Zeb was impressed, too. He could imagine peaceful winter nights sitting in an upholstered chair with a footstool beside a roaring fire, reading a book, maybe even the Bible, perhaps sipping at a glass of fine wine. Or was that his vision of what Heaven must be like?

Sitting down behind the desk, Michael adjusted his wings over the chair back and glanced at a folder he'd brought with him. Zebulan stood nervously at attention before the desk.

"Tsk, tsk, tsk!" Michael clucked as he read.

Zebulan flushed, but he remained ramrod stiff.

"You have sinned mightily," the archangel pronounced, slapping the folder shut.

"I have."

"There are vangels . . . one in particular . . . who have interceded on your behalf."

Zebulan started to speak, then stopped himself. "I did not ask him to." Not precisely, anyhow.

"Are you sorry for your sins?"

"Desperately," he answered without hesitation.

"What would you have me do?"

"End it. I do not want to be a Lucipire anymore. Send me to Hell if you must, but I can no longer bear to perpetuate evil. I hate myself."

Michael nodded his understanding. "You were willing to give yourself up for Trond and his woman. I cannot discount that. However, I cannot excuse your sins."

Zeb felt tears well in his eyes. He had been a Hebrew, but he'd betrayed his people by serving the Roman armies, all in hopes of saving his vineyards and his family, of course. Beautiful Sarah and the adorable twins, Mikah and Rachel. Little had he known that his family had fled to Masada for refuge while he'd been gone, and the siege in which he'd participated had led to their deaths, as well.

"It is not that sin I refer to, Zebulan. 'Tis the centuries of sin you have done on Jasper's behalf."

Zebulan bowed his head in contrition. His shoulders slumped, realizing there was going to be no easy forgiveness here.

"God has noticed the speck of goodness left on your black soul, Zebulan, and He is offering you another chance. If you will go back into Jasper's world and work undercover as an agent of mine for fifty years, your sentence as a Lucipire will end."

"And then?" The demon cocked his head to the side.

"And then you would become a vangel."

"But I have no Viking blood. I thought only those of Norse descent could become vampire angels."

"You will be the first non-Viking to join their ranks."

Zebulan smiled then. "I can imagine how happy that will make The Seven."

"It is not for them to be happy or unhappy about my decisions."

"There's a problem, though. I've been gone too long, and I haven't followed Jasper's orders to bring him Trond and Nicole. He won't accept me back into his wicked fold."

Michael shrugged. "I will give you three dozen evil humans . . . sinfully unredeemable souls . . . for you to present to Jasper in reparation. You will tell him that you were unable to fulfill his demands, but that you gathered these humans together in the meantime. Jasper will not be happy but he will accept your 'gift.' "

"Only fifty years . . . a mere half century?" Zebulan asked, time meaning something different in the demon/angel world.

Michael nodded and smiled at him.

As Zebulan dropped to his knees, Michael walked around the desk and placed his hand on the man's head. "God be with you!"

Angels wept at that moment.

Twenty-five.

The road to happiness is long and winding . . .

Zeb smiled at Trond and Nicole when he left the office.

"Do you have to go back to Jasper?" Trond whispered to Zeb.

Zeb nodded, but he said nothing more. And, oddly, he was still smiling as he sauntered down the hall toward the kitchen. He'd probably been given orders to keep his fanged mouth shut. At least for now.

Trond would have liked to question the Lucipire more . . . assuming that's what Zeb still was, disheartening as that prospect was, but it was his turn to enter the office for his showdown with Mike.

He squeezed Nicole's hand. They'd had no chance to talk yet, but they would later. He hoped. He noticed that she didn't return his squeeze.

Mike had his desk chair tipped back precariously. The edges of his wings, tucked in behind him, swept the floor. His long, denim-clad legs were propped on the desk. His pure white T-shirt bore the logo: "Faith Makes Things Possible, Not Easy."

Should Trond be scared by that message?

The archangel didn't look up when Trond first came in. Instead, he studied a folder.

Those damn folders again! Vangels had come to hate them when called into a meeting with their mentor. Trond couldn't wait until Harek got Mike to convert everything to computers. If Mike had been staring at a computer screen when Trond walked in, he might just as well have been playing Solitaire, or IM-ing with God or one of the other archangels. Not deciding on his fate, based on a few missteps documented in a folder.

When Mike set the folder down, his gaze pierced Trond. "With all the years you've been a vangel, when will you learn?" Mike asked him.

Talk about trick questions! If I answer wrong, I might be volunteering information he doesn't have. "Are you talking about my trying to save Zeb?"

"Of course. What else would I be referring to, Viking?"

"It seemed like the right thing to do. The only thing to do. If Zeb was willing to offer himself for me, shouldn't I have been willing to do the same for him?"

"Your motives were pure. Your execution was not. What gives you the right to make such a decision? When you were given a second chance and became a vangel, you offered yourself up to God. You belong to God. How dare you offer yourself to Jasper?"

