The Angel’s Brother Excerpt

“Dad?”

“In here, Chel.”

I gripped Annabeth’s hand, pulling her into my father’s office. So far, Annabeth had been cool with Mum and Joe, but this was the big one. I needed her to pass this encounter.

Dad had lowered Heaven Inc to the Earth Realms for the afternoon, a feat I didn’t know he could perform, and which I was certain he shouldn’t technically do. Nevertheless, I’d walked Annabeth down Piccadilly Circuit and Heaven had been waiting for us.

There was an unfamiliar woman in the office with Dad when I entered. She was sitting opposite Dad, looking as though a train had just knocked her down. She was staring at Dad, mouth open, eyes wide, hair a mess. She looked like she’d been fired, but I’d never seen her in the office before. She didn’t work for Dad.

“If you’ll excuse me, Taragin,” Dad said to the woman, standing up. She stood up too, bowed and left, walking backwards out the door, still staring at him.

“She doesn’t work for us?” I half-asked, sitting in the seat Taragin had just abandoned.

“Not exactly. She’s the former C.E.O.” He looked to Annabeth, who was staring, open-mouthed, at the sparsely-decorated office. “Hello, Annabeth.”

Annabeth jumped, then stepped closer to me. “Good afternoon, Mister Morningstar—”

“Call me Luce, please.” Dad smiled at her, sitting down and gesturing Annabeth to a seat beside me. “What can I do for you two lovely ladies?”

“Just introducing Annabeth to the family.” I smiled. “What’s been happening? How’s Mum?”

“You could probably answer that better than me, Chel. She’s divorcing me.”

I stared at him, trying to work out if he was joking or not. “She what?”

“Your mother left me.” Dad glanced at Annabeth. “I haven’t seen her in months, since I followed Aspen to Hell and she banished me.”

“She banished you?” I demanded, forgetting Annabeth’s lack of background knowledge. “She, Mum, ex-Hellraiser top dog, banished you, Dad, God, from Hell?”

He nodded. “She’s within her power to do it, so I just found out.” Dad glanced at Annabeth. “Perhaps this is a conversation for a later time—”

“To buggery it is! Dad, how could you do this to our family?”

“How could I—? Chel, it’s your mother filling the papers, not me.”

“Then vanish them away. You’re God, for shit’s sake, surely you can do that!”

“To what end,Chelsea?” he asked, shaking his head. “She will still hate me. Probably more-so than if I was to let her go along with it.”

“Then make her love you.”

“I can’t do that, Chel. Even if I could, it would never be real. That would be worse then her leaving,” he said quietly. “I’ve thought this all through, Chelsea. It’s no use—nothing will work.”

I felt tears rolling down my cheeks, and I jumped when Annabeth squeezed my shoulder. I looked up at her and she knelt behind my chair, her arms around my shoulders and her chin on my shoulder, lending me her support.

“It’s not the end of the world, Chel,” she murmured in my ear, smoothing my hair down. “Lots of families go through a divorce. Mine did.”

I squeezed her hand, opening my mouth to tell her how sweet she was, but Dad spoke over me.

“Annabeth, I don’t know what Chelsea has told you about her family, but let me correct you on one small matter. Many families go through a divorce, that’s true. But I’m afraid that, in truth, this divorce literally could mean the end of the universe.”