“I understand pretty clearly, Maddy,” he threw back at her. “You’ve made your choice.”
Maddy felt her body ripple with sadness as she looked at the figure next to her, his nostrils flaring. “Something’s happened to you over the past few months, Jacks. You were never so . . . hard.”
“Something did happen to me, Maddy, remember?” Jacks spat back.
“I’m sorry,” Maddy said, fighting back the overwhelming emotion that just wanted her to break down, fall on her knees, beg for Jacks to forgive her. “I’m sorry for . . . everything.”
Jacks didn’t respond. By now the sun had fully risen over the ragged tops of the hills, bathing all of Angel City in the golden morning light. Buildings glinted in the sun. Jackson took one last look out at the Immortal City before walking to his car. Maddy stood rooted to her spot.
Jacks stopped just before opening his car door and turned back to Maddy.
“Do you want to know why it’s different?” Jackson asked.
“Why what’s different?”
“You asked me in the diner. Our unsanctioned saves. The difference between when I saved you, and when you saved the girl. What’s different?”
“I don’t know, Jacks.”
Jackson’s eyes were unblinking as he looked at Maddy.
“It was different because I loved you,” Jacks said.
The car door closed with a hollow thud as Jacks got in. Snarling to life, the sports car screeched its way down Mulholland, throwing dust and gravel high in the air as Jackson disappeared.
*
The neon sign for Kevin’s Diner had been shut off, and the placard in the window read “CLOSED”. The diner wouldn’t be opening today. Barely even registering the crowd of paparazzi and news vans across the street, Maddy slipped her key in the steel lock and opened the glass door. The bell chimed. Maddy stepped into the restaurant.
Tom got up and gave her a tentative hug. As their bodies touched for a bittersweet, painful moment, she just wanted to cry. She was thinking about the Angel at the outlook, and what she had done to him.
Kevin stood up from the booth where he and the pilot had been sitting over two steaming mugs of coffee, waiting for his niece.
“It’s . . . it’s done,” Maddy said, burying her face in Tom’s shoulder.
“You did the right thing, Maddy,” Tom said, lowering his eyes to her with gentle concern. “You did the right thing.”
Jackson’s footsteps echoed in the great hall as the near-translucent young woman in the fine gold-threaded robe led the young Angel into the chamber. The Council of Twelve rose from their seats as he walked in. His stepfather, Mark, was already there.
“Jacks,” Mark said, embracing his stepson.
Jackson’s face remained strangely neutral.
The enormous televisions mounted on the front walls of the chapel played incessant coverage of the standoff between the U.S. government and the Angels, showing military and police units preparing to occupy NAS offices throughout Angel City and the country. The problem was, they had no idea where the Council was.
“We heard the good news about your wings, young Godspeed,” Uriah said, nodding in his golden robe. “We had nothing but hope for this new technology. And now it has come just in time.”
Gabriel stepped forward, his perfect, ageless features looking at Jackson.
“And so you are sure?” Gabriel asked. “This would be of greatest service to us and your fellow Angels. The act of a true hero, befitting your father.”
Jackson nodded.
The image of Maddy leaning her head against Tom’s shoulder flared again angrily in his mind. She was doing it for him. For Tom. She had left Jackson for the human pilot. Jacks’s mind became murky and deadly, pulsing with quick anger and pain whenever he thought about it. He shook his head slightly to get rid of the sensation.
The ADC agent standing to the side handed Jackson one piece of armour at a time. Jacks put each section on deliberately, coldly. Making sure each joint was snapping together, all the seams correctly aligned.
When he was finished, Jackson stepped back and looked at himself in the full-length mirror. His broad shoulders were pronounced, his muscles defined by the contours of the sleek shell. He looked formidable. He was dressed in the sleek, black, modern armour of a Battle Angel.