Macy had the National Geographic folded up in her back pocket, the one with Tim and Akbar’s photo in it. No wonder she hadn’t recognized them, two tiny men staring up at a two-page spread of roaring inferno. But their presence totally made the image, showing the overwhelming scale they faced and battled. And Tim really was two Akbars tall. Even in their tiny corner of the photo, their height discrepancy was dramatic.
The article had also talked about the “Fire Witch,” the best FBAN working the West Coast fires. She was the fire analyst who’d beaten the New Tillamook Burn.
“You’re not playing very well.”
Macy blinked and looked down at the chess board on Carl’s bar, up at Natalie, then back down at the board. She had been playing, hadn’t she?
According to the positioning of the pieces on the board, she wouldn’t be beating any ten-year olds today.
“Sorry, Short Stuff.”
“Do you have to keep calling me that?” Natty wiped out one of Macy’s bishops. The other one was…already taken. Crap. She liked bishops—they were sly and sneaky, doing strange attacks at odd angles.
“Have to. It’s the law. I gotta do it while I can. You’re already taller than I was at your age, and way prettier.” Macy struck back with a mighty pawn move that, in retrospect, achieved nothing but put her one step closer to defeat.
“I’m pretty?” Natty looked up in surprise.
“Gorgeous,” Macy’s dad came up and kissed Natty on top the bright blond curls that shone even in French Pete’s dim interior.
“You too,” and he kissed Macy on the forehead.
“Biased,” she told him as she did every time he said something like that.
“Absolutely. You’re my gal.”
Natty finished cremating Macy’s pieces before Carl could even finish drawing a beer for her dad.
“Maybe I’ll do some homework,” then she shot a wicked grin at Macy, “I mean algebra has to be harder than beating you, doesn’t it?”
“Next time, Short Stuff.”
“Not for much longer, Stick Girl.”
“That Ms. Stick Girl to you.”
They stuck out their tongues at each other, but Macy had to work to find the smile. If Natalie took after her mom, she’d end up pretty in more than just her hair and face. Whereas the nicest thing that could be said about her own figure was “sleek.” “Stick Girl” would have been an apt nickname, as much now as back in high school, if she hadn’t gained a reputation early on for beating the crap out of anyone who used it.
She followed her father over to one of the booths, the one she’d been in with Tim just this morning. Then, when Natalie called to her, Macy had to double back to fetch her painfully silent radio and barely touched Coke.
“What has you so snarled up, sweetheart? Anything bad happen with Brett?”
“What? Brett?” What was he doing in this conversation? Oh, last night’s date. “Oh, no. He was fine.”
“It was good to see you dating again.”
“It wasn’t—” she gave it up. “Okay, it was, but it wasn’t. I aimed him at Linda Lee.”
“Always wondered why they didn’t get together.”
Macy had long ago learned that her dad saw far more than was comfortable.
“It’s from spending so much time with your mom,” he’d explain every time she whined about it. Josh Tyler saw who was pairing up and who was breaking up in Macy’s high school years, usually weeks before she did. Of course, he’d been everyone’s favorite teacher—he’d totally rocked third grade, even for her once she got over the stigma of being the teacher’s kid—so that probably gave him an inside track.
Once, when she’d been much younger, he’d made the mistake of pointing out some things about Tim Harada and Sally Kirkman, and then they’d gotten together; the hot item for all four years of high school. She hadn’t talked to her father for months after that. Ever since, Tim, Stephen, and her own relationships had been strictly off-limits between them.
“Did you see him this morning?”
“You’re doing it again, Dad,” she sighed. No need to ask who “him” was. Macy was twenty-five and still fighting a lost cause. Fine, there were only so many fronts she could be contrary on at once. “Yeah, I did. We spent a couple hours together.”
“Where is he? I haven’t seen him since last night.”
“Arctic Village.”
He looked at her in surprise.
“Fighting a forest fire.” On his vacation, rather than spending time with her…no, she wasn’t going to think about what they’d be doing if they were together. Partly because she hadn’t a clue; fighting or— And she definitely wasn’t going to think about that in front of her father.
“You don’t want me to say it, so I won’t.”
“Grown women are not supposed to be so transparent to their fathers.”
“It’s only because I love you so much, sweetheart.”
Macy sighed, glared at her silent radio for putting her in this predicament.
Her father sat silently.
“Say it.”
Now it was her father’s turn to study his beer, shift it around in little twists until he’d turned it through a full three-sixty.
“Go on!” Macy clamped her tongue in her teeth against the tone. Her father smiled rather than being put off.
“You two always had something special together.”
“Yeah, I kept dragging him into trouble and he kept me from getting in too deep.”
Her father nodded, then sipped his beer. “Yep. That’s about right. He always did love you.”
She was still gaping at him when Mom slid in beside him.
“I killed him gloriously,” she crowed as she waved at Carl for a pint.
“You killed the hero?” Then that smile of his started. “Does he get resurrected later in the book?”
“Not a chance, Mister. His ass was vaporized, across six dimensions and three timelines,” she kissed her husband on the cheek. “Besides, I never agreed he was the hero of this story.”
