Cold Fire

by Dustin Stevens

  OTHER WORKS BY DUSTIN STEVENS

  Quarterback

  Be My Eyes

  Scars and Stars

  Catastrophic

  21 Hours

  Ohana

  Twelve

  Liberation Day

  Just a Game

  Ink

  Four

  Motive

  The Zoo Crew Novels

  Tracer

  Dead Peasants

  The Zoo Crew

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2014, 2015 by Dustin Stevens

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Published by Thomas & Mercer, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Thomas & Mercer are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781477830062

  ISBN-10: 1477830065

  Cover design by David Drummond

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2014958623

  For my parents.

  CONTENTS

  Start Reading

  PART I

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  PART II

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  PART III

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Chapter Thirty-Four

  PART IV

  Chapter Thirty-Five

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Chapter Forty

  Chapter Forty-One

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Chapter Forty-Three

  Chapter Forty-Four

  Chapter Forty-Five

  PART V

  Chapter Forty-Six

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  The sun was . . .

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  It is better to conquer yourself than to win a thousand battles. Then the victory is yours. It cannot be taken from you, not by angels or by demons, heaven or hell.

  —Buddha

  PART I

  Every time I closed my eyes, it was the same damn dream.

  After six weeks on the road, slogging through some of the worst shit this world had to offer, I just wanted to be home. Sleep in a bed with an actual mattress. Eat food that wasn’t prepackaged or freeze-dried. Hold something close to me that didn’t have a firing pin and a full magazine.

  The thoughts filled my head as I drove southeast out of San Diego, the late-day sun just a sliver above the horizon behind me. It threw the shadow of my beat-up pickup out onto the blacktop in front of my tires, an ominous black cloak preceding my arrival.

  My mood was upbeat, jovial even. I had long since shed my sport coat and tie, rolling the sleeves of my dress shirt to the elbows. I leaned forward and blasted the radio as I tore down a desolate stretch of California highway, “Free Bird” piping in through the speakers. Throat stripped raw from weeks in the desert sand, I tapped out a drum solo with my thumbs against the black leather of the steering wheel, playing along to the beat.

  The first thing that hit me was the smell.

  There is simply no logical explanation for how that happened. I should have seen the glow against the darkening evening sky, or at least the smoke rising up in charcoal curlicues, but I didn’t.

  Instead I noticed the scent. The undeniable, acrid aroma of smoke dancing across the breeze. Even with my reduced sense of smell, it was unmistakable.

  My first thought was somebody was having a barbecue, squeezing in a few more moments of summer before the calendar turned to November and the desert chill settled in for the year. The thought lingered for almost a mile before my mind pieced together where I was, too far from anywhere for a simple cookout to be detected.

  Right then, in that moment, the first tiny spark of doubt ignited in the back of my mind. I had no reason to believe anything was wrong, no evidence that a single whiff was about to turn my world upside down, but somehow I knew.

  Whether that was the case at the time, or it was the reconstruction my mind created after replaying the scene for five long years, there was no way of knowing.

  Reaching out, I switched off the radio and took up my cell phone from the cup holder on the middle console. I flipped it open and pressed the first speed dial. The line cut straight to voice mail, and the automated voice told me the person I was trying to reach was unavailable.

  I snapped the phone shut before the automaton had a chance to finish, and I leaned on the gas a little harder. That tiny spark in the back of my mind grew into an ember as I drove, the moisture fleeing my mouth, the taste of desperation settling in.

  My aging rig passed over eighty-five miles an hour as a battered green roadside sign flew by on the right shoulder. I’d seen it enough times to know it was informing me that Tecate, California, was two miles away, the United States–Mexican border crossing a mile farther than that.

  None of that mattered, though. I wasn’t going as far as either one.

  The smell grew stronger as I drove. It was laced with the smell of charred meat that bordered on roasted pork. The aroma flitted across my nostrils, disappearing just as fast while I sped forward into the encroaching night.

  Behind me, the last bit of the sun slid beneath the horizon, the tiny orange arc disappearing from my rearview mirror. The world around me grew darker, the shadow of my truck less pronounced on the road, as the first stars peeked out overhead.

  It wasn’t until that moment that I noticed the glow.

  It began as just a small orange orb, rising no more than a few inches above the earth. Not until the last bit of sun was gone did it grow strong enough to draw my attention, pulling my gaze south.

  My stomach constricted itself into a tight ball, and my right foot nudged farther down toward the floorboard. The V-6 engine whined in protest as the truck pushed on toward a hundred. I kept my attention aimed out the right side of my windshield.

