by Nora Roberts
The chute billowed open, snapped him up. He looked right, then left and found Dobie, heard his jump partner’s wild, reckless laughter.
“Now that’s what I’m talking about!”
Gull grinned, scanned the view. How many saw this, he wondered, this stunning spread of forest and mountain, this endless, open sky? He swept his gaze over the lacings of snow in the higher elevations, the green just beginning to haze the valley. He thought, though he knew it unlikely, he could smell both, the winter and the spring, as he floated down between them.
He worked his toggles, using instinct, training, the caprice of the wind. He could see Rowan now, the way the sun shone on her bright cap of hair, even the way she stood—legs spread and planted, hands on her hips. Watching him as he watched her.
He put himself beside her, judging the lineup, and felt the instant he caught it. The smoke jumpers called it on the wire, so he glided in on it, kept his breathing steady as he prepared for impact.
He glanced toward Dobie again, noted his partner would overshoot the spot. Then he hit, tucked, rolled. He dropped his gear, started gathering his chute.
He heard Rowan shouting, saw her running for the trees. Everything froze, then melted again when he heard Dobie’s shouted stream of curses.
Above, the plane tipped its wings and started its circle to deploy the next jumpers. He hauled up his gear, grinning as he walked over to where Dobie dragged his own out of the trees.
“I had it, then the wind bitched me into the trees. Hell of a ride though.” The thrill, the triumph lit up his face. “Hell of a goddamn ride.’Cept I swallowed my gum.”
“You’re on the ground,” Rowan told them. “Nothing’s broken. So, not bad.” She opened her personal gear bag, took out candy bars. “Congratulations.”
“There’s nothing like it.” Libby’s face glowed as she looked skyward. “Nothing else comes close.”
“You haven’t jumped fire yet.” Rowan sat, then stretched out in the meadow grass. “That’s a whole new world.” She watched the sky, waiting for the plane to come back, then glanced at Gull as he dropped down beside her. “You had a smooth one.”
“I targeted on you. The sun in your hair,” he added when she frowned at him.
“Jesus, Gull, you are a romantic. God help you.”
He’d flustered her, he realized, and gave himself a point on his personal scoreboard. Since he hadn’t swallowed his gum, he tucked the chocolate away for later. “What do you do when you’re not doing this?”
“For work? I put in some time in my dad’s business, jumping with tourists who want a thrill, teaching people who think they want, or decide they want, to jump as a hobby. Do some personal training.” She flexed her biceps.
“Bet you’re good at it.”
“Logging in time as a PT means I get paid to keep fit for this over the winter. What about you?”
“I get to play for a living. Fun World. It’s like a big arcade—video games, bowling, bumper cars, Skee-Ball.”
“You work at an arcade?”
He folded his arms behind his head. “It’s not work if it’s fun.”
“You don’t strike me as the kind of guy to deal with kids and machines all day.”
“I like kids. They’re largely fearless and open to possibilities. Adults tend to forget how to be either.” He shrugged. “You spend yours trying to get couch potatoes to break a sweat.”
“Not all of my clients are couch potatoes. None are when I’m done with them.” She shoved up to sit. “Here comes the next group.”
With the first practice jump complete, they packed out, carrying their gear back to base. After another stint of physical training, classwork, they were up again for the second jump of the day.
They practiced letdown in full gear, outlined fire suppression strategies, studied maps, executed countless sit-ups, pull-ups, push-ups, ran miles and threw themselves out of planes. At the end of a brutal four weeks, the numbers had whittled down to sixteen. Those still standing ranged outside Operations answering their final roll call as recruits.
When Libby answered her name, Dobie slapped a twenty into Gull’s hand. “Smoke jumper Barbie. You gotta give it to her. Skinny woman like that toughs it through, and a big hoss like McGinty washes.”
“We didn’t,” Gull reminded him.
“Fucking tooting we didn’t.”
Even as they slapped hands a flood of ice water drenched them.
“Just washing off some of the rookie stink,” somebody called out. And with hoots and shouts, the men and woman on the roof tossed another wave of water from buckets.
