Angel Fever

6

SEB LAY ON HIS BED reading, all too aware that what he was really doing was waiting. Though it was after two a.m., he was still half dressed.

Even without Willow’s hurried call back to the base, he’d known that she was nearly home – he hadn’t been able to stop himself from checking on her compulsively these last few days. His own forebodings were bad enough; sensing Willow’s inner turmoil had kept him taut with worry. He had to see her as soon as she was back – make sure she was all right.

Seb grimaced and tossed the book aside. Dios mío, when would this end? Exactly how long could he stay in love with a girl who thought of him only as a brother?

His gaze fell on a note from Meghan on his bedside table: I still haven’t seen this harem of yours, you faker! Love, M.

With a small smile, Seb picked up the note and turned it over in his hands. He still wasn’t sure just what he felt for Meghan…but the truth was, the relationship seemed like the only good thing in his life right now.

It had started one night about a month ago, when the group of recruits he hung out with had been talking here in his room. Most of Seb’s life had been spent on the road searching for his half-angel girl; now he’d finally stayed in one place long enough to have friends. Meghan was one of them – and this time, she’d remained behind after the others had left. The sudden silence had made Seb very aware of the way she was lying across his bed, propped on her elbow. The pose that had been casual with the others around now seemed much more intimate.

Seb had stayed at the head of the bed, and they’d talked as if nothing had changed…but when their conversation hit a pause, Meghan cleared her throat. “So – can I ask you something? You don’t have a girlfriend, right?”

Danger flags started waving madly. Seb kept his tone light. “No, I do. I have several.”

Meghan smiled. A dark red eyebrow arched against her milky skin. “Several, huh?”

“Yes, I have a harem, actually – didn’t you know? Seven girls; they stay locked in a room that only I have the key to. I keep them very happy.”

“And do they keep you happy?”

“They keep me exhausted.”

She laughed then, and Seb found himself admiring the wholehearted way she gave herself to it, throwing her head back. It was what he liked most about Meghan – the reason why, in the months he’d known her, he’d found himself seeking her out more and more: her energy made him feel happy even when he wasn’t.

She grew serious again, tucking a strand of auburn hair behind her ear. “No, I was just wondering, because…well, girls flirt with you and you flirt back, but you never…” She gave an expressive shrug. “So, I was wondering why not.”

Taking in the gentle rose drifting through the turquoise lights of her aura, Seb knew that Meghan was interested in more than friendship with him. If he was honest, he’d known it for a long time. “Because I’m already in love with someone,” he admitted. And realized, startled, that it was the first time he’d ever told the truth about himself to anyone but Willow.

Meghan nodded slowly. “Is it Willow?”

He managed a smile. “It’s obvious, yes?”

“Not very. I had a feeling, that’s all.” She trailed a finger over the bedcover; her mouth twisted self-mockingly. “You know, I guess I should hate her, but…I just can’t.”

This is why I never tell the truth, Seb thought wryly – Meghan had just plunged the conversation into far deeper waters than he wanted to navigate. He wished he could go back in time a few minutes and keep her talking about how she’d just been accepted for an apprenticeship with a San Francisco dance company before the quakes hit.

“Meghan, maybe—”

He’d been about to say, Maybe it’s time to call it a night, but the look on her face stopped him. It held such genuine understanding – more than he’d felt from anyone in what seemed a long time.

When he didn’t continue, she cleared her throat. “So, tell me to mind my own business, but…did anything ever happen between you two?”

Deflecting her with banter felt pointless now. “We kissed once,” he admitted. “Last December.” He scraped a hand over his stubble, remembering. “She cried afterwards and said it had been a mistake.” The memory of the most wonderful moment of his life, followed swiftly by the most terrible, still had the power to hurt him.

Meghan took this in silently, without judgement. “She seems really in love with Alex,” she said finally.

Seb almost laughed. “Yes. She does, doesn’t she?”

Meghan’s rueful smile acknowledged what this must be like for him. There was a pause that felt weighted – then with a rustle, she shifted upwards on the bed until their heads were almost level. He could feel the warmth of her arm through his shirt.

“So, if I promise not to cry…” she said.

Seb knew what she was going to do – could have stopped her, but didn’t. Resting a hand on his chest, Meghan leaned close. Her mouth was warm, giving. Seb responded without being able to help himself, his heartbeat quickening as their lips moved together, the kiss staying soft.

Meghan drew away, her cheeks pink. “Bad idea?” she asked finally.

