“Uh-huh,” Sarah said again, her solemn expression telling Mallory she knew differently.

“I’ve got to go.” Mallory didn’t have time to give assurances Sarah wouldn’t believe. Sarah had as much as said at the end of the last season she was worried Mallory would take chances, trying to make up for something that wasn’t her fault. “You’re senior while I’m gone, Sarah. Check on my injured rookie, will you? Ray Kingston. Any problems, transfer him out.”

“I will—don’t worry about it.”

Mallory couldn’t pretend not to see Jac any longer. Jac stood next to Sarah with her hands balled in the pockets of her cargo pants, looking a little rumpled and a lot sexy. Had it really only been a few minutes since they had crowded together on her cot, pretending to feed each other but doing something far more intimate? Mallory’s lips still tingled from where Jac’s fingers had grazed them. She felt the weight of Jac’s body leaning against her legs, and her belly quivered. Whatever had happened between them had been sidelined by the klaxon, and just as well. Jac’s eyes were stormy now and every bit as hot as they had been upstairs. Mallory couldn’t afford to get lost in those kinds of clouds, not with anyone, but certainly not with a rookie whose mere presence almost made her forget the cost of getting too close. She squeezed Sarah’s arm and pointed at Jac. “Listen to Sarah. Don’t screw up, rookie.”

Jac stepped closer, then halted abruptly as if surprised she’d moved at all. “I’ll wait till you get back to do that.”

Mallory shook her head. “Then I’ll try to make it quick.”

“You do that,” Jac said. “See you soon…Mal.”

Hiding her smile, Mallory turned away and jogged to the plane. She climbed on, checked that all the crew were there and strapped in, and gave Benny the thumbs up. She slid the cargo door closed and made her way up front to the cockpit. Settling into the seat opposite Benny’s, she buckled in and didn’t look out the window as they taxied away. Superstition, maybe. Maybe she just didn’t want to see Jac’s figure disappearing in the distance.

Once airborne, Benny said, “Sully radioed they’ve got a tanker dropping mud before you land.”

“Good. The retardant along with the snow ought to make our job easier, even though it’s hell to slog through that crap on the ground.”

“Not to worry. I’ll circle until the tanker leaves, and you can find a nice clean spot for your landing.”

“Thanks.” Mallory laughed. As long as no one ended up in a tree, she’d be happy.

Thirty minutes later she caught the first sign of the smoke column climbing into the sky. The fire stretched out along a quarter of a mile of ridge in dense forest. Snow still covered patches of ground, which would make clearing the line a little bit harder but might help contain the fire front. She pointed to a clear spot in the trees. “Over there.”

Benny banked in that direction so she could get a better look. Mallory checked several spots until she found a landing zone close to the fire front, but flanking it and not littered with boulders.

“That looks good.” Mallory radioed their position and reported the initial fire assessment to the local fire station.

The base supervisor radioed back. “Do you need ground support?”

“Not at this time,” Mallory answered. “Will advise after we establish our control lines.”

“Roger.”

Mallory clapped Benny’s shoulder. “We’re out of here.”

“Stay safe,” Benny said.

“Right.”

Back in the cargo hold, Mallory signaled for the team to clip on and prepare to off-load. She slid back the cargo bay door and waited while Benny flew over the landing zone, then tapped the first pair to go. On his fourth pass, she jumped with Cooper, and Benny headed for home.

In a matter of seconds, the frigid air whipped around her and numbed her face and body. She landed stiffly, jolting hard on the ground despite automatically flexing her knees and falling to her side at the instant of impact. Ignoring the bone-jarring pain, she jumped up, checked to see that the rest of the team had landed safely, and collected her chute. After a fast confirmation of the fire status, she dispatched the team and radioed the local base with a status update. Once done, she took her place on the line—farthest from the safety zone. If anyone got caught too far out ever again, it wouldn’t be one of her crew.

Everyone knew what to do. They’d done it dozens of times before. Mallory set to work with her pulaski—part-hoe, part ax—clearing melting snow, clumps of ice, rotting leaves, and other debris along a ten-foot-wide line in front of the fire. She removed everything flammable down to the dirt—chopping roots, digging out stumps, scraping away undergrowth until nothing remained to feed the advancing flames. Men with saws took down larger trees and dragged them away.

