Burning Flame: Californian Wildfire Fighters Book Three

by North, Leslie

  "You never gave him a chance to make that decision," Landon said. "You withheld all the information he would need to make that decision."

  Lana hung her head. Out of the corner of her eye, she caught the venomous look Alex sent in the firefighter’s direction, but her friend didn't rise to her defense this time. She didn't need to. Landon was right. Lana had tried to navigate the rocky terrain of truth and dishonesty, and she had steered wrong. She had put off telling Hank the truth until it was too late.

  Alex wrapped her arms around her, and Lana fell into the offered embrace. She breathed raggedly, quietly, trying to stifle any more displays of her utter despair.

  Landon's phone buzzed, and he turned away from them to answer the call. Alex smoothed Lana's hair and murmured to her quietly. Lana wasn't sure what her friend was saying, but she appreciated the gesture.

  God, she was tired of feeling alone.

  "What is it?" The concern in Alex's voice made Lana raise her head.

  Suddenly, she wasn't the immediate center of the drama in the room. Landon's expression was stretched so taut that his clenched muscles caused new shadows to overtake his face.

  "That was the Cedar Springs chief," he said. "The storm veered. The heat wave came up from the south, and the winds kicked up and pushed the fire over the firebreak. Just like Hank suspected it would. Damn it."

  "What does that mean?" Alex whispered.

  "Exactly what you think it means. We have to start evacuating the town. Now." Landon moved toward the door. Lana rose, Alex with her. The women exchanged alarmed looks. "They need all hands on deck."

  "Where is the fire now?" Lana asked him.

  "It's here. The south side of town. We all need to head north immediately."

  "I have to get to the hospital." Alex's own pocket was buzzing now. She looked to Lana, possibly fishing for a signal that Lana understood, and Lana nodded.

  "Go," she agreed. "I'm right behind you."

  Alex squeezed her hand once more in parting, then released her. Landon held the door open for her, and she ducked beneath his arm with a backward glance. Lana nodded again.

  "Get to safety," Landon said. "We'll find you as soon as things settle down." And we'll finish this conversation, his tone seemed to promise.

  Lana nodded a third time. As soon as they were gone, she rushed to her room. She started packing.

  God, Hank. She couldn't stop the thoughts racing through her mind. I wish you were here. But you aren't. Now it's up to me to look out for myself.

  And it's up to me to look out for this baby.

  17

  HANK

  He was an hour down the road when the call from Chase came.

  Hank almost didn't answer it at first. He watched his cell phone ring on the dash, vibrating its way around the tray. He glanced out the window at the scenery retreating behind him. The further away from Cedar Springs he got, the more the blackened trees, stripped of their life and leaves, reared up to greet him.

  The fire had already passed through this area. His was one of the only trucks out on the road, and that was how he preferred it. Let this dead, winding road lead him home—or whatever it was he was running back to.

  Because that's what it was. Running. He wasn't chasing anything. And it was the thought of the chase that was continuing to elude him that drew him back to the Chase who just wouldn't leave him the hell alone.

  "Hank here." He pressed the phone to his ear, letting it be known by his tone that he wasn't in the mood for Chase's horseshit. If the other man thought he could convince him to return to Cedar Springs now, he had another think coming.

  "Hank!" Chase's tone, in contrast to what he had been expecting, was urgent. Hank pressed the phone closer to his ear to catch the agitated stream of words. "It's the fire, Hank! It blew into town!"

  "Where?" This was the last damn news he had wanted to receive, especially now that he was already headed out of town. That fucking county commissioner should have listened to him . . . no, Hank should have insisted that he listen. Now the fire had done exactly what they’d all feared, and there was no one to blame but himself. He had let his intuition be drowned out. He had been so preoccupied with Lana . . .

  Lana.

  "Where, Chase? Where has the fire spread to?"

  "South, near the highway."

