabbed onto the rickety handle and pushed it down firmly, before kicking the bottom left corner of the splintering wood, "It's got charm. Character, you know."
Bonnie hummed a noise of agreement and tried not to let herself laugh at the absurdity of an 'angelic being' struggling with an old tenement building door. People could write sitcoms about it... in fact, they most definitely have.
As Gremory ducked through, disappearing into the alcove inside with the sound of clattering objects following him, Bonnie's foot hovered over the entrance. Looking into the dark corridor, the warm sunlight behind was asking why she'd want to go in. Far off laughter and the chirping of birds echoed the sentiment.
She took a breath, pushing the nerves down.
"Why not? It's not like I have anything to lose."
Once they'd shuffled past the discarded cement blocks and avoided the leaking ceiling, the front door they arrived at seemed unusual. It looked heavy enough that Bonnie wondered if she'd even have the strength to open it on her own, but that could have been the point. Gremory did it with ease, waving her in.
At first, the odd shape of the room took her aback. With barely any edges, it seemed to continue round for eternity. It reminded her of the velodrome only a few miles away, just slightly less... shiny. The bayed windows were almost as high as the ceiling that had plaster flaking from it, and the light they let in cast over the detailing still left on the borders, illuminating the detailed patterns.
What threw Bonnie the most was that as she walked into the space, she saw a smaller room with the same shape as its surrounding walls.
"This is..." She blinked again, "Wow."
"It was an old bank before," Gremory mused, running his hand along the rough surface. "The room in the middle was the safe."
Understanding settled as she spun around, putting together the architecture with the shape. The remains of what must have been the old design were still visible; a teller's hatch boarded up with a mirror hanging over it, the protruding bench once used for waiting, now the home of a television and some plants.
"A safe?" she questioned, moving towards it with excitement. "And now it's...?"
Her shoulders relaxed with disappointment as she stuck her head in further, checking she wasn't missing anything.
"It's a toilet?"
Gremory smiled with a look akin to pride as he joined her in the doorway.
"Exactly. You should always feel secure with your trousers down."
Bonnie couldn't exactly argue with that.
"Come on, I'll show you the rest of this place."
"There's more?"
With a laugh, Gremory shut the door and placed a hand on her back, gently guiding her around to the other side of the room. Unlike the side that they'd entered from, this one had flat walls put up, which were clearly there to provide a place for a kitchen. The size of the space was vast, and the eight person table in it even seemed dwarfed. She didn't want to think of her own tiny flat and the pathetic excuse for a kitchen she had. It was incomparable to the grandness of this place.
"That chandelier is amazing," she gaped with wide eyes, walking in small circles as she followed the lines of unlit candles. "It looks ancient."
"Thanks. It is," Gremory replied, taking his coat off and hanging it on the back of a chair. "My friend Poyel got it for me a few hundred years ago. He's tried to win it from me twice since."
"Oh right," mumbled Bonnie, "Angels."
After clearing her throat, she pulled herself away from the piece and moved to join Gremory at the table, where he was rifling through a bag.
"So, does Poyel ever come and visit?"
The real questions she wanted to ask burned her lips, but she refrained from seeming too eager. She could act as though this conversation was completely normal.
"Not anymore. Him and Kimaris don't exactly get along."
Kimaris?
"Speaking of," Gremory grunted, giving up on whatever he was looking for, "I'm going to go see if I can find him. He should be upstairs."
There's an upstairs?
"Right," Bonnie said slowly, motioning around her, "Should I wait here, or...?"
"Probably best," Gremory replied with a wince. "He's a little touchy about his space."
"Good thing you've got so much then," Bonnie mused, eyes already wandering back over the ornaments on display.
Gremory let out a laugh, which quickly ebbed into a sigh. "You'd think! How about you grab a drink and take a seat? Pick whatever you'd like from the fridge. I shouldn't be a minute."
Without a glance, he left the room through a door she'd not noticed. He certainly knew how to dodge questions, that was for sure, but she could wait a few minutes longer. Maybe if there were two of them, they'd be knowledgeable on far more. Although she wondered how much knowledge her brain could cope with.
At that thought, she followed Gremory's suggestion and headed for the fridge. "I might just need a drink to stay sane."
The question of what an angel kept in their fridge had never crossed her mind before. It was probably debatable that they even needed one. However, she now knew that, at least for this angel, he filled it with fine wines and meats. Or what she presumed were fine wines. She didn't really have any experience in that.
"Chardonnay's aren't that expensive, are they?" she asked herself, rolling the bottle in her hands while giving the shelves one last glance over. "It seems like a safe bet."
