Natural Born Angel

  But no one had said they admired her.

  “Thank . . . you,” she said.

  “Friends?” he said, putting his hand out.

  “Friends.”

  The two shook hands, smiling.

  Maddy was halfway out the truck door when Tom’s voice stopped her.

  “And Maddy?” he said.

  She turned and looked at him.

  “Don’t let anyone tell you that you don’t know how to fly. You’re a natural.”

  Maddy flushed, her red cheeks half-illuminated by the truck’s dome light.

  “Thanks,” she said.

  Maddy watched the truck’s tail-lights disappear into the quiet Angel City evening. She figured she would just head home – it was near the dinner rush at the diner, and after all that had been happening, she was too tired to deal with being recognized tonight.

  It was then that she felt her phone buzzing in her bag. She pulled it out and saw she had numerous missed calls. All from Kevin.

  “Hello?” she said, worried.

  His voice was pretty serious: “Are you back from flying?”

  “Yes. What’s— ”

  “You’d better get to the diner.”

  And he hung up. Maddy’s imagination blazed. She began quickly walking the block to the diner, wondering what in the world could strike Kevin so serious as to make a phone call during the dinner rush.

  The first thing Maddy noticed was a number of men wearing suits standing underneath the glowing Kevin’s Diner sign outside. They wore dark sunglasses and had small transmitters in their ears. This wasn’t a strange sight in Angel City – they could’ve been security for any Angel event, and Maddy had dealt with them a lot over the past year. But this was outside her uncle’s decidedly non-Angel restaurant. And these men were different. They seemed a bit more on edge, their suits a bit boxier. Like there might be guns under them.

  They stared straight ahead as Maddy walked into the diner.

  Kevin, wiping his hands on his apron, met her at the entrance. The restaurant seemed empty.

  “Kevin, what’s going on?”

  Her uncle led her towards the back booths, talking under his breath.

  “I don’t know how he found us, but . . . well, he’s waiting,” Kevin said.

  “Who’s waiting? What’s happening?” Maddy asked.

  “Just, well, you’ll see,” Kevin said. He led Maddy to the furthest table in the back and motioned for her to sit.

  Maddy slipped into the booth and found herself facing a man in a navy Brooks Brothers suit, red tie, and a big smile. His hair looked perfect. With a shock, she realized who it was.

  “Hello, Maddy. Let me introduce myself— ”

  “You’re Senator Linden,” Maddy interrupted cautiously, her eyes darting to the men in the dark suits standing behind them. She examined the senator. He had a strong jaw, but his eyes had a certain lightness to them. He was still a handsome man. She thought of all the things Jacks had said about Linden’s campaign. How stakes were growing by the day. How it was one of the biggest crises to face Angels since they came out of hiding over a hundred and fifty years earlier.

  “Yes, I am. You might not be aware of this, but I was friends with your father, Maddy.”

  Maddy remembered the rainy night a year before, when Jacks had saved her and the ADC agents were closing in. Uncle Kevin pulling out an old, secret album. She’d seen a photo of her father with a young Ted Linden.

  “You worked together,” Maddy said, remembering that conversation. “What do you want from me? Are you trying to get my endorsement? Even you should know that’s a long shot.”

  The senator didn’t seem ruffled by his cool reception.

  “I didn’t come here for your support, Maddy. This is an unscheduled stop. I came here today because I did know your father, Jacob Godright. And respected him very much. He was a great Angel.” Linden’s voice trailed off, as if he were remembering something very painful. “And so I thought I owed it to you. I simply thought we should talk. I want you to know why I’m doing what I’m doing.”

  “Why?” Maddy said. She had to admit that she was curious about how he could go from working with Angels to banning them outright.

  “The Angels’ PR machine is good, I have to give them that. I’m painted as a bigot. A hatemonger. But I don’t hate the Immortals. I’ve loved some of them. I loved your father dearly, like a brother. I hate the system. The system is so unfair and corrupt, it must be dismantled.”

