Alex and Kara sat in silence as Willow found glasses in a cupboard and filled one from the bottled water that sat on the counter. Kara was very pointedly not looking at Willow; she sat drinking her coffee, drumming her fingers on the worn wooden table. Her nails were short but shapely, painted bright pink. Memory stirred in Alex as he noticed. Those incongruous feminine touches of Kara’s had given him some sleepless nights when he was fourteen or fifteen; he’d speculated endlessly on whether she might wear lacy lingerie too. Kara probably would have decked him if she’d known. No, not “probably”.

Willow sat down, slipping into the chair next to him and avoiding his eyes. Under the table, Alex rubbed her thigh reassuringly, wishing they were alone; he hated how tense she seemed. She let out a breath, and darted a grateful glance at him.

“So what is this place?” he asked Kara again. “How did you hook up with the angel spotters, anyway? And how did you manage not to get killed? Cully said—”

Kara’s brown eyes turned large. “You’ve seen Cully?”

“Yeah, just over a month ago.” Alex glanced down, playing with the handle of his coffee mug. “He’s got angel burn, Kara.” Even now, he hated thinking about it. Once Alex’s father, Martin, had started losing grip with reality, Cully had taken over as lead of the AK training camp: the place in the remote New Mexico desert where both Alex and Jake had been raised. And he’d done it so tactfully and unobtrusively that Alex’s dad hadn’t even noticed to take offence. The man had been a father to him in everything but name.

He described the encounter to Kara – how Cully was staying alone at the old camp now; how he’d tried to kill Willow because the angels had told him to.

The news brought a hard line to Kara’s mouth, but then her manner turned thoughtful as she took in the pink scar on Willow’s arm, where Cully’s bullet had struck her.

“So the angels want you dead, huh?” she said.

Willow grimaced slightly. “Yeah, you could say that.”

“It’s what the terrorist manhunt is about,” said Alex. He drained the rest of his coffee in a quick gulp. “They think she has the power to destroy them.”

Kara sat watching Willow; even relaxed, Alex could see the muscles in her slender arms. “And? Do you?”

“No one’s told me how yet, if I do,” said Willow. Her spiky red-gold hair cut across her cheek as she looked down, tapping at her water glass. “Unfortunately, being a half-angel doesn’t come with an instruction manual.”

“No, I guess not,” said Kara. “But my guys saw something about you that freaked them out.”