Twice the Heat

by M. L. Buchman

  By the time they were leaving, she was idly wondering what other areas they were confident in—with reason. Things had shifted through the meal until there were two separate conversations. Julie and Drew talking about firefighting, spaceflight, and movies. Her own conversation with Amos was filled with enough laughter that her sides were pleasantly sore.

  The guys drove an immaculate and testosterone-huge GMC Denali pickup. It had the Firebirds’ logo on the door, red-and-orange flames on the hood, and was rigged for towing. It might be a company rig, but it fit them. The Falcone-mobile was a hard-used Subaru Forester wagon in mud-spattered bronze. It fit her and Julie.

  “Is it named Carmine?” Amos looked down at their car.

  Natalie laughed. That was usually the first joke out of anyone’s mouth who heard their last name. Carmine Falcone—the villain of so many Batman tales—was usually placed as their father or brother. It was one of her tests actually. If a guy didn’t get the joke, it was a big caution flag. If he overused it, it was another kind of flag.

  Amos had struck a whole new balance by teasing her car.

  “It is now.” She glanced at Julie for her approval, but Julie wasn’t there.

  It took her a moment to spot her twin. She and Drew had walked well into the darkness away from the diner and were looking up at the stars together. An black arc was blocked out of the sky by the fire’s smoke cloud to the north, but the main view over the quiet water of Finnon Lake was to the south where the rest of the sky glittered.

  “Well, that’s a first.” Julie was very slow about warming up to guys. Sometimes she’d get in a mood, usually on the dance floor. Then her sister would burst out of her shell and shimmy like a sex goddess just to drive the men wild. It was one of the few moves that Natalie couldn’t keep up with. But this wasn’t that at all. They stood apart, but closer than was usual for Julie. Drew was darkly handsome and very smooth in his speech and manners—and it seemed to be working for him.

  She turned back to realize that she was so close to Amos that she had to look up to see his eyes, barely lit by the neon “Open” sign in the diner’s window. Amos had a cheery demeanor that seemed to see the bright side of everything. His rough edges, she realized, were a choice. Not an affectation, but a conscious choice of how he chose to approach the world: here I am, deal with it.

  The neon sign winked out, plunging them deeper into darkness.

  They stood little more than a breath apart. After an evening of chatter and laughter, his silence was echoing and pulled her in. Half a step was all it took. Half a step and they came together.

  The comedian was gone. The rough edges gone as he leaned down the few inches to kiss her. Lightly as a question, deep as an answer. One hand on her waist, no longer sore with laughter but warm with anticipation. Another resting lightly on the small of her back forcing a sigh from her by its unexpected gentleness.

  It would just be a kiss. She was a hotshot and would be back in the woods tomorrow. He’d be flying who knew where. There was only tonight.

  But as the roughed-edged man smoothed out her own edges with such skill—another thing he deserved to be confident about—Natalie wished that there was a chance for more than this one moment.

  8

  Does it make me a bad man?” Amos asked Drew. He didn’t do it over their shared frequency. He’d waited until they were back on the ground, getting fuel for their helos and food for their bellies.

  “You mean that you hope this fire never gets a hundred percent contained?”

  Amos sighed. It had started with that after-dinner kiss.

  “Total bone melter.”

  “Had one of those myself,” Drew agreed.

  The next day they’d airlifted the twins out to reinsert with their hotshot team. The day after that, the Firebirds had offered transport to lift the entire team, heli-tack style, to a new section of the fire. Six helos could move three hotshots each. One flight had moved eighteen of the team. Then he and Drew had doubled back to pick up the twins and deliver them to a high ridge near their team from which to do some scouting before they rejoined the others.

