Chasing Fire

by Nora Roberts

  “You know where the base pumps are.”

  “Had to try.”

  She’d talk him into letting her drive it before the end of the season, she promised herself as she headed out to her much less sexy Dodge. She just had to outline the right attack plan.

  The minute she drove off the base, something shifted inside her. As much as she loved what she did, she felt just a bit lighter driving down the open road. Alone, away from the pressure, the intensity, the dramas, even the interaction.

  Maybe, for the moment, she realized, especially the interaction. A little time to reconnect with Rowan, she thought, then in turn for Rowan to reconnect with her father.

  She could admit to the contrary aspect of the feeling. If L.B. had insisted she take time off, had pulled her off the jump list, she’d have fought him tooth and nail. Asking for the little crack in the window was more a little gift to herself, and one where she chose the wrapping and the contents.

  Maybe, too, it hit just close enough to the camping trips her father had always carved out during the season—this one evening together, her making dinner in the house they shared half the year. Just the two of them, sitting at the table with some decent grub and some good conversation.

  Too much had happened, too many things that kept running around inside her head. So much of the summer boomeranged on her, making her think of her mother, and all those hard feelings. She’d shaken off most of them, but there remained a thin and sticky layer she’d never been able to peel away.

  She liked to think that layer helped make her tougher, stronger—and she believed it—but she’d started to wonder if it had hardened into a shield as well.

  Did she use it as an excuse, an escape? If she did, was that smart, or just stupid?

  Something to think about in this short time alone, and again in the company of the single person in the world who knew her through and through, and loved her anyway.

  When she pulled up in front of the house, the simple white two-story with the wide covered porch—the porch she’d helped her father build when she was fourteen—she just sat and stared.

  The slope of lawn showed the brittleness of the dry summer, even in the patches of shade from the big, old maple on the east corner.

  But skirting that porch, on either side of the short steps, an area of flowers sprang out of a deep brown blanket of mulch. Baskets hung from decorative brackets off the flanking posts and spilled out a tangle of red and white flowers and green trailing vines.

  “I’m looking at it,” she said aloud as she got out of the car, “but I still can’t quite believe it.”

  She remembered summers during her youth when her grandmother had done pots and planters, and even dug in a little vegetable garden in the back. How she’d cursed the deer and rabbits for mowing them down, every single season.

  She remembered, too, her father’s rep for killing even the hardiest of houseplants. Now he’d planted—she didn’t know what half of them were, but the beds hit hot, rich notes with a lot of deep reds and purples, with some white accents.

  And she had to admit they added a nice touch, just as she had to admit the creativity of the layout hadn’t come from the nongardening brain of Iron Man Tripp.

  She mulled it over as she let herself into the house.

  Here, too, the difference struck.

  Flowers? Since when did her father have flowers sitting around the house? And candles—fat white columns that smelled, when she sniffed them, faintly of vanilla. Plus, he’d gotten a new rug in the living room, a pattern of bold-colored blocks that spread over a floor that had certainly been polished. And looked pretty good, she had to admit, but still . . .

  Hands on hips, she did a turn around the living room until her jaw nearly landed on her toes. Glossy magazines fanned on the old coffee table. Home and garden magazines, and since when had her father . . . ?

  Stupid question, she admitted. Since Ella.

  A little leery of what she’d find next, she started toward the kitchen, poked into her father’s home office. Bamboo shades in spicy tones replaced the beige curtains.

  Ugly curtains, she remembered.

  But the powder room was a revelation. No generic liquid soap sat on the sink, no tan towels on the rack. Instead, a shiny and sleek chrome dispenser shot a spurt of lemon-scented liquid into her hand. Dazed, she washed, then dried her hands on one of the fluffy navy hand towels layered on the rack with washcloths in cranberry.

  He’d added a bowl of potpourri—potpourri—and a framed print of a mountain meadow on a freshly painted wall that matched the washcloths.

  Her father had cranberry walls in the powder room. She might never get over it.

  Dazed, she continued on to the kitchen, and there stood blinking.

  Clean and efficient had always been the Tripp watchwords. Apparently fuss had been added to them since she’d last stood in the room.

  A long oval dish she thought might be bamboo and had never seen before held a selection of fresh fruit. Herbs grew in small red clay pots on the windowsill over the sink. An iron wine rack—a filled wine rack, she noted—graced the top of the refrigerator. He’d replaced the worn cushions on the stools at the breakfast counter, and she was pretty damn sure the glossy magazines in the living room would call that color pumpkin.

  In the dining area, two place mats—bamboo again—lay ready with cloth napkins rolled in rings beside them. If that didn’t beat all, the pot of white daisies and the tea lights in amber dishes sure rang the bell.