  I had never been a religious man. I had nothing against God, or Buddha, or Allah, or any other being that might be out there. I’d just never given the time or energy to figure out what any of them were all about, and without that I didn’t see the point in casting my lot with them.

  In that moment, though, feeling my palms grow sw
eaty, having the air pulled out of my lungs, I prayed. I prayed long and hard. I pushed the words out with every ounce of sincerity I could muster, calling on every higher being I’d ever heard of.

  I asked all of them to please not let me be right. To make me look like the biggest, most paranoid fool that had ever walked the earth for even thinking such a thing.

  To not make my family pay for the sins of my past.

  And every damn time, as if my mind, or all those higher beings I called on, or some unknown cosmic force I had yet to even consider, wanted to remind me of what had happened, of what I had said, the things I had promised, that was when I woke up.

  Why that was, I had long since stopped trying to figure out, my body no longer able to take the exhaustion that came with it. If there was some overarching story, some life lesson, that it was meant to impart, I guess it was lost on me, because after five years, there was still only one thing I could think every morning when I woke up, the sheets wet beneath me with sweat, my heartbeat racing.

  Lot of damn good it did me.

  Chapter One

  “You folks have a nice trip back,” I said, pushing the tailgate on their SUV closed. The bulging pile of gear crammed into the rear space resisted a bit against the door as it went, and the latch only caught halfway.

  “And maybe come a little earlier next year, before it gets too cold,” I added with a smile, releasing the gate and slamming it shut once more. This time the myriad of bags and coolers inside were no match, the articles jostling about as the rear hatch locked into place.

  “We’ll do that,” the driver said, an affable man in his late forties who had insisted all week that I call him JP. Why a man his age would insist on going by that instead of some variation of his given Jon Paul I had no idea, but it wasn’t my place to judge.

  The family had paid top dollar and gotten along reasonably well on our five-day excursion, which was about the best I could have asked for. By late in the trip they did start to complain a fair bit about the weather, but I’d anticipated that when they booked it.

  People from Florida just aren’t cut out for Yellowstone in October.

  “Thank you again for everything,” JP said, pausing by the driver’s-side door. His family, a wife and two kids, were already stowed inside, no doubt holding their hands up to the vents blasting warm air as fast as the registers would allow.

  “Thank you,” I said, raising my hand in farewell. “I appreciate your business.”

  JP returned the gesture, nodded once for emphasis, and climbed inside. I could hear the fan on the heater whirring as it pushed heat through the car. Everyone hunkered low in their winter gear. It was a scenario I’d seen a hundred times before. They’d be as far north as Bozeman before any of them realized they were riding in a sauna.

  I waited until their taillights disappeared from view before turning and surveying the building that housed my business. The fact that it was still standing and in one piece was a good sign, something I learned long ago not to take for granted.

  A single story tall and constructed of flat-front pine boards, the entire structure was painted dark brown, the door and windows trimmed out in forest green. A rough-hewn wooden sign stretched across most of the roof, the same dark brown color inlaid with green letters.

  HAWK’S EYE VIEWS:

  WEST YELLOWSTONE’S FAVORITE PRIVATE GUIDE

  Slightly less than modest, perhaps, but in a market as saturated as Yellowstone in the summer, being humble didn’t pay the bills.

  Gravel crunched beneath my feet as I walked across the front lot and up the three stairs leading to the door. A small bell hanging from the ceiling jangled as I stepped in, and a rush of warm air hit me in the face.

  “Just a minute,” a familiar voice called from the back.

  The entire front part of the building was one open room. A waist-high wooden counter ran most of the way across it, framed by doorways on either end. To the left was the restroom, a simple affair with a toilet and sink. On the right was my office, taking up the rear half of the building.

  The smell of fresh coffee drew my attention toward the wall, leading me to a half-full pot still sitting on the burner. Grabbing a Styrofoam cup from the stack, I filled it with straight black, guzzled down half of it, then refilled it.

  “Take your time, Kaylan,” I said, returning the pot to its place. I wasn’t sure what she was doing back in my office, but after three years together, I trusted her enough not to care.

  The floorboards creaked beneath my weight as I crossed over to the front counter and leaned against it, taking another swig of coffee. The brew was black as motor oil and tasted much the same, exactly the way we both took it.