Out on the line, her mind cleared and her body took over. She didn’t think of anything as she chopped and cleared except the position of the fire and the location of the rest of the team. The day wore on, and she opened her jacket, letting the chill air dry the sweat soaked into her fire-retardant Nomex shirt. Smoke and embers drifted in the air, and she wiped her face with the bandanna she’d tied loosely around her neck. One of the times she stopped to drink water from her canteen, she pulled a protein bar from her PG pack and bit into it. As she chewed the mostly flavorless bar, she remembered the bran muffin and the soft caress of Jac’s fingers on her mouth. Jac. How had Jac managed to get so close so fast?

Mallory shoved the wrapper in her pocket, grabbed her pulaski, and went back to digging. Thank God Sarah had shown up early. Sarah could take charge of Jac’s training, and Mallory could get some distance. And some damn perspective.

Chapter Thirteen

Jac lay awake, listening to a light rain dance on the hangar’s metal roof. The loft felt dark and close, growing colder every night that Mallory was gone. Almost a week that seemed like a month—endless hours stretching interminably from sundown until dawn. The shadows weighed more heavily on her chest, the empty cot across from her echoing the emptiness that hollowed out her bones. Tonight she’d never fallen asleep at all, lying on her back staring into the gloom, remembering all the nights she’d lain awake listening to the scratch of sand shifting against the sides of a canvas tent, surrounded by humanity and aching with loneliness. She ached tonight, but not in some vague existential way. Tonight she just missed Mallory.

Sighing, she punched her pillow and rolled onto her side. Mallory’s neatly rolled sleeping bag mocked her. She’d straightened Mallory’s bed the first night Mallory was gone. When she’d rested her hand for a few seconds on the spot where she had sat with Mallory’s feet tucked against her leg, she’d registered that the bag was cool, but she’d imagined the heat of Mallory’s body tucked inside it. She’d imagined herself spooned against Mallory’s back, her arm around Mallory’s waist and her chin tucked in the curve of Mallory’s shoulder, her mouth close to Mallory’s ear. Murmuring to her. Kissing her softly. The fantasy was exquisitely bittersweet, and when she crawled into her own cold sleeping bag, the pulse of desire hammering between her thighs haunted rather than tempted her. She feared an orgasm would taste only of ashes, reminding her of all the hopes that had vanished long before the desert winds had ground them to dust.

Each night, sleep became more elusive while her body strummed with anxious tension, but she didn’t want the quick release and hazy aftermath of a solitary orgasm. While it made no sense, she didn’t want to come fantasizing about Mallory when Mallory was fighting a fire on a mountainside somewhere. She had no doubt Mallory was sleepless, and it seemed the least she could do was to tolerate her own restless nights. At least she was warm and dry, and Mallory’s team most certainly wasn’t. Weather had blown in within hours of Benny’s return from dropping the team at the fire front—an icy rain mixed with snow, nature’s reminder that spring had not yet driven out the last breath of winter.

Jac had checked the satellite images of the burn area every few hours throughout each day, following the storm’s path as it lingered over the mountains. She’d traced the topography of Bitterroot with her fingertip, climbing mountain peaks and descending into valleys, trying to place Mallory in that vast wilderness. Wishing they had radio contact. Wishing she was digging line and chopping trees by Mallory’s side.

Sarah had opted to use the time Mallory was away to cover the mandatory didactic sessions, and most of the last few days had been spent sitting at a table with the other rookies in a cinderblock-walled room. While listening to Sarah talk about fire protocols and Sully discuss principles of fire management, her mind kept drifting to the realities of the job. She hadn’t worked a full season, but she’d spent enough time on the line to know how easily the job could turn treacherous. Even when the fire wasn’t bearing down, there were dozens of other potential hazards. Snakes, bugs, and terrified animals incited to violence were as dangerous as burning branches, falling trees, and blowups. And so many other ways to encounter injury—heat exhaustion, sun exposure, and always, always the fire.

Every firefighter recognized the dangers, guarded against them, trained to avoid them, and still, still, every year firefighters were lost. Everyone accepted the risks, no one dwelled on them. Jac tried not to. She’d spent enough time at the front—first when deployed, then on the fire line—to learn not to torture herself with what-ifs. She knew Mallory would be back, she just wished she knew when.

She’d skipped dinner earlier and opted for an extra-long workout, hoping to wear off her nagging disquiet. After too many nights with too little sleep, she’d turned in early, physically fatigued and mentally exhausted. If she’d been able to sleep propped up against sandbags in the middle of a godless desert, she ought to be able to sleep here. So she’d thought.