When a bomb threat shuts down the Vinestead West building in Sacramento, senior developer Rick Diaz gets an unexpected gift: a free day. He just doesn't know what to do with it... until he meets Bonnie on the train.
From a fancy breakfast south of downtown to an immersive sim in the tech mecca of Umbra, she shows Rick that there's more to life than writing code for a ruthless conglomerate. It's the kind of day he didn't know he needed, with a woman he can't quite figure out.
But the Guardian Angel Bill is moving through Congress, and its passage—mandating Vinestead's biochip for every newborn and naturalized American—casts a long shadow over an otherwise perfect afternoon. Bonnie has strong feelings about that. Stronger than Rick realizes.
Some days change everything. This is one of them.
Where to Buy
Starring
Rick Diaz - Senior developer at Vinestead International, Rick writes code for the Guardian Angel biochip. He is unhappily married, quietly resentful, and deeply committed to his routine. Until he isn't.
Bonnie - She loves trashy romance novels, thirty-three-dollar lipstick, and hanging out in Umbra. She is warm, funny, and seems genuinely interested in Rick. Seems.
Author's Note
Guardian Angels started with a dream: a train, a stranger, and the unease of meeting someone who seems too good to be true. I loved the idea of a woman who isn't what she seems, and a man who falls for it completely. Hook, line, and sinker.
But the story that lives in my head is bigger than Rick's skip day. Behind Bonnie's smile: an army coordinating across the city, a first strike against Vinestead International, a war that's just getting started. That part wrote itself once I had the ending locked. And the ending was never in question. Rick gets one perfect day. One glimpse of a different life. Then he becomes a casualty of something he never even knew he was part of.
That's the Vinestead Anthology in miniature, really. The big ugly thing in the background, slouching towards Bethlehem, while someone just tries to live their life.