Hot Shot

by M. J. Fredrick

  “You were there.”

  “I was.” The words were rough. “I was new at the paper, where I worked before I got this job, writing, which I knew I could love. I wanted to make a splash, and I was following a scoop, so I went to the chop shop with my photographer. I didn’t know I’d end up as the story, screaming over the death of my husband.”

  Had she pulled further away or had he? There was a definite chasm between them, painful after last night. But if he was honest, she hadn’t opened herself to him last night.

  He hadn’t opened himself to her completely, either, but more than he had to any other woman since Jen.

  She choked, and he couldn’t bring himself to reach for her.

  “Dan knew I was there. He was mad about it. But he was usually so focused. I didn’t think I was putting him in danger. If I’d listened—” She swallowed, looked down at her hands. “I loved him.” Her voice was thinner, higher, a ghost of the voice of the woman he knew. “He settled me down in a way nothing else could. I mean, we were thinking about having kids. He wouldn’t have been the same person if he hadn’t been a cop, if he hadn’t been so good at it, committed. It made my life hard, but he loved who he was. It gave him this confidence, this belief in himself that he was invincible.”

  Gabe knew something about that. “I guess there are people who have to do this kind of job to make them feel like they’re alive.”

  “Except it’s an easy way to get not alive anymore.” She took a deep breath, drawing back tears. They rattled in her throat. “They gave him a hero’s burial, a twenty-one-gun salute. I have the flag from his casket. After he died, well, I woke up. I had to find a focus or drown.”

  He pictured her at the graveside, too young to be a widow. Had anyone been with her to comfort her? Or had she been alone?

  “What about the guy who killed him?” He turned the conversation, needing it to be about results instead of questions. “Did they catch him?”

  “He’s still awaiting trial.”

  “After nineteen months?”

  “Justice is a slow process.” She gave him a sad little Mona Lisa smile. “It just doesn’t matter now. It won’t bring Dan back.”

  “And you writing these articles? It’s because of him?”

  She nodded. “All because of him.”

  Guilt. It made you do things you never thought you’d do. But as Gabe pulled the hotel door shut behind them, he wished he didn’t know she’d wanted her husband to be someone he wasn’t.

  Chapter Ten

  The rest of the crew sat at a long table, eating breakfast, when Peyton and Gabe came downstairs. The only two empty chairs were not together. One, at the head, was clearly meant for Gabe, because Kim sat beside it, and the other in the middle of the group on Kim’s side. Peyton started toward it, but Gabe caught her hand and led her to the head of the table.

  “Move down one,” he said, and two firefighters beside Kim shifted to new chairs.

  An expression of betrayal froze Kim’s face. Gabe tilted his head in expectation, and Kim glanced at their joined hands, then shot Peyton a heated look before doing as Gabe asked. Peyton’s shoulders were tense as she took Kim’s chair. So much for fitting in with the crew. She’d known that would be a side effect of her decision last night, but hadn’t realized Gabe would advertise their relationship. He sure didn’t seem the type.

  The rest of the crew were quiet a minute, taking in the change, but conversation resumed when a new waitress brought them breakfast menus.

  “It doesn’t mean anything, you know,” Kim said, leaning slightly toward Peyton when Gabe was distracted in conversation with Howard. “He’s slept with all of us. You’ll just be the favorite till someone new comes along.”

  Peyton knew that wasn’t true. Too much emotion had passed between them last night for him to be a player. Still, she let her gaze wander the table. “Who was the favorite before me?”

  Oh, way to antagonize, Peyton. Kim’s hand folded into a fist.

  “I was.”

  Right. In her dreams. Peyton tried not to show her alarm at the younger woman’s anger. “Then I guess I’ll just have to enjoy it till someone new comes along.” But her hands were shaking from the confrontation as she stirred her coffee.

  Their time away from camp, and the drain of her confession, made their return feel like they’d stepped into a slow-motion dream. Peyton wasn’t sure if the camp itself had changed or only her perception of it. She sensed no energy, no excitement, none of the confidence in the firefighters she’d experienced when she first arrived.

