“I hiked up to the overlook to Snowshoe Peak. That’s where I saw the bear. I think I ran about half a mile, maybe less. I can probably get to camp—”
“Stay there!” Oops, now his voice added a tremble. He cleared it. “Just...stay put. At least until you know the bear is gone. He could still be rooting around—”
“But—”
“Liza, listen to me. I’m coming for you, okay? I’ll be there.” He stopped just short of I promise, but there it was, aching to emerge. “Just wait for me.”
Yes, clearly he was out of his ever-lovin’ mind.
“I will, Conner, it’s just—”
“Liza—”
“I think the bear—I think he attacked a camper. Or...” And her breaths came over each other again, quick, successive.
“Shh... Just tell me.” He hardly heard himself over the voice screaming in his head to hang up and call the rangers.
“She snuck out of camp this morning—and I thought she came up here to watch the sunrise.”
He refused to stop and linger on a memory.
“And when I got here, I found her jacket over the side of the cliff. And then the bear was just there. I don’t know if she went over the cliff, or—” Her voice started to shake again. “I gotta get back to camp.”
“Liza—please let me come for you. Stay—”
“I’m going back to camp. I’m just going to—yeah, I think it’s okay. I don’t see him.”
He heard branches snapping, her breath heavy in the phone.
“You have to help me find her, Conner. We have to find her.”
“Of course we do—and we will. I gotta call the rangers. But keep calm. I’m on my way.”
“Okay. Yeah—Conner. Hurry.”
The phone clicked off.
Conner stared at it, his hands shaking, tasting his pulse. Trying to untangle his panic to get to the one thought thrumming through him. Liza crying. Liza needing him., turning to him. Trusting him. Liza, perhaps ending up in his arms.
Liza, back in his life.
God, please keep her alive.
Conner hit the number for dispatch.
Reuben leaned on his saddle horn. “Baby? Honey?”
Conner looked at him, not sure where to start. “Cliff—get me the Bull River Ranger Station on the line. We have a grizzly incident up near Snowshoe Peak.”
#
No crashing behind her, no grunts, no heated breath.
Maybe she’d outrun the danger. Liza flew down the path, arms pumping, her chest burning as she cut toward camp, her feet stirring up gravel and needles. She tore past the zip line, the horse corral, the art pavilion, the climbing wall, the cabins tucked into the forested grounds, the chapel pit with the giant cross looming in the center. She nearly grabbed the rope in the bell tower but skipped it and headed straight for the mess hall.
“Beck!”
She slammed open the screen door, screaming the name of the camp director.
A hundred heads swiveled her direction, the reverence for Beck’s breakfast prayer a quiet palate for her panic.
Wiry, former military chaplain, current pastor of the Ember Community Church, John Priest put his gimme cap back over his salted, dark hair and advanced toward her from where he stood near the ledge stone fireplace. Dressed in his Gore-Tex camp pants, Keens, and a signature Camp Blue Sky T-shirt, he caught her arms with his wide grip as she collapsed onto the gleaming wood-planked floor.
Gasping and unable to speak, she grabbed his arms, held on as one of the campers came over. “I’m a doctor—what’s going on?”
“Is Esther Rogers here? Has anyone seen her?”
Every eye in the room pinned to her, all the diners at the ten-plus picnic tables sat without moving.
Oh, no, this could turn dark, fast. She grabbed Beck’s arm, cut her voice low. “Esther Rogers wasn’t in her cabin this morning.”
Beck’s expression creased into concern.
“I thought she might be at the overlook—you know, Snowshoe Peak?”
John nodded. “Why?”
“It’s a long story, but we were going to hike up together—and then she wasn’t in her bed this morning.”
She’d raised her voice just loud enough to ignite a murmur. She stared at Beck, cut her voice low again. “Have you seen her?”
John scanned the room. Then, in his I-am-a-chaplain-don’t-worry voice, he said, “Anyone seen Esther Rogers this morning?”
Not a word of response. And Liza’s breath unhinged from where she’d held it.
