Chasing Fire

by Нора Робертс

  “Regardless—”

  “Regardless, my ass.” He grabbed her chin, pulled her in for a kiss. “That makes you my girl.”

  “Holy hell, Gull, you’re making my back itch.”

  Amused, he scratched it, then hooked an arm around her shoulders and kept walking. “So, later. Your place or mine?”

  With the light softening, she pulled her sunglasses off, then swung them by the earpiece. “Some people are intimidated or put off by a certain level of confidence.”

  “You’re not.”

  “No, I’m not. Fortunately for you, I like it. Let’s—” She jerked back at the sharp crack in the air. “Jesus, was that—”

  The breath whooshed out of her lungs when Gull knocked her to the ground and landed on top of her.

  “Stay down,” he ordered, and saw a bullet dig into the ground six feet away. “Hold on to me. We’re going to roll.” The minute her arms clamped around him, he pushed his body over, felt her do the same, so they covered the ground in a fast, ungainly roll to shield themselves behind one of the jeeps parked outside a hangar.

  A third report snapped, pinging metal overhead.

  “Where’s it coming from? Can you tell?”

  Gull shook his head, keeping his body over hers while he waited for the next shot. But silence held as seconds ticked by, then shattered with the shouts and rushing feet.

  “For Christ’s sake, get down, get cover,” he called out. “There’s a sniper.”

  Dobie bolted for the jeep, dived. “Are you hit? Are you—Goddamn, Gull, you’re bleeding.”

  Rowan bucked under him. “Get off, get off. Let me see.”

  “Just scraped up from the asphalt. I’m not shot. Stay down.”

  “Rifle.” Dobie shifted to a crouch. “I know a rifle shot when I hear one. From over there in the trees, I think. Damn good thing he’s a shitty shot ’cause the two of you were sitting ducks. Standing ducks.”

  “Hey!” Trigger called from the far side of the hangar. “Is anybody hurt?”

  “We’re okay,” Rowan answered. “Don’t come out here. He may be waiting for somebody to step into the clear.”

  “L.B.’s got the cops coming. Just stay where you are for now.”

  “Copy that. Get off me, Gull.”

  “He tackled you good,” Dobie commented when Gull pushed off. “You know he played football in high school. Quarterback.”

  “Isn’t that interesting?” Rowan muttered it as she turned Gull’s arm over to examine the bloody scrapes on his elbows and forearms. “You got grit in these.”

  “I liked basketball better,” Gull said conversationally. “But I didn’t have the height to compete. Had the speed, but I’d topped out at six feet until senior year when I had a spurt and added two more. Baseball, now, I like that better than either. Had a pretty good arm back in the day.”

  Maybe talking kept his mind off the scrapes, she decided, because they had to sting like hell.

  “I thought you were the track star.”

  “My best thing, but I like sports, so I dabbled. Anyway, I liked collecting letters. I graduated a four-letter man.”

  Rowan studied him in the fading light. “We’re sitting behind this jeep, hiding from some nutcase with a rifle, and you’re actually bragging about your high-school glory days?”

  “It passes the time. Plus I had very impressive glory days.” He brushed dirt off her cheek. “We’re okay.”

  “If you two are going to get sloppy, I’m not looking the other way.” Dobie leaned back against the tire. “Wish I had a beer.”

  “Once this little interlude’s over,” Gull told him, “the first round’s on me.”

  “I was thinking about going to the lounge, kicking back with some screen and a beer. Just stepped outside for a minute, and bam! bam!”

  “So you ran out, in the open, instead of back in?” Rowan demanded.

  “I wasn’t sure if either of you were hit or not, the way you both went down.”

  Rowan leaned over Gull, kissed Dobie on the mouth. “Thanks.”

  “I’m not kissing you. He’s gone,” Gull added. “He took off after the third shot.”

  “I expect so,” Dobie agreed. “It’s full dusk now. He can’t see squat, unless he’s got infrared.”

  “Let’s go.” Rowan pushed up to her haunches. “If he wants to shoot us, he could circle around in the dark and get us while we’re sitting here.”