  Filthy men and women milled around as though wading through water. They looked at Peyton and Gabe with bloodshot eyes and grim faces, as if sensing and resenting they’d gotten a full night’s sleep in a real bed.

  Jen appeared worst of all when they found her outside the strategy tent. For the first time, Peyton studied Jen woman to woman. The stress of the job had her pale and drawn. Her years of outdoor activity had honed a strength in her no gym could duplicate. Her masculine attire belied her natural beauty, her golden blonde hair swept back efficiently but the style only served to accent an elegantly boned face. Peyton didn’t have nearly as much trouble picturing Gabe and Jen together as she had hoped.

  “Where’ve you two been?” Jen asked irritably, walking back into the tent without waiting for an answer.

  “We had a few hours’ leave coming,” Gabe responded, following. Peyton debated her role here a moment, especially since Gabe hadn’t said much after her revelation, then trailed after them.

  Jen swiped an escaping lock of hair back from her face. “Right, yeah. I forgot. That seems like a year ago.”

  “That bad?” he asked, almost solicitous. Peyton felt dizzy with envy at the history between them, and wondered why. She’d only known Gabe a handful of days, and was jealous of a past she hadn’t been a part of? Who knew she had a possessive streak?

  “I just found out the president is coming to assess the situation.”

  “The president?” Gabe echoed.

  “Coming here?” Peyton asked, her reporter instincts kicking in.

  Jen glanced at Peyton, having clearly forgotten she was there. “Yeah, specifically to Bounty. They want me to brief him, and at the same time they’re beefing up security, so it’s harder for crews and supplies to get through, as if I didn’t have enough to worry about.” She stopped and regarded them quizzically. “I’m surprised you guys didn’t have any trouble getting back in.”

  “One of my crew was on the road to vouch for me,” Gabe said. “I thought it was a little weird. The president, huh?”

  “Yeah, well, if we were getting the job done, he wouldn’t have to come out. And then—Jesus.” Jen’s hand was shaking as she pushed back her hair. When Jen looked up at Gabe, her eyes were dark with pain. “I may as well tell you. You’ll find out anyway. Doug’s been arrested.”

  The words bucked Peyton’s heart, but Gabe merely smiled. Peyton turned to him, amazed at his lack of sensitivity. “Another bar fight?”

  “No!” Jen choked the word out, waving her hand in front of her in a release of pent-up energy. “They think he started this fire.”

  “What?” Gabe’s tone sharpened as his body snapped to attention and he rounded the table to Jen’s side. “Why would they think that?”

  Peyton watched Jen gather herself, square her shoulders, swallow her tears. She was working hard not to show weakness to Gabe. Her voice, when she spoke again, was steady, businesslike. “They found the point of origin. They found a drip torch—his drip torch, with his fingerprints—and footprints they say are his.”

  “How could they find footprints or fingerprints?” Peyton asked, thinking of the moonscapes she’d seen on the mountain, when nothing was left.

  “In a forest fire, you look for the area of least destruction, because the fire burned away from the point of origin, moving uphill,” Jen said wearily. “It left the evidence behind.”

  “But Doug’s experienced. He wouldn
’t have left evidence.” Peyton worked it through, letting the thoughts come out of her mouth without censoring them. Way to go, Peyton.

  Gabe pivoted toward her, his expression closed, as it had been the first day she had joined his crew. “He didn’t do this.”

  From the corner of her eye, Peyton saw the surprise on Jen’s face as she faced Gabe.

  “I’ve known Doug half my life.” Gabe’s tone was insistent. “He’s a good firefighter. Nothing’s more important to him. He would never do this.” He turned to Jen. “Why do they say he did it?”

  She shook her head, and this time lost the battle with her tears. In her panic, her voice rose. “They don’t have a motive. They arrested him on physical evidence alone.”

  “How did his drip torch get out there?” Peyton asked.

  Both Jen and Gabe turned to her, brows furrowed in identical expressions, like she’d said something wrong.

  “I don’t know.” Frustration colored Jen’s every word, every movement.

  Peyton blew out an impatient breath, searching her mind for some explanation. “Could he have been starting a backfire?”