John wore the look she felt as he turned back to her. “Did you check the cabin again? Maybe she went out to the bathhouse—”
“I don’t know—yeah, maybe. I will but—”
John gestured to Skye Doyle, one of the nature guides. “Could you check the cabins and the bathhouse?”
Skye nodded and took off, passing Liza with a squeeze to her shoulder.
Yeah. Maybe she was simply—overreacting. Just seeing trouble that wasn’t there.
“I think maybe you should sit down,” John said, directing her over to his table.
“No, but...I think—” She let him push her down into the seat, clasped her trembling hands together. “No. Beck. You don’t understand.” She blew out a long breath. “I went up there and...” Her voice started to tremble. “There was a grizzly.”
John stilled. A beat passed between them as he appeared to weigh her words. “Where?”
“Snowshoe Peak. And I—I ran. I ran and ran and then I climbed a tree—”
“Grizzlies can climb—”
“I know. But I didn’t know what else to do, and I thought, what kind of idiot sticks around to play dead, right? Except maybe, I don’t know, but maybe that’s what Esther did because—”
She pressed her hands over her face. “Oh, Beck.” Her breaths tumbled over each other, her voice rising. “I found her jacket. Or what I think was her jacket—I don’t know. It was definitely a Blue Sky jacket.”
“Where?” This from the doctor. Doctor Billings. Shep’s father.
As in Shep Billings, the boy who had broken Esther’s heart.
Liza looked up, met his gaze, saw in his features the same handsome, solid chin, dark-blue eyes, a gleam of authority that he’d probably passed along to his arrogant, charming son.
She’d like to get her hands around Shep’s prom-king neck right about now. “Over the edge of the cliff,” she said quietly. “The jacket was caught in a bush below the lookout.”
The doctor’s jaw tightened, and he turned to Beck. “A word?”
John stood up.
The door slammed behind them, and Skye ran back in, breathing hard. “She’s not in the cabin or the bathhouse. I ran into the chapel but she’s not there either.”
Something about the way the doctor was leaning toward Beck... The worry that creased Dr. Billings’s face, then Beck’s, the quick glance at Liza—
“Shep isn’t here,” Dr. Billings said quietly.
“Oh. My. You’ve got to be kidding me.” Liza stepped up to their huddle, didn’t bother to keep her voice down.
It was the way the doc swallowed, his Adam’s apple dipping in his throat, his face whitening. “He wasn’t in the cabin this morning.”
Liza had a retort cued up and ready when the doc’s breath shuddered out, shunted it. “He took his jacket.”
The jacket. Liza couldn’t move, her brain suddenly fixed on the grizzly, the realization that two might have gone over that cliff.
“Blake, what’s going on?” The question came from a petite blonde.
The man who now glanced at the woman, then took aim, and fired at Liza.
“Shep sneaked out with some girl, and they’ve disappeared. And apparently, she told them to.”
Huh?
“I—no, I—”
Another woman arrived, with cropped brown hair, wearing an ill-fitting T-shirt, shorts, and crocks. “I’m Esther’s mom. What’s going on?”
“Liza here t
old my son and your daughter to sneak off—”
“No,” Liza said. “Actually—no. I told Esther to meet me, and we’d go—” She shook her head. “It doesn’t matter—they’re missing. And there’s a...” She cut her voice down. “A grizzly out there.”
“Oh my—” The petite woman clasped a manicured hand over her mouth. “Oh—Blake.” She grabbed his arm.
“It’ll be okay, Allison,” Dr. Billings said, his expression saying the opposite as he pinned a look on Liza. Liza did the quick math and attached a name to the blonde—Mrs. Billings, Shep’s mother.
“Listen, I don’t know what happened. We shouldn’t jump to any conclusions.” Liza took a breath, bitterly aware, however, that she’d led the leaping.
“We need to search the camp,” John said. “Let’s form groups, and everyone check the cabins, the corrals, the zip lines, and all the outbuildings. But don’t leave camp premises.”
“But the jacket—” Mrs. Billings started. “My son is out there.”