  “She’s got a point. Don’t run in a straight line. That’s what they say in the movies,” Gull pointed out. “Barracks?”

  “Barracks,” Dobie agreed.

  Before either man could react, Rowan sprang up, a runner off the blocks, and revved straight into a sprint.

  “Goddamn it.”

  Gull raced after her—could have caught her, passed her, they both knew. But he stayed at her back, zigging when she zigged, zagging when she zagged.

  “We’re coming in!” Rowan called out, then hit the door.

  “What the hell were you thinking?” Gull grabbed her, spun her around. “Taking off like that?”

  “I was thinking you weren’t going to be my human shield twice in one day. I appreciate the first, I’m not stupid.”

  “You don’t get to decide for me.”

  “Right back at you.”

  They shouted at each other while people shouted around them. Libby let out a piercing whistle. “Shut up! Shut the hell up. Everybody!” She shoved her hands through the hair dripping from the shower she’d leaped out of. “Gull, you’re bleeding on the floor. Somebody get a first-aid kit and clean him up. The cops are on their way. Okay, the cops are here,” she amended when the sirens sounded. “L.B. wants everybody inside until... until we know something.”

  “Come on, Gull.” Janis gave him a light pat on the butt. “I’ll be Nurse Betty.”

  “Is everybody accounted for?” Rowan asked.

  “Between here, the cookhouse and Operations, we’re all good.” Yangtree stepped forward, drew her in for a hug that nearly cracked her ribs. “I was watching TV. I thought it was a backfire. Then Trig came running through, said somebody was shooting, and you were out there.” He drew her back. “What the fuck, Ro?”

  “My thought exactly. Why would somebody shoot at us?”

  “People are batshit.” Dobie shrugged. “Maybe one of those government’s-our-enemy types. Y’all got those militia types out here.”

  “Three shots isn’t much of a statement.”

  “It would’ve been,” Trigger pointed out, “if one of them had hit you or Gull.”

  “Your father’s going to hear about this, Ro,” Yangtree commented. “You call him now before he does, tell him you’re okay.”

  “Yeah, you’re right.” She glanced down toward Gull’s quarters before she stepped into her own to make the call.

  Steaming, Gull endured the sting as Janis cleaned out cuts and scrapes. “What the hell’s wrong with her?”

  “Since the blood on her appeared to be mostly yours, not much. And I know you’re talking about how she thinks or acts, but you’ll have to be more specific.”

  “How can somebody trained to be a team player, who is a team player in ninety percent of her life, be the damn opposite the other ten?”

  “First, smoke jumpers work as a crew, but you know damn well we all have to think, act and react individually. But more to the point, with Rowan it’s defense mechanism, pride, an instinctive hesitation to trust.”

  “Defense against what?”

  “Against having her pride smacked and her trust betrayed. Personally, I think she’s dealt pretty well with being abandoned by her mother as an infant. But I don’t think anybody ever gets all the way over being abandoned. Okay, I’m going to need to use the tweezers to get some of this debris out. Feel free to curse me.”

  He said, “Fuck,” then gritted his teeth. “You trust every time you get in the door. The spotter, the pilot, yourself. Hell, you have to trust fate isn’t going to send a speeding bus you
r way every time you step out of your house. If you can’t take that same leap with another human being, you end up alone.”

  “I think she’s always figured she would. She’s got her father, us, a tight pack of people. But a serious, committed one-to-one? She’s not sure she believes in them in general, much less for herself.”

  A bit of gravel hit the bowl with a tiny ting. “I’ve worked with Ro a long time. She’s a proactive optimist in general. In that she—or we, depending—will find a way to make this work. In her personal life, she’s a proactive pessimist who has no problem living in the moment because this isn’t going to last anyway.”

  “She’s wrong.”

  “Nobody’s proven that to her yet.” She glanced up. “Can you?”

  “If I don’t bleed to death from this sadistic game of Operation you’re playing.”

