Page 147 of Wicked Believer

A layer of celestial protection that I didn’t realize I needed to stand on my own two feet until now. My hand flits to my collar.

Like a balance. A scale.

To level the playing field between Lucifer and me.

“Not enough for you to be open with me. Not enough for you to trust that I could handle all this. Would you even have told me you’d lost your powers if I hadn’t been here to witness this?” I gesture to his wounds, the sweat coating him.

He’ll need a full course of antibiotics and plenty of rest for sure.

Azrael stands with his arms crossed over his chest like he’s not going anywhere.

Lucifer rubs the back of his neck. “You can imagine how emasculated I might have felt.”

My features soften. “All of them?” I ask, wrapping my arms around myself. “You really lost all of them?”

“All the earthly ones, I’m afraid.” He nods slowly, and I blanch.

“And Michael? He still doesn’t know what your plan was?”

“No.”

“And what’s the new plan?”

Lucifer glances toward Azrael uncertainly, who gives a curt nod of encouragement.

“You are, Charlotte,” Lucifer says, locking eyes with me.

“I’m sorry?” I can’t have possibly heard him right.

Lucifer looks away from me, pinching the bridge of his nose and squeezing his eyes shut. “I meant to give you more time. To shield you from this for as long as I could while Azrael and Greed trained you.”

My chest tightens. “What are you trying to say?”

He turns to me. “There is only one immortal capable of navigating between all three realms, between Heaven, Hell, and everywhere In-Between, the only person aside from Christ—”

“And Lazarus,” Azrael grumbles.

“Who’s ever been brought back from the dead. The only being who has both my Father’s power andminein one corporeal body.”

I gape at him. “And who . . . ?”

“You, Charlotte,” Lucifer says, watching me as if he’s trying to gauge my reaction.

His emotions play out on his face. Pride mixed with fear.

A flare of adrenaline fires inside my brain.

Like he’s incredibly proud of me, but also ... tortured by the thought that he might have put my life in danger.

But what choice did he have? To let me die in his arms?

Suddenly, all the ways I blamed him for our shared fate feel incredibly selfish.

Lucifer speaks softly then, as if he fears the full knowledge of all this might shatter me. “I’m afraid when I gifted my Father’s redemption to you, I unintentionally made you the only immortal capable of reopening the pearly gates. The only person capable of navigating all three realms. The only one who would ever be capable of searching for my Father, to find Him, to demand He put a stop to all this.”

I exhale slowly, my breath shaky. “So, all this punishment, this training, was because you planned to ...”

“Use you as a celestial weapon?” he asks.