I decided to take Cullen’s.
Because fuck him.
But when I pulled his suitcase out of the closet—it matched mine—I couldn’t hold back the tears.
Strands of long hair stuck to my wet cheeks as sobs bubbled up from my chest. I splayed my hand over my heart, suddenly understanding the term heartbroken with perfect clarity.
I’d thought I loved him. I’d thought he loved me.
Apparently I’d been wrong. Horribly wrong.
I needed to call my mom. I’d have to go to her place. I wasn’t the sort of girl who had many friends; I was too shy. And my best friend Ginny didn’t live nearby. Fortunately, I knew Mom wouldn’t mind.
Except I scrolled past my frequently used contacts—which was all of three people, Mom, Cullen, and Ginny—and stopped at a different number.
Dad.
Norman Stanley. Fire Chief, Tilikum Fire Department.
I didn’t know why I had the urge to call him. He wasn’t the parent I normally went to in a crisis. In fact, I didn’t even see my dad all that often.
But somehow the pieces of my cracked and bleeding heart yearned for the comfort of my father’s voice.
If he’d even answer. He was probably on duty. It seemed like that was all he ever did—work.
Still, I decided to give it a try. I brought up his number and hit send.
He answered on the first ring. “Hey, Skylar.”
A flood of renewed tears ran down my cheeks and I could barely croak out a single word.
“Daddy.”
1
Gavin
A trickle of sweat slid down my spine and the hot air around me was thick with smoke.
“How we looking up there, Gav?” Chief’s voice crackled on my radio.
I keyed the remote mic on my radio to reply. “A lot of smoke. Dirk might want to pull his crew out for a bit once we get this fireline cleared. They’re looking a little rough.”
As if on cue, the guy about ten feet down from me coughed.
“Copy that. Just get that debris cleared so you can get out of there.”
“Will do, Chief.”
Clouds of smoke billowed from the trees, casting a dingy haze over the landscape. I could taste it in the air, the acrid bitterness sitting on my tongue. A few inches from my feet, the ground sloped down—precarious, but not too steep to hike—until it dropped off abruptly into the valley below. A dry creek bed meandered across the bottom.
Beyond that, the burn raged, the forest glowing red.
It looked like hell down there.
Levi’s chainsaw roared next to me as he sliced through a trunk that clung to the rocky ground. He kicked the small tree, tipping it downslope so it could fall. The branches scraped across the ground as it slid, stirring up dust.
I adjusted the sixty-pound pack on my back, re-gripped my Pulaski—a tool with an ax on one side and a horizontal adze blade on the other—and attacked the stump that was left.
Chief had once told me that wildland firefighting was long hours of monotonous, backbreaking work punctuated by brief moments of sheer terror. In my experience so far, he was not wrong.
Except for the terror. I’d been right up against the edge of an out-of-control burn last season, and it hadn’t scared me. Got my blood pumping, though.
But mostly, we cleared a lot of debris.
A wildland firefighting crew worked alongside us. They’d been out here for the last few weeks, working to contain the forest fire that had eaten up tens of thousands of acres as it came down from the North Cascades, ripping through the dry mountain forests. Municipal fire departments like ours didn’t always work these kinds of fires. Brush fires, sure. But widespread forest fires weren’t usually our area.
Unless they were really big, or too close to town.
This one was both.
Levi straightened his back and wiped grime and sweat from his forehead with the back of his wrist. “Fuck, it’s hot.”
“No shit.”
Our faces were smeared with soot and dirt, mingling with sweat from the hundred-plus degree heat. The September sun mercilessly baked the mountains, cooking everything like one of Gram’s pies. It had been a hot, dry summer without a drop of rain for the last two months. Even now that it was almost fall, there was still no sign of precipitation.
Without another word of complaint, Levi and I both got back to work. We had a job to do. Bitching about it wasn’t going to make it better.
Besides, I didn’t care that it was hard. That my muscles ached, my hands were raw, the smoky air seared my lungs, and the heat did its best to suck every ounce of energy from my body. I lived for this shit. Needed it.