  "Shit!" Hank swerved on his stretch of road. The wheels of the truck squealed beneath him, and the whole creaking body of the vehicle careened wildly as he stomped the brakes and wrenched the wheel around into a screeching U-turn on the two-lane county highway. The smell of burned rubber filled the air and singed his nostrils as if the fire was beneath him, right at his heels.

  "Hank! What the hell, man?" Now Chase sounded like he was in a blind panic. "Hank? You there, Chief? Shit! Please tell me he didn't just get into a fucking accident . . ."

  "I can hear you," he growled. "I didn't get into an accident. I'm on my way back to you."

  "Glad to hear it. See you when you get here."

  Chase dropped the call. Hank's thumb flew across the keypad frantically as he dialed. The subsequent ringing in his ear was cold, and shrill, and continuing, continuing . . . continuing right into voicemail.

  "Come on, Lana!" Hank hissed through his teeth. He tried dialing again. Nothing. Just Lana Sweet's unassuming voice inviting him to leave a message. Maybe it was a good thing that he couldn't reach her. Maybe it meant she had evacuated already.

  Or maybe it meant she was screening his calls.

  Hank hung up. He was about to toss his phone onto the seat beside him, maybe bang his hands on the steering wheel and string profanities together until his throat was sore, but another idea occurred to him. He shouted his sister's name into the phone, and Siri dialed.

  "Hank!" He could only barely distinguish Sookie's voice over the din of what he recognized to be helicopter blades.

  "Sookie, I need you to get to Lana's house and make sure she got out okay. The fire is headed right for her."

  "I know it is, Hank." Sookie sounded more distressed then he could ever remember hearing her. "But I'm gearing up to fly. I have my orders. Believe me, I wish I could run to her house and make sure she's safe." The channel garbled as Sookie responded to something another member of the National Guard was shouting at her. "I'm sure she's fine, Hank. She has to have evacuated by now. Everyone knows where the fire is."

  "I wish I could be so sure," Hank whispered. He doubted Sookie heard him over the roar of the chopper. He raised his voice to shout into the phone. "Be safe, little sister. I look forward to seeing you when you get back down, Sook."

  "Same to you, big brother. I love you, Hank."

  The words jarred him, but Sookie hung up before he could return the sentiment. He’d thought he would never hear those three words on his sister's lips again.

  Hank threw his phone down and floored the accelerator, gunning the truck down the highway. As he sped, he tried to relax, starting with his shoulders since his thoughts wouldn't immediately cooperate. Of course, what Sookie said had to be true. Lana always had the local news on in her living room these days, just like anyone else. And there was no way she couldn't see the fire coming, looking out those huge bay windows of hers.

  Nevertheless, he made the hour drive back in under forty minutes.

  They had already set up the one-way blockades. Hank parked, but left the engine running as he stepped down out of the truck's cab.

  A police officer hustled over to him, already shaking his head, a denial of entry on his lips.

  Hank opened his wallet and thrust his ID at the man. "I'm a firefighter," he stated. "I'm here with the volunteer contingency from Alaska. Let me through."

  The cop's headshake quickly transformed into a nod. "Winds’re pushing the fire up into the south part of town," the officer said as he moved the barricade. "Not sure where your squad is going to be. Caught us completely by surprise. We're still in the process of evacuating everyone."

  "Thanks." Hank pulled himself back
up into the cab, not bothering with his seatbelt as he shot on through.

  He headed south, toward the flickering orange glow feeding on the darkening horizon. He couldn't tell if the black miasma in the evening sky overhead was smoke or storm clouds. It almost didn't seem to matter anymore.

  The apocalypse had come to Cedar Springs.

  He was forced to slow down as he began passing rapidly unfolding scenes of chaos. Too many volunteers had been sent home prematurely, and the people of Cedar Springs had been lulled into complacency thanks to the commissioner's positive reports. No one seemed prepared for the fire. Vehicles careened down both lanes of the road, and frequently screeched to a halt as the drivers stopped to pick up their fleeing neighbors. A man was outside on his lawn, spraying down the burning roof of his home with a garden hose; Hank watched the scene conclude in his rearview mirror, when a fireman was forced to tackle to the distraught homeowner and drag him away so the professionals could do their work but to Hank’s practiced eye, it wouldn’t be long before the house collapsed completely. Booming above the uncontrolled panic was an authoritative voice on a loudspeaker telling everyone to get out now! No request for calm, no time for orderliness. This was it.