  “Hey, Hawk,” Kaylan said, bustling out of the side door, a pencil stuck behind her ear. A bundle of messy curls was piled atop her head, and the sleeves of her green sweater were bunched up to her elbows. Even in boots she came no more than a few inches above five feet tall, her body graced with just a couple of extra pounds. She pulled the door shut behind her as she went, and it closed against the wooden jamb with a bang.

  “Hey, Kay,” I said, “what’s going on?”

  “How’d it go with the Olsons?” Kay asked, ignoring my question. She tossed the pencil down on the desk and settled heavily into her chair, letting out an audible sigh as she went.

  “It was good,” I said, which was mostly the truth.

  “Two kids, disinterested mother, father trying way too hard for the perfect vacation,” Kaylan said, rattling off the list as she had done an infinite number of times before. “Had all the makings of a disaster on your hands.”

  “Oh, I know it. I believe I even said that to you as we were leaving.”

  One side of Kaylan’s mouth curled up at being caught parroting my own words back to me, though we both let it slide.

  “So?” she pressed.

  I finished off the last of my coffee and crossed over to the pot to pour myself another. “It really was okay. The kids were pretty into it, got along much better than most adolescent boy-girl pairings. The parents, too. The only thing that tripped them up was the cold.”

  “Ahh,” Kaylan said, rocking her head back. “I actually thought about that last night when it got down in the low thirties.”

  I made my way back to the counter and tilted my head an inch to the side, feigning flattery. “Aw, you were worried about me?”

  “You? God, no,” Kaylan said, letting out a snort. “I was concerned for them, being from Orlando and all.”

  “Right,” I said, swirling the dark liquid in my cup and taking another drink. She was absolutely correct, and we both knew it. After five years on the job, cold just wasn’t something that got to me anymore. “How’s the year-end stuff coming along?”

  Kaylan raised her eyebrows at me and said, “Well, I don’t think we’re quite there yet, Boss.”

  I cast a glance at the West Yellowstone National Bank calendar hanging on the wall, red X’s crossing out everything up to the twenty-fourth of the month. “What do you mean not quite there yet? Next week is Halloween. And like you said, it’s getting damn cold at night.”

  “Hey, not my doing,” Kaylan said, raising her hands by her side before hooking a thumb at the wall behind her. “Talk to the crazy lady in your office right now about it.”

  I opened my mouth to respond, but stopped just as quickly and looked at her. Taking on the Olsons at such a late date was pretty rare, exceedingly so in a year where winter seemed poised to arrive at any moment.

  “There’s someone in there now?” I asked, letting my surprise show on my face, in my voice.

  “Why do you think the door’s shut?” she asked.

  “I don’t know,” I said. “Thought maybe you needed to give your boyfriend a chance to escape through the window.”

  Kaylan’s head rolled back an inch in a smirk as she stared at me.
“If that was you trying to ask if I’m single, the answer is yes.”

  Despite her being just six years younger than me, I often failed to see Kaylan as anything other than a kid. While her twenty-eight to my thirty-four didn’t seem like much in terms of years, we were much further apart than that in life experience.

  “What’s she want?” I asked, pushing right past Kaylan’s statement.

  She stared at me a long moment, knowing full well what I’d done, before shaking her head. “A guide, of course. Something about her brother went camping and hasn’t checked in for a few days.”

  A look somewhere between a grimace and a sneer crossed my face as I pushed myself away from the counter. “You tell her we’re done for the year?”

  “I did.”

  “And?” I asked, finishing the coffee in my cup and dropping it into the trash can at my feet.

  “And she made a very compelling offer,” Kaylan said.

  “Doesn’t matter,” I replied. “The Olsons were the last run of the season. It’s been a good year, but I’ll be glad to get off my feet for a while.”

  “That may be,” Kaylan said, dipping the top of her head in agreement, “but I figured I would at least give you the right to refuse her.”

  My brow furrowed as I walked slowly around the front of the desk, my fingertips dragging along behind me. “Meaning?”

  “Just trust me,” Kaylan said, twisting the base of her chair to track my movement. “You’re going to at least want to hear this one out.”

  Chapter Two

  Kaylan and I had a running joke: The only way we would ever take a client before May 15 or after October 15 was if they made us an offer so ridiculous we would be fools to refuse it.

  I don’t know why, but for some reason that came to mind as I pushed through the closed door into my office. She hadn’t said those exact words, hadn’t given any true indication that was what she meant, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that was what I was about to encounter.

  Three steps inside I realized I was wrong.

  Standing behind my desk was a woman I was quite certain I had never seen before, the kind of woman I doubt anybody in West Yellowstone had ever seen before.