Summer of the Burning Sky Read online

  But she didn’t have any room for more disaster in her life. And falling for a short-term hero only meant trouble and heartache for both of them.

  So maybe Vic was right.

  “Thanks, Tucker. Nice to meet you.” She held out her hand.

  He took it, his grip warm and strong and roughened by callouses and chips. But he clasped his other hand over hers. “You going to be okay?”

  “Yeah,” she said. “Don’t worry about me.” He couldn’t fix anything, not really.

  “Okay. Stay out of trouble, Stevie.” He winked, then walked away, swinging his keys around his finger.

  She watched the team load up, all guys except for one gal, who glanced at Stevie. Interesting.

  Then the van pulled out and headed west, into the lingering sunset. And Stevie closed her tailgate and climbed into her truck.

  She still needed to find someplace to sleep tonight.

  2

  “The scout base is located here. About three miles south of the fire.”

  Tucker leaned over the massive terrain map spread out across the long, rough-hewn table in the kitchen of Sky King ranch, listening as Barry Kingston drew an area on the map that encompassed the fire. Don Trotter from the BLM worked the same map on the other end of the phone set on speaker in the middle of the table.

  A massive window looked out toward Denali National Park, the glorious infamous peak rising into the clouds in the distant horizon. All blue sky, save for the tiniest chimney of new, black smoke in the distance, something so faint it could hardly be called a threat.

  Except, of course, to the handful of lodges and private homes along the outskirts of the park, not to mention, well, the Boy Scout camp.

  A bush pilot from a local wilderness guide service had caught the smoke early this morning. Tucker had no doubt, with the wind off the mountain and today’s low humidity, the fire was growing. But they still had time to get in and stomp it out before it grew into something inter-agency.

  He and his team could handle it.

  Tucker reached for his travel mug. A few other team members had trickled in to the makeshift headquarters. Not a bad place to convene, with the massive great room, overstuffed leather sofas, a log-top table brightly shined, a massive two-story river rock fireplace. Hand built in the 1950s from local Sitka spruce and Alaska pine, the place was a fortress carved out of the untamed wilderness surrounding it. A tiny lake edged the ranch to the west, surrounded beyond that by more mountains.

  A few cabins for guests hugged the eastern shore of the lake. To the west, a tiny homestead cabin sat in the shadow of a ridge that cordoned off the land to the south. A road wound along the property to the cabin, clearly an outbuilding that belonged to the ranch.

  The entire setup was remote, rugged, and quiet. So quiet that when Tucker got back last night, while the rest of the team hung out on the Kingston’s deck recounting the past few days, he’d retreated to the porch of his tiny rental cabin and simply listened to the wind in the trees, watched the moon struggle for presence in the tepid gray sky.

  He wanted a place like this.

  Someplace quiet where he could build a life. A wife, kids.

  Once upon a time, he thought he had that, with Colleen. But he’d been so very young. So very stupid.

  So very willing to be anything, do anything just so Colleen would love him. But she’d wanted him, ultimately, for one reason only.

  The gauged ears, the tattoo had told her he was someone else. Someone dangerous. Someone her parents would hate. Someone who looked on the outside like the turmoil going on inside Colleen.

  And he’d simply been too desperate to be anything else.

  He was tired of trouble.

  I’m leaving you in charge, Tuck.

  He still couldn’t believe that Jed had so easily handed over the keys to the team.

  Don’t do anything stupid.

  It wasn’t a big fire yet, but it could be if they didn’t get it under control.

  “Last eyes on it had it at about ten acres, and it’s crawling, so I think your team can knock it down. But if not, then I need your team to get in there on an initial attack, get eyes on it, and slow it down. We’re short on tankers—they’re on a fire north of Fairbanks. So I’ll need a status on your reinforcement needs asap,” Don said. A division one boss, Don had devised the fire action plan that had finally killed the Chelatna Lake fire.

  Riley came over holding a cup of coffee in a travel mug, eyeing the map.

