Angel

Page 83

 

  Jonah didn’t know how long he simply stared upward at the arriving angels, wondering what he was supposed to do now. Then, at the corner of his vision, he saw a brief sliver of light from the far end of the cathedral. Glancing over, he saw a dark-haired figure carrying a girl disappear through the double doors.

  Jonah stared as he recognized her. Willow. Was she still alive — or not? Then he realized that he had to get out as well. Raziel knew now that Jonah had betrayed him; he had lied about Willow’s death, and the angel must have noticed him shouting at the crowd, holding the preacher back. During all the confusion, Raziel had vanished, obviously retreating to his divine form; so far the angel hadn’t reappeared.

  What would he do to Jonah when he did? For that matter, what would the church members do when this was over?

  Jonah turned and ran through the darkness, stumbling across the uneven floor. Near the barrier, he saw the security guard gaping upward and veered away from him. As he neared the doors, he jerked back with a gasp, his brown eyes widening. There was a dark shape lying in the shadows: Raziel, sprawled unmoving in his human form. Shock reeled through Jonah, along with a sick relief. Could Raziel be dead? He couldn’t tell; he wasn’t about to touch him to find out. Edging around the prone figure, he sprinted the final few steps.

  He pushed through the doors; the lights back here were making a humming noise, flickering on and off. The person carrying Willow was already halfway down the long corridor, disappearing fast. Jonah ran after him, suddenly desperate to know whether the girl was all right or not. He caught up with them just as they reached the outside door.

  “Hey —” he started, and then sucked in his breath as the dark-haired youth whirled on him, clutching Willow to his chest with one arm and holding a gun on Jonah with the other.

  “I seriously don’t think you want to try and stop me,” he said in a low voice.

  Jonah felt the blood leave his face. “No, I — I’m sorry. I just —” In a daze, he saw that the guy was younger than he was.

  Willow had her arms around his neck, her head against his shoulder. At the sound of voices, she tiredly opened her eyes; her gaze and Jonah’s met. “Alex, he helped,” she murmured.

  Alex? Jonah gaped at him. Of course, it was the assassin. He was here.

  At Willow’s words, Alex seemed to relax a fraction. He lowered the gun, and Jonah let out a breath. “You’re the contact,” stated Alex.

  Jonah nodded. “You’re . . . the assassin. ”

  Alex didn’t respond; his eyes flicked down the long corridor behind Jonah. “You’d better get out of here, too; they’ll kill you when this is over. ” He put his other arm under Willow, then shoved through the door and was gone.

  Jonah glanced behind him. He could still hear the sound of distant cheers, but for how long? Pushing the door open, he stepped out into the fading sunset. At the edge of the nearby parking lot, Alex and Willow were standing beside a motorcycle. Alex had just helped Willow out of her silvery-blue robe. He dropped it to the ground and seemed to be asking her something; she nodded as she looked at the motorcycle. Abruptly, he bent down and kissed her, gripping her face in his hands.

  Jonah ducked his head away, not wanting to spy on their private moment. When he looked again, Alex was helping Willow put on a helmet; then he quickly straddled the bike and she got on behind him, wrapping her arms around his chest. At the sight of them preparing to leave, Jonah remembered something, and his heart chilled.

  “Wait!” he called, running over. Alex was already revving the engine; he glanced over a shoulder.

  “Raziel,” panted Jonah, reaching them. “Is he dead?”

  “The angel?” Alex shook his head. “No, he’s just knocked out. He’ll be out of commission for a few days, but he’ll be fine. Unfortunately. ”

  Willow’s face was pale and drawn. “Thank you for helping, Jonah,” she said. “I wish . . . ” Her voice trailed off.

  “Yeah,” mumbled Jonah. He’d been stunned to see Willow face-to-face at last — in his mind he’d built her up to be some kind of supergirl. Instead she was diminutive, and had been so gravely frightened and self-composed that he’d just felt ashamed of his own terror.

  Now he looked back at the door, trying not to panic. “What will you do now?” He meant, What will I do now? but he couldn’t say the words.

  Alex lifted a muscular shoulder, and Jonah sensed his impatience to leave. “Getting away sounds like a pretty good plan. What about you? Have you got a car or something?”

  Jonah nodded. “In the employee parking lot, just around the side. ”

  A humorless smile crossed Alex’s tired features. “You’d better use it,” he said. “I don’t think you’re going to be working for the angels anymore. ”

  “Take care, Jonah,” said Willow weakly, and then Alex kicked the clutch, and they were gone, roaring off down the road. Jonah stood watching until they had vanished from sight and he couldn’t hear the engine anymore.

  Or anything else. The sound of cheering had stopped.

  Jonah licked his lips, frozen where he stood. He hadn’t expected this. He had thought that the destruction of the gate would kill him along with everyone else nearby, and on some level, he had wanted it that way. What was his life going to be like now, without the one shining, beautiful thing that had been his — the knowledge of the angels and how they were here to help humanity? Miserably, he thought that if he had any courage, he’d go back inside and let the crowd do to him what they would. But he didn’t have courage. That was the problem; it always had been.

  Then, softly, a memory came to him: his angel, the first he had ever seen, flying toward him on the campus in a glory of wings and light. Don’t be afraid. I have something to give you. She had helped him. He hadn’t imagined it. He had had courage; because of her, he had managed to change his whole life. If he could just hold on to that — the knowledge that there really were angels who were good and kind, regardless of the rest, maybe that would give him the courage he needed now to go on living.

  Glancing anxiously at the doors, Jonah took off at a run, heading for the employee parking lot.

  The service road led them back to the highway, where Alex saw long lines of cars still creeping along on the other side, caught in gridlock. Heading away from the cathedral, there was hardly any traffic at all. As dusk fell, he switched on the headlight and headed south, feeling the wind lashing at his hair and T-shirt. Occasionally he put his hand on Willow’s arms around his chest, just to reassure himself that she was really there.

  He would have preferred to put a thousand miles between them and the church, but it wasn’t happening tonight. He could feel tiredness overtaking him, like a dark undertow pulling at his skull. He drove for as long as he dared, taking them to a town called Trinidad, in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in the southern part of the state. He stopped at the first motel he came to, sweeping into the parking lot and idling to a stop. His muscles stiff from the cold mountain air, he helped Willow off the bike. In the glow of the streetlights, she was pale and wide-eyed as she pulled the helmet off, clearly as exhausted as he was.

  She had never been more beautiful.

  For a moment they just stood in the parking lot gazing at each other, drinking each other in. Alex thought that he’d never get enough of simply looking at Willow from now on, not if they both lived to be a hundred. The dark bulk of the mountains rose up in the background, and a single car passed by on the quiet late-night street. He touched her face; she put her hand over his, rubbing her cheek against his palm. Bending his head, he kissed her slowly, savoring the softness of her lips, the warmth of her. She was alive. Somehow, somehow, he still had her. With a soft sigh, Willow wrapped her arms around his waist and leaned against him. Alex held her, dropping his cheek to her hair and stroking her back.