It had been the drink of choice for the girls she knew at university, and they definitely didn't care about the taste. This bottle didn't look that different. With a shrug, she closed the fridge and made her way to the drawer, which looked like it might contain a corkscrew. It was lucky that the cupboards were all windowed. Otherwise, it might have taken her some time to find a glass. After struggling with the cork for a minute, it finally popped out and Bonnie gave herself a pat on the back as she poured a generous measure.
"Well, Miss Lawrence, you've gone from almost being killed by a demon to drinking the wine of angels," she mused, raising her glass in a toast. "Who said Tuesdays were boring? Cheers!"
She took a hesitant sip of the white wine, letting it sit on her tongue for a moment as she debated the truth in her words, and the taste.
It was sweet, but with a citrus edge to it and hints of hazelnut—just kidding. It tasted like wine and she only paused for a minute before throwing the entire glass down her throat.
"Can I help you?"
As quick as it had gone down, half of the wine returned with a route through Bonnie's nostrils. As she wiped her mouth and turned around, her coughs echoed through the building.
"I'm so sorry, I—" Seeing who was standing behind her, she stopped. "Oh, it's you."
The other man who had been with Gremory in the cafe stood across the table from her, his dark hair pulled back into a bun, and his scowl even deeper than the last time she had seen him. He almost looked like a shadow in the pale room.
"Yes, it's me," he growled, taking a step closer. "What do you think you're doing? You shouldn't be here."
"Oh," she stammered, now very aware of how tall he really was. Her feet moved back on their own accord, trying to pull her away from danger. "Gremory told me to help myself to the fridge."
"Did he really?" echoed the man, his jaw tightening. Bonnie wished she had more wine in her glass to help her dry mouth. "Well, Gremory is a complete and utter—"
"There you are! I thought it felt colder!"
Both of them whipped their heads to look at the bouncing blonde who strode back into the room, his smile overstretched and laughter slightly too light. "Where have you been?" he asked as he got closer, moving his arm as if to pat the new arrivals' back. "I thought you were in your room."
"Clearly not," the raven haired man gritted out, looking pointedly at his partner as he caught his arm, "I was actually partaking in doing something important, unlike what you've clearly been up to."
Bonnie felt herself shrink as both men stared at each other, the surrounding air electrifying with tension.
"Kimaris look, I just thought—"
"See, that's when we have problems—when you think."
"That's not fair! She's not doing any harm!"
"I just watched her down a three hundred pound glass of wine and then project it out through her nose, so forgive me if I'm not too thrilled that she's here."
While their mutters continued, Bonnie's eyes bulged as she picked up the bottle, trying to figure out where on the label it told her they laced the wine with gold.
"That's an absurd amount. That's almost my rent."
Bonnie's whispered yet alarmed voice sounded foreign to herself as both men froze and turned their heads to look at her. She quickly put it back on the table and cleared her throat, wiping her damp hands on her trousers.
"I'm so sorry, Mr... Kimaris, was it? I would never have drank any if I knew that's how much it cost, I swear." She offered a weak smile. "I thought chardonnays were cheap."
"Some are, that one isn't," he replied flatly, and the look of disdain he gave Bonnie didn't go unnoticed. "Perhaps in the future you should stick to what you know—like what chips are best for frying."
Ouch.
"I'll make sure to remember that for next time." Bonnie tried to let the words brush off of her as Gremory hissed something at him. She'd probably be pissed too if someone had wasted her money like that—but in fairness, he'd already wasted the money himself on buying it.
Who has that much disposable income, anyway?
"Don't worry, you shouldn't have been here in the first place, so there won't be a next time. Gremory can show you out."
Panic flitted through Bonnie as she watched Kimaris turn away from her to leave the room, his sullen expression glaring at Gremory as he pushed past him, ignoring his pleads. If she left now, she might not ever get the answers to the questions she had, and she didn't doubt that Gremory would be forced to never see her again if he got his way. She couldn't go back to a normal life without knowing.
"Wait!" she called, bumping into a chair in her haste, "Please, I just want to know more about you guys."
"That's nice, but there's nothing to know; you had a mental break and imagined things."
"Please!" she continued to try, her feet loud against the wooden floor, "I won't tell anyone anything!"
"There's nothing to tell!" Kimaris almost laughed, his hand on the door to leave the room, not even turning back once to look at her. "Cheerio!"
Bonnie looked at Gremory who had a sympathetic but resigned turn to his mouth and knew that this was her last chance. If Kimaris left, he'd never give her the opportunity to talk to him again.
"I just want to know more about angels!"
As soon as the words left her lips, Bonnie wondered if she had made a mistake. By the look on Gremory's face and the way Kimaris stilled, it wouldn't be hard to say.
