Page 50 of Smoke Season

Deklan stared at her and nodded as the crew members murmured their agreement.

“My fault,” Mel repeated for good measure. “All mine.”

The appearance of the wildland engine, lights, and siren running just over the bridge in safety might have been the most beautiful sight Mel had ever seen. Beyond it, she glimpsed the remaining truck and her crew, some members pacing in agitation, some leaning against the hood of the engine, eyes on the blaze across the water. When she hit the brakes, slamming the vehicle into park, she heard Lewis’s whoop even over the din of the fire and the whine of the siren.

“Thank God!” he laugh-yelled. Mel could feel the relief his entire being seemed to dispel in waves. He looked shell-shocked, coated in soot and sweat, but beautifully whole. “Figured you’d find us if we kept the lights going.”

He greeted her with an arm thrown tight around her shoulder, describing the way the wind had changed direction, turning back on the crew at forty-five miles per hour as they cut containment in the canyon, out of sight of the flames. “It reached the trigger point so fast, you woulda gotten whiplash,” he said numbly, eyes pinched closed,hands cradling his skull. “Still, I called for evac, but with rookies on the comms, it was chaos. We scrambled to the ridge before we could be caught in no-man’s land, forced to deploy shelters.”

It must have been the haunted look shining in Mel’s eyes that had him adding, “What took you so long to get here, anyway?”

“I’m sorry,” Mel managed. “I was ... I checked the ridge first.”

“Shit.” His tone fell flat. “Why on earth would you do that?” He finally looked beyond Mel to see Deklan climb out of the truck cab on shaky legs and added with a frown, “What’s got the kid ready to soil his yellows?”

How badly did Mel want to answer with aRookies will be rookiesquip? How easy would that be to sell? Instead, she squared her shoulders and said, “I went back because you said you were eighteen, and I knew that meant Deklan wasn’t with you. And that meant I had to go back because, Lew, he wasn’t with me, either.”

“What do you mean, he wasn’t with you?” Lewis’s face had gone white.

How could Mel explain herself? She couldn’t. “I found him about halfway down the pocket. He’d deployed his Shake ’n Bake, like you said you might, and was sheltered in place.”

“Bishop,” Lewis said. “I don’t understand.”

“I was on the ridge,” Deklan answered, “with you all.” He trailed off, his eyes still glassy, his face still flushed from a lack of oxygen.

Lewis looked like he wanted to shake him by the shoulders until whatever the hell played behind his eyes came pouring out of his mouth. “Talk, son.”

“I knew we were trying to connect with the hand crew, so I kept moving forward. Downhill. I couldn’t hear a damned thing out there, and then ... and then ... you all were gone.”

Lewis couldn’t seem to decide whether to yell or soothe. “I do remember you there now, cutting a shit containment line. With Ryan. But then ...” He pivoted toward Mel, his face a study in agony. “Thenthe shit hit the fan, and when I saw Ryan return, my brain only seemed to recall you taking Deklan with you.”

“I was all right, Chief,” Deklan said robotically. “I sheltered in the scrub.” But he sounded as though he were still there, on the slope, caught in that fold in the earth, now smoke-choked, that wedge of flame yawning.

What was it they said about the chaos of war? Being in the midst of it made you crave all you stood to lose. But what if it wasn’t war? What if the chaos had been of your own making? Orchestrated by your own selfish agenda? Mel deserved to lose her career and more.

“I made a grave error in judgment,” she told Lewis, choking, even before the sentence was fully out of her mouth, on the inadequacy of these words.

At first, Lewis just stared at her, uncomprehending. “Meaning ... what? You didn’t update me, give me an accurate count?” He spoke slowly, as though walking them both through a stubborn but solvable logic problem, coaching Mel toward the answer they both wanted to hear: Deklan had been accounted for by someone. His crew’s leadership hadn’t put a young life at risk. This was the only formula that made sense, after all. “Bishop, did you lose track of him?”

“No, no, no, no,” she muttered, rubbing at her eyes, which were stinging from the smoke. From ash. “Listen, I can’t explain it,” she said, while watching Lewis’s respect for her slide off his face. Worse: watching pity take its place.

“I know it can get tough out here,” he said carefully. “Confusing and chaotic.”

God, now she was being patronized. Which was still nothing,nothing, compared to how she’d compromised her crew. Compromised Deklan.

“But you’re the battalion chief, Bishop,” Lewis said. “You’llhaveto explain it, eventually, before the safety board if not to me. If not now.”

“I know. And I will.”

Mel turned away, stumbling on the uneven ground of the gravel staging area, unable to mount any further defense. A rush of tears rose so fast, they ran unchecked down her filthy face. She felt her stomach heave once more as she retched, vomiting what little water she hadn’t sweated out onto the brittle bushes along the side of the road.

CHAPTER 24

True turned off the highway onto the river road, flashing the rapid tag at the surprised search-and-rescue volunteer assigned as gatekeeper at the junction. Not waiting for his official permission to proceed—probably a relief to them both—she now strained through the windshield in an attempt to make out the elbow-bend turn that indicated she was within yards of her own long driveway. The usually familiar route swam before her eyes like a moonscape today; she could barely make out her neighbors’ properties, the familiar sight of the Joneses’ weathered barn completely obscured, the Juarezes’ horse pasture a flat gray expanse. As anticipated, the river road was barred entirely to traffic beyond, and as she made the turn toward her property instead, she tried Mel on her phone while she still had a signal. She doubted she’d pick up while in the field, but the sat phone was a luxury True only had on the river, and once she passed the final cell tower near Buck Peak, service would be nonexistent. When her call went to voicemail after the first ring, she told herself she’d worry about trying to rendezvous with Mel after getting to the Outsider.

The first raindrops hit her windshield just as she made her way up her drive, and the sound of them on the glass left her suddenly giddy with relief. By the time she was in sight of the canvas-dome rooftop of her yurt, however, the rain had already ceased, and a much less welcome sound boomed in the distance: thunder.

Why couldn’t they catch a break? She was closer to the base of Flatiron than she’d been in two days, and the smoke mushroomed here,just over the ridgeline, below which a ring of flame glowed orange. Gone was the murky ambiguity of a hazy sky or even thick-as-soup smoke. True was now treated to a clarity she’d never asked for.

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