  Don had paused, and now his voice came through the phone. “Just checking, but are you guys okay to deploy? I know you just came off a fire—”

  “We’re good,” Tucker said, aware of Riley’s gaze on him. Sure, they were tired, but that’s why they were here. “As soon as Barry gets the plane fueled, we’ll get loaded up.”

  Don hung up, and Tucker leaned over the map, trying to pick out the right drop zone.

  “We need to get our chutes repacked,” Riley said. A few more of Tucker’s team had assembled, probably feeling the buzz of a jump in the air.

  Shoot. He hadn’t thought of that. Probably, Jed hadn’t either. Repacking all the chutes would take precious time. “We could use the extras from the BLM team.”

  “Those are squares. Not rounds.” The Alaskan team deployed on ram-air canopies while the USFS used round, FS-14 chutes that deployed automatically from the static line of the plane. But the ram-air offered more precise steering and could handle the higher winds coming off Denali.

  Except, of course, the landings came at a faster velocity, which meant a higher chance of injury.

  He glanced at the layout. “There’s a Boy Scout camp at the base of that mountain, about three miles from the blaze. And we’re just down the road another five clicks.” His finger landed at Sky King ranch.

  Riley nodded. “I’m in, Tuck. But you’ll need to babysit the rookies.”

  “We did at least five jumps on rams before coming up here.”

  “Yep,” Riley said. “At least five.” He glanced up as Larke came into the room, her nearly moon-white blonde hair pulled back into a wispy ponytail. She wore yoga pants and a T-shirt that read Take to the Sky King.

  Riley looked away. “I gotta pack my gear bag.”

  Larke poured herself a cup of coffee and joined Tucker at the map. Didn’t even look at Riley as he left. Interesting.

  “Another fire?” she asked.

  “Lightning strike,” her father said and hung a hand on her shoulder. “This one’s up past the McGinty place.”

  “That’s not far from Alicia Salmon’s place. She’s almost to term. Maybe she should evacuate.”

  “Where does she live?” Tucker asked.

  “Southwest of the fire, about a mile from the main road.” She pointed to a place just south of the state park line. “Rough road, mostly for a four-wheeler and snowmobile,” she said. “Or, of course, horseback.”

  She turned to her father. “I’ll see if I can get her on the CB.”

  “Don’t go in without checking in with us,” Tucker said, feeling a little odd to be giving orders, but, well, Jed had put him in charge.

  “I’ll load up a Fat Boy in case you guys need to set up a strike camp and we need to drop in supplies,” Barry said. In his mid-sixties, Barry was every inch the picture of an Alaskan bush pilot—rangy, tough, unruffled. He shaved his white hair down to bristles, wore a white handlebar mustache, had blue eyes and a rare smile. Now he pressed a kiss to his daughter’s temple, reached for the cap folded in his back pocket, and headed out to his Otter drop plane.

  “Roll call,” Tucker said to a couple of the rookies from Minnesota. Crazily, they hailed from his hometown of Deep Haven in northern Minnesota. They’d joined the Jude County hotshot crew two years ago on a recommendation from Jed. This year, both had tried out and made the team. A guy named Romeo—lean, wide shouldered, with long, dark blond hair. The other, a lumberjack named Seth. Their other sawyer, he handled a chain saw like he’d been born with one in
hand and bore the reddish-blond beard and white-blond curly hair of a true Norseman.

  Seth nodded at him and went to grab his fellow rookies, two Zulies—Hanes and Eric—who had transferred from the Missoula team. Jed had hired them after they passed their training.

  The team assembled a few minutes later outside the lodge, and Tucker gave them the update, including the decision to use the squares. Not a word of dissent and by the time Barry had his Otter fueled up, the team had packed their PG bags, along with the cargo box of fuel, water, fusees, chain saws, water canisters, and hose line and dragged it all out to the tarmac.

  Tucker grabbed his own gear, added a few extras—streamers, a low-range antenna, toothbrush and paste, an extra T-shirt and socks—and joined the seven-person team assembled near Kingston’s yellow Otter. A bumblebee in the sky.