  “But reform can happen,” Maddy said, although her voice was somewhat uncertain.

  Senator Linden was firm. But his voice was filled with regret. “We don’t have time for that. I’ve tried it before. Time and time again. But the Angels won’t do their part. I don’t see any other choice. I don’t want it this way. I’m an idealist at heart, Maddy. But I have to be a pragmatist in my actions. It’s the only way to save us both: humans and Angels. I have an obligation to shut it down. I wish it weren’t this way.”

  Maddy absorbed Linden’s words. She wasn’t sure how she felt about them. But she was starting to see how he had marshalled so much support, so quickly. It wasn’t just some kind of anti-Angel spirit sweeping the country. When he was there, you could feel his conviction. Even if you didn’t agree with him, it was almost intoxicating.

  A young man in an ill-fitting suit appeared at the counter. He spoke under his breath: “Senator, we need to be moving along. We have the dinner at Palisades Riviera in two hours, and we need to stop at the community centre in West Angel City along the way.”

  Senator Linden nodded. “Just give me one more moment with Ms Montgomery here. Or Godright.”

  The young man nodded and disappeared around the corner.

  “Maddy, you come from both worlds, Angel and human. I know this must be difficult,” the senator said. “I just wanted you to know I understand that. Whatever happens, it’s not personal. And I wanted to meet you. I’m glad I have – your father would have been proud.” A far-off look came across the senator’s eyes as he remembered another time, another place.

  Words came rushing out of Maddy’s mouth. “I still think reform can happen. That I can help make it happen.”

  The senator considered what she had said for a few moments.

  “Maddy, I know your heart is in the right place.” His eyes searched hers. “But honestly, no matter what you think, you’ll never be able to reform the Angels from the inside. They’d never let you. If you’re honest with yourself, you’ll know that what I’m saying is true.”

  A pang stabbed Maddy’s body as she heard these words.

  On some level, did she agree with what Senator Linden had said? Was it in fact going to be impossible to effect change from within the Angel organization? She had thought that from within was the only way to bring about change. But was she entirely sure?

  “Now I should go before my staff has a meltdown,” Linden said, standing up and smoothing his blazer. “Who knew being a politician was mostly being babysat by a pack of highly strung people?”

  “Kind of like being an Angel,” Maddy said aloud before she could stop herself.

  The senator put his hand out towards her. Maddy hesitated a moment. His smooth hand hung outstretched in the space between them.

  Maddy shook his hand. He gripped hers firmly.

  “You have your father’s eyes,” the senator said. “Goodbye, Madison. Let’s hope we meet again under more favourable circumstances.”

  CHAPTER 20

  Jackson and Mark sat next to each other at a gleaming oak table in the conference room of the medical centre. Across from them was assembled a panel of four doctors, wearing crisp white lab coats over their shirts and ties. The room also doubled as a library, and the walls were lined with volume after volume of handsomely leather-bound books and journals.

  Jacks
wasn’t looking at the doctors or anything else in the room, though: his gaze was through the window at the sunny day outside. Birds flitted about, squirrels scurried back and forth with prize nuts, and sprinklers chattered along the green lawns as they watered the grass.

  The tall doctor with a neatly trimmed beard whom Jackson’s stepfather often played golf with cleared his throat.

  “Jackson?”

  Jacks kept looking out of the window. After a long moment, he answered without turning his head. “Yes?”

  “So you understand . . . what we’ve told you?”

  Jacks spun in his chair and put his hand down gently on the table. “Yes, doctors, seems pretty clear.”

  A pained look crossed Mark’s face.

  Jacks stood up and put his hand out. “Thanks for your time.” He nodded to a shorter Angel doctor with auburn hair. “Dr Liebesgott, safe travels.”

  The doctors all shook Jackson’s hand, grave looks on their faces. Jacks’s smile, on the other hand, was bigger than life. It confused them as they filed slowly out the side door to their offices.

