Her Guardian Angel 4-Her Angel Series by Felicity Heaton Page A

stared into the distance across the rooftops
of London.
    Who was
he fooling?
    Not
himself, that was certain.
    The spark
of desire her touch had reignited in him, bringing his hunger to
caress her in return back to boiling point, and the warmth that
travelled through his flesh, spreading outwards from the point
where her fingers rested against his skin was unmistakably a sign
of him harbouring an attraction towards her.
    He paced
the black tarred roof of his apartment building, scouring the
horizon for an answer to his troubles. The problem of gaining
Amelia’s trust had been all but solved until he had foolishly told
her to keep away from him.
    He had
always been aware that his instinct to protect her ran deep in his
veins but had never suspected that it had corrupted his heart too
and that he would even deem it necessary to protect her from
himself. She’d had her share of pain and suffering, more than such
a pure kind soul deserved, and he couldn’t bring himself to add to
it. When his mission was over, he was leaving Earth and Amelia
behind him for good. If he used her desire against her, her heart
would break when that happened. She would never understand. She
would blame herself, just as she did whenever one of the vile men
she involved herself with decided to leave her or did something
that forced her to leave them.
    He
couldn’t be like them.
    Amelia
deserved better.
    Far
better than him, that was for sure.
    One day,
she would meet the man who would become her world and who would
treat her right and make her happy.
    A flash
of her smiling at him yesterday cut into his thoughts and deep into
his chest.
    He had
made her smile.
    Truly
smile with happiness and warmth.
    And then
she had looked wounded, leaving him at the café alone to ponder
what had possessed him to say such things to her and why he had
decided to once again intervene in her destructive relationship
with her ex-lover.
    Duty.
    In part
it was a lie to say he did these things out of his sense of duty,
but it was also his shield and he would not cast it
aside.
    The dying
rays of the sun warmed his skin, the lingering heat of the day
cocooning him in a soft breeze that stirred his soul as he watched
the sun set over London. It was growing late. Time had passed
quickly while he had been lost in his thoughts, hidden away from
the hustle and bustle of the mortal realm far below him, and he
still hadn’t found the answers to the questions that plagued him.
Questions about his mission had been joined by ones about Amelia
and her feelings for him.
    Why would
a beautiful mortal female look upon him with such
desire?
    Marcus
looked down at his hands and turned them palm up. These hands had
killed many in the line of duty, harvesting souls of sinners and
detaining them for judgement. In times past, when wars had been
frequent, he had reaped battlefields and cities alike in the name
of Heaven, following orders to the letter to assist the angels of
death in their mission, never once feeling remorse over his
actions.
    Until
now.
    He had
told her to keep away from him.
    She
deserved better than a man who had killed so many of her kind
without flinching.
    A role he
would gladly resume once his current mission had come to an
end.
    He was no
better than those men who had hurt her.
    If
anything, he was worse.
    For all
their noise and disgraceful behaviour, none of them had ever taken
the life of another mortal. Amelia believed him good and kind,
thought that he was different to the men she had previously been
intimate with, but she would never see him that way if she knew the
things he had done in his past, in the time before he had lost his
wings.
    Since
being cursed, he had led a different life. Wars had become less
frequent and the angels of death had no longer required outside
assistance from the other branches of angels in Heaven. His kind,
the guardians, had returned to their normal duties, shepherding
souls and protecting Heaven, or watching over the mortals, both