Selena Rose, Daughter of the Moon

Chapter 24

Gabriel swoops down and kicks Selena in the stomach sending her flying back. She hits ass first and falls back clutching her stomach trying to convince her body that breathing should happen. She can hear Gabriel laughing as she struggles. Fuck this guy. She gets herself rolled over onto her hands and knees, slowly getting herself back on her feet. She sees Gabriel hovering not far from her. She creates a small and weak energy ball and pretends to be throwing it at him while making sure it fizzles and make a low slow arc to the ground as if she was running low on power.

Gabriel laughs long and loud at her, flying round and round, making her dizzy with the speed of it. Focusing elsewhere, because she still feels like her lungs aren't working right and her stomach wants to empty, she sees her father peeking around a building. "Gabriel! You too scared to come down here? Can't stand and face me? How are you going to force me to marry you if you can't even fight me like a man?" Dad, I hope like hell you are a better shot than I am because that is going to make him lose his damn mind.

"What? Fight you like a man?" He lands lightly just a few feet away in front of her, "Are you joking? Look at you! You're bleeding all down your face, you still look like you're about to puke. The last shot you fired at me—"

The shot of chaos laced with venom hits him in the left shoulder. It spreads across his body with a terrifying speed, Selena steps farther out of his reach as he stretches toward her. Apophis walks across the parking lot. "He was incredibly long winded wasn't he?"

Selena stands there staring for a minute till what Apophis said registers, "Did you just make a dad joke?" He looks at her deadpan, "I did." Selena starts laughing and then the tears arrive, "Oh Dad, why did he have to do this?" Apophis wraps her in a hug and rubs her back while making soothing noises as she cries herself out. When she is calmer she steps back and is horrified at the blood, snot, and tears on his shirt. She looks up wild-eyed, "We can't let Kya see us like this". Apophis takes out his phone and calls his butler. Telling him where they are he asks him to send a couple of the security detail with shirts for each of them, wipes and mouthwash, and a few large garbage bags.

He walks over to Gabriel, masks his wounds with magic and makes it appear as though he were bitten by a snake on his left shoulder. Selena walks over and picks up her phone, entirely grateful for the case that kept it safe when she tossed it across the parking lot. She pulls up the last message from Dwayne, smiling and tracing the lines of their faces in the picture. She sends Dwayne a message, 'Be there soon.' She walks over to where her father is standing, looking down at Gabriel's body. "I don't know what you ever saw in him. He still looks like a putz and he's dead." Selena laughs, "I wondered the same thing earlier. Do I look really bad?"

Apophis looks her over very seriously, "You look like a vampire with poor table manners." He grins at her and she laughs a little more. The security guys pull into the lot and turn the headlights off, parking with the trunk nearest the body. They get out of the car with shirts and wipes in hand, after handing them off they open the trunk and take out the large black bags inside. While Selena and Apophis change shirts they bag up his body and place it gently in the trunk, so as not to mark it. Apophis marvels at women's maneuvers that allow for the changing of shirts in public without taking the first off before putting the second on. Selena starts dabbing at her face with the wipes. She is wincing, looking closer he can see that her face is swollen and bruised. He looks at Gabriel's body, almost wishing he was still alive so he could pay again for what he had done. Selena painstakingly cleans herself up using her phone's camera as a mirror. Apophis tells his security guys to go ahead and go home but pick up his car on the way. He hands over his key fob and they leave. Selena is perfectly clean but still looking at her face in the camera. He waits in silence as she does this. When she finally hits the lock button on her phone he says, "Are you ready to go home?" "Yes, I am. I don't want Kya to see me like this but I can't keep it from her either." She turns toward her truck but then turns back, "Hey Dad, could you drive this once?" Apophis chokes up a little. Clearing his throat and grateful for the dark he agrees to drive them home.