  They might have lingered for a few minutes. Truth be told, he’d wanted to shut down his helo and take the time then and there to discover just how good Natalie would feel if shed of her fire gear. Because she felt beyond amazing in it as she’d leaned into his kiss hard enough to pin him bonelessly against the door of the MD 520N. It had been a little weird to think of Drew and Julie doing the same not fifty feet away, but not too weird. He didn’t know a better man than Drew—they’d both saved each other’s lives so many times they’d stopped counting. Even guy-tallies hit their limit sometimes. And if Drew had gotten as good from Julie as he had from Natalie, more power to him.

  Drew took another bite of his sandwich. “What are we gonna do about this, Amos?”

  “Got me, bro. But we can’t let this just slide away and fizzle out.”

  “Not this scale of heat.”

  They headed aloft no closer to a solution.

  9

  Drew,” Julie said as they took a thirty-second hydration break from cutting a new fireline.

  “Amos,” Natalie agreed before capping her bottle and reshouldering her Pulaski fire axe. Her muscles ached and zinged above the steady hum of pain that she’d come to identify with Day Four on a fire. She swallowed a couple of Tylenol with the last swirl of moisture in her mouth. In minutes, the smoke would make it achingly dry once again.

  “Hotshots still?” she offered Julie when they shifted over to swamping branches—the arduous task of dragging clear the cuttings made by the sawyers. All of the burnable fuels had to be moved clear of the fireline and placed on the far side of the firebreak, which was thankfully downhill this time. Yesterday, it had to be cleared uphill over a hump. Absolute killer.

  “One season enough?” Julie’s thoughts echoed her own. It had been interesting, challenging, and hard work. The last didn’t bother either of them, but after this one season the first two hadn’t really grabbed them.

  “Then what?”

  That stopped them both long enough to stare at each other for a long thoughtful moment.

  Julie glanced upward in a little double motion that said she wasn’t merely looking at the overhead smoke.

  Space.

  They didn’t have the degrees for that. Just like their mom and dad—who’d met on a building fire after coming from two different engine companies (as if that wasn’t a slightly creepy echo of the current situation)—she and Julie had spent most of their lives in and around fires.

  Space. While that might be out of their reach, they could do almost anything else. They’d long ago agreed that neither of them was interested in cashing in on their looks, though they’d had offers from the fashion runway to porn movies. But they were both smart and strong, especially after a season working as hotshots rather than Public Information Officer and inter-departmental liaison as they had back in their dumb-enough-to-date-twins days.

  The firefight ran through that night and much of the next day, but they managed to halt the fire in its tracks. Helos and air tankers buzzed overhead. Air commanders above them. A second hotshot team did a set to the west and they held the line. Even the little Firebirds came in from their usual house-saving details to chase spot fires wherever they cropped up.

  When the madness finally died down—over forty-eight after they’d arrived on side of the fire and started digging in for the fight—a dozer finally managed to cut a new road into the area. A Category II team rolled in with a trio of wildland fire engines to take over the cleanup. The hotshot team loaded up their gear—axes, saws, fuel, and their few scraps of camp gear—then began the long walk out. Not a one of them weren’t stumbling like drunks. It had been two full days on the line with only a two-hour catnap. Dropping off the adrenaline on the fireline left them with almost nothing to get out of these damned woods.

  It was a pleasant surprise when less than a mile later, they broke out into the o
pen.

  “Pavement,” Julie sighed happily.

  “Civilization,” another hotshot agreed. They stood along the edge of a one-lane road that felt like freedom.

  “Cold water,” Natalie could barely croak, but it would be near now. She had no idea exactly where they were; glad to just focus on lifting one foot after the next as someone else led them out of the woods.

  The sun was setting, blood red in the smoke haze. It was a major improvement now that the fire was dying. They hadn’t seen the sun since entering the diner for that first dinner with Drew and Amos.

  Nobody was moving.

  Maybe they’d just sleep here beside the road.

  Then, by some miracle, a set of headlights stabbed through the descending darkness.

  Not one, but two heaven-sent Denali pickups rolled up to stop in front of them.