Gram inexplicably called me Otter—which was the least manly animal name ever—but really, I was a shark. Not because I was a bloodthirsty, vicious predator. I was actually a pretty nice guy. But sharks had to keep moving or they’d die.
That was me. A shark, always moving.
I’d tried to get Gram to change my nickname—I thought I had a damn good argument—but she’d just laughed at me.
But out here, digging a fireline so the burn would run out of combustible material if it decided to chase up the side of the valley, I was moving.
Besides, I hadn’t joined the fire department so I could spend my days rescuing kittens out of trees.
Levi and I dug the stump out of the ground and sent it down the slope. The guys around us dug and sawed and cleared. We had to get down to the mineral soil, where there was nothing left to burn. The top of a cliff wasn’t the ideal place for a fireline—usually a two- to four-foot trench—and right now, the fire wasn’t moving this direction. But there was a house not fifty yards behind us, so we couldn’t take the chance of the burn turning. If it did, it could get ugly fast.
Dirk, the wildland crew captain, walked by. His face was as dirty as mine no doubt was, grime caking into the lines around his eyes. He gave us a nod, his gaze sweeping over the ground, tracking our progress.
He wanted off this ridge as much as we did.
A breath of air brushed past my face, making my nose twitch. I stopped, lowering my Pulaski again. Inhaled deeply. It still smelled like smoke—no more than it had a few minutes ago—but something was different.
I could feel it.
“Fire’s gonna turn,” I said.
Levi glanced back at me. “You think?”
I scanned the forest below us, glowing red with heat, spitting clouds of smoke into the sky. Nothing looked different. Not yet. But I had a feeling.
“Yeah.” I sniffed again. “Smells wrong.”
Levi nodded. “Radio Chief. I’ll go tell Dirk.”
Under any other circumstances, Levi wouldn’t have listened to me. I knew it, he knew it. I was the little brother. The screw-up. The wild one. If we’d been sitting at home, or in a bar, or driving down the road, he’d have blown me off. But when it came to a crisis situation, if danger was involved, my instincts were… well, they were fucking weird is what they were. I was almost always right.
I radioed Chief.
“Go ahead.”
“Chief, just a heads up, I think the fire’s going to turn.”
“Understood.” Chief knew it, too. “Do you think it’s time to move out?”
I glanced back at the house. Wayne and Mary Risley’s house. They’d lived there for thirty years. We couldn’t let it burn. “Not yet. We can finish up here.”
“Okay. Helitack crew will be there soon with a bucket drop.”
A fresh wave of smoke blew over us and the guy next to me coughed again. “Maybe tell them to hurry up with that.”
“I will. Don’t do anything crazy, Gav. That’s an order.”
My mouth hooked in a grin. “Course not, Chief.”
I never did anything crazy. Not by my standards, anyway. Other people seemed to disagree, but as far as I was concerned, the things I did were completely sane.
Going against my instincts—now that would have been crazy.
Levi came back. “Dirk radioed the Incident Commander. Helitack crew should be here soon.”
“Yeah, Chief told me.”
“We should—shit!”
I whipped around to see what he was looking at.
Down the line, a group was working on a snag—a dead tree clinging precariously to the edge. The sawyer had lost his balance and dropped his damn chainsaw. The guy downslope from him shuffled his feet, trying to get out of the way of the deadly blade.
He slipped.
The chainsaw clattered against the rocks, spitting dirt into the air. It missed the guy below, sliding past him. It roared its way down the slope and dropped off the edge.
I was already running. Because the guy on the slope was going to fall.
My feet ate up the ground between me and the sawyer at the top. He stood, dumbstruck, his hands open at his sides.
“Gavin, wait,” Levi called behind me.
The guy on the slope bent at the waist and grabbed at the scrubby ground, his fingers digging for purchase. His feet scraped against the dirt, like something below had reached up and clutched his ankles. A fire demon lashing out with red hot rage, pulling its next victim to his demise.
