Page 1 of Return By Fire

CHAPTER ONE

Present Day

I step onto the balcony and inhale the crisp air derived from the glacier that’s so close, I feel my soul reaching out to it. Amused, I admit to myself that twenty years ago, I’d have ignored the klatch of women waiting for me to join them in favor of whipping out subterranean thermometers, setting up probes, and a portable chemistry lab.

With a glance behind me at the impressive kitchen I’m stepping out of with a freshly topped off coffee and a baby monitor, I can’t help but smirk. “Really awful living conditions.”

“I know,” Maris Smith, my best friend and sister-in-law, drawls in her smoky voice. “This place is a complete hovel.”

“A slum,” Rainey Meyers agrees without opening her eyes from where she’s rocking on the hammock. Her voice is slurred from finding that perfect moment in time between sleep and consciousness when she asks her sister Meadow, our hostess, “How can you stand to live in such a dump?”

I make my way over to the L-shaped couch to resume my spot even as Meadow Bourneman twists on her chaise lounge so she’s facing the three of us. “It’s a struggle, but I manage. Kara, is the baby all right?”

“Just hungry.” In fact, if my son was any more perfect, I’d wonder if they injected him with some kind of clinical trial drug at the hospital when he was born. He’s just that much of an angel.

Now, my daughter... I shudder when thoughts of all the trouble an adorable toddler with golden eyes can get into. Instead of letting it ruin my time with my best friends, I shove it to the side and do what I always do. I blame her father for spoiling her too much.

Speaking of my three-year-old angel, she’s screaming for someone to change the channel to Bluey. Fortunately, my oldest steps in before I have to leave my “sisters” for the second time. Wearily, I ask, “Whose idea was it to bring the kids?”

Maris lifts her glass. “Yours.”

“Christ, why didn’t you tell me I was being a sentimental idiot?” I joke, knowing she did just that.

Everyone laughs even though we know we wouldn’t have it any other way. Having our family—as many of us as possible—together in one spot for any period of time is a gift we all cherish. Then, as if to cap off our decision to bring our kids along for our long overdue vacation, I hear my oldest son turn into a puddle of mush at his baby sister’s demands—much like his Uncle Dean did for him.

Dean. My head bows and my fingers clench hard around my coffee mug until my knuckles are white. If there were one person I could will into walking through Rainey’s front door right now, it would be my big brother. In my head, I know his arrival is an impossibility, but my heart still believes in miracles.

“What do you guys want to do today?” Meadow asks, bringing me back to the conversation.

“Do we have to do anything more than this?” Rainey wonders. She’s spread eagle across the two-person hammock, dark hair poking through the natural knots.

“If you were wearing a swimsuit right now, do you know who you would remind me of?’ I remark offhandedly.

“Dua Lipa?” Rainey offers, hopefully. Too hopefully.

Showing she’s always on the same brain wavelength as me, Maris grinds her hope into the cool earth Rainey’s home sits upon. “Wrong. Try Jed.”

Rainey almost upends herself as she shoots from her lounging position. “You take that back right now!”

Meadow, who spun around to glance at her sister, slides down the lounger laughing. “Your hair...”

It’s all she needs to say. Rainey’s normally sleek hairstyle is sticking up.

“Worse than sex hair, Rainey,” Maris confirms. “All you have to do to become Jed’s twin right now is slap on a pair of those damn flamingo shorts he loves so much.”

“You all suck,” Rainey declares.

Meadow hums, “Frequently.”

“As often as possible,” Maris agrees.

I don’t speak, but my lips curve upward—the smile of a cat who licked up all the cream. Down to the very last drop. I recall last night when my husband was gripping the bedpost in the room we’re staying in, and I could feel his thighs quivering...

I tune in to hear Meadow giving Rainey’s secrets up. “Then there was the time Rainey came home late—all apologetic.”

“Of course I was,” Rainey agrees complacently, even as her skin color begins to pinken.

Meadow continues, “After she talked her way out of being grounded, she burst into my room, and it’s all she could talk about.”

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