  She considered going upstairs, decided she needed a drink first, and a little time to absorb the shocks already dealt. A little time, like maybe a year, she thought as she opened the refrigerator.

  Okay, there was beer, that at least was constant. But what the hell, since he had an open bottle of white, plugged with a fancy topper, she’d go with that.

  She sipped, forced to give it high marks as she explored supplies.

  She felt more at home and less like an intruder as she got down to it, setting out chicken breasts to soften, scrubbing potatoes. Maybe she shook her head as she spotted the deck chairs out the kitchen window. He painted them every other year, she knew, but never before in chili pepper red.

  By the time she heard him come in, she had dinner simmering in the big skillet. She poured a second glass of wine.

  At least he looked the same.

  “Smells good.” He folded her in, held her hard. “Best surprise of the day.”

  “I’ve had a few of them myself. I poured you this.” She offered him the second glass. “Since you’re the wine buff now.”

  He grinned, toasted her. “Pretty good stuff. Have we got time to sit outside awhile?”

  “Yeah. That’d be good. You’ve been busy around here,” she commented as they walked out onto the deck.

  “Fixing things up a little. What do you think?”

  “It’s colorful.”

  “A few steps out of my comfort zone.” He sat in one of the hot-colored deck chairs, sighed happily.

  “Dad, you planted flowers. That’s acres outside your zone.”

  “And I haven’t killed them yet. Soaker hose.”

  “Sorry?”

  “I put in a soaker hose. Keeps them from getting thirsty.”

  Wine, soaker hoses, cranberry walls. Who was this guy?

  But when he looked at her, laid his hand over hers, she saw him. She knew him. “What’s on your mind, baby?”

  “A lot. Bunches.”

  “Lay it on me.”

  She did just that.

  “I feel like I can’t get a handle on things, or keep a handle on. This morning, I thought I did, then it started slipping again. I’ve been having the dreams about Jim again, only worse. But with everything that’s gone on this season, how am I supposed to put that aside anyway? Everything Dolly did, then what happened to her. Add on her crazy father. And the thing is, if he did what they say he did, if he killed her, the preacher, started the fires—and he probably did—why am
I more pissed off and disgusted that he ran, left his wife twisting in the wind? And I know the answer,” she said, pushing back to her feet.

  “I know the answer, and that pisses me off. My mother ditching us doesn’t define my life. I sure as hell don’t want it to define me. I’m smarter than that, damn it.”

  “You always have been,” he said when she turned to him.

  “I’m tangled up with Gull so I’m not sure I’m thinking straight. Really, where can that go? And why am I even thinking that because why would I want it to go anywhere? And you, you’re planting flowers and drinking wine, and you have potpourri.”

  He had to smile. “It smells nicer than those plug-in jobs.”

  “It has berries, and little white flowers in it. While that’s screwing with my head, Dolly’s mother’s giving the baby to the Brayners because she can’t handle it all by herself. It’s probably the best thing, it’s probably the right thing, but it makes me feel sick and sad, which pisses me off all over again because I know I’m projecting, and I know the situation with that baby isn’t the same as with me.

  “I may be jumping fire in Alaska tomorrow, and I’m stuck on pumpkin-colored cushions, a baby I’ve never even seen and a guy who’s talking about being with me after the season. How the hell did this happen?”

  Lucas nodded slowly, drank a little wine. “That is a lot. Let’s see if we can sift through it. I don’t like hearing you’re having those nightmares again, but I can’t say I’m surprised. The pressure of any season wears on you, and this hasn’t been just any season. You’re probably not the only one having hard dreams.”

  “I hadn’t thought about that.”

  “Have you talked to L.B.?”

  “Not about that. Piling my stress on his doesn’t work for anybody. That’s why I pile it on you.”

  “I can tell you what we talked about before, after it happened. We all live with the risks, and train body and mind to minimize them. When a jumper has a mental lapse, sometimes he gets lucky. Sometimes he doesn’t. Jim didn’t, and that’s a tragedy. It’s a hard blow for his family, and like his kin, the crew’s his family.”

  “I’ve never lost anybody before. She doesn’t count,” she said, referring to her mother. “Not the same way.”

  “I know it. You want to save him, to go back to that jump and save him. And you can’t, baby. I think when you’ve really settled your mind on that, the dreams will stop.”

  He got up, put an arm around her shoulders. “I don’t know if you’ll really be able to settle your mind until this business with Leo is resolved. It’s in your face, so it’s in your head. Dolly tried to put the blame for what happened to Jim on you, and it looks like her telling him she was pregnant right before a jump contributed to his mental lapse. Then Leo came at you about Jim, about Dolly—and the cops think he’s the one responsible for her murder. Time to use your head, Ro.” He kissed the top of it. “And stop letting the people most responsible lay the weight on you. Feeling sorry for Irene Brakeman, that’s just human. Maybe you and me tend to be a little more human than most on that score. Ella’s over there right now helping her get through it, and I feel better knowing that.”

