Rachel Caine: Ill Wind

"Yeah, well, not like I had a choice," I said.

"What with the murder charges and all," he agreed.

"It wasn't murder! It was—" Boy, it sounded lame. " — self-defense."

He grunted. "You know, Jo, that defense don't hold up all that well even in the regular courts, especially when the guy was three times your age and unarmed."

"Like a Warden's ever unarmed. This was Bad Bob we're talking about, after all. Not some helpless old guy I knocked over the head for his wallet."

He sighed. It rattled the speaker in the phone. "He had a lot of friends. Lot of powerful friends. What the hell possessed you to take it this far? I mean, he could be a bastard, but Jesus, you fucking destroyed his house with him in it, Jo. Not to even mention that this storm you cooked up through all that crap has been focused on you like a guided missile."

I didn't want to talk about that, too many things to explain about Bad Bob and Florida. "Later. First things first. Somebody set up an unpredicated lightning bolt."

A long, expressive whistle. "That'd explain the fucking up of my weather. You're saying somebody threw it at you? Specifically?"

"I'm saying somebody really good threw it at me. I kind of need to know who. Was it… you know… official?"

"As in, did anybody clear it with me first? Hell no. Take my word for it: This didn't come through the chain of command." He paused for a few seconds; I could almost hear him thinking. "Jo, look, this is getting too serious. You'd better come see me. Albany. You know the address."

I did. "Paul?"

He understood the question before I had to ask it. "I'm not turning you in, babe. I don't exactly come from a family history of ratting out."

That said, he hung up. I clutched the phone for a few seconds, trying to decide, but really, I didn't have a choice. Paul's suggestions were just polite orders.

I urged the Mustang up another notch on the speeding-fine scale and hauled ass for Albany.

I met Paul when I was eighteen, at my official intake meeting for the Wardens.

It was scheduled at a Holiday Inn outside of Sarasota. I had directions and an appointed time to appear, all on official Warden stationery, and I spent most of the drive wiping sweat from my palms and wishing I could keep on driving and disappear. But the Wardens had made it crystal clear that my presence was required, not requested. They'd also mentioned that they could not only make my life miserable, but if they wanted to, they could put a real unhappy ending on it, as well.

So I walked into the modest little hotel and looked over the meeting-room signs on the board, CULLIGAN COMPANY BOARD MEETING. Nope. LADIES ASSOCIATION OF ROSE GROWERS Probably not. METEOROLOGICAL RESEARCH INSTITUTE. That looked like the right one. I tugged down my skirt one more time, wished I'd worn something businesslike and conservative, and walked down what felt like the Last Mile. The door was closed. I knocked.

That was the first time I met Paul. He made an impression. He opened the door, and for a frozen second, all I could think of was Oh, my God, he's gorgeous, and he made it that much worse by letting his eyes go wider and giving me that quick, comprehensive X-ray scan men are so good at delivering. He was six feet tall, olive skinned, with dark hair and designer stubble. Body by some very expensive personal trainer, or incredibly good genetics.

"Joanne Baldwin?" he asked, still standing in the doorway. I nodded. "You're late."

His voice didn't match his body; it was low, gravelly, rough. But then again, maybe it did match, because it vibrated in parts of me that generally don't react to voices. I swallowed hard and hoped my legs weren't shaking too badly, and I followed him into the room.

Of the seven people there, Paul was definitely the standout for looks, but that didn't mean anything; I felt potential power zip up and down my spine the minute I stepped inside. Ugly or beautiful, any one of these people could lay waste to entire countries.

The man sitting at the head of the long table stood up. He was older and blank faced, with gray eyes that looked as warm as polished marble. I didn't know it then, but I was meeting the man in charge of the weather for the entire continental United States, a man who did not generally concern himself with assessing the fitness of some little girl from down in Florida.

"Joanne Baldwin," he said. It was by way of a formal introduction, and I nodded and fought an impulse to curtsy, which would have been disastrous in the miniskirt anyway. "My name is Martin Oliver. You've just met Paul Giancarlo—" A nod from the stud muffin. "Let me introduce the rest of the panel."

It was a who's who of People Who Mattered. State Wardens from Texas, Arkansas, Montana. Marion Bearheart, an American Indian woman with kind eyes and an aura powerful enough to shatter glass… and the State Warden for Florida, Bob Biringanine. Bob was a short Irish-looking fellow with a perpetual blush, feathery white hair, and steel-blue eyes. He didn't like me. I could sense it at his first uninterested glance.

"Sit," Martin Oliver invited me, and demonstrated the process. I carefully lowered myself into a squeaky black chair. Everybody stared at me for a few seconds. "Coffee?"

"No thanks," I managed. "Look, I'm not really sure why—"

"You're here because either you need to be accepted into the Program, or you need to have your powers blunted," Bob said. "Somebody like you is too dangerous to leave running around wild."

Martin's cold gray eyes flicked at him, but Bob didn't seem to feel the impact. I tried to think of something to say. Nothing volunteered. Bob—Bad Bob, I later learned he was called—shuffled papers and found something that apparently interested him. I couldn't see what it was.

"There was a storm," he said. "One year ago. You vectored it around your house."

Oh. That. I hadn't thought anybody noticed. My lips were dry again, and so was my mouth. "I had to," I said. My voice sounded childish and soft. Bad Bob's gaze pinned me like I was an insect.

"Had to?" he repeated, and traded looks with a couple of the others. "Weeping Christ, girl, do you understand what you did? Your interference added force to the storm. What would just have caused minor damage to your house ended up destroying six others. Because of you. You lack judgment."

I hadn't known that. I thought—I thought I'd done the right thing. Carefully. Precisely. The idea that I'd made things worse elsewhere was a completely new one.

"That's a little harsh," said Marion Bearheart. She leaned back in her chair and studied me. "We've all screwed the pooch from time to time, Bob. You know that. Just last year, Paul dumped seventeen inches of rain on a floodplain when he was supposed to produce a summer shower. How many houses did you wash away, Paul?"

"Five," Paul grunted. "Thanks for bringing that up as often as possible."

Bad Bob ignored him, staring straight at Marion. "Paul didn't get anybody killed."

My heart froze up. There was silence around the table. Bob shuffled papers and came up with a newspaper clipping. "Dead in the wreckage of the house were Liza Gutierrez, twenty-nine, and Luis Gutierrez, thirty-one. Three children between the ages of nine and two years escaped with the help of neighbors before the home collapsed."

It was like listening to someone reading my own obituary. I tried to swallow. Couldn't. Looked down at faux woodgrain and blinked back tears. I didn't know I didn't know I didn't know. The mantra of the helpless.

And then, a low gravelly voice. "Bullshit." I looked up to see Paul staring at Bob. "Come on, Bob, she deflected the storm, sure, and she didn't take the force vectors and wind speed into account, but it still wasn't a bad job. But then, you didn't recheck for changing conditions before you started lowering the ceiling up in the mesosphere. You want to sling some blame, I think you ought to get a little on you, too. And for God's sake, people die. Without us, the whole Atlantic seaboard would be a pile of corpses— you know that as well as anybody. Sometimes you can't save everybody. Sometimes you can't even save yourself. You know that. You of all people."