Lucy quickly shook off her shock and followed the sprinting aerian out the door. Janus too quickly recovered from his surprise. He grabbed a cell phone out of his pocket and Aidan could hear him calling for reinforcements as they pelted down the hall. “We probably shouldn’t take the elevator, let’s find the stairs,” he said. They quickly located the stairwell and soon were dashing down, Aidan leading the way, taking the steps four and five at a time. A door below them banged open and Aidan could hear feet hurrying up the stairs. “Great, they’re ahead of us.” He stopped on the next landing and exited into a hallway. This level seemed to be all offices. At this hour they were deserted, only a few emergency lights illuminating little patches of carpet beneath them. Aidan dashed down the hallway, looking for a second stairwell. He found it, but as soon as he opened the door he could hear ascending footsteps there too.

“We’re trapped,” said Lucy.

“Maybe not,” said Aidan. He turned to the nearest office. The door was locked, but that didn’t stop him. He pulled with all his strength and the lock broke. “Looks like we’re in luck,” he said. The office was a nice, spacious one with a huge floor-to-ceiling window that looked out over the city. They were about four stories up, too high to simply jump, but Aidan had something else in mind. He pushed the desk back out of the way and then turned and kicked the window. It broke with a spectacular shattering of glass. Shards went flying out into the night, glittering as they fell. Aidan turned to Lucy. “The only way out is down.”

She looked out the window, wide-eyed. “I hate heights,” she said.

“No time for that. Grab on, piggy-back style.” She looked at him as if he were insane. She was five or six inches taller then he and somewhat more heavily built as well. “Look,” said Aidan, “I can carry you. We won’t be able to really fly, it’s going to be more of a controlled fall, but I can do it. Now grab on, they’re almost here.”

The sounds of feet and voices in the hall decided her. She put her arms around Aidan’s neck and he didn’t wait for anything more, he simply dived out the window. For a heart-stopping moment they simply plunged down, but then Aidan spread his wings and gradually brought them out of the dive. He beat his wings rapidly, trying to gain altitude if he could, but they continued to sink. He heard the whirr of a bullet passing by and banked sharply, making Lucy grab tighter and shriek. If he’d needed to breathe he would have been in trouble because she had a death-grip on his neck. He turned and twisted in the air, limited by the weight of Lucy on his back and the necessity of avoiding violent motions that might throw her off. At last they reached the ground. The landing was rough, but they were safely down. Aidan looked back up at the building he’d just left. He could see the broken window and the tiny figures of a few men still standing there. He took Lucy’s arm and hurried her down the street and around the first corner he came to, safely out of sight.

Several more turns and quite a few blocks later they stopped to rest in a park. Lucy collapsed onto a bench, panting hard. Aidan sighed and sat next to her. “You all right?” he asked.

“I think so,” said Lucy. Then she blinked and said, “I should be asking you that! You got shot!”

Aidan looked down ruefully at his perforated and bloodstained shirt. “I’m fine. Unfortunately my only real shirt is now a total loss. You can’t exactly get aerian-cut shirts at Wal-Mart you know.” He peeled the shirt slowly off. Beneath it his skin was bloodied but already the bullet hole had healed completely. He used the ruined shirt to clean the blood off as best he could. “What a mess. Guess it’s a good thing I came along though.”

“That, that psycho! He was going to kill us both. I can’t believe it!”

“Well, at least we got away relatively unscathed.”

“You’re really doing fine?”

“Sure. I lost a little blood is all. No problem.”

“So what now?”

Aidan shrugged. “He might decide to just write us off.”

“We should be so lucky. But I don’t think so. I mean we know his dirty secret now. He kills people, he’s a murderer. He can’t afford to let us go.”

“You’re probably right. I’ll be fine, I can go back to living on rooftops and he’ll never find me. But I worry about you. He can track you down too easily. Would you have any objection to having a permanent bodyguard?”

“What, you?”

“Sure. You’ve seen how indestructible I am.”

“Yeah, but I do go places during the day too. What about then?”

“I can go out during daylight if I have to. But I think you’re in the most danger after dark anyhow.”

“I don’t know. I don’t want to be a burden on you. I like to take care of my own problems.”

“It’s no burden. I got myself involved in this, and now there’s no backing out as far as I’m concerned. And I’d never forgive myself if that nutcase got you and I could have prevented it.”

“I guess I’ve got myself a bodyguard then.”

“I should start by escorting you home. Where do you live?”

“South Salt Lake,” said Lucy. “There’s a Trax stop pretty near here where I can catch a train.”

“Let’s go then.”

Lucy had a little apartment in a somewhat dilapidated complex. Inside however it was bright and cozy. “You planning on staying the night?” said Lucy.

“If you don’t mind,” replied Aidan. “It’s much simpler that way.”

“I don’t have a spare bed, just the couch.”

“That’s fine. Oh, I should probably warn you. I’m going to be out cold during daylight unless you really try to wake me, and I don’t breathe when I’m asleep. So don’t panic. I scared the life out of Owen the first day I slept at his place.”

“You seriously don’t breathe?”

“Yep.”

“This I’ll have to see… Well, goodnight. See you tomorrow.”