Pastor John held up a hand. “Could be anyone’s jacket.” But the look he gave Liza suggested he was already over the edge of foregone conclusions and falling into dark consequences. He turned his voice down low, just for their huddle. “We are not going to do anything rash. We don’t know if that grizzly is still there, so we’ll need to call the rangers before we head back up there.”
“I already called for help.” Liza’s voice matched Beck’s. “A friend of mine works at the Ember base as a smokejumper and—”
“This isn’t a fire, sweetheart,” said Dr. Billings. “We need rangers. Armed rangers.”
Esther’s mother’s eyes widened. “You don’t think—you mean armed, with guns?”
“You did hear the word grizzly, right?” Mrs. Billings snapped.
“Everyone, keep calm.” Beck’s voice rose. “We don’t know what to think.” He glanced at Dr. Billings. “And by the way, smokejumpers do more than put out fires.” He turned to Liza. “Good call.”
Really? Because she’d been knocking herself in the head ever since hanging up.
And seriously wondering why her first impulse had been to call a man she had deliberately walked away from.
#
“So who is this girl?”
Reuben rode beside Conner at a gallop, his voice lifting over the sound exertion of staying on his mount. Except, expert horseman Reuben wasn’t wheezing, or frantically grabbing the saddle horn, hoping his horse didn’t flip him off.
He should have taken a four-wheeler to search for the drone, but he hadn’t known how dense the terrain to scour might be. Having Reuben around meant more questions than Conner wanted to answer.
“Just someone I met during the BWCA fire in Minnesota three years ago.”
Understatement of the decade, probably, but he didn’t need Reuben’s scrutiny.
Conner spotted his fifth-wheel trailer parked at the far edge of the Ember Campground in the last spot, closest to the road. His black Ford 150 was parked beside it in the gravel drive, Reuben’s truck and horse trailer behind it.
Conner slowed his horse to a canter once he hit the gravel road.
“She’s not just someone you met,” Reuben said. “In fact, I think I remember her. Brunette? Didn’t you go to Arizona last summer—”
“She’s just a friend who’s in trouble.” He’d tried her number, at least twice, after alerting the rangers at the Bull River Ranger Station.
Please let them be on their way—although by land, the rangers were nearly an hour out from Liza’s location.
“You should call Gilly.”
Conner shot him a look, doing the math even as Reuben filled in the answer. “It’ll take you two hours or more to get there by car. Gilly can drop you into the camp in twenty minutes.”
Easy math, the correct answer. “Good idea. And round up Pete and whoever else is off duty. Liza thinks there’s a girl missing—we might need manpower.”
Gracie was still breathing hard as he reined her in at his camper. “Thanks, old girl.” He patted her heaving withers as he dismounted and headed inside, dialing Gilly’s number on his cell. When it went to voice mail, he tried not to panic. “Gilly, call me. I need you.”
Rare words, but he didn’t care.
Behind him, Reuben had dismounted.
Gracie stood, lathered, waiting.
Conner banged inside his fifth-wheel trailer, already cataloging his supplies. His jump bag of course, a first aid kit, pressure bandages. flare gun. He might leave his Glock locked in his bedside stand.
He startled at the sight of Commander Jed Ransom sitting at his kitchen table. The crew boss wore a grim, dark look, attired in his uniform—black Jude County Smokejumpers T-shirt, green Nomex pants, and boots. He played with his cell phone, turning it like a pack of cards in his grip.
Conner froze and in a moment ticked off a list of everyone he knew who might be in trouble.
Nope, the team wasn’t deployed, and the Jude County Hotshots were on the tail end of a cleanup. Which meant the only one left who might leave a gaping hole in his life was the woman who’d just hung up on him. “Jed?”
“Where’ve you been?”
Conner gaped at him. “On my day off? None of your business.” He didn’t mean to snap at him, but— “I gotta go, Jed.”
He pushed past him, but Jed grabbed his arm.
“I’m here on official business.” It was the edge of worry in his voice that kept Conner from yanking his arm away, throwing Jed out of his camper.
“Talk fast.”
Conner headed to the back bedroom, grabbed his gear bag.