  “I guess it’s good that she—Mrs. Brakeman—has somebody.”

  “I had your grandparents, and I leaned on them pretty hard. I had my friends, my work. Most of all I had you. When somebody walks out, it leaves a hole in you. Some people fill it up, the good and the bad, and get on that way. Some people leave it open, maybe long enough to heal, maybe too long, picking at it now and then so it doesn’t heal all the way. I hate knowing it as much as you, but I think we’ve been like the last.”

  “I don’t even think about it, most of the time.”

  “Neither do I. Most of the time. Now you’ve got this guy, who’d be the first one you’ve ever mentioned to me as giving you trouble. And that makes me wonder if you’ve got feelings for him you’ve managed to avoid up till now. Are you in love with him?”

  “How does anybody answer that?” she demanded. “How does anyone know? Are you in love with this Ella?”

  “Yes.”

  Stunned, Rowan stepped back. “Just like that? You can just . . . poof, I’m in love.”

  “She filled the hole, baby. I don’t know how to explain it to you. I never knew how to talk about this kind of thing, and maybe that’s where I fell down with you. But she filled that hole I never let all the way heal, because if I did, there could be another. But I’d rather take that chance than not have her. I wish you’d get to know her. She . . .”

  He lifted his hands as if to grab something just out of reach. “She’s funny and smart, and has a way of speaking her mind that’s honest instead of hurtful. She can do damn near anything. You should see her on a dive. I swear she’s a joy to watch. She could give Marg a run for her money in the kitchen, and don’t repeat that or I’ll call you a liar. She knows about wine and books and flowers. She has her own toolbox and knows how to use it. She’s got great kids and they’ve got kids. She listens when you talk to her. She’ll try anything.

  “She makes me feel . . . She makes me feel.”

  There it was, Rowan realized. If there’d been an image in the dictionary for the definition of “in love,” it would be her father’s face.

  “I have to get dinner on the table.” She turned away to the door, then turned back to see him looking after her, that light dimmed. “Are you, more or less, asking for my blessing?”

  “I guess. More or less.”

  “Anybody who makes you this happy—and who talked you into getting rid of those ugly curtains in your office—is good with me. You can tell me more about her while we eat.”

  “Ro. That means more than I can say.”

  “You don’t have heart-shaped pillows on your bed now, do you?”

  “No. Why?”

  “Because that’s going to be my line in the sand. Anything else I think I can adjust to. Oh, and none of those crocheted things over spare toilet paper. That’s definitely a deal breaker.”

  “I’ll take notes.”

  “Good idea because I probably have a few more.” She walked to the stove, pleased that light had turned back on full.

  25

  Feeling sociable, Gull plopped down in the lounge with his book. That way he could ease out of the story from time to time, tune in on conversations, the ball game running on TV and the progress of the poker game he wasn’t yet interested in joining.

  Or he could just let all of it hum at the edges of his mind like white noise.

  With the idea he might be called up at any time, he opted for a ginger ale and a bag of chips to snack him through the next chapter or two.

  “Afraid of losing your paycheck?” Dobie called out from the poker table.

  “Terrified.”

  “Out?” An outraged Trigger lurched out of his chair at a call on second. “That runner was safe by a mile. Out my ass! Did you see that?” he demanded.

  He hadn’t, but Gull’s mood hit both agreeable and sociable. “Damn right. The ump’s an asshole.”

  “He oughta have his eyes popped out if he can’t use them better than that. Where’s the ball to your chain tonight?”

  Amused, Gull turned a page. “Ditched me for another man.”

  “Women. They’re worse than umps. Can’t live with them, can’t beat them with a brick.”

  “Hey.” Janis discarded two cards at the poker table. “Having tits doesn’t mean I can’t hear, buddy.”

  “Aw, you’re not a woman. You’re a jumper.”

  “I’m a jumper with tits.”

  “Unless you’re going to toss them in the pot,” Cards told her, “the bet’s five to you.”

  “They’re worth a lot more than five.”

  Better than white noise, Gull decided, and likely better than his book.

  Across the room, Yangtree—with an ice bag on his knee—and Southern played an intense, nearly silent game of chess. Earbuds in, Libby ticked her head back and for
th like a metronome to her MP3 while she worked a crossword puzzle.

  A lot of sociable going around, he mused. About half the jumpers on base gathered, some in groups, some solo, more than a