Fuck that.
Turning sideways, I scrambled down the slope toward him, keeping my feet angled for maximum grip. Rocks tumbled down the hill, jarred loose by my boots. There was almost nothing to grab onto, save some thin roots and a few dry shrubs clinging to the rocky ground, but I’d been rock climbing for years. I’d be fine.
“Hang on, buddy,” I shouted.
He turned his feet outward, slowing his descent almost to a stop. His hands braced against the ground and he looked up at me, his eyes wide with fear.
I let gravity do the work, pulling me down, and the friction from my boots kept me from sliding out of control. My heart beat hard in my chest and the heat of the day, the smoke, the fatigue in my arms were gone. Nothing. Unimportant. Adrenaline washed it all away, like icy cold river water.
I was going to get this guy out. Safe. I knew it.
So I wasn’t scared.
He was, though, and that was not good. Rescuing someone in a panic was always dangerous.
I slowed down when I got close to him and found a rock to wedge my foot against. “Hey, brother. Don’t move, okay? What’s your name?”
“Robby.”
“How long have you been on the wildland crew?” I asked, just to get him talking while I pulled a coil of nylon rope out of my pack.
“First season.”
“No shit?” Smoke billowed around us, stinging my eyes. “You’re going to have a badass story to tell when you go home. Chased down the slope by a runaway fucking chainsaw.”
His mouth started to hook in a grin but his eyes widened, and before I could take another breath—let alone reach him—his feet slipped.
Primal fear contorted his features as he fell backward.
I heard him hit the bottom. “Fuck.”
People shouted at me from the top. Probably telling me to climb back up. No one wanted Robby to die—whether they knew his name or not—but I was just one guy without proper rescue equipment, clinging to a too-steep slope with a raging forest fire below pumping smoke into the air.
“Robby!” I called.
“Here,” he answered, his voice distorted with pain. He was alive, but injured.
“Are you bleeding?”
A pause. “Uh, no. But I think my leg’s broken.”
Shit. That meant Robby wasn’t climbing out on his own.
We needed a rescue team. Now.
“He’s down there,” I called to Levi at the top. “Possible broken leg.”
“Get up here, Gav,” Levi called back.
And I was going to. I really was. A rescue team would come and they’d get Robby out. They’d do a better job than I would anyway, with the right equipment and—
A flicker of warmth against my cheek made me turn toward the burn.
It was coming. It was going to jump that dry creek bed and crash through the valley like a tsunami of flame, eating everything in its path.
Including Robby.
I met Levi’s eyes. He opened his mouth, probably to yell at me to come up. But Robby didn’t have time.
My decision made, I took hold of one end of the rope and launched the other toward Levi. He caught it, still yelling something at me.
But I was focused on one thing and one thing only. Getting Robby out.
I shifted my feet to slide down to the edge, where the slope dropped off. I let go of the rope, leaving it to dangle over the side, then slipped off my pack and let it drop.
Then I pushed myself away from the slope and jumped.
It was high enough that I knew it was going to hurt when I landed, so it was no surprise that it did. I kept loose and rolled as soon as I hit, but that didn’t stop pain from shooting through my shoulder and back.
I ignored it. Paused for half a second to make sure no sharper jolts of pain manifested—none did—and got to my feet.
Smoke was thicker down here, trapped against the valley wall. The head of the fire wasn’t far and I could feel the heat of it beating at me.
“Gavin, check in. Now!” Levi’s voice roared through my radio.
“I’m good. Secure the rope. I’m gonna get him up.”
Robby was on his back about ten feet away, reaching down to hold his thigh.
“I got you, man,” I said, picking up my pack and jogging to him. “You’re going to be fine.”
In an ideal situation, I’d have properly secured his leg before even thinking about moving him. But we didn’t have time for ideal.
“Robby, I’m not going to lie, this is going to suck ass. But it’s better than being crispy fried.”
