Page 11 of Hurricane's House

Tina grabbed her keys and bag, knowing that if she didn’t leave now, she’d never make it to work on time. She had to get across town and at this hour, that was damn near impossible. “Shit,” she grumbled, checking the time. She pulled her front door shut and was locking it when her phone rang. She didn’t even check to see who was calling and when her boss asked her where she was, she felt a sense of panic that she knew would have her stuttering in no time. It was her only tick—stuttering, and after years of speech therapy, she could control it as long as she stayed in charge.

“I’m leaving my place now,” she said. “I will be to work on time,” she assured.

“We talked about this yesterday, Tina,” he said. He sounded angry and she wasn’t sure if he was pissed at her or if his day was already off to a crappy start. “Today was an early start for our group. You were supposed to be here at seven-thirty to make coffee for everyone and get everything printed and ready for the meeting.” Shit—was that today? She had been so preoccupiedwith Chasity and everything that happened with Hurricane that she felt like she didn’t have any control over the rest of her life lately.

“That was this morning?” she asked, knowing damn well that it was.

“Why else would I be calling you if it wasn’t?” her boss asked.

“I’m so sorry,” she insisted. “I’m on my way now, and I’ll work through my lunch.”

“Don’t bother, Tina. You have been warned about taking so much time off to find your niece. We need you hear, ready to work, not running all over the state looking for a kid who’s not even yours.”

Tina didn’t hide her gasp. “How dare you say that about my niece?” she spat. “I’m her legal guardian, and that makes Chasity mine. I’m sorry that you didn’t get your coffee today, but I’m sure that you’ll be able to find someone to fill my very small shoes.” Tina quickly ended the call before he could get another word in, and she wasn’t sure what she had just done, but she was pretty sure of one thing—she was screwed. Without that shitty job, she wouldn’t be able to afford her craptastic place and then, how would Chasity ever be able to come home to live with her again? She wouldn’t be able to, and that broke her heart.

The one thing she was sure of, the clock had started ticking on her time to find another job or be kicked out of her apartment, and that thought terrified her more than going to Hurricane to ask him for help.

“Pride goeth before the fall,” she whispered to herself. But Tina didn’t want to fall. She wanted what her heart had been denying her for weeks now, and she just hoped like hell that it wasn’t too late to ask Hurricane to be her booty call.

Hurricane

Hurricane walked into the kitchen to find Chasity sitting at the table, staring into space, holding a steaming cup of coffee. “I made coffee, but it’s strong,” she warned.

“Just the way that I like it,” Hurricane said. He poured himself a mug and sat down across from her. “Should you be drinking that?” he asked her, nodding to her coffee mug.

“Should you be drinking that?” she asked, notating his mug. She was such a smart ass, she reminded him of himself when he was a teen. He had learned to use sarcasm as his ally.

“I’m a grown-ass man, kid,” he reminded.

“Yeah, well, I’m an old soul, so I guess we’re both good to drink coffee,” she sassed. He sighed, not having the energy to keep going back and forth with her. “We need to talk,” he said.

“Does this have anything to do with me finding my aunt naked in your room a few weeks ago?” she asked. They hadn’t really talked about that, so it was a good guess on her part.

“Yeah,” he admitted. “I think that it’s time to talk about the elephant in the room,” he said.

“I saw no elephant,” Chasity insisted. “Just two naked, old, gross people.” She made a face, and Hurricane couldn’t help but laugh.

“Thanks for that,” he said. “Listen, I haven’t heard from Tina, and I was hoping that she had reached out to you.”

“I’ve heard from her,” Chasity admitted. “I mean, she’s been calling me since finding you two knocking boots in your room,” she said.

“Can we stop with the sex euphemisms?” he asked. “We were two consenting adults, and besides that, I like your aunt—a lot,” he admitted. Chasity was the first person that he had ever admitted that to besides Tina.

“Okay, fine,” she grumbled, “she’s been calling me to check-in. It took me a while to want to talk to her, but honestly, she’s okay to talk to on the phone. It’s kind of like old times, you know, when my parents were alive, and she’d call just to talk to me and see how I was doing.”

“So, she’s doing all right then?” he asked.

“She was,” Chasity said, “yesterday when she called me, she sounded a bit weird, though.”

“Weird how?” Hurricane asked. He worried that he had pushed Tina too much, too quickly and he hated that he hurt her. If she was acting weird, it was probably because he was an ass. He needed to fix things with Tina, but he had no idea how to do it.

“Weird as in something happened recently and she’s pretty freaked out. I asked her what was going on, but she told me that it wasn’t anything for me to worry about, so your guess is as good as mine,” Chasity said. Sometimes, when he talked to the teen, he forgot that she was just a kid. She seemed wise beyond her years, and she was right—she had an old soul.

“Do you think that she’ll talk to me?” he asked, worried that he wouldn’t be able to help her if she kept shutting him out.

“No clue, but I do have a surefire way to at least give you a fighting chance,” she whispered as though telling him a secret.

“And what’s that?” he asked.

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