Gabriel's Hope - Page 8/175

Dump Logan. Her attention lingered on it for a moment before she wrote one more.

Ask Wynn to dinner.

Satisfied, she closed the notebook. The end of her life started this weekend. She was going to enjoy it, no matter what.

*****

Dr. Wynn stood in the middle of his office. His heart was pounding harder than ever. Deidre's tears burned through his shirt to his skin, and he couldn't dismiss the expression on her face from his thoughts. She'd made a decision in front of him, one that warned him this might be his last chance to reveal his secret. He'd wanted to tell her not to go to the beach with Logan, to spend the weekend with him instead of some stupid human that had no idea how to appreciate a woman like her. He walked away, because it was the right thing to do.

Wynn didn't do what was right in this life or the last, unless it benefited him directly. He wanted her. It didn't matter if she felt the same or if she had someone else.

One minute, Dr. Wynn was headed back towards Deidre's exam room. The next, his foot sank into sand. Fluorescent lighting overhead morphed to an expansive blue sky and brilliant sunlight that made him squint. The air-conditioned hospital corridor gave way to the balmy heat of the Caribbean island on which he stood. He glanced down at the expensive loafers that now contained tiny grains of sand he'd never be able to flush out of the seams.

"Where might you be going?" a warm voice asked from behind him.

Wynn was still for a long moment. It was not every day he was summoned by a deity. Reincarnation left his power stunted and him far less brash in how he used what remained.

"You do not normally demean yourself by talking to someone as lowly as I am," he replied, turning.

Barefooted and relaxed, Fate flashed a wide smile. His brown hair was tousled from the ocean breeze, and he was dressed in jeans and a loose shirt fastened across the golden skin of his chest by one button.

"A doctor this time around?"

"It's an honorable trade," Wynn replied.

"An honorable trade for a man with no honor," Fate said.

"Better than preying on the free will of humans."

"Speaking of preying on those weaker than you, I have an interest in your … patient."

"You and many others." Wynn removed his shoes and sat nearby, uneasy but unwilling to show it. Deities did not summon formerly dead-dead Immortals to them without a compelling reason.

"Vengeance is a strong motivator, even for me," Fate began. "I am curious, doctor, did you know she would come to you or did you stumble upon her?"