Through the dirt on his face, he was pale, sweat gleaming on his forehead. But he nodded. “Yeah, okay. What do we do?”
I pulled a second rope out of my pack and tied it around him, fashioning a makeshift harness. “I apologize in advance to your balls, but they’ll thank me later when they’re still attached to a live body.”
Through his pain and fear, he chuckled. Good. He was tough enough to laugh. He’d make it.
I looked over at the burn. The trees were glowing red masts jutting into the air, the hot embers like a thousand mocking eyes. Deadly hot smoke billowed upward, polluting the pristine sky with gray. A wave of heat washed over us, making Robby flinch and raise his hand to shield his face.
It was coming.
The dry creek bed had plenty of debris. The burn wouldn’t stop until it chased up the cliff and hit our fireline. Until it ran out of fuel.
Not today, Satan. We were getting out of here.
“Can you stand?” I asked.
“I’ll try.”
I helped him to his feet and draped his arm over my shoulders. He used me as a crutch, hobbling as I kept him upright. We quickly made our way to the cliff wall where my rope still hung down. I gave it a tug and radioed Levi.
“I’ve got Robby harnessed. He has a busted leg, so you guys have to do most of the work to haul him up.”
“Jesus, Gav. Copy that.”
“He’s going to give me so much shit for this later,” I said while I secured the rope to Robby’s harness. “Of course, when he watches that fire run up this fucking cliff, he’ll know I was right.”
“Thanks, man,” Robby said, his voice shaking.
I put my hand on his shoulder and met his eyes. “You can do this. You hear me? Embrace the suck and get your ass to the top.”
He nodded. “Got it.”
“Levi, bring him up.”
The rope went taut. Robby used his hands and good leg to climb up the cliff face while they pulled from above.
Damn, that had to hurt.
But dying would be worse, so…
I backed up so I could watch Robby through the smoke. As soon as they got him secured up top, they could throw the rope down to me. Climbing this would be easy. I did shit l
ike this all the time.
Not usually with a raging forest fire at my back, but hey, I loved new experiences.
The fire whispered behind me, the voice promising death. It would burn me to ash, reduce me to nothing. Wipe me from the face of the earth.
It was getting hotter, wasn’t it?
Slowly, I looked back over my shoulder, then radioed Levi.
“Bro, when did you say that helitack crew would get here?”
“They’re less than ten minutes out.”
Well that sucked. Because that was more time than I had to spare.
2
Gavin
“Gavin, get out of there,” Levi said through the radio.
My eyes darted around, looking for an escape route. “No shit, bro. I’m working on it. Anyone else got a rope up there?”
“Maybe. Hold tight.”
Rope wasn’t standard gear for us or for wildland crews. It was a me-thing to carry rope—and a fucking good thing for Robby. But it was taking too long to get him to the top. I didn’t have time to wait down here.
This was a seriously shitty place to be. If I went left or right, along the wall, I’d get cooked before I found an escape route. That meant there was nowhere to go but up.
A nice metaphor. It wasn’t going to get any worse.
I could live with that.
Time to climb.
Finding grips in the rock, I started to scale. I just had to make it to the edge, where it went from sheer cliff to steep hill. Once I got that far, I’d be able to scramble up, more or less on my feet. Or maybe by then Robby would be at the top and they could toss me the rope.
In the meantime, all those rock-climbing hours were sure coming in handy.
“Gavin, check in,” Chief said. “They’re moving everyone off the fireline.”
Wedging my boots into the rock, I made sure I could let go with one hand, then answered. “I’m climbing up. Did they get Robby out yet?”
A gust of wind, hot enough to sear my arm hair, buffeted me.
That wasn’t good.
“He’s fine. But Gav, we’ve got all the makings of a firestorm right where you are.”
I reached up, feeling around for another handhold. Dug my fingers in, pressing them as if I could indent the rock itself to give me just a little more purchase, and pushed upward with my feet.
Rushing In: A Small Town Family Romance Page 2
