Jack of Harts 2: Angel Flight by Medron Pryde Read Free Book Online

placing both hands on the left.  “Someone who’s just a little different from the rest of society.”  This time his hands moved to the right and stayed there.
    Betty shook her head and sighed.  “Well, she’s different all right.”
    “Ooh?” Jack asked with raised eyebrows.
    Betty turned a wicked smile on him.  “She chose the name of an angel.”
    “Oh,” Jack answered with a frown.  Of course, she was the cybernetic brain of Los Angeles , so he supposed it made a certain amount of sense.  “Shiny.  Which one?”
    Betty just smiled and stepped to the side.  A new cyber appeared on the console, standing next to Betty and Jasmine in the standard white uniform of the United States Navy.  Long red hair framed a face that would look at home on any college campus, and inquisitive grey eyes gave Jack the feeling he just might end up liking her.
    “Captain Jack,” he said, placing one hand on his chest.  “And who might I have the pleasure of meeting?”
    An amused smile twisted her lips and he caught the lively sense of humor under that face.  “Gabrielle,” was all she said.
    Jack pursed his lips in thought, and cocked his head to the side.  “And here I always thought Gabriel was a he,” he said, feigning confusion.
    “The standard presumption of a male-dominated society,” she answered, grey eyes twinkling in amusement.
    Jack laughed out loud, slapping the arm of his flight chair.  “Touché,” he finally pronounced, granting her a point in their verbal contest.
    “Merci,” she returned with a half bow, accepting his point with humility that must have been feigned.
    A display flashed for his attention and Jack pulled his gaze away from her to see the display showing each of his five Cowboys.  Their fighters and drones held three dimensional flying wedge formations around five cruisers, and one more display showed his fighters doing the same for Los Angeles .  Jack nodded in approval.  He loved it when a plan came together.
    “Well, I do believe we’re about ready to run away to fight another day,” Jack said, forcing a charming smile back on his face as he turned back to her.
    “Agreed,” Gabrielle returned and made a show of looking around at the displays on his fighter.
    Jack followed her gaze to see a frigate accelerating away from the American task force, engines at maximum burn.  He leaned back and watched as a destroyer followed, another frigate, and then more.  Finally, one of the cruisers broke away.  Jack focused on it and the name Dallas came into view.  She was a good ship, one of the Pre-War cruisers, but he’d fought next to some of her sisters and knew she could kill Shang as good as any ship he’d seen.  The destroyers Harrington and Grayson followed the cruiser out, snuggling up close to the ship they were tasked with protecting.
    He looked away from those three ships to see most of the American cruisers and destroyers “fleeing” the wall of battle in a ragged line that looked like the result of perfect panic.  Then Los Angeles spewed blue fire from her main engines and began to follow her sister ships.  The frigates Clark and Hammond , a dozen Hellcats, and Jack’s Avengers held formation around the larger ship with ease.  The wall of battle fell behind, British and Spanish ships screaming a cacophony of orders for the Americans to get back to the wall.
    A glance ahead showed another salvo of Shang missiles still moving towards the wall and Jack smiled.  No missiles tracked the ragged task force.  The Shang were playing the game the way they’d thought.  Well, those aliens were not going to enjoy the end game.  He frowned as he noticed several British destroyers and frigates pull away from the wall and begin following them as a more organized force.  He focused on the lead destroyer, but the display zoomed in on one of the frigates instead.  Jack raised an eyebrow in surprise until he recognized the name.  Recovery .  The British were sending