  “I haven’t hit the buzzer yet. You’re the first guy, in my opinion, who has a shot at proving her wrong. So don’t screw it up. There.” She dropped more grit into the bowl. “I think that’s it. You lost a lot of skin here, Gull,” she began as she applied antiseptic. “Banged up your elbows pretty good, but it could’ve been a hell of a lot worse.”

  “Not to knock the results, but I keep wondering why it wasn’t a hell of a lot worse.”

  He looked over at the rap on the door frame. As she had earlier, Rowan leaned on the jamb, but now she had two beers hooked in her fingers. “I brought the patient a beer.”

  “He could probably use one.” Janis bandaged the gouges around his right elbow. “Any word?”

  “The cops have the grounds lit up like Christmas. If they’ve found anything, they’re not sharing it yet.”

  “Okay. You’re as done as I can do.” Janis picked up the bowl filled with grit, bloodied cloths and cotton swipes. “Take two ibuprofen and call me in the morning.”

  “Thanks, Janis.”

  She gave his leg a squeeze as she rose. “None but the brave,” she said, then walked out.

  Rowan stepped over, offered a beer. “Do you want to fight?”

  Watching her over the bottle, he took a long swallow. “Yeah.”

  “Seems like a waste, considering, but fine. Pick your topic.”

  “Let’s start with the latest—we can always work back—and how you ran, alone, into the open out there.”

  “We’d decided to try for the barracks, so I did.”

  “Of the three of us, I’m the fastest—and the one best qualified to draw and evade fire, if there’d been any.”

  “I said I like overconfidence, but this idea you can dodge bullets might be taking it too far. I can and do take care of myself, Gull. I do it every day. I’m going to keep doing it.”

  He considered himself a patient, reasonable man—mostly. But she’d just about flipped his last switch.

  “The fact you can and do take care of yourself is one of the most appealing things about you. You idiot. Handling yourself on a jump, in a fire or in general, no problem. This was different.”

  “How?”

  “Have you ever been shot at before?”

  “No. Have you?”

  “First time for both of us, and clearly a situation where you should have trusted me to take care of you.”

  “I don’t want anybody to take care of me.”

  “You know, that’s just stupid. Janis just took care of me, yet somehow my pride and self-esteem remain unbattered and unbowed.”

  “Bandaging somebody up isn’t the same as falling on them like they were a grenade you were going to smother with your own body to save the guys in the trenches. And look at you, Gull. I’ve barely got a scrape because you took the brunt of that roll instead of letting me take my share.”

  “I protect what I care about. If you’ve got a problem with that, you’ve got a problem with me.”

  “I protect what I care about,” she tossed back at him.

  “Were you protecting a fellow smoke jumper, or me?”

  “You are a fellow smoke jumper.”

  He stepped closer. “Is it what I do, or who I am? And don’t try the ‘you are what you do’ because I’m a hell of a lot more, and less, and dozens of other things. So are you. I care about you, Rowan. The you who’s got a laugh like an Old West saloon girl, the you who picks out constellations in the night sky and smells like peaches. I care about that woman as much as I do the fearless, smart, tireless one who puts her life on the line every time the siren goes off.”

  Wariness clouded her eyes. “I don’t know what to say when you talk like that.”

  “Is the only thing you see when you look at me another jumper you’ll work with for the season?”

  “No.” She let out an unsteady breath. “No, that’s not all, but—”

  “Stop at no.” He cupped a hand at the back of her neck. “Do us both a favor and stop at no. That’s enough for now.”

  She moved into him, wrapping her arms tight around his waist when their lips met. She felt her equilibrium shift, as if she’d nearly overbalanced on a high ledge. With it came a flutter, under her heart, at the base of her throat. She gripped harder, wanting to find the heat, the buzz, an affirmation that they were both alive and whole.

  Nothing more than that, she told herself. It didn’t have to be more than that.

  “Getting a room’s not always enough,” Trigger said from the doorway. “Sometimes you gotta close the door.”

  “Go ahead,” Gull invited him, then slid back into the kiss.

  “Sorry, they want you in the lounge.”

  “Who are ‘they’?” Rowan demanded, and gave Gull’s bottom lip a nip.

