Silver

Chapter 14

We soared low down across the ocean, circling back towards the Santa Monica pier. The tips of the waves licked my shoes, splashing up onto my legs. It was refreshing. The water here was so much warmer than the water in the Puget Sound. 

Siena had us circling Los Angeles for the last hour while the sun set so nobody would see us. Once it got dark, we circled back towards the beach near the pier, beating our wings to slow us down before we hit the sand. Siena and Grey landed in a sort of jog, and Allison fell to one knee as she landed. My feet hit the sand and my legs gave out, so I, graceful as always, landed on all fours. 

"You okay, Jordan?" Siena asked, walking over to me. I brushed the sand off my knees as I stood up, my legs wobbly. Now that my adrenaline was dying off from the flight, I realized how utterly exhausted I was. My wings were so sore. I don't know why my legs were tired, but they were. As a matter of fact, so was the rest of my body. It felt like I'd spent the whole day at the gym maxing out on weights. Odd. It was like my wings had drawn energy from everywhere else in my body in order to get me here, and now, I was just drained. 

"Yeah.  Just tired, I guess," I replied, looking around. Siena had landed us away from people, further down from the pier. 

"Most Angels need a few months at least before they can fly that far. You did well," she offered me a slight smile. 

"We need to find a motel," Grey mumbled out, narrowing his eyes at Siena and I. Ugh. He was so cranky. He outstretched his wings to either side of him before pulling them back in towards his body. They then vanished as he reined them back in to his soul. 

"Where are you thinking?" Allison asked, stretching her wings out as Grey had, and then pulling them back in. 

"If we go to a motel along the pier, we can pull off the whole tourist thing. We'll seem less suspicious here and will likely draw less attention," Grey explained. 

"But wouldn't going to a motel on the outskirts of LA be safer? Less chance of running into a demon where there's less people," Siena suggested, pulling her wings in as Grey and Allison had. 

"Just keep your souls under control and don't make eye contact with anyone. Outskirts of LA have more crime, so demons are more attracted to those areas. We're probably safer here," Grey sighed, running his hands through his hair. I outstretched my wings as the others had, sucking in a deep breath before exhaling and pulling my wings back in to my soul. It knocked the wind out of me and I shivered. 

"Okay. There's a motel a block from here. Says it has vacancy. I'm not very good at Suggestion yet, so one of you will have to do it," Allison explained, eyeing Grey and Siena. 

"I can do it," Grey clenched his jaw slightly. 

"Okay. Follow me," she pressed her lips together, leading us down the beach towards the wooden stairs that brought us up to the main level of the city. 

I was glad we had made it without any demonic interference. Grey had been on edge all day, and it was really pissing me off to be completely honest. I get that we're likely to be attacked at some point, but I don't think paranoia is going to protect us from that happening. 

"You can't pull another stunt like you did today," Grey grumbled next to me, his jaw clenching slightly. He kept his eyes trained forward, flicking around the surrounding area as he had been doing all day. 

"Are you seriously going to keep going on about that?" I rolled my eyes as we reached the staircase. I gripped the railing to help pull my sore muscles up.

"Yes. It was stupid. You could've gotten us all killed just because you wanted to see a rock," Grey retorted lowly. 

"You do realize we could all die on this mission, right?" I turned to look at him over my shoulder when we reached the top of the stairs.