Trond hadn't thought about it in quite that way. I am in bigger trouble than I thought.

"I'm not going to add more years to your penance for that offense, but I am going to give you a mission that you might consider a penance of sorts."

Uh-oh!

"You will get U.S. citizenship papers, after which you will apply to become an official Navy SEAL. For years to come, you will be assigned to that post where you will save those SEALs who teeter on the edge of sin. Jasper has not given up on his mission to turn some special forces men into Lucipires."

This would indeed be a penance because Mike knew full well how much he hated extreme exercise, and he would probably have to start from the beginning in SEAL training with all that involved, including Hell Week. Ironic, really, since he'd volunteered to go to Hell.

But he could foresee many problems with this mission, not just his hate for hard work or hell in any format. "How can I take on a contemporary job? My comrades in SEALs would grow older, while I remained the same age."

Mike thought for a minute. "Ten years, then."

Trond wouldn't even bother to ask about all the complications of security clearances and Jaeger history, the red tape of joining an elite military group, even explaining his absence for several weeks. Mike would handle all that. He knew people.

"I'll be like a red light blinking target for Jasper."

"That you will, but you will have Zebulan to work with you, from the other side."

Ah! He was beginning to understand. "Zeb is going to be a good demon?"

"There is no such thing. He will pretend to be a demon."

Trond tilted his head in confusion. "What is he then? Surely not . . . a vangel?"

Mike waved a hand dismissively. "Zeb's status is his concern; you need only to work with him."

He wondered how long Zeb's sentence . . . uh, penance . . . would be. Surely not as short as ten years.

"What about Karl?" Trond suddenly realized that he hadn't seen or heard from Karl since he'd been back.

"Karl's human wife died. He is grieving. Later, I will decide his future missions. Probably not SEALs."

Now they came to the real complication of Trond's returning to Coronado and a military career. Nicole. How was he going to withstand the temptation of being around her and not acting on his baser inclinations? How was he going to stand loving her and not being with her? Was that to be the punishment in his new mission?

As if reading his mind, Mike asked, "Was she worth risking your immortal soul?" He was referring to the sex, of course.

"Yes, it was worth whatever punishment you will levy." Trond doubted that meant his immortal soul. That would be too harsh a punishment. "Honestly it didn't . . . doesn't . . . feel wrong."

"I wonder why."

"Because I love her?"

"Aha! The Viking has a brain, after all."

Mike's snideness on occasion was something Trond and his brothers had learned to abide, but that didn't mean they liked it.

"What are you going to do about this love of yours?"

"Nothing."

Mike raised his angelic eyebrows.

"I have nothing to offer her."

"Material wealth is easy to come by."

Trond shook his head. "I am a shell. I am not worthy of her."

Mike laughed. "Dost know nothing, Viking? Men are rarely worthy of the good women in their lives."

Trond had no clue where they were going with this conversation.

"There will be no more premarital sex. Not even that ludicrous near-sex that is fooling no one. You will either mate with this woman for your eternal life, or stay away from her. Totally."

A choice. He was being offered a choice. He assumed it would be under the same conditions as Vikar had with Alex, something they'd all thought was a one-time exception. Married forever. Fidelity required. She would live only as long as he would. No children. "But . . . but . . . but I'm not sure she would have me."

"You'll never know unless you ask." Picking up a cell phone on the desk, Mike pressed a few numbers, then spoke into it. "Vikar, send the woman in."

"You," Mike said, pointing to Trond, "sit down before you fall down."

Trond sank into one of the two chairs in front of the desk and watched as Nicole walked hesitantly into the room and sat in the chair next to him. She seemed frightened to look at Mike, who was studying her through steepled fingers. She avoided looking at Trond, too. Not a promising sign.

"Miss Tasso," Mike finally said.

She looked up and gasped.

Trond could understand that. Mike was a formidable sight, even in modern clothing. His features were just too perfect. And ethereal. Plus, there were those wings. And the sun shining through a stained glass window gave the appearance of a halo.

With what was probably hysterical irrelevance, Trond noted that he probably hadn't earned his wings on this last mission. Probably wouldn't ever. No big loss there.

"What are your feelings toward this sorry excuse for a vangel? A Viking, no less!"

The question surprised her, but then she smiled. A slight smile, but a smile nonetheless. "He lies. He has the sensitivity of a rock. He's arrogant. He-"

"That comes from being a Viking," Mike interrupted. "The whole lot of them are full of themselves." He waved a hand for her to continue. He was obviously enjoying her criticism of Trond.

"He's lazy. Refuses to listen to motivational tapes."

"I love motivational tapes!" Mike said. "Have you ever heard Roger Atwood speak on 'Listening to a Higher Power'?"

Trond looked at the archangel as if he'd lost his mind.

Nicole's smile was getting wider. "You should order Trond to listen to motivational tapes," she told Mike.

"Wait a minute here," Trond protested. That really would be punishment.

"Be quiet, Viking. I am talking to your woman."

He wasn't the only one who caught Mike's reference to "your woman."