Company of Angels 02 - The Demoness of Waking Dreams

snapped the picture had caught the target in a bad moment. Or perhaps she only had bad moments.
    Yet, she was undeniably beautiful. In the photo, she was suspended in midturn, tendrils of dark hair whipping in the wind around a face whose full lips and haughty, defined cheekbones could have graced the cover of Vogue Italia. But what caught Brandon, what made him literally stop and stare, was her glittering green eyes, so vibrant and snapping with life that they seemed to leap off the screen.
    A shiver ran through him.
    In both boardrooms, there was a pause and a hush as the angels looked at her picture. Behind Brandon, one of the male Guardians let out a low whistle.
    “Enough,” Brandon said, cutting off the inappropriate behavior by holding up his hand.
    Michael switched the image back to the live video stream.
    “Luciana Rossetti,” Michael said, “is no ordinary demoness. She’s fiercely independent and fiendishly clever, like all Rogues. But she is much more than that. She is a poisoner par excellence and a Mata Hari of the demon world. She escaped from the Company a few days ago. She’s dangerous in her own right, but she has risen to the top of the Company’s Most Wanted List because she has created a poison with which she killed another demon.”
    If it can kill a demon…
    It can kill an angel.
    Every angel in both Los Angeles and Chicago fell silent.
    Michael continued, “We need to catch Luciana before she uses this poison again—on our kind. Or worse, before she manufactures another batch of it and distributes it among the demons. She has the ability to unleash a weapon of unparalleled power. It would give them an edge over us. An edge from which we might never recover.”
    Both units were still for a moment, as though the earth had stopped its rotation and for a brief moment the world seemed to come to a halt. Every one of the angels was thinking the same thing, Brandon was certain.
    If that poison got into the wrong hands, it could mean the end of our kind.
    “Furthermore, we have also received word that Archdemon Corbin Ranulfson is planning to retaliate,” Michael continued. “Some of you may not know, but Corbin was recently defeated by the Company and lost his empire’s flagship hotel. If Corbin strikes at us, he will strike to destroy. He is one of the most powerful demons in America. We believe that he was weakened in the last attack, but may be seeking to recover some of his lost powers. Three days ago, Corbin was sighted in hell, but word on the street is that he has been seen again, on the surface. We have every reason to believe that Corbin will search out Luciana. For the poison.”
    “Is he connected with her?” Brandon asked.
    “She’s his lover,” said Michael. “Luciana is our only link to Corbin. And we believe she has returned to Venice. We must bring her back to America.”
    “We’ve got to find out what she’s done with the poison,” Arielle said, “and pump her for whatever information is inside that evil head of hers. I think this is a case for disposal.”
    Disposal.
    The word sent another hush through the conference rooms.
    “ Disposal is the term we sometimes use in the Company when an individual is to be returned to the divine,” Arielle had told Brandon, back when he was a fledgling angel, training under her. “Technically, the soul never dies. Energy is neither created nor destroyed. But a disposal means that a person no longer has a distinct identity.”
    Luciana would cease to exist.
    As a rule, Brandon didn’t agree with disposal. Normally, Arielle didn’t, either. If she was so set on disposal in this case, he wanted to know why. But there was no time for that right now. First, he needed to catch the demoness and bring her back to America.
    “Michael, please email me the rest of the file via secure transfer,” Brandon said. “I’ll go to Venice myself. And I’ll finish briefing myself on the plane.”
    “Why you?” Arielle ground out.
    “I can get the job done,” he said.
    Not a single one among the sixty angels disagreed with him. He disliked being arrogant in any way. But time was of the essence, and in the past he had found that it paid to be up front with Arielle.
    Michael nodded.
    Arielle shook her head, clearly frustrated. “Fine, do it your way. Of course, you’ll work with members of my team. We were the last ones who saw her, and—”
    “I work alone,” Brandon stated.
    Every angel in the Chicago unit knew that.
    “As a