Gremory was trying to mouth something to her but she couldn't quite make it out, and by the time Kimaris had slowly turned, he'd given up and resorted to a forced laugh, with eyes that frantically looked between the two of them.
"What did you say?"
"Kimaris, she—"
Gremory's words were cut off by the sharp look his flatmate gave him, and Bonnie swallowed loudly as his piercing gaze rested on her. Waiting.
"I-I said I just want to know more about angels," she stuttered out.
That wine was looking pretty good right about now—she felt like she needed all the liquid courage she could get.
"And why, pray tell," Kimaris began slowly, his head tilting ever so slightly to the side, "Would we know anything about angels?"
There was something in his tone that made her want to not speak. Suddenly, she felt as though she was in a lot of trouble. Gremory was refusing to look her in the eyes.
"Because you guys are angels," she finally responded, deciding that no matter what, it would be impossible to lie now, "That's why I'm here, to know more about... you."
Her final word rang in the air, momentarily suspended in a sea of tension that Bonnie thought might choke her. Gremory's shoulders had slumped and his eyes had shut, but it was unclear whose gaze he was trying to stay clear of.
Kimaris, meanwhile, had not stopped staring at her. However, his hands had curled into fists and Bonnie wondered if he had even stopped breathing. His body was unmoving. She wasn't sure what she had done to this man to make him despise her so much, but she knew that the last minute of conversation had only made it worse.
"Gremory. Upstairs. Now."
Bonnie thought she might develop a chill from his voice. Now she understood why Gremory had joked about it earlier when he'd arrived.
The blonde sighed as the other left the room. He wore a troubled expression for only a moment before turning to Bonnie with a forced grin, his hand scratching the back of his head.
"I'm sorry about him, he can be a little..."
"Mean?" Bonnie offered, making him snicker at her weary voice.
"Yeah. Mean." He looked towards the door and then back at her, the urge to not follow clear on his face. "I'm gonna go and speak to him. How about you grab another glass and sit on the sofa around the side? It's much comfier than the dining chairs and I'm not sure how long we'll be."
Bonnie shook her head before he'd even finished speaking, her hands rising in refusal.
"Oh no, I couldn't. Maybe I should just—"
"Look," Gremory interrupted, more forcefully than anything he had said before. "The wine is already open, so it would be a waste not to and I promised you I'd tell you more. So stay." He paused. "Please."
Whether it was the almost pleading tone to his voice or her own curiosity, something told her to do what he said. She'd gone this far. Why not stick it out?
"Okay."
Gremory looked almost relieved at her agreement, clapping his hands together as his knees bent. "Amazing. The tv remote is on the armchair if you want it."
Before she could ask anything more, the previously bouncing figure strode out of the room in a blink. The wooden door slammed behind him and Bonnie was left standing in the middle of the kitchen, alone.
She looked around the room, her eyes being brought over to the front door and the way out involuntarily, but she quickly pushed the idea down and headed behind her instead.
"Just drink wine and wait," she mumbled, reassuring herself. "That's super easy to do."
After following Gremory's orders and pouring herself another glass, which admittedly she was now far more careful with, she made her way back around the loop and went to sit on the plush couch that was basking in sunlight. It was hard to feel nervous in a place that had so much light to it, and she was grateful for the warm rays that thawed her frozen bones, which still seemed to shiver from someone's steel stare.
"I'd hate to get on that guy's bad side." She thought about Kimaris' glare that had pinned her to the spot. "Or worse side, I guess."
After carefully placing the glass down and turning on the television, Bonnie sank into the sofa, resting her head back on the frame. The position reminded her of the cafe and the tile in the roof that had caught her eye. Would she ever be able to look at a ceiling again without thinking of that event? Or would she always be slightly on edge, wondering if a creature was going to drop and attack her?
"Probably the latter," she confessed to herself, quickly looking away as she grabbed her drink and swallowed a large mouthful, hoping that the liquid might prevent her from freaking out again. She'd rather not have to explain why she was crying to angels that were arguing over her being here.
Deciding that it was better to not think about it, Bonnie turned her attention to the television and let herself get consumed by the bad storyline and mediocre acting it was showing on screen. She welcomed the break from mind bending information and world changing revelations. Replacing it with something numb and predictable gave her the perfect change.
Between the comfort viewing, wine, and the gentle caress of light through the window, Bonnie felt herself relax tremendously and before long the strain of the day had caught up with her, only making her position far more comfortable. Before she knew it, her wineglass was empty and abandoned on the floor beside her, and she had slowly rotated until she was lying across the cushions, her feet tucked up. With the soft lull of the tv, her eyelids drooped and before long she had fallen asleep, her last thought of the angels upstairs and how she hoped any demon would be too scared to come near her with them around.