  “There would have been record of authorization,” Jen said. “There was none.”

  “I’m just searching for answers here.” Peyton looked curiously at Gabe, at Jen’s side. She would not allow herself to be hurt. There were no sides here, right? Jen was just worried about her husband, and Gabe was worried about Jen, so he was feeling protective. He couldn’t still love Jen and make love with her the way he had last night. “They have to have a reason, a motive. Have they set bail?”

  Jen shook her head, battling tears. “It’s happened so fast.”

  “Do you have a lawyer?”

  “No!” Jen’s denial burst forth on a wail, and Gabe reached for her, pulled her into his arms to soothe her.

  Peyton felt like she’d been kicked in the sternum as Jen tucked her head under Gabe’s chin, folded her hands against Gabe’s chest. Still, she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the former husband and wife.

  It didn’t help that Jen was the one to push against Gabe’s chest and move away, to look over at her. That Gabe was the one who stood with his arms empty.

  “The bail hearing is in an hour. I can’t go, I can’t leave, not with the president due to arrive tomorrow.” Jen wiped at her face and looked at Peyton. “Will you go?”

  Peyton stared, unable to fathom what the woman had just said. Even Gabe took a step back. “Jen, he’s your husband.”

  “And this is my job, my responsibility. Doug understands.” She swept her hand to encompass the fire camp. “I can’t just leave camp. Will you go?”

  Peyton blinked. There had been days when she would have done anything to have just another hour with Dan, and this woman was choosing her career over her husband? Even with the imminent arrival of the president, she would have chosen Dan.

  She was fairly certain he wouldn’t have made the same choice.

  Gabe’s somber expression revealed a ghost of pain. Had Jen made those choices when she was married to Gabe as well?

  “You don’t even know me,” Peyton murmured.

  “Right. I know almost everyone in camp, and while I understand the word will spread faster than the fire, I need just a few more hours where no one knows. A few more hours to get my thoughts together.”

  “Uh, Jen, she’s a reporter, remember?”

  Color brightened Jen’s cheeks and anger flashed in her eyes when she looked at him. “I don’t need her silence forever. Just her silence for now.” She turned back to Peyton. “Will you go?”

  “If Gabe will go with me,” Peyton answered finally.

  Jen nodded, relief clear in every line of her body. “That would be great. I appreciate it.”

  Appreciate? Peyton opened her mouth, but Gabe closed his hand around her arm and tugged her toward the tent exit.

  “We’ll bring him back here.” He ducked out, pulling Peyton behind him.

  “Is she kidding?” Peyton couldn’t hold the question in until they were out of earshot of the tent. “Her husband is in jail and she can’t take a few hours off?”

  Gabe’s jaw tensed. “She does have a big responsibility here. She has to explain to the president how this got out of control.” A smirk twisted his lips. “It won’t be easy for her to hold back. Jen hates President Hutchinson.”

  Peyton shook off the comment. “But you couldn’t do her job for a few hours? Someone else? Instead she sends you to go get Doug, knowing how you feel about him?” The words tumbled over each other in her rage.

  “Technically, she sent you.” The smile he gave her was grim. “You dragged me into it.”

  “Well, look.” Peyton hung back, urgency at getting to the bottom of this warring with the unfairness of it. Poor Doug. How would he feel, already vulnerable and now rejected by his wife? Put in second place to the president?

  Okay, bad example.

  Still. “Go tell her you’ll act as incident commander, and I’ll go with her to bail out Doug.”

  He shook his head. “She won’t like that solution. She’s a firefighter first, Peyton. She always has been. Don’t be too hard on her. It’s bad, but he didn’t do it.”

  “That doesn’t always matter. Maybe—maybe she didn’t come herself so she could keep a distance from him. It wouldn’t do her career any good to be married to a suspected arsonist, right? And that’s why she doesn’t want anyone to know yet.”

  What the hell was wrong with these people that they didn’t see the problem there? No matter how important the job, people were more important. Would Doug understand when his wife didn’t show up? Was he just like these two? She didn’t think so. Even the expression on Gabe’s face when Jen had refused to leave told Peyton he didn’t agree with Jen’s decision.