  “We heard your team was coming out this way,” Amos grinned at her from the driver’s seat. Drew sat beside him, his grin was even bigger. She didn’t know if she’d ever been as happy to see anyone in her life. The cabins were full with other people, but she was more than happy to pile in the truck bed with the other hotshots.

  Once they were loaded, the mood rose fast. Saved the final trudging walk, they’d beaten back the fire. She and Julie leaned shoulder to shoulder and enjoyed the others’ laughter and joking. They’d not only beaten back another fire, they’d beaten back a fire season. The team would disband and scatter now through the winter months. Those who wanted to, would show up for the next season and bring on another set of rookies—just as she and Julie had been eight months ago.

  But another season hotshotting wasn’t for them. She didn’t know what was, but that wasn’t it.

  The trucks were moving slowly up the narrow road. She smelled it first. The char—not of burning forest—but of cooking meat. Not burned past recognition—like the occasional deer or other wildlife who hadn’t made good their escape from the fire. It smelled like…

  “Food!” One of the crowd shouted out.

  The trucks pulled into the driveway of a massive three-story house tucked back in the trees. Major bonus! The trees weren’t burning.

  Amos climbed down and was standing beside the truck bed. “Locals are so glad we all saved their homes, they’re throwing us a party. Burgers and dogs on the grill. Hot showers and a swimming pool!” He had to shout the last over the cheers of the team.

  Everyone scrambled and jumped down. When she and Julie reached the tail of the bed, Amos and Drew were waiting for them.

  “You’ll get dirty,” she warned them as they reached out to help them down. Two days deep in the smoke, she and Julie were both darker than Drew—soot-black rather than beautiful brown.

  “Caring about…”

  “…this much.” Both men held their thumb and forefinger pinched tightly together.

  Her own gasp matched Julie’s as they each were grabbed by their waist and set on the ground. Amos’ enveloping hug was sweet, but his devouring kiss rang bells all up and down her body. When he finally let her go, she could see the full-body char outline she’d left on his clothes. She pointed at it and he just shrugged happily before snugging her in against his side.

  Drew rolled his eyes when he looked down at the matching imprint Julie had left on his own clothes. But he only sighed once before he shrugged and pulled Julie against his hip as well. Natalie had always loved walking arm-in-arm, though it had never been one of Julie’s things. This time it didn’t look as if she was minding it very much.

  They showered, they ate, they belly flopped into the pool. The owners had a big hamper filled with men’s swim trunks and various women’s suits. After a quick glance consultation with Julie, they’d both selected the skimpiest bikinis they could find. Amos’ and Drew’s stunned-puppy reactions were well worth the hoots and catcalls from the rest of the team.

  10

  Jana waited and watched. She and her brother had founded the Oregon Firebirds eight months ago. They, along with Curt’s best friend Jasper, had spent three years planning—and then gambled everything against this shot at launching a firefighting helicopter team.

  It had turned out in ways she’d never imagined despite all of her careful planning.

  The fires had burned and the jobs had flowed. They were still a year from being debt-free, maybe two—six helicopters and all of the personnel and support vehicles didn’t come cheap. But they were far more cashflow positive than even her most optimistic projections. She’d built in contingencies and negotiated early payment bonuses as much as she could, and it had worked.

  But it wasn’t only the Oregon Firebirds that had exceeded expectations. The pilots and crew had come together not like fliers, but like family.

  Her and Curt’s biological family hadn’t been much of a one. But the Oregon Firebirds…

  Her brother and Stacy now frolicked in the deep end of the pool just like the newlyweds they were.

  Palo watched raptly from the pool’s edge as Maggie did a dive off the board that was as beautiful as she was.

  And her own Jasper was easy to spot in his ever-present cowboy hat. He crossed the deck toward her carrying two fresh beers in one hand and a plate with a pair of enormous brownies in the other. He planted a kiss on the top of her head where she sat upright on a lounger.