“Yes, I’d better throw you out now.” Seb meant it, though he spoke jokingly.

She looked down. Her hand found his, and she gently explored his fingers. She swallowed but didn’t speak again.

And then somehow Seb found himself touching her autumn-bright hair, smoothing it away from her face. Their eyes locked and held. He knew he should pull away; instead, very softly, he stroked the corner of her mouth with his thumb. Her eyes were so blue, like pieces of sky – you could fall into them and never find your way out.

Coming to his senses, he dropped his hand. “You were right – this is a bad idea,” he said. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

She squeezed his fingers. “Seb, look, I really care about you, and – and unless I’m crazy, it’s not one-sided. I mean, the way you look at me sometimes… You do like me, don’t you?”

“Like” was an inadequate word for whatever it was he’d begun to feel for Meghan these past few months. He just had no idea what the right word might be, when it wasn’t “love”.

“You know I do,” he said roughly. “But, Meggie” – the nickname came out of nowhere; it suited her – “I can’t change how I feel about Willow. I’ve tried.”

“Okay, but – wait, wait, let me get this straight,” she said, sitting up a little. “I like you, and you like me – boy/girl liking, right? Not just friends?”

He had to smile; she looked so earnest. “Yes,” he admitted. Of course he was attracted to Meghan, with her leggy dancer’s body and golden spray of freckles across her nose – her warm, happy energy that always seemed to soothe him, embrace him. He’d have to be devoid of all his senses not to be.

“But you’re in love with someone else,” Meghan went on, “who is also in love with someone else, and who doesn’t seem likely to change her feelings anytime soon – and so you don’t even want to explore this thing with me a little? See what it could be like with us?”

When she put it like that, his reluctance seemed slightly insane. “I just don’t want to hurt you, chiquita,” he said again. The endearment came with no planning either – “querida” belonged to Willow.

Meghan shrugged; her blue eyes had begun to sparkle. “Hey, not so fast there, hombre. I could hurt you, you know. Maybe you’ll fall madly in love with me, and I’ll dump you.”

“Yes, this is true.” Seb was smiling now. There was a pause; he rubbed his stubble. “Wait – have we just agreed to something?”

Meghan gravely pretended to consider. “I think we’ve agreed that you should just kiss me and we’ll take it from there.” Then she grinned and bumped him on the chest with her fist. “Because to tell you the truth, this is kind of agonizing.”

And suddenly Seb had realized that he had no desire at all to resist her any more.

Now, a month later, Seb’s love for Willow remained as strong as ever – he sometimes thought he’d cheerfully barter his soul to get over her. But meanwhile, the relationship with Meghan was making him happier than anything had in a long time. She was beautiful, kind, fun to be with – she seemed to know him better than he knew himself. They’d been keeping a low profile, but he was becoming less and less interested in maintaining it.

Maybe I can fall in love with her, Seb thought, folding the note from Meghan carefully and putting it back on his bedside table. Maybe I really can.

As if mocking the idea, a sudden flash of awareness told him that Willow had just returned. All other thoughts left him. Seb snapped on a T-shirt – and when he left his room, found his footsteps leading him to the medical bay. His eyebrows drew together sharply. What was going on? Willow had said she was all right.

He knocked but went in without waiting for an answer. Alex was sitting on the examination table, shirt off; a bullet wound gaped in his toned bicep. Willow stood tensely beside him. Claudia, a recruit who’d been training to be a paramedic – the closest thing to a doctor they had – was there; Alex winced as she examined his wound.

“You were lucky – it looks like a clean, through-and-through shot,” she said. “I don’t think you’ve damaged the bone.”

Seb gave the injury only cursory notice; what had hit him the second he walked in was the mood. Both Willow and Alex were still reeling from something that had nothing to do with however Alex had gotten shot.

The foreboding Seb had felt for days intensified. “What’s happened?” he demanded.

Alex gave a thin smile. “Might have known you’d show up.” As Claudia stepped away to rummage through the supply closet, he rubbed his temples and said in a low voice, “I’ll be announcing it to the others soon. The angels aren’t linked any more.”

At first Seb thought he hadn’t heard right. “What?”

Willow held out her hand. “Here,” she said quietly. She wasn’t offering comfort, she was offering information. Seb took Willow’s hand, trying to ignore the feel of it in his, and closed his eyes.

