It had more than one head, she realized, like black snakes bursting forth from its body, horns that erupted out of its back like twisted tree limbs. A long, black tail whipped against the palm trees. Framed by the famous skyline, looming over the busy freeway traffic, the burning thing turned to look at her with strange, iridescent pairs of eyes. A sudden, overwhelming feeling hit her. It was the same feeling she had felt in the bio lab that previous night. A kind of mortal, suffocating dread.
Maddy now knew what she was looking at. She knew what had just landed on top of the Escalade. She froze in the driver’s seat, paralyzed by terror.
“What is that?” Gwen cried, the sound of her voice like tearing metal.
“Dark Angel,” Maddy whispered.
“What?” Gwen shrieked.
Maddy watched as the demon leapt off the moving Escalade and onto the next. The Escalade buckled and spun wildly against the concrete median before rolling back into traffic, right at them.
“Maddy!” Gwen yelled.
The destroyed SUV tumbled toward them like a bowling ball of death. Maddy snapped the wheel to the right and the Ferrari swerved. The car growled like a wild animal as they swung around the rolling vehicle.
Gwen started screaming something, but Maddy couldn’t hear her. She was hypnotized, riveted with fear.
She watched the demon tear open the roof of the SUV with its various mouths and begin pulling Angels out of the vehicle and tossing them onto the freeway. Guardians were torn to pieces, their wings ripped from their bodies. Immortal parts rained down on the road. The demon reached in and pulled a struggling Angel out like he was a doll. Maddy’s heart hammered in her chest.
“Jacks!” she screamed.
She could see him now. He was in the arms of that burning thing, his eyes wild. It’s taking Jackson. It was the first rational thought Maddy had since the demon appeared.
It’s got him now and it’s going to take him.
The demon lifted off the SUV and rose. Ascending over Angel City in the twilight, it was gone.
Maddy could barely focus through the fog of shock and terror as the second Escalade clipped the first and both vehicles rolled over and tumbled across the freeway, knocking cars into one another.
There was no time to think anymore, only to react.
“Crashing car!” Gwen yelled as a Civic ricocheted toward them.
“I see it!” Maddy yelled, and yanked at the wheel.
“Another crashing car!” Gwen yelped, and pointed at a truck that was hurtling toward them. Maddy veered around it; the twisted metal missed them by inches.
“Tell me where it is, Gwen,” Maddy said, keeping her eye on the chaos in front of her, trying to snatch glimpses up at the sky.
“Where what is?!” Gwen panted, her fingernails digging into the leather seat.
“The demon. Tell me where it is.”
“It’s a demon?” Gwen gasped in horror, “Like in the olden days?”
“Yes! Now tell me where it is!” Maddy shouted. Gwen squinted up through the sunroof.
“I don’t see anything, Maddy,” she said breathlessly, peering out the window to where the demon had disappeared with Jacks. “It’s gone.”
Maddy’s heart bottomed. Despair radiated through her as the Ferrari continued snarling down the freeway.
Despite everything, she had failed. Even the Angels couldn’t protect Jacks from the horror that had come for him.
“Wait, I see it!” Gwen suddenly shrieked. “It’s ahead of us!”
Gwen pointed out the windshield. A dark image was crossing the still light sky.
“Which way is it going?”
“Toward downtown. It’s moving so fast.”
Maddy’s mouth became a grim line of determination.
She mashed the gas pedal to the floor and the Ferrari sang as the speedometer climbed past 100. Cars swerved all around them, drivers no doubt transfixed by the image of a demon flying over Angel City.
“I. . I think it’s going to the top of that really tall building ahead of us,” Gwen announced.
“Which building?”
“The. . the tallest one. Maybe it landed, ’cause I can’t see it anymore.”
Maddy squinted up at the looming, semicircular skyscraper towering above the rest of the buildings on the skyline. At its top was a design of windows like a crown. Maddy couldn’t see if anyone was up there, but she thought of Sylvester’s words again. They would hire someone, or something, to do their dirty work for them. Whatever trick of the Archangels this was, Maddy was about to see the endgame.
With a flick of the wheel the Ferrari tore down the exit ramp for downtown. Maddy whipped through the streets, ignoring stop signs, lights, and oncoming traffic. All around them, sirens began to ricochet off the buildings. She could see the lights in the rearview. The police were after them now.
The tower’s entrance came into view. Maddy downshifted and hurtled toward it, braking hard to a halt right in front of the building.
Her heart was galloping uncontrollably in her chest. She looked out at wide marble stairs leading up to the lobby.
“Come on,” Maddy yelled as she threw her door open.
Gwen jumped out with her, leaving the Ferrari still rumbling behind them.
They ran up the stairs toward a row of glass doors.
Maddy didn’t need to turn around to know police cars were pulling up behind them. She heard the footsteps and shouts of the officers as they emerged from their vehicles. Reaching the glass doors, she furiously tugged at the handles until she found one door all the way to the left that was still unlocked.
She ripped it open as the footsteps pounded up the stairs.
Gwen turned to her, out of breath.
“Go. I’ll slow them down,” she panted.
“What? No!” Maddy cried.
Gwen’s eyes were suddenly, inexplicably calm.
“Maddy, I’m your best friend, and there’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you. There is something you can do to help him. I’ve always been amazed by you, Maddy, you can do anything you put your mind to. I know you’ll think of something. Now go to him. He needs you.”
Maddy met Gwen’s eyes. The unexpected words had tightened her throat.
“Gwen—” she started.
“Don’t say anything, just hurry,” Gwen said, and shoved Maddy inside the lobby. Closing the door, Gwen wrapped her arms through the handles, using herself as a human shield. Maddy could see police streaming up the steps. They slowed, advancing on Gwen.
Maddy turned and ran toward the gleaming bank of elevators.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
Sylvester tore down Wilshire Boulevard in his unmarked cruiser, weaving around the teeming Beverly Hills traffic.
Overhead, palm trees swayed anxiously in the wind, leaves glinting orange in the fiery dusk. Careening across oncoming traffic on Beverly, not bothering with the red light, he pulled into the NAS building, scraping the belly of the car on the garage ramp. He screeched into the valet parking and left the car without waiting for a ticket. He took the stairs up to the lobby.
The chirpy receptionist seemed startled to see him again as he strode across the sleek lobby.
“Can I help you, sir?” she said in her pseudo-polite tone.
“Save it, honey,” Sylvester grumbled as he passed her.
She rose out of her chair, sending her latte spilling all over the desk.
“Wait! You can’t go in there!” she shrieked. He ignored her.
Turning the corner, Sylvester blew past the rows of assistants on their headsets. They gave him curious, uncomprehending stares as he passed. He could hear the receptionist’s clacking stilettos on the tile behind him, most likely trying to raise an alert, but he didn’t bother to look back. He reached the end of the hall, turned, and threw open the glass doors of the conference room.