  The smile remained on Jacks’s face until he and Mark had reached the hallway, which is when it turned to disgust. Jacks took five quick steps and then spun on his heels to the right, punching the thick wall. His fist instantly flared in pain.

  “Jacks,” Mark said, reaching forward. Jacks started walking further away down the hall.

  “Over,” Jacks said in anger and sadness. “It’s over.”

  “Jackson, wait.” Mark caught up to him, grabbing his shoulder. “We don’t know that yet. We can get a third opinion, a fourth opinion, a fifth opinion. They themselves said it’s not a hundred per cent.”

  “How long can we fool ourselves?” Jacks began walking again, his footsteps quick and angry.

  “It’s not fooling ourselves. There is a new treatment from England. We can find more doctors, another clinic, a— ”

  Jacks stopped and turned to Mark, his eyes and voice were brimming with emotion.

  “Mark, they said I’ll probably never fly again. What was the term he used?” A mocking tone edged his voice. “Oh yes, I think he used the term miracle.”

  Mark looked Jacks squarely in the eye. “There have been those before, Jackson. There have been miracles.”

  Jacks looked at him almost mockingly. “Not in my lifetime, Mark.”

  Jacks turned and walked the rest of the way down the hall, pushing open the heavy oak door that led outside. Mark watched as sunshine poured into the dim corridor and then vanished as the door creaked shut again, Jacks disappearing into the sunny afternoon.

  Outside in the blinding sun, Jackson put on his sunglasses and squinted off into the distance, past the well-manicured garden and fountains outside the medical building, into something more abstract. Something more terrifying. His stomach felt cold and vacant.

  Ahead of him, his life seemed to stretch out to infinity. Empty. A series of meaningless daily rituals, adding up to nothing, meaning nothing. If he couldn’t be a Guardian, what good was he? He knew now that the parties, the clubs, the attention in Angel City – all of that would never fill a life in which he couldn’t do what he was sure he had been born to do. He couldn’t live on those empty events. Not after Maddy had shown him the deeper side of life, which was helping people. Not after saving Maddy, and being saved by her. He thought about Sylvester’s story of how he had lost his wings, and the young girl the detective hadn’t been able to rescue. Penelope. Maddy had saved more than Jackson’s life that night on the library tower.

  Yet now he was doomed to lose any chance at all.

  Jackson’s fists were unconsciously clenched at his side, trembling, his fingernails digging bitterly into his palms.

  Suddenly he spun around on his heels, sensing someone behind him.

  It was Archangel Churchson. He smiled at Jackson from behind his trademark salt-and-pepper goatee, wearing a perfectly tailored Hugo Boss suit. Off to the side, Jacks could see a couple of very built Angels in dark suits and shades. Out-of-uniform agents? Archangels didn’t usually have bodyguards.

  “Hello, Guardian Jackson Godspeed,” Churchson said. He smiled.

  Jacks looked at him speechlessly, having been startled out of his dark thoughts.

  “Is everything all right?” Churchson asked, his eyes scanning Jacks’s pale face.

  “Just some bad news, I guess you could say,” Jackson said.

  “Well, I’m sorry to hear that,” Churchson said. He put his hand on Jackson’s shoulder and squeezed it warmly. “We don’t like our Guardians having to deal with hardship.”

  Jacks gave a short, bitter laugh. “I don’t think it’s correct to call me a Guardian any more.”

  Churchson’s brow knitted in concern.

  “This doesn’t have anything to do with your wings, now, does it, Jackson?” he said.

  Jacks didn’t answer. He couldn’t bring himself to.

  “Well, so wonderful we just happened to run into each other this afternoon. There’s something I’ve been meaning to bring up with you,” Churchson said, looking over at his security detail for a moment before focusing his attention back on Jacks again. “What would you say if I told you that we have a way for you to fly again. . .”

