Eye of the Sh*t Storm by Jackson Ford (most romantic novels .txt) 📕

And Annie does the oddest thing.

She drops to one knee and grabs hold of my shoulders. Like she’s about to start shaking me, yelling at me for revealing my ability. Except: she doesn’t. There’s no anger on her face. There’s just…

I don’t know what it is. There’s longing there. And fear. And worry. Exasperation. Desperation. Anger. All of it, buried in the lines around her eyes and the set of her mouth, the flare of her nostrils. It pushes through the high she must be feeling, something raw and red. I stare at her, unable to look away. Not knowing what to do.

Before I can figure it out, the look is gone. Annie pulls me to my feet, as if she was planning to do that all along.

“Ya,” Africa says, dazed. “Food is good.”

“Yay!” I throw my arms high, the weird moment with Annie forgotten. “Fried chicken for everyone!”

SIXReggie

Regina McCormick ends the call with Africa – she can barely understand what he’s saying at the best of times, even when he isn’t speaking at ten thousand miles an hour – and takes a long, shaky breath. Her diaphragm is even worse than usual today, and the sound that rolls out of her is weak and wheezy.

“What the hell?” she murmurs.

She doesn’t even know why she’s surprised any more. The insanity of what she saw on China Shop’s video feed before the pinhole cams cut out? The… whatever the hell it was that Teagan just did, at the Main Street Bridge? Or – lest we forget – the fact that someone knew about their mission, and tipped off the Legends?

Africa told her that Teagan thinks she took care of any cameras, but if she missed even one, revealed her ability to others, then they’re in trouble. Reggie quickly scans social media. There are a few people claiming they saw something… but no video, or photos. None at all.

Of course, if there were, Reggie would already have gotten a call from Moira Tanner. Not a pleasant one either. She glances at her cell, sitting in its slot on the right of her wheelchair. Reggie frowns, picking up the phone – it’s difficult, with the lack of mobility in her fingers, but the phone’s case has a specially designed ring on the back, slotting over her middle finger.

No missed calls. That’s good. As long as Moira isn’t calling, everything will be all right.

All the same… Damn it, Teagan. The girl could do a thousand jobs perfectly, using that insane ability of hers without a hitch, clean getaway. But when a job did go bad, it happened fast, it happened messy and Teagan somehow always ended up making it worse. There were definitely witnesses, even if they didn’t know what they were seeing, or get anything on tape. And what about the bikers? What will they do?

China Shop is going to need one hell of a debrief. They’ll get their story straight, figure out how to present this as a win to Moira. Reggie winces. Maybe she should call Africa back, get some real answers – or take him up on his offer to join them for a meal, something which exhausts her even thinking about. Then again, what good will it do? It’s all over, and anything Africa or Annie tell her – and it would have to be those two, because you can’t get a serious answer out of Teagan even on a good day – would only prompt more questions. Best she do it later, when she’s had a chance to do some actual research on her end.

Maybe she should go, meet up with the crew, demand some answers. No – it’s far more important to find out who it was that told the Legends about them, mid-mission. Or what if—

Hell. Maybe she should take a breath – ha – and get some tea. That’s what she should damn well do.

Reggie taps the joystick on her chair with the back of her right hand, reversing out of her Rig – the huge, six-screen setup she runs China Shop from. As always, she feels a tiny pang as she rolls away. Being locked into her Rig makes her feel like a pilot again.

As she manoeuvres her chair, the bag hanging on the back catches against the edge of the desk. It’s a bag Reggie loves, that she’s had on the back of her chair for ever – or since she visited Taos, anyway – made of multicoloured cloth in Native American patterns. It holds her tools and an extra scarf and a water bottle, and despite her limited mobility, she can reach round and pull it towards her. But she keeps catching it on the furniture in this new office, and she’s started to wonder if she should move it, or get a different one.

The earthquake destroyed China Shop’s old offices in Venice Beach. Their new setup is in an apartment block on West 228th Street in Torrance. A two-bed, two-bathroom new build that survived the big quake. Reggie works out of one bedroom, lives out of another – both are off a narrow, undecorated hall, which is itself off a larger living area. Moira paid the contractor a substantial fee to widen the doors for Reggie’s chair, raise the countertops, even build a special roll-in shower. Give the woman this: she’s a ruthless operator, but she has always looked after Reggie’s physical needs. After all, they go back a long way.

Of course, the gigantic payout from the Army after her accident certainly helped. It’s paid for Reggie’s physical rehab, her medicine and equipment. It’s paid for her carers over the years. It will probably continue to do so for the rest of her life. Reggie doesn’t know if the payout happened because of Moira’s involvement, and she never asked. Something tells her the woman would never admit to it.

The bright lights in the hall don’t Reggie’s