  He held her beer bottle steady until she had a good grasp on it with the hooks that had replaced her right hand and knocked her out of the sky into being an administrator rather than a pilot. He didn’t see her having one arm as any bit of a handicap; he just helped in small, thoughtful ways.

  “Good summer,” he said softly, his voice tickling her ear as he slid into the lounger behind her and eased her back against his chest.

  “Beyond good,” she agreed and bit into the brownie. “I’ve been watching the boys.”

  Jasper’s harrumph of irritation was a tease.

  She knew that he knew what she meant.

  “Look mighty happy, don’t they?” Jasper waved his bottle toward them.

  “They do.” Drew and Amos were sporting with the twins in the pool. They were playing in a way that could only happen when it meant more than just the physical. There was a care there, an ease that she’d never have been able to see at the start of the season—not until Jasper had helped her discover it in herself.

  “Might have heard this hotshot team was done for the season.”

  “Might have heard that myself,” she agreed.

  “Might have also heard that those two weren’t real anxious to go hotshotting next year.”

  That she hadn’t heard. She’d come to like Natalie and Julie, at least as much as she could in the few moments the boys had spared them for. Over burgers, potato salad, and massive bags of salty chips, they’d talked about past jobs—what they’d liked, what they hadn’t.

  “They’re a fire family to the core.”

  “Daughters of a chief mother and a lieutenant father,” Jana had gotten that from them as well.

  “You got some ideas, pretty lady?” Jasper’s hand slid around her waist to hold her close.

  “Seems I might,” his big hand spanned across her belly and made her feel so safe and sure. Sure of herself…and of them. “We’ve got that contract flying support for burn restoration. Could use some help with coordinating the effort. Field liaison and the like.”

  Jasper leaned down far enough to nuzzle a kiss against her temple. “That’s my kind of Firebird.”

  And Jana knew that he was no longer talking about the twins. They’d talk more, but she just knew that between them they could make it fly. Drew and Julie. Amos and Natalie. The family would grow a little more and the Firebirds would fly a little higher.

  But Jasper was talking about her.

  Her wings had been cut when she’d lost her hand in that accident.

  But as manager of the Firebirds, as a woman lying in the arms of the man who’d loved her since that first day when he was six and she was ten, she felt as if her wings had regr
own. As long as she had these people around her—they could fly forever.

  Wildfire at Dawn (excerpt)

  If you liked this, you’ll love the smokejumper novels!

  Wildfire at Dawn

  (excerpt)

  Mount Hood Aviation’s lead smokejumper Johnny Akbar Jepps rolled out of his lower bunk careful not to bang his head on the upper. Well, he tried to roll out, but every muscle fought him, making it more a crawl than a roll. He checked the clock on his phone. Late morning.

  He’d slept twenty of the last twenty-four hours and his body felt as if he’d spent the entire time in one position. The coarse plank flooring had been worn smooth by thousands of feet hitting exactly this same spot year in and year out for decades. He managed to stand upright…then he felt it, his shoulders and legs screamed.

  Oh, right.

  The New Tillamook Burn. Just about the nastiest damn blaze he’d fought in a decade of jumping wildfires. Two hundred thousand acres—over three hundred square miles—of rugged Pacific Coast Range forest, poof! The worst forest fire in a decade for the Pacific Northwest, but they’d killed it off without a single fatality or losing a single town. There’d been a few bigger ones, out in the flatter eastern part of Oregon state. But that much area—mostly on terrain too steep to climb even when it wasn’t on fire—had been a horror.

  Akbar opened the blackout curtain and winced against the summer brightness of blue sky and towering trees that lined the firefighter’s camp. Tim was gone from the upper bunk, without kicking Akbar on his way out. He must have been as hazed out as Akbar felt.

  He did a couple of side stretches and could feel every single minute of the eight straight days on the wildfire to contain the bastard, then the excruciating nine days more to convince it that it was dead enough to hand off to a Type II incident mop-up crew. Not since his beginning days on a hotshot crew had he spent seventeen days on a single fire.