“You’re now one of us.” From his position out of water range, L.B. shouted over the laughter and curses. “The best there is. Get cleaned up, then pack it in the vans. We’re heading into town, boys and girls. You’ve got one night to celebrate and drink yourself stupid. Tomorrow, you start your day as smoke jumpers—as Zulies.”
When Gull made a show out of wringing out his wet twenty, Dobie laughed so hard, he had to sit on the ground. “I’ll buy the first round. You’re in there, Libby.”
“Thanks.”
He smiled, stuffed the wet bill in his wet pocket. “I owe it all to you.”
Inside, Gull stripped off his dripping clothes. He took stock of his bruises—not too bad—and for the first time in a week took time to shave. Once he’d hunted up a clean shirt and pants, he spent a few minutes sending a quick e-mail home to let his family know he’d made it.
He expected that news to generate mixed reactions, though they’d all pretend to be as happy as he was. He slid a celebratory cigar into his breast pocket, then wandered outside.
The e-mail had cost him some time, so he loaded into the last of the vans and found a seat among the scatter of rookies and vets.
“Ready to party, rook?” Trigger asked him.
“I’ve been ready.”
“Just remember, nobody gets babysat. The vans leave and you’re not in one, you find your own way back to base. If you end up with a woman tonight, the smart thing is to end up with one who has a car.”
“I’ll keep that in mind.”
“You dance?”
“You asking?”
Trigger hooted out a laugh. “You’re almost pretty enough for me. The place we’re going has a dance floor. You do it right, dancing with a woman’s the same as foreplay.”
“Is that the case, in your experience?”
“It is, young Jedi. It surely is.”
“Interesting. So . . . does Rowan like to dance?”
Trigger raised his eyebrows. “That’s what we call barking up the wrong tree.”
“It’s the only tree that’s caught my interest and attention.”
“Then you’re going to have a long, dry summer.” He gave Gull a pat on the shoulder. “And let me tell you something else from my vast experience. When you’ve got calluses on your calluses and blisters on top of that, jerking off isn’t as pleasant as it’s meant to be.”
“Five years as a hotshot,” Gull reminded him. “If the summer proves long and dry, my hands’ll hold up.”
“Maybe so. But a woman’s better.”
“Indeed they are, Master Jedi. Indeed they are.”
“Have you got one back home?”
“No. Do you?”
“Had one. Twice. Married one of them. Just didn’t take. Matt’s got one. You got a woman back home in Nebraska, don’t you, Matt?”
Matt shifted, angled around to look back over his shoulder. “Annie’s back in Nebraska.”
“High-school sweethearts,” Trigger filled in. “Then she went off to college, but they got back together when she came home. Two minds, one heart. So Matt doesn’t dance, if you get my drift.”
“Got it. It’s nice,” Gull continued, “having somebody.”
“No point in the whole screwed-up world if you don’t.” Matt shrugged. “No point doing what we do if nobody’s waiting for us once we’ve done it.”
“Sweeten
s the pot,” Trigger agreed. “But some of us have to settle for a dance now and again.” He rubbed his hands together as the van pulled up in a lot packed with trucks and cars. “And my toes are already tapping.”
Gull scanned the long, low log building as he stepped out of the van, contemplated a moment on the flickering neon sign.
“‘Get a Rope,’ ” he read. “Seriously?”
“Cowboy up, partner.” Trigger slapped him on the shoulder, then strutted inside on his snakeskin boots.
An experience, Gull reminded himself. You could never have too many of them.
He stepped into the overamplified screech and twang of truly, deeply bad country music performed by a quartet of grungy-looking guys behind the dubious protection of a chicken-wire fence. At the moment the only things being hurled at them were shouted insults, but the night was young.
Still, people crowded the dance floor, kicking up boot heels, wiggling butts. Others ranged along the long bar or squeezed onto rickety chairs at tiny tables where they could scarf up dripping nachos or gnaw on buffalo wings coated with a suspicious substance that turned them cheesepuff orange. Most opted to wash that combo down with beer served in filmy plastic pitchers.
