“It can’t,” said Aisha, and then added, “and you can’t ever tell Reece where Polaris is.”
Jamey went quiet.
“If you want to see it yourself at some point, for whatever reason, Grayson can probably make that happen,” Aisha said. “But no empaths can know where the corrupted empaths are being kept.”
“...okay,” Jamey finally said. “You’re right, there’s a million reasons you don’t ever want the pacifist empaths showing up at a facility for corrupted empaths. So are you heading to Prince Rupert tonight?”
“We’ll see how close I can get. Airports I’m looking at are pretty small, and it’s snowing here and probably at plenty of connections across Canada right now.”
“Send me your itinerary,” said Jamey. “I’ll see what I can learn from Stensby’s car. There’s also that creep who went after Reece, but Grayson’s claiming he’ll deal with it while we’re handling this.”
“God help the creep, then,” Aisha muttered.
Jamey snorted. “Grayson will have to be careful about being nonviolent; he’s got Reece with him. And I don’t like that at all, but part of me apparently still trusts Grayson to handle it.” She sighed. “Probably because Grayson went straight from the airport to find Reece on the highway—managed tosaveReece from failing brakes. And I talked to Reece last night, and he actually seemed happy, like it had cheered him up to be reunited with Grayson again. So... I don’t know.”
“DoesI don’t knowmean it’s still not ayesto being an official part of the team...but it’s not ahell no?”
“Maybe,” Jamey said wryly. “Montreal has amazing Lebanese food, right? Send me a picture and make me jealous. And call me again later.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
“...and Duncan has the puck, lines up the shot—Henderson out of nowhere, smashing him from behind!
Oh, Duncan didn’t like that, he’s taking a swing—he’s got Henderson’s helmet off, you can see the red on the ice, and now West is getting involved with Grande, this is looking like a big one, folks—
Hang on, we’re getting word that a fan has just collapsed, possibly fainted. Paramedics are rushing into the stands and—
Are you kidding me? Who brought an empath to the game?”
—TRANSCRIPT EXCERPT,HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADABROADCAST
“What the hellwas that?”
“What was what?”
Reece gestured behind them. “You just flew over that bridge without slowing at all. Don’t you know an overpass can ice in inclement weather?”
“This is Seattle. All of your weather is inclement.”
“It isnot.”
“I got here last night and it has yet to stop raining.”
“Then you should know the rain could have frozen on the overpass and you need to exercise a little caution and stop driving like you’re on some sunny country back road—although I hope you also know your current speed isn’t legal on any road in Texas either.”
“Maybe you’re trying to backseat drive your way behind my steering wheel,” Grayson said, “but, sugar, you can keep right on trying ’cause it’s not gonna happen. I’ll just addunrepentantbackseat driverto your EI file and keep the keys.”
Obviously Reece wasn’t trying to annoy Grayson into handing over the truck keys. Obviously he was way too mature for something like that.
He sat back against the seat with a huff, then huffed again. He’d swapped the giant Texas hoodie for a warmer fleece, and folding his arms was now annoyingly less satisfying without the dramatic flare of too-long sleeves. “But you’re not even driving her in the right terrain mode. It’s like you don’t even care about traction control or throttle response or public safety.”
There was a moment of silence, then Grayson fiddled with the buttons. “There. Weather mode. Better?”
Grayson wasn’t sharing emotions, but that hadn’t felt passive-aggressive. It felt like Grayson had actually listened to his empath bitching and taken him seriously. “Maybe a little,” Reece grudgingly admitted. “EI already knows I’m a backseat driver anyway, don’t they? Everything I’ve done from birth to today is in some EI file.”
“It’s supposed to be.” Grayson had kept his eyes fixedly forward as he said that.
“That’s not exactly the same thing as sayingyes,” Reece pointed out. “Is there something you knowisn’tin my file?”