  Tucker noticed Skye crouched before her PG bag and headed over to her. “How are you?”

  She wore her hair in a tight braid, her aqua-gray eyes just a little troubled as she forced a smile. “I’m good.”

  “Right. Okay, stand up, let me check.” He ran through the equipment in her leg pouches—a hundred-foot letdown rope, extra drogue deployment bag, 12x12 camping tarp, a knife. She held her gridded face helmet and wore a bandanna tied behind her ears.

  “Good. And your PG bag—you have your hard hat, leather gloves, signal mirror—”

  “Yeah.”

  “Bug dope?”

  “You mean large animal repellent?”

  Good, so she still had a sense of humor. He pressed a hand on her shoulder. “You’re still first stick, with me, so just do what I do. You’ve done this before—the winds might be a little higher, but we’ll put down far enough away from the fire line it shouldn’t be too bad.”

  She nodded.

  “Grab an extra protein bar, then get aboard.”

  Barry Kingston wore a canvas jacket, a fraying baseball hat, and aviator glasses and met them with a hand out. “Before you go—I gotta pray for you guys.”

  Huh?

  “Listen, guys. You’re headed into danger, and the only thing I have to give you is this.” He met Tucker’s eyes first. “‘The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want. He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters. He restoreth my soul: he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness for his name's sake.’”

  His gaze scanned the rest of the assembly. “‘Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.’”

  His eyes finally landed on Larke standing just outside the group. “‘Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life: and I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.’”

  Barry recited the psalm as if it might be conversation, a truth that belonged to him. “Lord—You have this team’s back. You go before them to prepare the way and will shelter them as they do the job to which You’ve called them. You are their good shepherd. Protect them. Guide them. And bring them home safely.”

  He glanced again at Tucker. “God is able. And you are able through Him. Let’s go.”

  Right. Whatever. But the words lingered. Sort of reminded him of Colleen’s dad, mayor of Deep Haven. He was always paraphrasing scripture—God is with you, don’t be afraid—that sort of thing.

  Frankly, he wanted to hope that God was on their side.

  They loaded into the plane and took off, and again, Tucker compared the terrain to the Montana landscape he’d spent the past three years jumping. The Alaskan wilderness was less tangled, with more pastures and streams down here at the base of Denali. But the soil was tougher, the lines harder to scrub out, the land brutal and unforgiving. And breathtakingly majestic.

  If someone would have told him when he grew up in the tiny town of Deep Haven, Minnesota, coming home to a dark and cold house, that someday he would not only be smokejumping, living large and free, but that he would be in charge of the lives alongside him, well, it took a lot for a guy like him to believe anything but tragedy.

  Anything but small, dark, and despairing.

  And sure, he’d once reached for the stars, but that had turned out just like his father had predicted. Don’t think more of yourself than you are.

  Yep.

  Except, for the moment, he was in charge of this crew, and he intended on living up to every bit of faith that Jed had shown in him.

  “Tucker, we’re coming up on the jump spot,” Barry said over the mic. The sky had turned murky, the plane flying through spots of gray soup.

  With Barry at the controls, they were short a spotter, so Larke had climbed into the copilot seat and now crawled into the back.

  “Guard your reserves!” she shouted.

  He hooked in his pony line and opened the door. The wind washed in, crisp and bracing, thunderous. The plane jerked with the turbulence.

  Tucker took the opportunity to look out the door and assess the fire.

  A towering smoke column of black, boiling heat rolled into the blue sky. The fire had expanded to well over fifteen acres and was chewing south along a high, dry ridge dotted with Sitka spruce and reindeer moss. About three miles south, he spotted a lake, and through the trees, a log lodge. Maybe the Boy Scout camp.

  A river ran north-south three miles to the west. Which meant they had to head off the fire, turn it before it could reach the camp, and, worst case scenario, send it into the river. Which may or may not have the strength to stop it. However, he couldn’t make out any other water sources within walking distance.

