Chapter Nineteen
‘William rang. He said that one of the angels has got into trouble. We need to go and help.’ Melissa flung open the curtains. My eyes squinted from the sunlight.
‘I’m too tired,’ I moaned, pulling the blanket over my head.
A rush of wind flew over my almost bare body as Melissa tugged the blanket away from me.
‘What are you doing?’ I moaned, curling into a ball to combat the chill.
‘Get up now. We have orders!’
Launching from the sofa, I grabbed my clothes and shoved them on. Melissa watched me with her arms crossed over her chest.
‘Please don’t do that,’ I grumbled, looking away from her cleavage.
Her cheeks turned bright red as she looked down at herself. ‘Oh, I see, that’s why you’ve been so cranky.’
Ducking my head into my jumper, I ignored her. It was too early to explain what had been going on with me. I was adapting, that’s all.
‘I know how you feel. I visited Michael at the compound infirmary. He makes me feel…’
Her cheeks burned again. The smile that threatened was pulled back as her starry eyed expression landed on me.
‘William told me to get on with it. He said that if I couldn’t focus, I had to do something about it. I never thought he would encourage…sex.’
Melissa laughed. The tinkling sound reached me as I made my way to the kitchen and poured myself a drink.
‘He will understand. He’s male. I doubt he meant to just sleep with a random person. That wouldn’t show the Perfect race anything. I think it’s about teaching them that two people who feel something for each other shouldn’t be afraid to explore it when they’re ready. And not before.’ Melissa followed me, handing me my jacket.
‘Sex before marriage went out the window a long time ago. However, there’s far too many people sleeping together before they get to know who they are. The damage in these people, Melissa. I refuse to go out and have sex with someone I don’t have feelings for. I can rein in my urges until that time comes.’
My jacket enveloped me as I pulled it on and strode down the hallway, Melissa in tow.
‘You’ve noticed how damaged they are, too? I can’t believe the amount of negativity around sex in general. It’s a completely natural thing, yet…’
‘People use it to exploit or cover up their emotional wounds. We knew that before we came here but seeing it in the flesh. It…’
My sentence trailed off as we marched down the street. I followed Melissa’s lead. She had been the one to take the call from William so she knew where we were heading.
‘It makes you sad because real love is almost non-existent in Upper Side.’
Running my hand over my hair, I agreed. She was right. I had not seen one Perfect look at another with love in their eyes. Admiration, yes. Lust, yes. But love…that was an emotion that they had no idea how to feel.
‘How do you think we’re going to show them that it’s worth opening up?’ Melissa asked.
The streets were quiet. The mist of dawn hung low in the air. It wasn’t freezing but it was cool enough. I put my hands in my pockets as we walked towards a park.
‘I think William has a plan. Jason and the girl will meet when the time is right. He has no control over that.’
Melissa glanced up at me. Her heels clipped on the concrete.
The entrance to the park came into view. Was that where we were going?
‘Do we know the girl yet?’
I shook my head. William had told me that she would appear when the time was right. Not before. Jason had a lot to learn. About us, about himself, but most importantly, about his destiny.
‘I bet she’s an Avoidable.’
Her chuckle made me look down. ‘What?’
‘She probably is…are you aware that you just screwed up your nose? You looked like the perfect Perfect.’
I scowled as we entered the park. The reason we had been sent was immediately apparent.
‘What can I say? I’m a good actor. Plus, I met a couple of them when I was on Lower Side. They’re intimidating.’
Melissa ignored me. On the bench near a huge tree was one of our angel colleagues.
She broke into a run as soon as she noticed her. I didn’t rush, there was no need. She was passed out cold.
The female angel was laid on her side, her arms hugging her chest.
It was a huge problem that she’d slept rough. Perfects were not known for tolerance. They wouldn’t mar their city with homeless people.
‘We need to hide her.’ Melissa gasped when I reached them.
The main issue wasn’t the sleeping rough part. It was the wings that stuck out of her back. She slept with her wings on full show. A Perfect could walk through at any moment, although it seemed unlikely, given the time.
‘She’s been drinking.’ I bent down to pick up the bottle of alcohol on the floor.
It wasn’t that easy to get hold of drink. Being in short supply, it was very expensive. What had our angel friend been doing to be able to afford it in the first place?
‘Someone’s coming!’ Melissa whispered, grabbing my arm.
I shoved my jacket off and laid it over our friend. Her short dark hair was matted against the bench. The bulge under the jacket looked odd. Melissa squeezed my arm. Turning, I plastered a smile on my face. An older man in a worn out suit walked towards us.
‘Morning!’ he called.
Considering he was a Perfect and it was dawn, he was in quite a good mood.
‘Good morning,’ Melissa greeted, smiling at him.
I glanced down at our friend, hoping she would stay asleep.
‘It’s early to be out here,’ the man said, trying to look around me.