The lights were mercifully dim, and despite the smoking ban dingy blue clouds fogged the air that smelled like a sweat-soaked, deep-fried, overflowing ashtray.
The only reasonable thing to do, as Gull saw it, was to start drinking.
He moved to the bar, elbowed in and ordered a Bitter Root beer—in a bottle. Dobie squeezed beside him, punched him in the arm. “Why do you wanna drink that foreign shit?”
“Brewed in Montana.” He passed the bottle to Dobie, ordered another.
“Pretty good beer,” Dobie decided after a pull. “But it ain’t no Budweiser.”
“You’re not wrong.” Amused, Gull tapped his bottle to Dobie’s, drank. “Beer. The answer to so many questions.”
“I’m going to get this one in me, then cut one of these women out of the herd, drive ’em on the dance floor.”
Gull sipped again, studied the fat-fingered lead guitar player. “How do you dance to crap like this?”
Dobie’s eyes slitted, and his finger drilled into Gull’s chest. “You got a problem with country music?”
“You must’ve busted an eardrum on your last jump if you call this music. I like bluegrass,” he added, “when it’s done right.”
“Don’t bullshit me, city boy. You don’t know bluegrass from bindweed.”
Gull took another swig of beer. “I am a man of constant sorrow,” he sang in a strong, smooth tenor. “I’ve seen trouble all my days.”
Now Dobie punched him in the chest, but affectionately. “You’re a continual surprise to me, Gulliver. Got a voice in there, too. You oughta get up there and show those shit-kickers how it’s done.”
“I think I’ll just drink my beer.”
“Well.” Dobie tipped up the bottle, drained his. Let out a casual belch. “I’m going for a female.”
“Good luck with that.”
“Ain’t about luck. It’s about style.”
Gull watched Dobie bop over to a table of four women, and decided the man had a style all of his own.
Enjoying the moment, Gull leaned an elbow back on the bar, crossed his ankles. Trigger, true to his word, already had a partner on the dance floor, and Matt—true to his Annie—sat with Little Bear, a rookie named Stovic and one of the pilots they called Stetson for his battered and beloved black hat.
Then there was Rowan, chowing down on the orange-coated nachos at a table with Janis Petrie, Gibbons and Yangtree. She’d pulled on a blue T-shirt—snug, scoop-necked—that molded her breasts and torso. For the first time since he’d met her she wore earrings, something that glittered and swung from her ears when she shook her head and laughed.
She’d done something to her eyes, her lips, he noted, made them bolder. And when she let Cards pull her to her feet for a dance, Gull saw her jeans were as snug as her shirt.
She caught his eye when Cards swung her into a spin, then stopped his heart when she shot him a wide, wicked smile. He decided if she was going to kill him, she might as well do it at closer range. He ordered another beer, carried it over to her table.
“Hey, fresh meat.” Janis toasted him with a dripping nacho. “Want to dance, rookie?”
“I haven’t had enough beer to dance to whatever this is.”
“They’re so bad, they’re good.” Janis patted Rowan’s empty chair. “A few more drinks, they’ll be nearly good enough to be bad.”
“Your logic tells me you’ve walked this path before.”
“You’re not a Zulie until you’ve survived a night at Get a Rope.” She glanced toward the door as a group of three men swaggered in. “In all its glory.”
“Local boys?”
“Don’t think so. They’re all wearing new boots. High-dollar ones.” She topped off her beer from the pitcher on the table. “I’m guessing city, dude-ranch types come to take in some local color.”
They headed toward the bar, and the one in the lead shoulder-muscled his way through the line. He slapped a bill on the bar.
“Whiskey and a woman.” He punched his voice up, deliberately, Gull imagined, so it carried above the noise. The hoots and laughter from his friends told Gull it wouldn’t be their first drink of the night.
A few people at the bar edged over to give the group room while the bartender poured their drinks. The lead guy tossed it back, slapped down the glass, pointed at it.
“We need us some females.”
More group hilarity ensued. Looking for trouble, Gull concluded, and since he wasn’t, he went back to watching Rowan on the dance floor.