  “The lieutenant guy and the tree cop. If you’re not interested in finding out who the hell shot at you tonight, I can tell them, gee, you’re out on a date.”

  Gull lifted his head. “Be right there.” He looked at Rowan, ran his hands over her shoulders, down her arms. “My place,” he said. “The decision that was so rudely interrupted earlier. My place tonight because it’s closer to the lounge.”

  “Not a bad reason.” She picked up the beers, handed him his. “Let’s get this done so we can close the door.”

  DiCicco sat with Quinniock and L.B. in the lounge. Generally at that time of the evening, people sprawled on sofas and chairs watching TV, or gathered around one of the tables playing cards. Somebody might’ve buzzed up some microwave pizza or popcorn. And there would always be somebody willing to talk fire.

  But now the TV screen remained blank and silent, the sofas empty.

  L.B. got up from the table, walked quickly over to wrap an arm around Gull and Rowan in turn. “You’re okay. That matters most. Next is finding the bastard.”

  “Did they find anything?” Rowan asked.

  “If we could get your statements first.” DiCicco gestured to the table. “It should help us get a clearer picture.”

  “The picture’s clear,” Rowan countered. “Somebody shot at us. He missed.”

  “And when you file a fire report, does it just say: ‘Fire started. We put it out’?”

  “If we could just take it from the beginning.” Quinniock held up his hands for peace. “The witness, Dobie Karstain, says he stepped outside the barracks around nine thirty. A few minutes later, he noticed the two of you walking together between the training field and the hangar area, approximately thirty yards from the trees. Does that sound accurate?”

  “That’s about right.” Gull took the lead as it seemed obvious to him DiCicco put Rowan’s back up. “We went for a walk, took a couple of beers, watched the sunset. You’d narrow down where we were if you find the bottles. We dropped them when the shooting started.”

  He took them through it, step by step.

  “Dobie said it sounded like rifle fire,” he continued, “and it was coming from the trees. He grew up hunting in rural Kentucky, so I’m inclined to believe he’s right. We couldn’t see anyone. The first shot fired right around sunset. The whole thing probably only lasted about ten minutes. It seemed longer.” />
  “Have either of you had trouble with anyone, been threatened?” When Rowan merely arched her eyebrows, DiCicco inclined her head. “Other than Leo Brakeman.”

  “We’re a little too busy around here to get into arguments with the locals or tourists.”

  “Actually, there was an incident with you, Mr. Curry, Ms. Tripp and Mr. Karstain in the spring.”

  “That would be when Rowan objected to one of those three yahoos’ behavior toward her, and them sopping their pride by ganging up on Dobie when he came out of the bar.”

  “And you kicking their asses,” Rowan concluded. “Good times.”

  “The same holds true on them as it did when we had the vandalism,” Gull continued. “It’s pretty hard to see them coming back here. And harder still to see any one of them staking us out from the woods and taking shots at us when we went for a walk. We’re in and out all the damn time anyway. Together, separately. It’s stretching it even more to figure those bozos from Illinois came all the way back, then got lucky when Ro and I walked out to give them some target practice.”

  “How do you know they’re from Illinois?” DiCicco asked.

  “Because that’s what the plate on the pickup said—and I did some checking on it after the ready room business.”

  “You never told me that.”

  Gull shrugged at Rowan. “It didn’t amount to anything to tell you. The big guy—and he was the alpha—owns a garage out in Rockford. He’s an asshole, and he’s had a few bumps for assaults—bar fights his specialty—but nothing major.” He shrugged again when DiCicco studied him. “The Internet. You can find out anything if you keep looking.”

  “All right. You two have recently become involved,” DiCicco said. “Is there anyone who might resent that? Any former relationship?”

  “I don’t date the kind of woman who’d take a shot at me.” He gave Rowan the eye. “Until maybe now.”

  “I shoot all my former lovers, so your fate’s already set.”

  “Only if we get to the former part.” He covered her hand with his. “It was either a local with a grudge against one or both of us specially, or the base in general. Or a wacko who wanted to shoot up a federal facility.”