  Dan had been driven like Jen, and Peyton could easily imagine Doug’s reaction when Jen didn’t show up at the courthouse. Did she and Gabe have more in common than she thought? “Was that part of the reason you broke up? That she put the job first all the time?”

  Gabe looked at her, like he had a message he wanted to make sure she got. She returned his gaze questioningly, and he glanced away. “I’m not all that different. We were equal there.”

  Just like Dan. Damn it, she knew better. So why let it hurt? Could she handle being part of a relationship where she was second to the job again? Was she willing to be committed to a man who didn’t put her first? “But if the person you loved was in trouble—would you stay on the job and let someone else take care of it?”

  His eyes were sad, as if he was unable—or unwilling—to give her more. “I wish I could say no. The hell of it is, I don’t know.”

  She nodded, but needed more. She had to cut bait. As soon as she could get out of here, she would. As great as the sex had been, she wasn’t willing to give up part of her soul again.

  Forcing her thoughts to the present and not to what-might-have-beens, she made her way to the van they’d just parked.

  “You’re very certain Doug’s innocent,” she said as he pulled out of the camp onto the main road. “Up on the mountain, you were ready to believe he was capable of anything.”

  Gabe’s gaze cut to her, and she felt the wariness that had disappeared overnight cloak him again. See, another reason to walk away. He wouldn’t allow himself to trust her.

  He turned his attention back to the dirt road. “I’ve known him a long time. He may be a son of a bitch, but he wouldn’t put anyone’s life in danger. He’s been around the dragon too long.”

  “Was he with you on Angel Ridge?”

  The van staggered when he let his foot off the pedal in surprise, throwing Peyton against her seatbelt. “Who told you about that?”

  “Howard.” She straightened, adjusted the strap over her shoulder and took a deep breath before pursuing the conversation. “You’d have to respect fire after seeing something so horrifying.”

  “No, Doug wasn’t there.” He accelerated again. So much for ela
boration. “He was in Montana. Doesn’t mean he doesn’t have respect for fire, though.”

  “That doesn’t preclude him from being an arsonist. Why are you so certain he isn’t?” She was pushing him, more than was wise, but she was leaving anyway, right? Why did she care if he was mad at her, as long as she got the story?

  So what if she was doing what he accused her of? Using people for her own gain?

  “I told you. He wouldn’t risk hurting people. He doesn’t have it in him.”

  “He hurt you.” She wanted to take the words back as soon as they were out of her mouth. She was forcing him to turn away, in case she didn’t have the courage to walk when the time came.

  “Goddamnit, Peyton, what do you think I’m going to say?” When the tires hit the shoulder, he fought the wheel to pull the van back onto the road. “That he did it, and I’m glad, and I hope he rots in jail, so I can have Jen?”

  “Is that what you want?” She forced the words past the lump in her throat.

  “Jesus, are you jealous?” His voice rose on his incredulity.

  She choked back the lump. “Of a woman who can’t walk away from her job long enough to get her husband out of jail? No.”

  “Hitting a little close to home?” he asked quietly, with an insight she hadn’t expected, not when his own emotions had to be too close to the surface for his comfort. He was thinking of Dan, of what she’d told him. His tone and perceptiveness had her relaxing marginally.

  “Maybe.” She didn’t have to push so hard, not yet. Again, she steered the conversation. “Jen thinks he’s been set up. He has no clear motive. Jen has more of a motive than he does.”

  He whipped around in surprise. “What’s hers?”

  “She got to be IC, didn’t she? Clearly her job’s important to her.” Or Jen would be the one going to town.

  He was silent a moment, his jaw working angrily. “Jen has a lot of faults, God knows, but setting up her husband to take a fall isn’t one.”

  In his opinion, anyway. Gabe did value loyalty. Why he thought the woman who hadn’t shown him any would show it for another man, Peyton didn’t know. “I don’t believe she did it. I’m reasoning out loud, trying to figure why they think Doug might have done it, aside from the physical evidence. Jen has a stronger motive.”