Macy closed her eyes and tried not to think about the man facing a fire three hundred miles over the horizon.
# # #
There were times that night that Tim wished he’d called up more air support. The fire had dodged south before turning east once more. It would have been a good time to have another plane or chopper on site.
When the BLM clerk had informed him that the nearest asset was three hours out, Tim had declined. Three hours from now they’d have either beaten the beast or they would be in full retreat.
They had to drive the fire break another half mile out. A dozen villagers had arrived over the rough terrain on four-wheel ATVs. He got them shifting equipment and making sure his team was kept supplied with water, food, and fuel for their saws and pumps.
Three hours.
That’s about how fast Macy and her LongRanger could be here from Larch Creek. Right. That was probably the asset that the post clerk had been referring to.
Too late now.
He hoped she wasn’t taking it personally. MHA had enough rockin’ female heli-pilots that any bias he’d had about women in harm’s way had long since been extinguished. Besides Krista bucked fire just as effectively as he and Akbar did when the three of them jumped a fire together.
He could really use the two of them right now.
“Hank!” he grabbed the man by his harness and they leaned on each other for support.
After sixteen hours on the fire, the only thing that kept them upright was being in constant motion so that they didn’t simply tip over sideways. Stopping led perilously close to the danger of simply collapsing to the soil in exhaustion.
“Cut me a hole, Hank. That line, right there,” he held out an arm. “Take your best sawyer and make a path even twenty feet wide. In ten
minutes I’ll send another team to take the next twenty feet and so on. We’re going to open up the line in a wedge form, but your goal is get me even twenty feet of breathing room all the way across in front of the fire. Don’t look back, because if you do, we’ll run over your lazy behind.”
Too exhausted to speak, Hank punched his acknowledgement against Tim’s shoulder and took off shouting for Tina. Tina? Tim didn’t even know he had a woman on the crew. They were common enough among the Hot Shots now, but female smokies were few and far between.
“Go get ‘em!” he croaked after the pair as they began slicing into the tree line. Tim rubbed at his shoulder.
It wasn’t that Hank’s punch had hurt, but he’d hit right where Macy’s head had rested against his shoulder after they’d kissed. Somewhere in the firefight, he’d come to terms with that. He still had no idea at all of what to do about it, but he wasn’t going to be complaining if she was willing to try it again.
# # #
Macy hadn’t slept a single blink all night. She’d even let Baxter up on the foot of the bed, which always made him so happy that it was like going to sleep bathed in the dog’s joy.
Not a single eye blink.
After breakfast—she still needed to get milk and eggs—knowing she was a complete idiot, she drove down to the hangar and pulled out the LongRanger.
Screw the expense! She was going to fly up to Arctic Village on her own dime.
Macy dragged the folded up Bambi fire-fighting bucket to the bird and leveraged it into the cabin…just in case. When in use, the big orange bucket dangled a hundred feet below her helo and could scoop up two hundred gallons in seconds. It took up two seats, but it was worth bringing it along.
She was passing Fairbanks and striking north when her radio squawked.
“Ladd Airfield smokie to Tyler. You out there, Macy?”
It was Hank. The fear hit her like a slap. Why would Hank be calling her? Where was Tim?
“Here!” she managed in a desperate gasp.
“Easy, girl,” he chuckled. “Didn’t mean to spook you. I got a passed out piece of meat here with your name on it. You want me to hold it for pick up or stuff it into a handy bunk?”
Macy slammed over the controls hard enough for Baxter to yip in surprise as he scrambled for purchase on the copilot’s seat.
“I’ll…” take a deep breath. That seemed to help so she took another and then wondered if she was about to hyperventilate and pass out with relief. She really needed to teach Baxter how to fly just in case. “…fetch him now. Why don’t you just prop him up outside for me. I’ll drop a longline and haul him home.” There, that sounded more normal.
She hit the other radio and called the control tower for permission to enter the pattern.
“Will do, Macy,” Hank’s knowing chuckle was cut off when he released his transmit key.
Less than two minutes later she was idling down the engine and looking at Tim slumped against the side of one of the Sherpas. Hank had helped Tim to his feet by the time she reached them.
“Hey, Mace,” Tim brightened up as she took his other arm. He leaned in and placed a sloppy kiss on her cheek. He reeked of smoke and char. His face was blackened with soot as was the Nomex gear that was still draped over him.
But he was having real trouble placing one foot in front of the other.
“Are you hurt?”
“Nah!” Hank answered for him as Tim stumbled back toward the helo. “Turns out he’d just come off a ten-day burn down in California before he came up here. Wouldn’t have known it yesterday and last night though. Damn! I was sure that was a two-day fire, maybe three. With Tim out in front the whole way, we beat it in one.”
There was no way to get him into the copilot’s seat. Tim’s long legs, heavy fire gear, and complete lack of motor control defeated their best efforts to get him into the seat. She finally opened the rear cabin door and tipped him over onto the floor. He was asleep before he hit the deck.
