Page 132 of When We Burn

“We’re fine,” Birdie echoes, making me chuckle.

“Actually, Birdie, would you like to come over to the other house with me, and we’ll start packing? You can play in my makeup and stuff.”

“Yes! Can I try on the makeup, too?”

“Sure, why not.” Dani shrugs as if it’s no big deal. “It’s bath night anyway. It’ll washoff.”

I love how chill she is with Birdie. Dani’s not afraid of a mess and enjoys having fun with my girl.

It’s sexy as fuck.

“Do you think?” Dani whispers to me, and I nod my head, reading her mind.

“Probably.”Yeah, it’s probably the motherfucking arsonist.

“I wonder how bad it is,” she says.

“I should hear soon. I’m sorry, but it’s going to be a quick drop-off?—”

“Hey, this isn’t my first rodeo with the chief,” Dani reminds me. “Stop feeling so guilty. This is yourjob.I’m not mad or disappointed or upset at you. I promise.”

My chest loosens at her reassurance, and I smile over at her. “Thanks, kitten.”

“Of course.”

Ten minutes after I drop the girls off at home, I’m headed back out and up to the resort. The police have already done a good job of blocking off traffic up the mountain to anyone but first responders, and there’s been a steady stream of civilian traffic coming down.

It’s bad enough to evacuate.

“Shit,” I mutter, and once I’m on the scene, I park and hurry over to where Rhodes, the chief of police, is, along with some of my senior guys. “What have we got?”

I can see the smoke and some of the flames coming up from the Snow Ghost, but then another fire catches my eye, and I realize that the condos are on fire, as well.

“We have four individual blazes,” Jones says, pointing. “The pub, the condos, the main lodge, and the ski rental cabin.”

“Fuck,” I growl.

“We have surrounding area teams on the way,” Rhodes says. “My guys are evacuating everyone, not just the condos and the lodge, but also the surrounding homes, just in case this gets out of hand.”

“Excellent.” I nod at him and turn to Jones. “Let’s get these fires out.”

Suddenly, there’s an explosion that makes my ears ring and my chest tighten.

“Gas stove in the pub,” someone says. “Had to be.”

“Get those lines shut off,” I yell, and run off to do my job. The fire is loud and spreading too fast. The smoke is thick, making it hard to see well, and I pull on my mask so I don’t inhale too much soot.

The motherfucker wanted the entire village to go up in flames, and he might get his goddamn wish.

For the next few hours, we work fast. More engines and crews show up to help us, spreading out over the entire resort to make sure the fires don’t spread to nearby homes and other buildings. The fires have been too hot for us to get inside, but we have tall ladders that can shoot the water from above, and that seems to be the most effective, particularly on Snow Ghost Pub.

“We need medical,” I hear in my radio and feel my chest tighten. “Northeast corner of the condos, near run three.”

“One of us?” I ask.

“No, I think we just found the goddamn arsonist.”

I take off at a sprint. I’m at least a half a mile from there, but it’ll be faster to run through the plowed parking lot than to weave my vehicle through, and it would just be in the way.

---