It was like he had traveled back in time.
Except for the ringing of his cell phone.
Madeline had brought him back to her apartment, the two of them soaking wet after being caught in a sudden summer downpour. She’d commented on them looking like a couple of drowned rats before pulling him closer, kissing him hard on the mouth.
She’d said something about the two of them getting out of their wet things before they caught their death of cold. And then she’d laughed, one of the most arousing sounds he’d ever heard in his long lifetime, and started to remove their clothes.
The sound of his phone was distracting, tugging at him, pulling him from this special place in time.
It was the first time they’d made love, not even making it to her bed. They’d dropped down upon the living room floor, feeding each other’s passions their only intent.
He’d been with other humans before, more out of a perverse curiosity than anything else. If he was going to be one of them, he needed to experience everything, sampling all their wants and desires. Sexual dalliance was inevitable.
But nothing had compared to this.
She had awakened something within him, something that had become still over the centuries, deathly quiet since he’d left Heaven. She made him want to be part of something larger; she awakened his need to connect.
The feel of her body against his, the awkwardness of their attempts to satisfy a passion that grew in intensity over the passing seconds.
He had felt it. Actually felt it.
Connecting in the instant their bodies grew together, the rhythm of their furious lovemaking like the heartbeat of some giant, long-extinct animal.
No. Like the heartbeat of the world.
Remy knew what it was like to be them. He wasn’t just pretending anymore.
He knew what it was to be human.
The phone wouldn’t stop, soon drowning out the sounds of their lovemaking, and suddenly he wasn’t there anymore.
The harsh reality of the present had found him once more, as it always seemed to.
Lying in the darkness, he felt his wife’s touch upon his body, phantom caresses growing softer, and softer still, until all he had left was their memory.
Marlowe stirred at the foot of the bed, lifting his large head as if to ask Remy if he would ever answer that damnable piece of technology.
Remy’s hand moved like lightning, and he was tempted to throw the trilling device at the wall, but what good would come of that? He’d only have to buy a new one.
“Yes,” he said after flipping open the cell. He saw on the face of the phone that it was a little after four in the morning, and had a suspicion about who would be calling him at this hour.
“Did I wake you?” Francis asked. Remy could hear the sound of a television blaring in the background. It sounded like a game show, probably The Price Is Right. Francis had a thing for Bob Barker, thought he was the coolest MC that had ever graced a game-show stage.
“No, I was just lying here in the dark waiting for your call.”
“You need a good hobby. Collecting Hummels would suit you, I bet. Have you ever thought about collecting Hummels?”
“What do you want, Francis?”
Marlowe lifted himself up from where he lay, walked up to the top of the bed and plopped down again. It was like somebody dropping a seventy-pound bag of laundry beside him.
“Got somebody I think you should talk to,” the fallen Guardian said. The sound of a television announcer wailed, “Come on down,” as an enthusiastic crowd clapped, cheered, and whistled in the background.
“About Hummels?” Remy asked.
“Almost as good,” Francis answered without missing a beat. “I got somebody who knows a thing or two about missing property, and would be willing to talk to you.”
Remy reached over and began to scratch beneath Marlowe’s neck. The big dog reacted immediately, rolling onto his back. The Labrador preferred belly rubs.
“I guess it would be too early to talk to him now.”
“Your powers of observation are fucking amazing,” Francis said through a mouthful of something that could have been potato chips. “Have you ever thought about being a detective?”
“The thought’s crossed my mind. Would I make a lot of money and meet fabulously interesting people?”
Francis laughed. “Can’t really say about the money, but interesting people you’ll meet by the wheelbarrow full. In fact, I’ve got one that wants to meet you at lunchtime.”
“Awesome,” Remy said without an ounce of excitement.
“And, oh, yeah, you’re bringing the lunch.”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Francis was waiting for him in the parking lot of the Lock & Key Self-Storage building located off of the Expressway in Southie. You could see the building from the highway, an inflated padlock and chain draped around the front of the boxy structure.
Remy pulled his car alongside his friend’s Range Rover. Francis stood at the front of his vehicle smoking a cigar and staring up into the sky at a flock of geese flying in a V formation to parts unknown.
“Remembering what it felt like?” Remy asked as he slammed his car door closed. Though the gift hadn’t been lost to him, as it had to Francis, he seldom flew anymore. It gave the Seraphim nature too much strength.
Francis looked away from the birds, taking a final puff of the foul-smelling stogie before dropping it to the ground and crushing it beneath his foot.
“What what was like?” he asked coming around his car, pretending that he hadn’t noticed the birds.
“To fly,” Remy said, instinctively looking up into the sky as a plane flew overhead on its descent to Logan.
“Can’t remember that far back,” Francis said. Remy noticed a twitch at the corner of the Guardian’s eye that told him he was lying. “Can’t miss what you don’t remember.”
There was a moment of uncomfortable silence before Francis started up again.
“Did you remember lunch?” he asked, looking at Remy’s empty hands.
Remy moved around to the passenger-side door of his car. “Stopped off at Primos before I got on the road,” he said. “Two large: one with extra cheese, the other pepperoni.” He opened the door and carefully removed the two stacked pizza boxes.
“That should do it,” Francis said. He started across the parking lot toward the front entrance of the self-storage building.
Remy followed, pizzas in hand. He’d seen this building from the road for years, never imagining that it contained anything more than promised.
“So he has a storage bin here or something?” he asked.
“Rents at least one of the floors,” Francis said as he ambled up a handicapped-accessible ramp to the front door. “Has places all over the city, I guess. Mason’s the guy to come to when you need something that nobody else has.”
Standing in front of the door, Francis pulled out his cell and dialed a number. “We’re here,” he said into the phone, listening for a second before hanging up.
“They’ll be right down,” he said, closing the phone and slipping it back inside his coat pocket.
“Been here before?” Remy asked, inhaling the enticing aroma of baked cheese and pepperoni. He hadn’t thought he was hungry, but his mouth started to water.
“No,” Francis answered with a head shake. “Been to his space in Lynn and another smaller one in Chelsea.”
“The man’s got lots of stuff,” Remy said, noticing two figures approaching the door from the inside.
A big guy with thick black hair, dressed in a navy blue windbreaker, pushed open the door for Francis to enter, his eyes darting around, looking for anything that might’ve seemed out of place.
“You bring lunch?” he asked, his South Boston accent thick.
“That was his job,” Francis said, hooking a finger over his shoulder at Remy.