Immortal City (Immortal City 1)

“What do you think of them?” he asked.

Slightly afraid, but overcome with curiosity, Maddy reached out and ran her finger across the top of the left wing. It was hot to the touch.

“They’re . . . great.”

Jacks smiled. “Want to try them out?”

Maddy pulled her finger away. “You mean actually fly?”

“Sure. Real deal.”

“I don’t know,” she said, unsure.

Jacks held out his hand to her. “Do you trust me?”

Somehow, strangely, Maddy felt as if the question held within it far more than just this night. She was at a crossroads. She looked at this boy Angel, young and perfect, his hand outstretched before her like the hand of fate itself. It was a simple response—just a single word—but somehow, on some level, Maddy knew that it would change her life in ways she couldn’t imagine.

Her lips moved.

“Yes.”

Maddy pulled her hood up around her head and cinched the drawstring tight. “Put your arms around my neck,” Jacks instructed, kneeling down. “And hold on tight.”

When she finally gathered the courage to open her eyes, she and Jacks were rushing through the dark canyon just beyond the outlook. Maddy looked at Jacks’s winged body. It wasn’t just powerful; it was incredibly graceful too. The wings instinctively and effortlessly adjusted to the air currents as they sailed. Then they curved like airplane flaps, and with a powerful thrust, Maddy and Jacks ascended steeply out of the canyon.

Maddy screamed at first, but then something amazing happened. The scream grew into a shout. And the shout grew into a laugh. A laugh that seemed to start all the way in her toes and radiate throughout her body. Jacks and Maddy soared high over Angel City and into the night, as the stars hovered above.

“I thought you would put your arms out!” Maddy yelled.

“What?!” Jacks struggled to hear her over the wind.

Maddy yelled louder. “I thought you would put your arms out when you flew! Like Superman!”

Jacks laughed. He reached his arms out and let his palms ride on the air current. Maddy gripped his waist with her legs, then traced her fingers over his arms until they found his hands. Fingers laced, they buzzed the palm trees of Santa Monica, the neon pier, and then rushed out over the churning Pacific. Then Jacks climbed, up through the misty marine layer, until they were floating atop a moonlit bed of velvet white.

They flew past spiraling freeway connections swirling with traffic even at this late hour and rocketed over the rooftops of Brentwood, Westwood, and Beverly Hills. Then they dropped low to buzz the lights of Dodger Stadium. Jacks took them out over the scorched deserts of Palmdale and swung so low over an orange grove Maddy could taste the tangy citrus in her mouth. Circling back, they wove through the skyscrapers of downtown. Finally, Jacks pointed them toward a familiar sight. The Angel City sign. He brought them down gently on top of the fifty-foot glowing C of the word CITY. When Maddy unlaced her fingers from Jacks’s hands, she realized they had gone numb. They sat there together and let their feet dangle over the edge. Everywhere below, humanity twinkled up at them through a fine layer of mist.

“This is my favorite view in the entire city,” he said, a little smile playing across his lips.

“It’s wonderful,” Maddy admitted, her head still spinning from the flight. Jacks’s smile widened into a grin.

“It’s perfect, right?” But when he turned to Maddy, she was looking away from him. Her gaze had fallen down below and fixed on something. Jacks followed her line of sight until he saw the dormant Kevin’s Diner sign.

“So you live with your uncle?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

“And you work at the diner for some extra spending money?”

“No,” Maddy said, slightly annoyed. “Kevin can’t afford to bring on another waitress, so I fill in. It’s only temporary, just until the cash flow improves”—she hesitated, embarrassed—“but it’s been temporary for four years now. At least I get to keep my tips.”

“That doesn’t seem fair.”

“Life isn’t fair,” Maddy said, irritated. “Well, for me at least. For you it’s perfect.” She folded her arms. Like in the classroom, Jacks’s face fell.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, his mind churning with frustration. He looked into Maddy’s eyes, trying to figure out anything he could do, what he could say, to break through this wall she had set up against him.

“I mean, don’t get me wrong, Jacks, this was . . . amazing,” she said. “It’s just . . . this isn’t me.”