Third Angel

Doug feels best at 3:00 a.m.-a time of uncertainty, a time of transition. The old day is dead, and the new one only a promise. Most people sleep. Doug sits in a worn and salty leather chair, looking at shimmering city light reflected from Elliot Bay, the Seattle waterfront. On good nights, he describes himself as a confirmed agnostic. On bad ones, you get nothing at all. The owner of a late night bistro, Doug is selectively gregarious, a well-liked host to a Bohemian clientele. He looks like a well-preserved but retired linebacker without the scars and bad knees. Combine this with the carefully cultivated air of a partially reformed bad boy, and you get a series of attractive and ambitious twenty-something-year-old women looking to whip him into shape. But he has secrets. Doug has several uncommon-some would say unnatural-gifts. He can see and do things most people only read or dream about. He accepts his exceptional abilities and feels obliged to put them to use but only on his terms. The resurrections are especially troublesome. Into Doug's reasonably stable life walks Kate. Beautiful, bright, and dangerous, she is irresistible. Doug is hooked instantly. Circumstances take them diagonally across the country several times-the northwest to the Florida Keys and back. They are pursued and attacked by organized crime. They live in shadows, professionally and morally. Betrayal, secret societies, and death lead Doug from bemused cynicism to a reality that is nothing short of astonishing as he is compelled to move beyond comfortable ignorance and finally find out who he really is.