The Archangel Agenda (Evangeline Heart Book 1) by A.K. Alexander, Jen Greyson Page B

wide muzzle on his paws. He whined and stared up at me.
    I eased my toes away and tried to ignore the wolf-sized dog. “Felt doesn’t know what it does. I’m not sure anyone does.”
    “Then why do you want it?”
    I took a drink. I’d already agreed to work with Clay, and I still had two other pieces to find. But could I trust him? “It’s one of three relics that together open a gate to Hell.”
    His eyes widened and he scratched his stubbled jaw with the hand holding the bottle. “Huh. Yeah, wouldn’t have guessed that. But it makes sense.”
    “It does?” I’d tossed that out there to see where he stood on the supernatural side of things, but I totally hadn’t expected him to accept it like that.
    “Sure.” He leaned back and spread his arm across the back of the couch. “This happens a lot with the religious stuff. Someone always believes it’s a key to some magic portal. I wondered as much when I found out it was glass.” He looked up sharply at me. “You said a gate? Does that mean there’s more than one?”
    “From what I’ve found in my research, and what I’ve been told, there are twelve different gates. I only need to open one of them.”
    “How did you find any of that info? There’s nothing on this piece, not even a random conspiracy theory blogger… Nothing.”
    I set my bottle down on the coffee table and braced my hands on my knees. “I’m heavily involved with the rest of the steps. I have to find the other two pieces and go get my fiancé’s soul. Out of Hell, that is.”
    He flinched, then recovered quickly and gave me a lazy smile. “Didn’t figure you for a relationship kind of girl.”
    “That’s what you got out of that?” He really was impossible. Maybe working with him was a bad idea. I was used to the no-nonsense attitude of assassins and CIA agents and I wasn’t sure I could handle his laid-back approach. At this point he should really be thinking that I was as crazy as a loon.
    “Figured you wanted to know that I heard you. You’re engaged, off limits, all that.”
    I closed my eyes and shook my head in exasperation. “Can we please focus?”
    He shrugged. “You do it your way, I do it mine.”
    “Yes, great. What’s the plan?”
    “Who’s your source?”
    “Um…”
    “I can handle it.”
    He’d proven that was true. We’ll see just how much he could handle. “Metatron.”
    “The Transformer?”
    I rolled my eyes. “That’s Megatron , you idiot. I’m talking about Enoch, the holy man who became the archangel Metatron.”
    “Oh. Well, he should have picked another name.”
    “Pretty sure he came first.”
    He shrugged. “Archangel still sounds cool. Can I meet him?”
    I rolled my eyes. “What are you, fourteen?”
    “What? You want to go back on your story and pick something a little more believable now that I want proof?”
    “Not all of us need proof.” Though I sure as hell had. “Besides, meeting one isn’t all it’s cracked up to be.”
    He laughed and clinked his bottle against mine. “I dunno, working out okay so far.” He winked.
    “Mmmph.”
    “So what’d this Metatron tell you?”
    I didn’t care if he believed me or not. I could hear the condescending tone in his voice, but if I told him everything now, then I could give him the “I told you so” when we finally saw Metatron.
    “There are three relics, I don’t know what the other two are yet, but I’m sure they’ll be just as obscure and just as guarded.” He probably was thinking I was a nut job, but he still figured me good for the two million. I think he thought I had some serious cash stashed away, and I did…
    He puffed up. “Cool. You’ll need me for those too.”
    “I’m not paying you for them.”
    “We’ll talk about that later.”
    “Whatever. Let’s focus on the first one for now.”
    “Okay.” He got up and grabbed a laptop from under a huge haphazard stack of stuff on the edge of his kitchen counter and brought it back. “Let’s see what