They closed him in and stood outside for a moment beneath the slowly whirling rotor blades.
“Thanks, Hank.”
“You bet. You were here pretty damn quick.”
“Happened to be passing nearby…” she didn’t know what to say to him.
“With a two hundred gallon Bambi bucket stowed in your passenger cabin. Got the picture. Seriously, Macy. I’ve been jumping fire for over five years. I knew he and Akbar were the best; I just never really understood what that meant ‘til now.”
“Go home, Hank. Go see your lady.” She kissed his cheek in thanks, which was such a girly gesture that it totally surprised her even if Hank just took it in stride.
“You see to your man, Macy. He’s a good one.” And Hank was moving back toward the hangar not all that much steadier on his feet than Tim had been. Tim wasn’t the only good man who’d been on that fire.
She was aloft in minutes, flying as smoothly as she could, though nothing short of another fire would probably wake him.
It wasn’t until Macy was halfway back to Larch Creek that Hank’s words sank in.
Her man?
When the hell had that happened?
# # #
Macy wasn’t quite sure why she’d done it the way she had. Maybe it was that the only way she’d found to move Tim was to back her pickup right up against the passenger cabin opening and drag him across like a sack of coffee beans.
At the time it had struck her as an ignominious way to deliver him back it his parents. Hi! Here’s your exhausted, dirty, smelly son. Good luck with him.
Instead she’d taken him back to her place, driving around to the back kitchen door and getting the tailgate over the rear porch. Then she’d looked at him. Her own hands and arms were already black-smeared from handling him.
“Well, Harada. This is gonna be a new experience for both of us.”
She stripped off his borrowed boots and smoke gear right there in the truck bed. Next were the cotton long johns that were also black at collar, wrists, and ankles.
Macy had him most of the way out of them before she really thought about what he’d be wearing underneath. It turned out to be a white cotton tank top and blue briefs, briefs being the operative word. Couldn’t the man at least have worn boxers under there? These left far too little to the imagination.
Especially since she didn’t know if he was thinking their kiss before the fire had been serious or an invitation to a fling.
And neither did she.
“Well, Tyler. You’re the one who caught this fish and fetched it home. What are you going to do with it now?”
Finish the job.
She started with a washcloth and a bucket of soapy water. He was only sooty from the neck up and the wrists out, so she’d just concentrate on those. When gentle brushes failed to produce much result she began scrubbing, finally in earnest.
He roused enough to blink at her in protest, then smiled.
“Macy,” he sounded very pleased as one of his hands moved to cup her breast.
The shock was enough to steal her breath in that moment before he passed out once more. She peeled his hand off her breast. It was the first time she’d heard him say her proper name since they’d been kids and that took her breath away as much as the grope. Mace was a kid, a nickname that felt as if it was adding distance every time Tim used it. Macy was who she had grown up to be and at least his near-unconscious mind acknowledged that.
Macy returned to washing his face.
“Yep!” she tried to make her voice Neanderthal low as she spoke to Baxter who had perched on the back porch to oversee the operation. “I dragged it home, gonna clean it up and then…” she had no idea what.
“Stupid Day! Ha!” she told Baxter. “I get it. Yesterday everything Tim did was stupid. Today must be my turn.”
Baxter wasn’t arguing.
Well if it was her Stupid Day then there was no way she would finish this without being totally embarrassed. She finished his hands and had returned to cleaning Tim’s face when she heard her name called from out front.
“Out back,” she shouted and sighed. Resigned, she focused on cleaning one of his ears.
“Hi, Macy. Have you seen my son?” Eva Harada was already speaking as she came around the corner of the house. She didn’t have the decency to look shocked, surprised, or even a little alarmed when she took in the scene. Instead a smile lit her face as she stepped over the smokejumper gear that Macy had jettisoned over the side and looked into the truck bed at her prostrate son.
“Hi, Eva. Yes, it seems I have.”
“I see that. Have you noticed that he always looks like he’s up to something when he’s asleep? Most children look more innocent asleep than awake, but Tim was always backwards about that. Used to scare me to death as a mother. I was always worried that he would grow into that look.”
Macy stared down at him. She’d never thought about it, but could see it now. Had noticed it before too, like the time she’d snuck into the Harada’s house to slide a shovelful of snow under Tim’s blankets. He had looked so dangerous that she’d almost snuck off deed undone. But ultimately she’d decided it was only all the more reason to follow through.
Then she thought of the electric kiss yesterday, and the way he’d just smiled while groping her breast.
“Maybe he is growing into it.”
Eva hummed in the back of her throat, “Would you like some help?”
“Well, I think this is about as clean as I’m going to get him without tossing him in the river. Let me get a blanket over him and I can bring him home for you.”
Eva smiled up at her.
“What?” And then she knew. “Not you too?”
“Me too?” Eva did her best to look all innocent and Macy could see exactly where Tim had gotten his present sly and sneaky expression.
“My father.”
“Josh Tyler was always a smart man,” Eva looked back down into the truck bed. “Tim is right where he should be. I’ll help you get him inside.”
Wildfire at Larch Creek Page 8
