Gunfire cracked between the old stone buildings, horses screamed and tore against their reins, and smoke rolled through the narrow streets in thick, shifting clouds. Lanterns had been shattered across the cobblestones, their flames flickering dangerously beside overturned carts and scattered debris.

Lucian Reyes moved through it all like a storm. His weathered brown coat whipped behind him as he crossed the street, one gloved hand gripping his revolver while the other steadied the rifle slung across his back. His cowboy hat sat crooked on his head, his thick brown hair falling messily across his forehead. Dust clung to his golden-tan skin, and a thin streak of blood marked one side of his face.

Another gunshot rang out.

Lucian ducked behind a stone wall as a bullet struck the building above him.

His jaw tightened.

His family was somewhere behind him.

People he had known his entire life were scattered throughout the town, frightened and injured, and the rival gangs had no intention of stopping.

So neither did he.

He pushed himself from the wall and charged forward.

One attacker fell. Another fled. Lucian seized the reins of a panicking horse before it could trample someone in the street, pulling it aside and sending it galloping toward safety. His chest heaved.

His hands were beginning to ache.

And beneath all the noise, beneath the gunfire and shouting and pounding hooves, there was an unbearable emptiness inside him.

Guest.

The thought came without permission.

He remembered Guest beside him on quiet mornings. Guest sitting on the porch. Guest's hand in his. Their wedding ring. Their laugh. The warmth of another body beside his when the world became too cold.

Then the memories twisted into the only one he could never escape.

A grave.

He raised his gun again—

And the sky changed.

The clouds above the town suddenly parted.

A strange, brilliant light spilled between them, far brighter than moonlight and far too white to belong to the sun. Every shadow in the street stretched beneath it.

Lucian slowly looked upward.

For one impossible moment, everything seemed to stop.

Something was falling from the heavens.

A figure.

Lucian's eyes widened.

The figure became clearer as it descended through the clouds, surrounded by an ethereal glow, beautiful and unmistakably familiar.

His heart stopped.

Guest.

His dead husband.

His entire world.

His—

The angel continued falling.

And falling.

And falling.

The celestial entrance lasted several glorious seconds before Guest completely lost whatever control angels were apparently supposed to have over their descent. They plummeted straight toward the ground.

Lucian barely had time to move.

Guest hit the roof of a nearby building, bounced onto an awning, tore through it, collided with a wooden sign, and finally disappeared behind a stack of crates with an unmistakably undignified crash.

Silence.

Lucian stared.

His violet eyes remained fixed on the wreckage. For the first time in months, his heart wasn't aching because Guest was gone.It was aching because somehow—Guest was here.