“We have a problem. There are a couple of arson specialists down at Overhead who seem to think your drones are causing fires.”
His drones—? “What—? Conner glanced at his watch. Fifteen painful minutes since Liza had called...Please, God, don’t let her be bleeding to death.
He returned to the kitchen, searching for his keys. “Listen, Jed. I don’t know what they’re talking about. My drones aren’t flammable, and they haven’t been anywhere near any fires—”
“They found one at the Solomon River fire, near the source. And another one at Cherry Creek.”
Keys. Another thought about the Glock. “I know I lost one at Cherry Creek, but that fire had been blazing before the drone crashed.”
“Not the one you flew in—another one. Again, at what they think is the source.”
Jed had his attention now. “They found one of my missing drones?”
“You knew the drone was missing?”
Conner glanced at him. “I lost it over a month ago. Just went crazy, like number four—that’s where I was just now. Reuben and I went looking for a drone I lost last night. It went haywire, dropped off the radar.”
“You need to come in and answer their questions, get this thing cleared up.”
Conner glanced again at his watch. Twenty-one minutes. “I don’t have time to answer their questions—listen, I gotta go—there’s been a bear mauling—”
Jed froze. “Oh no.”
Conner stepped to the door. “I already called the rangers—but I have to get there.” He pushed his way outside.
Jed was hot on his tail. “There are investigators headed in from Boise. They want your drones.”
Conner threw his bag in the back of the truck. “Absolutely not. I only have one left, and it’s a prototype. An expensive, valuable, one-of-a-kind prototype, and if I hand it over, I’ll never see it again.”
He put his hand on the door handle, but Jed grabbed his arm. “I’m just giving you a heads-up. You take off now, it’s going to look like you’re running.”
“Running from what? I didn’t do anything. My drones don’t start fires. I don’t start fires.” He shrugged away from Jed. “Listen—” He blew out a breath. “Liza called. You remember her, right? From Deep Haven...”
It took Jed a second, probably sunk as he was in the ramifications of one of his smokejumpers being hauled in for a
rson questioning. But he caught up fast. “Liza. Wait—isn’t she the one who—”
“Yeah. Walked away from me without a word. I know what you’re going to say, but—”
“So why did she call? Is she in the area?”
“She was in a tree, hiding from a grizzly!”
Jed blinked at him, a frown creasing his face. “Is she hurt?”
“I don’t know—maybe. I hope not. But I gotta go.”
Jed’s mouth tightened. “It’ll look like you’re guilty of something.”
“But I’m not.”
“You could get suspended while they sort it out. Maybe be kicked off the team for good.”
Conner looked away. Drew in a long breath. Then his voice fell. “Listen, she called me. And she needs me. What would you do if it were Kate?”
Jed’s mouth tightened into a grim line of agreement.
“Cover for me. And...give me a plane?”
“A plane?”
“I have to jump in. Liza’s at Camp Blue Sky. It’ll take me two hours overland to get there, minimum.”
“Oh, fantastic. So, lie, cover for you, and distract them? Never mind who’s going to pay for it.”
“And maybe let me have Pete and, I dunno, Rube? Or CJ?”
Jed shook his head, but his expression suggested he’d climbed on board Conner’s cause. “Reuben’s on call. If you can talk Pete into it—and yeah, I think CJ’s got a few days off. But Conner, the minute you’re back, you check in with HQ, are we clear?”
Conner’s phone buzzed. He glanced at the caller ID. “It’s Gilly.”
“Tell her to gas up and meet you at the end of the runway. I’ll have Pete pick up your gear.”
“Thanks.” Conner climbed into his truck.
“And lock up your drone. Because if you’re not using them to start fires, someone else is.”
“It’s already secure, somewhere the Feds won’t find it.”
“Just try and stay out of trouble.”
Chapter 7
She’d just invited trouble back into her life.
Liza stood in the middle of the athletic field, where they played soccer and all-camp tag, and braced a hand over her eyes, scanning the blue sky for Conner’s drop plane.
Playing With Fire: inspirational romantic suspense (Montana Fire Book 2) Page 8