Storm of Lightning Read Free Page A

will never be peace.”
    â€œThere could be,” she said. “We can still hope.”
    â€œ Hope won’t bring my mother back. It won’t bring anyone back.”
    â€œWe don’t know for sure if she’s . . .” She couldn’t say the word. “Maybe she escaped. Maybe she had already left before they attacked.”
    I took a deep breath and bowed my head. I was afraid to hope.It would only make hearing the truth worse. “If that were true, the voice would have told us,” I said.
    â€œThe voice doesn’t know everything,” she replied.
    â€œIt hasn’t been wrong yet.”
    Ostin came up next to me, crouching in the aisle next to my seat. His eyes were red and swollen. “I’ve got to ask the pilot something,” he said. “I don’t understand how the Elgen could have attacked the ranch without the U.S. military stopping them. They couldn’t have crossed the border without being spotted on radar.”
    â€œI’ll come with you,” I said.
    We both walked to the front of the plane. The cockpit door was open.
    â€œExcuse me,” Ostin said as we stepped into the small cockpit. “I have a question.”
    The captain, Scott, quickly turned back. “Whoa, Michael, you need to step back. You’re affecting the instrumentation.” He turned to his copilot, Boyd. “You take the controls, we’re going to step out.”
    Boyd nodded. “Got it.”
    We backed out of the cockpit, and Scott followed. He asked Ostin, “What’s your question, son?”
    â€œHow could the Elgen have attacked a target inside America? Why didn’t the U.S. military stop them?”
    â€œThe ranch isn’t in America,” Scott said. “It’s in Mexico. The Elgen launched a surprise attack by air through the Gulf of California. They never entered U.S. airspace.”
    â€œWe were in Mexico?” I asked.
    â€œWe were in a remote part of Sonora.”
    â€œMexico,” Ostin said. “That’s why they were left alone . . .”
    â€œThey weren’t left alone,” I said.
    â€œ. . . by the government,” Ostin said. “How much longer until we land?”
    â€œAbout four hours. So get some rest. We have some intense days ahead.”
    â€œHow do we know if the ranch’s landing strip is safe?” Ostin asked.
    â€œWe don’t,” Scott said. “We don’t even know if the Elgen are still at the ranch. So we’re going to land in Douglas, Arizona, on the U.S. side of the border, then drive down. So get some rest.”
    Ostin and I went back to our seats. I don’t know why I was so eager to go to the ranch. I guess we don’t really accept that someone is dead until we see them. Maybe that’s why we have funerals.
    I reclined my seat, lay back, and closed my eyes. I suppose my exhaustion was finally greater than my anxiety, because I fell asleep. I woke as we were descending. I looked over at Taylor. She was looking at me.
    â€œHow long have I been asleep?”
    â€œAbout three hours. You were making a lot of noise. Did you have more nightmares?”
    â€œYes,” I said. “More nightmares. You didn’t look into my mind?”
    â€œNo. Your nightmares scare me too much.”

O ur plane touched down at the Bisbee-Douglas International Airport a little after five p.m., Arizona time. The wheels screeched on contact with the baked, dusty runway, as if they were in pain.
    Even though the airport’s proximity to Mexico made it an international airport, the title seemed a bit grandiose for such a tiny, run-down airstrip. In fact, it didn’t even look functional.
    The airport had just two narrow asphalt runways surrounded by desert and lined with fifty-gallon metal drums, painted white with thick red stripes around their middles. Weeds grew up through the cracks in the runway’s tarmac. Around the