Page 37 of Smoke Season

He started with the good news. “Word just in, people. We have containment on the urban interface line.”

A thunder of applause accompanied this announcement, but underneath it, Mel heard the low rumble of murmuring from the more fire-science-savvy of the community.

“If it’s not heading Carbon and Highline way, what’s that mean for the Outlaw?” someone called out.

Mel pinched her eyes shut as her prediction of a moment before was confirmed. “I’m told efforts will need to be redirected there,” Keith admitted as the clapping died down to a smattering. It ceased altogether as the prospect of the Outlaw—Carbon’s prime recreational hot spot and tourism draw—becoming a ravaged wasteland sank in. If the worst came to pass and the river corridor was consumed, a full-on public outcry would follow in its wake, drawing complaints from locals and environmentalists alike.

“At least the Wild and Scenic Act will kick in some federal funds,” Sam reminded the crowd. Mel nodded. Saving the protected river would take higher priority to the federal government than saving dot-on-the-map Carbon. And that boded well for True.

But before Mel could parse the nuances of environmentalism versus local jobs, Keith had a second announcement, one that was news to Mel. “As a result, as of twenty-one hundred this evening, ODOT has ordered the Outlaw River Road from Carbon all the way to the coast officially closed.”

River. Road. Closed.In less than an hour’s time. The words detonated in Mel’s brain like shards of shrapnel. Forget the uproar forthcoming from those who relied on the river to fund their outdoor recreation businesses. Forget even the generalized fear of the flames progressing west. The closing of the river road would seal off Temple Bar completely. Toeveryone. And sealinanyone who hadn’t gotten out already. Her thoughts swung wildly back to True, somewhere in the wilderness with her clients, undoubtedly unaware of this update. They could become stuck, put in the path of the fire. Put at risk, all because of Mel.

Don’t. Fucking. Panic.With the fire on a new trajectory, Highline Road would almost certainly remain at Level 1. She heard the liaison: the firefighting focus would now shift, Mel’s team along with it. She could focus almost entirely on helping True. New assignments would come down the line, and she’d be back out in the field, able to be proactive, by morning.

Which seemed impossibly far away.

So when she saw Chris Fallows slip through the crowd and out of the Eddy, several but not all of his cronies on his heels, it was all she could do to keep from leaping up from her chair immediately to follow him. Were they headed west to Temple Bar before the closure became official? The timing of their exit couldn’t be coincidence. Did they think True might use the river-road closure as a way to disappear with their cash? And what would they do to her if so?

Think,she ordered herself instead.Be smart.Surely the sheriff’s department personnel tasked with enforcing the road closure would turn Chris and his friends around if they attempted to travel west, though the Department of Transportationdidalways give rafting traffic the courtesy of a couple hours, at the very least, in which to pull stakes and get folks off the water.

Which only opened her mind up to further threats. If True secured one of these last-minute rides for her clients, her absence on the river would only confirm Chris’s suspicions. Or worse, she could arrive at Temple Bar only to be met by someone in Fallows’s back pocket. A local or even a Fish and Wildlife employee, ready to hold her for questioning, just for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.Fallows knows people everywhere,Sam had always told Mel. He’d set up Zack Murphy to take the fall for him for far less. God, if True was arrested, if the truth came out ... Mel couldn’t even go there. Money-laundering and drug-smuggling charges would ruin far more than just Annie’s chance at surgery.

She was still turning over each awful possibility in her mind when the only one shehadn’tallowed herself to conjure suddenly presented itself: True herself, walking right into the Eddy, cool as anything.

Mel nearly spilled the water glass she’d been gripping too tightly. “True!”

She looked exhausted, her damp tank top hanging limply on her muscular frame, her trucker cap low over her tanned but drawn face. She hadn’t changed out of her board shorts and Chacos, and Mel could smell the smoke and dried sweat from here, but none of this stopped Mel from practically flinging herself at her as she walked through the door.

“Thank God,” she breathed. “What happened at Temple?” she whispered.

The crowd jostled them, a local or two angling to greet True, too, and Mel caught a barely discernible shake of her head as she released her. They had an audience.

“You’re ripe,” True joked loudly, brushing soot off her torso after contact with Mel’s stained shirt.

“I’mripe? Well, you weren’t the only one out in the smoke all day, sleeping on the ground last night.”

“Auntie True!” Astor wormed her way through the crowd, not satisfied until she was pressed close to True’s side, regaling her with the tale of barricading the house from smoke. Sam trailed behind with a gruff “Glad to see you back in one piece.”

Mel wasn’t sure if it was the feeling of being watched or women’s intuition that had her and True glancing up at the same time, but they both caught sight of Chris Fallows’s return to the Eddy in the same instant. And behind him, framing the doorway, stood his father.

Guess his purpose at the bar had been to gather intel, after all.

And by the looks of it, Fallows hadn’t liked what he’d heard. He stared Mel and True down stonily, his eyes hard, and then very deliberately rubbed the fingers of one raised hand together in a gesture for cash. There was really no mistaking his meaning, but he mouthed his message anyway:Where the fuck is my money?

But Mel was still staring at his face. Sam had told her more than once: When John Fallows gets scared, he’s a mean motherfucker.

Which invited the question:What are you so afraid of, John?

The Flame

CHAPTER 19

“I should have brought the cash back to Carbon,” True confided to Mel in a hoarse whisper after filling her in on the past few hours in a rush, “protocol be damned.”

Mel shook her head swiftly, her ponytail flying back and forth. “You couldn’t have known.”

True weighed the validity of this statement against the shitstorm she’d found herself in twenty-five miles downriver from anyone who could have helped her, and nodded slowly. As a river guide, she had to make decisions on the fly, and she always stuck by them. She’d do the same now.

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