A rent in the sky – angels pouring in – an ominous sense of separateness. For an added kick in the teeth, he also saw how Alex had gotten shot: felt Willow’s panic, her immense love for him.

Finally Seb let go. He opened his mouth to speak, but there were no words. Willow touched his shoulder, her eyes tormented. “I know,” she said.

Maybe she did; it didn’t help. Seb slumped into a chair, watching distantly as Claudia gave Alex a local anaesthetic and cleaned his injury, trimming away the mangled flesh of his exit wound. As she started stitching him up, all Seb could see was a street scene in Mexico City.

It had been Revolution Day: there’d been a mariachi band, dancing in the street – and an angel cruising overhead. Seb had been watching from the balcony of his hostel when he’d seen the angel choose a street girl to feed from and, without thinking, he’d sent his own angel flying out to protect her.

Only through the sheerest of luck had he managed to destroy the angel and not be killed himself. But he’d done it. The girl had been saved – and Seb left stunned by his own willingness to risk his life.

He’d thought of her often since then: her thin face and brown eyes. Had she survived or been killed in the quakes that brought down Mexico City? He hoped she’d lived. Madre mía, he hoped so much that she’d lived.

Saving her had been the seed that had changed him. After a lifetime of ambivalence about the angels, it had hit Seb hard: What they’re doing here is wrong. The knowledge that the AKs could really defeat them had kept him going for almost a year now, especially as the biggest disappointment of his life had unfolded: the realization that his half-angel girl would never want him.

Seb watched blindly as Claudia finished bandaging Alex’s arm. So now there were millions more angels here, and the only way to kill them was to shoot them one by one? There were ninety-nine AKs. Seb had never spent much time in school, but there was nothing wrong with his basic maths.

It’s over, he thought. It’s all over.

Claudia handed Alex two small cardboard boxes. “Antibiotics – twice a day, with food. The others are painkillers; I think you’re going to need them.”

Alex barely glanced at the medication. “Yeah, thanks. Can you get on the intercom and announce a meeting in the dining room in ten minutes?”

Claudia blinked. “Now? It’s the middle of the night.”

“Yes, now,” said Alex, massaging his forehead.

“Alex, you need to rest. Whatever you have to say can wait until—”

His voice was quiet but firm. “No. It can’t.”

Claudia opened her mouth, then took in his expression. Her reluctance clear, she left the room. A moment later, her voice came booming out: “Attention, everyone! Please come to the dining room for a meeting in ten minutes. Repeat, please come to the dining room—”

As the announcement continued, Willow hugged Alex’s waist; he put his good arm around her. “Do you want a painkiller?” she asked.

“Not yet.” Alex’s blue-grey eyes met Seb’s; the corner of his mouth lifted humourlessly. “Bet this is just the news you wanted to hear, huh?”

Without waiting for a response – which was good, since Seb had literally nothing to say – Alex let go of Willow and stretched across the table for his T-shirt. Then he seemed to remember. “Oh, great, it’s covered in blood.”

“I’ll get you another one.” Willow kissed him, then pitched the stained T-shirt into the trash and left the room. For once, Seb’s energy didn’t automatically follow after her.

Alex grimaced as he lowered himself off the table. “Don’t ever get shot – it hurts like hell,” he told Seb wearily. Going to the mirror above the sink, he peered at himself, then reached for a towel. He moistened it and started swabbing the blood from his face and chest.

“How?” said Seb finally. His voice was ragged. “How did the cabrón do it?”

“Christ knows,” said Alex. “It was something to do with the gate – an energy blast when it opened. He did it with that, somehow.”

Alex went silent then; he wadded up the towel and threw it hard at the dirty linens hamper. “God damn it. How am I supposed to tell them this? What am I going to say?”

Seb couldn’t answer. Willow re-entered a moment later with a T-shirt; he watched Alex wince as she helped him into it. And for some reason, he thought about his father: the unknown angel, who for all Seb knew was still out there, feeding from unwary humans entranced by his beauty. Right now, the knowledge that someone – some thing – so closely related to him could be harming humanity felt like more than he could stand.

“You coming?” asked Alex from the doorway.

It took Seb a second to understand that Alex meant the meeting. He started to say no – he had no desire to hear the news a second time. Then he thought of Meghan, with her bright smile and joyous energy…and, to his faint surprise, realized that he wanted to be there for her even more than he wanted to return to his dorm and block out the world. He couldn’t let her hear this alone.

“Yes, I’m coming,” he said dully, and rose to his feet.