  Black smoke poured from Lana's street.

  Hank wrenched the steering wheel in a skidding turn onto her street. He could see houses going up like torches further—not far enough—past her house. Shock made him yank the wheel too late, and he overshot her driveway (her car was still there!) and flew into the yard. His wheels churned her lawn as he hit the brakes and skidded the car around, ending sideways to the house. He threw the door open before the truck came to a complete stop and leapt onto her porch.

  "Lana!" he shouted. He raised his fist to bang on the door—before realizing how far past pleasantries they were at this point. The fire was already consuming a neighbor's house just down the street, and wind-borne sparks filled the air around him like flaming fireflies.

  He reared back and kicked the door in.

  18

  LANA

  Lana was packing her duffel when the front door burst open. She whirled, heart leaping into her throat as if she expected . . . what? The fire to blow her door down like an uninvited house guest? Get a grip, Lana, she thought as she darted out into the hall.

  But her heart refused to descend when she saw the man standing in the entryway.

  Hank Logan breathed raggedly, in and out, like he had a pair of bellows for lungs. Like he had run back to her—all the way from Alaska. The way his shoulders squared, she knew he was ready for a fight, but—fight who? With fear, with the fire? With her?

  It was with her.

  "What the hell are you still doing here, Lana?" His voice was hoarse as he stalked toward her. Lana backed to the doorway of her bedroom, but not because she was intimidated by him. She cast a quick glance over her shoulder to take in just how much more she needed to pack. "The fire already caught a few houses down! What are you thinking?"

  "Don't talk to me as if I were a child." She surprised herself by the tone of voice she used, and she could tell she surprised Hank, too, by the way he stopped walking toward her. "I know the fire's here, Hank. I'm almost done packing. I just had to get a few more things."

  Hank glanced around the room. She knew that he was only just noticing for the first time the naked walls of her home.

  She turned from him, trying to keep her composure, all the while stunned by his sudden reappearance in her life. She crossed to her bed to finish, and found herself arrested around the middle—though she managed to retain her grip on the duffel bag's handles.

  "Hank!"

  But the fire chief wasn't to be reasoned with. He had caught her around the waist, and he was hauling her out of the house. Lana kicked out at the empty air—she didn't know why she thought that would be an effective protest—and clutched at her bag to keep the contents from spilling out. She was furious that she should feel anything remotely resembling embarrassment at being dragged bodily out of her own home.

  She decided to convert that humiliation to anger.

  As soon as they were out on the front lawn, she hauled off with her duffel bag and hit him in the face. The roar of the encroaching fire, the smoke, the sparks in the air seemed to mirror her roiling emotion.

  Hank grunted and stepped back, finally releasing her, and Lana was ready. She whirled. "Get your hands off me, Hank Logan! You have no right to touch me! You have no right to come back here!" She was yelling nonsense, but it was the truth from her heart. Everything she said, she felt with her whole being in that moment.

  "What if a gas main catches, Lana?" he demanded. "This whole block will go up! We have to leave, right now!"

  Lana realized too late that the duffel bag had done nothing to deter him. Hank was coming for her again. She pulled away, out of reach, teeth clenched in anger. She had never felt so incensed in all her life.

  "Get away from me," she repeated. "You were leaving—what do you care?"

  "Of course I care!" Hank snapped. "Why do you think I came flying back into town?"

  "I don't know!" Lana cried. "So you could be the hero? Isn't that why you came back to town in the first place all those months ago? Do you think that's the only time I need you? And what happens when the crisis is over? What happens to the hero? He'll take off as planned! So he might as well have never come back to begin with!"

