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“Good.” Aunt T enveloped Lando in a hug, tightly pulling Lando into her chest and holding her there. “Next time you need to give me more damn warning.”

Lando chuckled. “I’ll try.”

“You know your mama would be proud, right?”

Tears stung Lando’s eyes. Aunt T always tried to do that, bring her mother into the conversation, but Lando hadn’t even been two years old when her mother had died, and she barely remembered her. Most of her memories were because of Aunt T and Nan. It was far more for Aunt T’s benefit than hers. “I know.”

“Nan, too, as much as she was a stubborn old fool, she loved you with everything she had.”

That did make tears fall. Lando sniffled and buried her face in Aunt T’s shoulder. She was easily six inches taller than Lando, but it didn’t matter. Any time Aunt T hugged her she felt like she was home. Her life would have been so different if her grandmother hadn’t taken her in and she’d ended up with Aunt T. Both their lives. It likely would have ended in disaster. Aunt T wasn’t ready twenty years ago to be a parent. Hell, she’d barely been ready ten years ago.

“I miss her,” Lando whispered.

“Yeah. Me too. Old bitch had too much opinion in her to keep it quiet.”

Barking out a laugh, Lando pulled back. “I’ll see if there’s a break at all when we can come home and visit, but I do promise I’ll call.”

“Like I said, if I don’t hear from you at a minimum weekly, I’m siccing the marshals on you.”

“You do that.” Lando winked. “I’m going to finish packing.”

Lando saw her aunt to the door and locked it as soon as she was alone. She was going to miss the old house she’d grown up in, but this adventure was going to be the best decision for the career she wanted. It had to be, because she needed the break in life she’d never gotten before.

CHAPTER3

The air wascrisp that morning when Violet made the last pot of coffee in her apartment for the next six months. She’d always dreamed of chasing storms full-time, but it was rare to find someone who could afford to do it. She’d allowed only the summer for so long that adding in the extra quarter was going to be a shock to her system.

Six months was a long time to be gone, but it would be perfect for her soul. She needed it. The time to reconnect with nature and the outdoors, to do something she was so passionate about aside from teaching. Violet sipped her coffee, staring out at the horizon as the sun meandered its way upward.

It was late March, and they’d already missed several raging storms throughout the plains, but that wasn’t going to deter her. A few storms were nothing compared to six months living among them. The bitter brew hit her tongue, waking her up and warming her. Six months with Diane was going to be a feat she’d have to work through.

In all the intervening years since they’d met, Violet had never been able to end the crush she had on Diane. There was no reciprocated interest, no matter how much they flirted. Diane marched to the beat of her own drum, and unfortunately, Violet was caught up in it, always one step behind.

Scowling, Violet clenched her jaw. She was nearing her mid-forties, and she’d been enamored with her best friend for too long. She really needed to find a way to work through that and spending this length of time with the woman, confined in small spaces with no relief, could either help that cause or make it worse. Either way, it was going to be six months to remember.

She could barely wait to get the old team together, working hard on finding storms, gathering data, and analyzing it. It was a lot of work in a small amount of time, but worth every minute of it. Violet finished her coffee, cleaned the pot and mug, and set them back in place. She took out the trash, grabbed her bags and locked up.

In ten minutes she was at Diane’s, lounging on the edge of the bed while Diane finished packing. Diane always was a last-minute person with just about everything, even as much as she teased Violet for it. It used to drive Violet crazy, but she was determined to take the next six months with as much patience as she possibly could. The second cup of coffee was welcome, and warmed her fingers.

“Where are we going first?” Violet asked.

“Western Oklahoma, out around Guymon. I figure we can easily go north into Kansas or south into Texas or west into Colorado from there depending on where the storms are.”

“Makes sense.” It would take them about a day to get there, which wasn’t bad. The run-down hotels they would stay in along the way when they did stay somewhere would be good enough to sleep in but not much more. “Have you been tracking the weather stream going into that area?”

Diane nodded curtly, grabbing another piece of clothing and folding it into her small suitcase. “It looks promising.”

Violet lifted her shoulder in a slight shrug. She’d followed the same stream, and while it had some promising attributes to it, she wouldn’t bank teaching a course on it. It wasn’t very strong, and while it did have the potential to grow, it hadn’t picked up any speed in the process.”

“Did you talk to Erik?” Diane asked.

Shaking her head, Violet set her cup on the edge of the footboard. “No, why?”

Diane’s lines thinned. “Nothing.”

“Why?”

“It’s nothing.”