  CHAPTER 21

  The day after Senator Linden’s visit to the diner proved to be the last day that Maddy had an ounce of free time, as she and the rest of that year’s nominees inexorably hurtled towards the final assessment for Guardianship – and getting their own all-important Divine Ring. That ring brought the highest level of fame and fortune and the chance to save lives as one of the fabled and beautiful Guardians of Angel City. Maddy could see that even the more confident Angels at the training grounds were getting a little nervous as the date approached.

  As much as she didn’t want to admit it, Senator Linden’s visit had shaken Maddy up. He seemed like such a strange connection to have to her father, but besides her Uncle Kevin, he was now the closest. The stop at Kevin’s Diner hadn’t been on his official agenda for the Angel City visit, and no paparazzi had followed Maddy to her uncle’s diner, so it hadn’t hit the media at all, which was a blessing. She couldn’t even imagine trying to explain that to Darcy. And the senator could’ve easily somehow used it for some publicity. But she suspected he wanted it to be in the papers and on the blogs as little as she did.

  The Angel news channels were cranking up coverage, and the blogs were alive with gossip about upcoming Commissioning Week. Most of the buzz was about Maddy’s historic Commissioning. The irony to Maddy was that everyone just assumed she’d be recommended for Guardianship, no problem. The news and blog people were more worried about the designer of her skirts and which event she was going to. But she knew she was by no means a shoo-in, even though the NAS had bumped her up to this year. Mark Godspeed had told her she obviously had enough votes within the Archangels to be made Guardian. But to even be eligible, she had to be nominated for Guardianship by the training board. No matter how much support the Archangels put behind her, she had to be able to perform.

  Added to all this, Jacks was, for some reason, more distant than usual. This would have normally bothered her, but Maddy didn’t even have time to think about it too much as she prepared to face Kreuz and the board of instructors and somehow balance the even bigger crush of blog, TV and social media attention.

  As the days before the assessment grew near, Maddy had her final session with Susan Archson in the now-familiar frequencing room. Susan was wearing her normal white lab coat over a classy black dress. Maddy stepped on to the circular platform of the frequency modulator. The tiled room full of screens surrounded her, and they began to flicker on, one by one, as they drew frequencies from Protections across the board. The voices of all the people grew until they were an almost unbearable din.

  Maddy let her mind open, quiet. The frequencies and visio
ns poured in instantly this time. And unlike her first time, it didn’t create any pain. The cacophony in her mind was incredible, but she let it all wash over her, taking deep, long breaths.

  “Candace Waldman,” Susan said.

  Maddy’s mind quickly and neatly unconsciously threaded through the hundreds of Protections getting frequenced, all of the screens quickly darkening until she had isolated one: Candace. Maddy was transported as she saw the humdrum activity of Candace walking her dog down the street, waving at a neighbour.

  Susan called more names off, and each time Maddy isolated the frequency quickly again – it had become second nature.

  “Incredible!” Susan exclaimed, making a final mark on the digital tablet in her hand. She began shutting down the system. “Your speed is some of the best I’ve ever seen, Maddy. Your frequencing ability outstrips ninety-nine per cent of Guardians.”

  Maddy blushed. “Really?”

  “Really,” Susan said, smiling warmly. “You’ve made such progress. You’re special, Maddy, just like I said.”

  Maddy flashed back to her first day of training, when she’d felt totally . . . how had she felt? Exposed. That was the word. She didn’t know that at the time. But meeting Kreuz, and sensing the superior attitude of her fellow Guardians, how they sniffed at her as she passed . . . she had felt exposed, somehow. She had been afraid – afraid of what her abilities wouldn’t be, and, if she were honest, what her abilities would be. She had felt like the slow kid put in a class full of geniuses. Except instead of being nerdy, these geniuses were beautiful, perfect Angels.

  Yet Susan had been there for her.

  “I’m proud of you,” Susan said, putting her hand on Maddy’s shoulder. Her eyes grew serious. “We, I mean, I have high hopes for you. More than you can imagine.”

  “Thank you,” Maddy said, starting to feel a little emotional. She felt a bond with Susan. Out of all the Angels – besides Jacks, of course – Susan understood her the most.