  At least their jump spot seemed in their favor—a tiny pocket of meadow to the west of the fire, the wind at their backs.

  Her head out the door, Larke dropped the first of the streamers. The wind sucked it into the tornado of the blaze, a spiral of death.

  “Bring us around, to the southwest flank,” Larke said, and Barry banked for another go-round, flying over the fire.

  This time the streamer fell right in the breadbasket, and Larke motioned to Tucker. Skye lined up beside him, strapping on her helmet.

  They pulled up on final approach, and he spotted a few flames, maybe four feet high, edging toward the meadow, runaways from the inferno at the head, some eight to ten feet in flame length, shooting up black spruces and sending flames through the blackened smoke.

  Not so big they couldn’t knock it down before it got out of hand. But they’d have to dig in.

  Tucker did a quick four-point check, then glanced at Skye, a final once-over.

  Patted her rip cord, just to reassure himself that it was out and accessible.

  Probably they would all be just fine.

  “Your spot is about three hundred yards southwest of the fire. You should be able to pick your approach quartering in. If you overshoot, head south.” Because north might wind them back around, into the flames.

  The plane flattened out, and Tucker leaned back, bracing his hands on the open door. Kept his gaze on the far edge of the wingtip, where beyond that, the smoke billowed. His heartbeat swished in his ears.

  “Ready?” A tap on his shoulder and he pushed.

  The count went fast, the air pummeling his ears, and he ripped his cord.

  The hard jerk, quiet into the blue, and he glanced up to check on Skye.

  Away, falling, and then she pulled her cord. Her chute plumed, and he felt his pulse again.

  See, she knew what she was doing.

  He drifted down, cleared the southern flank of the fire, and came in at an angle. A gust billowed out from the fire, blasting him with heat and ash, but he let up on the toggles and rode it out, landing just outside the jump zone in a passable roll.

  He came up to yelling, just in time to spot Skye. The gust had reverted, caught her in a downdraft, and flattened her canopy right above a stand of flaming black spruce.

  “Reef down on the toggles!�
�� Tucker was on his feet, unstrapping, his gut coiled as he watched her struggle. She pressed down on the toggles, fighting to keep her chute filled, and he nearly wept as she cleared the trees, her feet so close to the flames he thought she might have lifted them.

  The wind had refilled the chute as if the hand of God caught her, and she landed just beyond him, tripping over some strewn logs.

  He unclipped his gear and pulled it together before running over. “You okay?”

  She untangled herself. “You wouldn’t pass me for that.”

  “You’re alive. You pass.” He helped her up, then left her to climb out of her gear while the second stick jumped.

  Romeo and Riley. Then Seth and Hanes and Eric.

  Tucker left Riley in charge of landing the cargo, including a five-gallon cubinator of water, and headed to a lookout point just north of their landing zone.

  He surveyed it through his glasses. The entire western flank was moving south at a dangerous rate, and spot fires were igniting a hundred yards from their jump area. They needed to scratch out a line along the west, get another team on the southern front, along a broad saddle of meadowland that could prove to be the perfect spot for a burnout, killing the fuel between the fire and the forest beyond.

  He got on the radio. “Base, this is Tucker.”

  Don came through the line. “Go, Tucker.”

  “This thing has the potential to blow up, but I see a way to stop it. We’re going to need another team to cut a line about a half mile south of our position.”

  A pause as Don most likely was looking at the map. “Roger, but you’re the only jump team we have in the area.”

  “Send in a hand crew. They can come in through one of the service trails.”

  Another pause. “No can do. We have no one to send.”

  Tucker pressed the radio to his forehead, wincing. C’mon. “No one? Maybe a team out of Fairbanks?”

  A pause, then, “Sometimes we draw from the correctional facility. But they’ll need supervision.”

  What? “A correctional facility?”

  “How many do you need?”

  “Eight? Ten?” He was mentally doing the math. Who’d he get to watch them? Not Seth, but maybe Riley. Or himself. Riley could stay here and cover the flank.