  Hank seized her arm and began to tug her toward the idling truck. Lana knew it was stupid to fight him on this point; she had been planning on leaving, anyway. What did he think? That she was so crushed by his departure, by her own sorrow, that she was willing to die in her own home?

  "We can talk about this once I get you somewhere safe," he said, but Lana barely heard him.

  "I don't need you, Hank," she protested desperately. "I don't need you. I don't need your help. I don't need you to be a hero, and I don't need you to be a father. I can do this myself!"

  Hank froze. "Father?" he repeated dumbly.

  Lana stared. Did she look as stricken as he did in that moment? Oh God, how had she let any of that slip out? She’d thought she would never see him again! Her defenses were down, and the truth was out.

  She turned from his intense gaze back toward the fire. Another house down the block, one closer, had caught as the fire advanced; hungry flames were climbing the walls and shooting high into the air from the roof. The wall of heat was coming for them.

  And there was no retreating from this.

  "Yes, Hank," she said finally. She shut her eyes against it all. "I'm pregnant."

  19

  HANK

  Lana spoke, and the world went quiet.

  The silence was almost complete. Never mind the fire burning in the too-near distance, the sounds of civilization breaking apart and crumbling to ash. Never mind the familiar roar and moan of an elemental appetite that could never be sated. Never mind the smoke that filled the air and crawled down his throat and compromised his lungs. Lana's words rang in his ears, cannoning off the inside of his skull. His blood pumped as a new adrenaline dump flushed through his system and threatened to take him over.

  He felt panic. He felt anger, and terror, red burning bursts of emotion that painted his mind's eye until he couldn't see the way forward. And then he felt . . . joy. A joy so pure and wonderful that he thought it would burst out of the seams of himself, the same way they had been hoping for the return of the sun all these months. It was all too much and not enough, and in the wake of Lana's confession, it left him paralyzed.

  "You left me, Hank!" Lana's voice had risen in volume to a shout. All at once, Hank found himself pulled back into the moment. He realized she was shouting over the roar of the fire, but the tears streaming down her face also told him in no uncertain terms that he was the reason she had to give vent to her words in a scream. "You left me again!" She succumbed to a violent coughing fit and doubled over.

  Hank raised his forearm to cover his mouth and nose, took as much of a breath through
the cloth of his shirt as he could manage, and lowered his arm to say, "Lana, now is not the time or place!" He reached for her, hands encircling her waist to try and hustle her out of the way, but Lana pulled herself away from him, and he found he was too afraid to go after her. What would happen to the baby if he used all his strength to corral and carry her off the premises? What would become of her, of the baby, in the next five minutes, if he didn't?

  "I won't budge from this spot until you tell me why," she said. The tears that streamed down her face reflected the living light of the fire behind them. "Why did you leave me again? What are you so afraid of?"

  "Lana, I never wanted to leave you. Not ever." Suddenly the words were pouring out of him, the words that had lived inside him for years like a virus no amount of distance could ever inoculate him against. The words were rising up, breaking their chains, and he was helpless to drag them back down to the dark place he had buried them. He wasn't their warden anymore. He didn't want to be. He let the words take him over and fill the night air between them. "I left because of Michael."

  "Why?" Lana hiccupped. "Michael died, Hank. We all miss him! There's not a day that goes by that I don't think of him. But he's gone! There's nothing any of us could have done . . ."

  "That's not true!" Hank exploded like the bursting of the building foundations just up the street. "Michael died because of me! I was supposed to drive him home that night, Lana! From the party! I knew full well that was supposed to be the arrangement, and I blew him off. I blew him off because I wanted to be with you. I knew where our night was going, and I couldn't walk away from you! Hell, I couldn't even look away from you. You were so beautiful, and I was . . . I was so stupid. That was the first night we spent together."

  "I remember." Lana's tears had all dried now. Hank watched her, and his stomach gave an awful twist as he saw that she was no longer in the moment with him. She was listening to every word that came out of his mouth, and filling in the blanks of that long-distant night with the real version of events.