"She came in a few hours ago. Didn't take any real genius to figure out what happened. Looks like some ape did a real number on her before putting her out of her misery," The aging coroner commented freely as his gnarled hand pulled the tray from the drawer. "Such a shame, a real looker she was."

Bud White was a detective, first and foremost. But at times like these the job hardly seemed worth the trouble or the heartache that was inevitable. He'd been stuck at his desk typing up back logged report after back logged report. He was stiff and cramped from hours of inactivity, when he'd looked up to see his sergeant coming across the squad room towards him.

"White, there's a Jane Doe cooling down at the morgue. I want you on this one. Go down and see what the coroner has to say, besides the obvious," came his orders, nothing unusual in of themselves. But the nightmarish trip had only just began.

Now, standing here looking at her, knowing beyond a doubt that it was her, he couldn't shake the feeling that the last four years of his life had been leading to this one moment. This moment that made him question every choice or lack of them in his life. She was beautiful even broken as she was. Like a child's miss used toy, broken and then discarded. It was then that his stomach rose in his throat, drowning the groan of emotion that ripped though his mind. He hadn't expected to find her here, not Angel. She should be showing up at his door like usual. Out of no where, a street brat, offering information for food or a lumpy couch for the night.

"Please excuse me, detective. There is something I must attend to." The coroner turned and rushed from the room, his white coat flaring behind him in his haste.

Bud had simply watched him go. It gave him a moment of reprieve, kept his eyes focused on something besides the woman on the cold slab in front him. When finally there was no excuse to look away, he turned his eyes back to her. Back to her thick auburn hair, back to the deep pools of ocean blue that were now closed forever, back to the swan like neck that held deep purple molding of a man's hand across the delicate skin. Running his fingers across the marred flesh there, he dictated every indention, every line, down to the pads of the print to memory. What happened? Was it because of me? Knowing me? Talking to me? Questions tumbled through his head one after another, pleading to be answered.

Slowly he lost himself in the memories of her, things she'd brought to his life, things she'd taken from it. She hadn't been more than seventeen that first night. His first night on the job in the Big Apple. A brutal murder, a body in an ally, no witnesses, and little evidence. He'd seen her in the crowd, eyes meeting for the briefest second and then she was gone. Sleep had been hard in coming that night. A strange city, strange bed, and a persistent knocking at his door. There she had stood -- gawking, cold, and frightened. Angel, she had said her name was. He hadn't believed her, not entirely. He'd heard enough bogus identities to know a name like Angel was hardly ever a given name. She turned over the description of a suspect that night for a ham sandwich, coke, and a hand full of stale chips. She had left as she had come, without a trace of herself, a phantom at his door. It became a pattern, a bargain between them, no taking without giving. Weeks turned into months, slipping into years of names and descriptions. His job had been made easier by her, his life more complicated. He knew when she began making money with her body, when she stopped really needing him. But still, she would show up in the night, there when he needed to see her, just needed to hear her voice.

He'd actually smiled the night she had trusted him enough to tell him of her past. Tell him about small town farm life, and the big dreams of a little girl. She had shown him the only thing she still had from that life, so long ago. A faded document, barely readable, but unmistakably her birth certificate. The only things he could really make out with any certainty was her name and birth date, Angel Marie had just turned 21.

Angel had been a woman, but still had a raw innocence about her that no john could steal. Bud had seen that, had protected it the times that he had found solace in her body.

He wound a finger around one curly lock. I'll miss you. Stay with me. Don't go, he wanted to say to her. Words he'd never said when he had the chance, when it mattered.

He turned, his steps taking him to the rigid chair across the room. He sat with his head in his hands, feeling helpless and insignificant in the wake of fate. If he had of begged her, pleaded with her, would it have changed this moment? Would she still be in his life? Would there have been a future? More questions without answers haunted him, confused him. It wasn't in his nature to do the very thing that could have saved her, commit.

"Detective?" The voice came from above him -- the coroner. "This was the only thing that was with the body besides her clothing. I haven't shown it to anyone." The man rushed ahead, holding out a familiar gray paper to Bud.

He took it and turned it over several times before unfolding the tattered document. "I keep it in my bra so that if anything happens they at least know who I am, or was," he remembered her saying, a chilling premonition. He was quick to notice the tiny scrawled letters in the upper corner. Reading them over several times until he nearly choked on them. They simply read, Bud White, I love you. She had left him this lasting message, knowing there would be only one way he would receive it.

He stood, tucking the paper into his pocket. "I want everything you find. EVERYTHING," Bud instructed the hesitant man. "Yes, as soon as we're finished with her I'll sent the report right over."

Retracing his steps, he stared down at her for the last time. Leaning towards her he whispered, "I'll find him and I'll make him pay, Angel. If it's the very last thing I do I'll make him pay." He nodded to the coroner, knowing that the man would go about his job just as soon as he was out of the way.

His tired gait delievered him from the morose cell of a room just as the shrill whine of the bone saw could be heard. His stomach twisted painfully, wanting to stop the preceedings he'd left behind. Instead he made his way down the hall.

One thought played over and over in his head. Maybe now, he truly did have an angel watching over him.