We laughed as his eyes landed on the prone figure on the bench. ‘We’ve been up all night,’ I said, wrapping an arm around Melissa’s waist.
‘Is she okay?’
The man eyed us both. We glanced at each other, unsure what to say.
‘Yes, we’ve been on a night out. She drank too much. We’re letting her rest before we attempt to get her home,’ I said, trying to block the man’s view.
His shoulders relaxed when he saw the alcohol bottle on the ground. Looking into my eyes, he hesitated before nodding once. ‘I’ll leave you to it.’
He wandered away, glancing over his shoulder as he went. Melissa got out her phone to pretend to call someone. I wasn’t convinced that we had persuaded the stranger.
‘Wake up!’ I took hold of the angel’s shoulder and shook her gently.
She gasped awake, pulling away from me and shrinking into herself. Her wings squashed against the back of the bench.
‘Leave me alone!’ she cried.
Her big brown eyes watered when she finally focused on me. ‘Paul!’
Jumping from where she cowered, she threw herself into my arms. I patted her back as Melissa kept guard. The jacket fell from the angel’s shoulders.
‘Elizabeth?’ Melissa gasped.
I couldn’t remember her earthly name. The shivering body pressed against me didn’t help with the struggle of my manly desires. However, she was an angel. It wasn’t quite the same effect. Not like some of the Perfect women.
An image of Belinda entered my head. Now that was one woman I would happily take out. Maybe I could show her how it was done. Not that we were supposed to fall in love. That would distract us from what we were doing.
‘Put your wings away,’ I whispered, tucking her hair behind her ear. ‘You’re bloody stupid having them out.’
She cringed away from me, reaching behind her to stroke the feathers attached to her wings. ‘I can’t. They’ve been out since I started drinking. I can’t get them back in. I don’t know what to do.’
Melissa put a hand on her shoulder. I stepped away from them, looking around to make sure no one could see us. Standing in the middle of a park was suspicious enough. Standing with an angel that had let her wings out was a completely di
fferent danger.
‘We need to get you back to mine,’ Melissa said, picking up my jacket and trying to put it over Elizabeth. It wasn’t big enough to cover her wings completely.
‘There’s someone coming,’ Elizabeth hissed.
I looked around but couldn’t see anyone. ‘How do you know?’
She ducked her head, trying to back away from us. ‘I just know.’
Her intuition. She still had it. Mine wasn’t as strong as I would have liked.
‘What do we do?’ Melissa asked, trying to tug on the jacket.
‘Pull them in,’ I hissed, desperately searching the park for any sign of life.
Elizabeth clenched her eyes shut and screwed up her mouth. Her wings didn’t budge.
‘Right, well there goes that idea,’ I announced, taking hold of her arm.
If we had to get back to Melissa’s, we better get moving. People would be going to work soon.
‘Let’s go.’
Melissa held the coat over Elizabeth’s wings as we walked. It looked ridiculous. Why was this happening? It seemed some of us had trouble acclimatising to our human nature.
‘There!’ Elizabeth gasped.
I spun away from the direction I had been heading when the same man from earlier came back into the park. What was he doing? Maybe he suspected us. Or maybe he had just been for a stroll.
‘We’ll go this way. If he doesn’t know something’s up, he’s really stupid.’ I led them down a different path.
I was about to start jogging when a guard stepped through the entrance. That was why the man had come back. He had told a guard about us. Great, there was no way we could hide anything from them now.
‘What do we do?’ Melissa said behind me as I started to back up.
The guard was slow in his approach. His steps were calculated. My gaze shot to the last exit of the park. Another guard waited there, his gun held to his side.
‘What’s going on?’ Elizabeth sobbed.
I closed my eyes and thought about home. Not the home a few streets away but the place we had come from.
‘I need you to concentrate,’ I said to Elizabeth. ‘If you don’t get your wings in right now, we’re-’
‘I can’t!’ she cried.
Melissa put her arms around Elizabeth from behind. The cringe on the angel’s face told me that her friend had crushed the bones in her wings. It was tough. There had to be a way to get rid of them before they were seen.
‘What’s going on?’ the guard called as he got closer.
Turning back to him, I put up my hand to stop him approaching.
‘I’d stop if I were you. We work for the government and we’ve made a discovery.’
I was thinking on my feet. What would William do? I had so much to offer and all I could do was compare myself to him. I could do it. Nothing was impossible. It was time for me to take control of who I was and be the angel I had come to be.
‘Yeah? What’s that?’ the guard sneered.
I closed my eyes briefly, hoping for inspiration. The breeze of the wind stroked the skin on my face. The physical sensations made the hair on my arms stand on end. I was here, on Earth, to change it. Nothing would get in the way of that. Nothing.
‘She’s strapped with a bomb and if we don’t get her out of here, we’re all going to die.’
Elizabeth’s Freedom