Janis leaned toward him as the band launched into a painful cover of “When the Sun Goes Down.” “Ro says you work in an arcade.”
“She talked to you about me?”
“Sure. We pass notes in study hall every day. I like arcades. You got pinball? I kill at pinball.”
“Yeah, new and vintage.”
“Vintage?” She aimed a narrow look with big brown eyes. “You don’t have High Speed, do you?”
“It’s a classic for a reason.”
“I love that one!” Her hand slapped the table. “They had this old, beat-up machine in this arcade when I was a kid. I got so good at it, I’d play all day on my first token. I traded this guy five free games on it for my first French kiss.” She sighed, sat back. “Good times.”
Following her gaze as it shifted to the bar, Gull glanced back in time to see the whiskey-drinker give a waitress passing by with a full tray a frisky slap on the ass. When the woman looked around, he held up both hands, smirked.
“Asshole. You can’t go anywhere,” Janis said, “without running into assholes.”
“Their numbers are legion.” He shifted a little more when Rowan stepped off the dance floor.
“That’s my seat.”
“I’m holding it for you.” He patted his knee.
She surprised him by dropping down on his lap, picking up his beer and drinking deep. “Big spender, buying local brew by the bottle. Don’t you dance, moneybags?”
“I might, if they ever play something that doesn’t make my ears bleed.”
“You can still hear them? I can fix that. Time for shots.”
“Count me out,” Gibbons said immediately. “The last time you talked me into that I couldn’t feel my fingers for a week.”
“Don’t do it, Gull,” Yangtree warned him. “The Swede has an iron gut. Got it from her old man.”
Rowan turned her face close to Gull’s and smirked. “Aw, do you have a tender tummy, hotshot?”
He imagined biting her heavy bottom lip, just one fast, hard nip. “What kind of shots?”
“There’s only one shot worth shooting. Te-qui-la,” she sang it, slapping her palm on the table with each syllable. “If you’ve got the balls for it.”
“You’re sitting on my balls, so you ought to kno
w.”
She threw back her head on that sexy saloon girl laugh. “Hold them for a minute. I’ll get us set up.”
She hopped up, swung around a couple times when Dobie grabbed her hand and gave her a twirl. Titania to Puck, Gull thought.
Then she hooked her thumbs in her front pockets and joined him in some sort of boot-stomping clog thing that had some of the other dancers whistling and clapping.
She shot a finger at Gull—and damn, there went his heart again—then danced over to the bar.
“Hey, Big Nate.” Rowan leaned in, hailed the head bartender. “I need a dozen tequila shots, a couple saltshakers and some lime wedges to suck on.”
She glanced over, gave the man currently grabbing his crotch a bored look, shifted away again. “I can take them over if Molly’s busy.”
The crotch-grabber slapped a hundred-dollar bill on the bar in front of her. “I’ll buy your shots and ten minutes outside.”
Rowan gave the bartender a slight shake of the head before he could speak.
She turned, looked the drunk, insulting bastard in the eye. “I guess since you lack any charm, and the only way you can get a woman is to pay her, you think we’re all whores.”
“You’ve been wiggling that ass and those tits out there since I came in. I’m just offering to pay for what you’ve been advertising. I’ll buy you a drink first.”
At the table, Gull thought, shit, and started to rise. Gibbons put a hand on his arm. “You don’t want to get in her way. Trust me on this.”
“I don’t like drunks hassling women.”
He shoved up, noted the noise level had diminished, so he clearly heard Rowan say in a tone sweet as cotton candy, “Oh, if you’ll buy me a drink first. Is that your pitcher?”
She picked it up and, with her height, had no trouble upending it over the man’s head. “Suck on that, fuckwit.”
The man moved pretty quick for a sputtering drunk. He shoved Rowan back against the bar, grabbed her breasts and squeezed.
And she moved faster. Before Gull was halfway across the room she slammed her boot on the man’s instep, her knee into the crotch he’d been so proud of, then knocked him on his ass with an uppercut as fine as Gull had ever seen when the drunk doubled over.
