The Tempest A.J. Scudiere (books to read in a lifetime .TXT) 📖

making Joule’s muscles clench with fear for her brother and her roommate.

“This was supposed to be easier than this!” the man yelled, clearly on the verge of a temper tantrum.

Joule tried to surreptitiously scan Laura’s face, looking for symptoms of drug abuse and wondering if the woman was strung out on her own product. But there weren’t any obvious signs.

It was Jerry who stepped forward, though the woman motioned him back by jabbing the gun against Cage's head a little bit harder. “Stay back, Jerry!”

“You don't want to do this,” he said calmly.

Her reply was anything but calm. “No, I fucking don’t want to!” she yelled back. “I don't. But you've put me in a position I can't get out of otherwise. This is your fault.”

She motioned a little with the gun, jabbing it as she spoke, and Joule watched as Cage slowly moved his head away.

She wondered if he could quickly duck away or jab his hand up and knock the gun out of her hand. It would be a dangerous move in any situation, but nearly impossible to have a good outcome because there was another gun aimed directly at Deveron's head. Even if Cage could win against Laura, Joule would expect the man to twitch.

Unless the two could act in concert …

Cage and Dev couldn't. They were both facing the same way and wouldn’t be able to read signals from each other. So unless Cage could reach out and grab Dev’s hand and tap out a plan in Morse code, and then Dev could understand it—which Joule thought was a long shot. Even then, it was highly unlikely the two of them could make a move in tandem.

But while Cage and Dev couldn't, Cage and Joule could.

They were facing each other. They understood each other's subtle signals. So, while Jerry distracted the Larkins by trying to talk them out of the situation, Joule moved in the slow beginning of a slide toward Dev, hoping no one would notice.

Hell, maybe Jerry would talk these asshats into becoming better people and putting their guns down, but Joule wasn't going to bank on that.

“Why are you doing this?” Jerry demanded.

“Come on, Jer,” the woman whined. “You know what it's been like since the big farms came through.”

Joule didn't know, but a, Jerry did. And honestly, even she could take a good guess. The local economy was tanking. Jerry had told her the farms weren’t even getting bought out anymore. The big firms just plowed their way in, moved into other sections of the state, or even the country, and then undercut the contracts.

At that moment, it clicked for her: Why Jerry was so mad at Helio Systems. It didn’t matter that they were solar or that it would save some of the local environment or that they would pay him more. Helio Systems Tech was another big company coming in and taking the livelihood from the locals. It wasn't that he loved his job so much. Helio was just a corporation bullying their way into his home town and he didn't trust the big corporations… with good reason.

He’d probably spent a good part of his life watching the little farms go under. The lucky farmers had taken the cheap buy-outs. For those who didn’t, things didn't just get bad, they got horrid. Without a working farm, the land itself probably wasn't even worth much.

She took another slide over toward Dev. And, as of yet, it seemed no one had noticed her.

That was good, she thought. But as she tried for another step, the man's eyes darted around frantically and Joule froze where she was, hoping he wouldn't notice she was in a slightly different place than she'd been just a few moments ago.

“Laura, these people are not involved. And neither am I,” Jerry said, trying his best to talk her down. “We’re not going to tell anybody.”

“I can't trust you to stay quiet, Jerry. This is the only way I'm keeping the farm. The only way I’m keeping food on my table.”

“You're going to murder people?” Jerry asked incredulously, finally putting into words what was going down.

Laura offered a small shrug. She looked exhausted. Behind them, the barn roof began to tilt crazily as the fire consumed the walls.

Joule had the flash of a thought that maybe it had actually been safer in the barn—fire and all. Laura’s eyes looked damn crazy.

Joule slid another foot closer to Dev. Cage saw what she was doing, and she offered a subtle nod. When he replied with his own, she looked first at the gun at his head. She didn’t flinch, though she wanted to. She and Cage had to live forever. She wouldn’t watch him die like this. Not for this stupid woman’s drug-running business.

Then she flicked her eyes to the gun at Dev’s head.

Cage dipped his chin slightly in acknowledgment.

She wiggled the fingers of her left hand, the side away from Laura and Levi, until Cage noticed. Then she held down three fingers as he watched.

Then two.

One.

Then all hell broke loose.

66

Cage waited until he saw Joule take her first running step before he moved.

He wasn't exactly certain what she was going to do, only that she was going to make sure that Dev didn't get shot. Dev might also have been on board with the plan, though Cage didn’t know that, either. Their roommate might have caught on to all the signaling and figured out that Cage and Joule were communicating. He certainly could have seen Joule’s fingers counting.

The sky had grown black, but flames that were licking their way out of the barn made the area bright enough to see that the twins were signaling each other. She could only hope no one bothered to look.

As Joule launched herself forward, Cage turned quickly, looking at Laura and for a moment. He twisted his head and found himself staring directly down the barrel of the gun.

He hadn't dropped fast enough. Drop first, then turn. Shit, it was too late