Falls Like Lightning (11 page)

Bo eyed it and then gripped it like a vise. Caleb winced.

Bo took a long deep breath. “Let’s be sure, then, the both of us keeps our promises.”

CHAPTER

15

E
lle dipped beneath rusty luminescent clouds that were half smoke, half vapor, diffusing the last of the early evening light. She forced thoughts of Silas to the back of her mind, relegating him there like the rest of his jumper crew strapped into the back. Present conditions warranted all her attention, and she couldn’t let their encounter and the emotions it stirred compete for it.

She had expected the jaunt into South Lake Tahoe to be turbulent, but not to the point of losing and regaining over a hundred feet in altitude in the matter of a few seconds. She was thankful she’d remained composed and able to calmly reassure Maddie that sometimes it got bumpy on plane rides, despite the fact that the drop had made even her experienced aviator stomach jump into her throat. Warren, the Redding jumpers’ longtime Spotter, sat silent in the copilot’s seat, not showing any concern. Elle figured she likely appeared that way to him too and smiled inwardly at his confidence in her abilities. She took pride in getting her crews safely to their drop points. Having Madison on board just ratcheted up the stakes tenfold. She wished she could stretch her hand out into the air and calm the currents for her baby.

The cockpit rattled with another round of turbulence. She glanced over the gauges and adjusted her grip on the yoke. Seventeen active wildland fires in the area of the Sierra Nevada’s Desolation Wilderness. California and Nevada resources were tapped, leaving only skeleton crews to remain for anything else that might blow up in the West. According to Weathers, strike teams consisting of five brush engines each and pulled from neighboring states were arriving daily and being sent on immediate need to unattended blazes. No stopping in staging. No getting settled at camp.

She crested a ridgeline, and the lake came into view. White-capped waves reflected the tawny gray underbellies of thunderheads. The lightning activity at the moment was lower than it had been for most of the trip, giving her a short window to come over the pass and park the Twin Otter at the airport in South Lake.

She’d flown in worse. But not with her daughter.

The plane briefly dipped. Elle held the stick level, glancing at her horizon bulb and the altimeter. Maybe agreeing to this assignment had been a mistake. What was she thinking—leaving Maddie with a complete stranger. Okay, Weathers’s wife was not a stranger. And Maddie would have playmates in their grandchildren. She’d be safe. It was better than Elle going on unemployment. And almost anything had to be an upgrade from Cecelia.

A pang of guilt twinged inside her. Cece would have to work her own way through her grief. She had to come to terms. She had to let go of the “but why” approach and accept things as they were. Cecelia had married a man who was drawn to jumping into fires. She knew the risks. She knew the possible outcome. What did she expect—for him to be around forever? Elle knew jumpers, and as such knew better.

Lightning struck over the eastern shore. Elle descended, dropping altitude to skim close to the lake, not wanting to toy with any unstable air masses above. She glanced back at Maddie. For all the worrying Elle had done, there the child sat, head tilted back with Rose under her arm.

Elle radioed the South Lake Tahoe airport tower for approach and permission to land. They approved her as second in the pattern behind a single engine air tanker that was returning after dropping its small load of fire retardant. She angled the stick and arced around. The heading indicator spun on the instrument panel.

Another flash burst in the sky. The south part of the lake seemed to spout and spatter like hot oil. South shore clouds tore from the sky, and sporadic raindrops tapped on the aircraft hull. The blue-lit runway lights came into view, emitting haloes in the downpour.

These microbursts weren’t uncommon at this time of the year. More bark than bite. The little moisture they released would soon be sucked up by dry tinderbox fuels and climbing daytime temperatures.

Her right-wing engine prop skipped and buzzed. She adjusted speed and angle to compensate for the loss of lift and brought her in, slow and easy, until the tires screeched and the flaps came up and the roaring sound of a safe ground landing hummed in her ears.

Right decision or not, they were there, touched down in Tahoe with the world afire.

———

Silas barely took three steps on the tarmac in South Lake Tahoe before Planning Chief Shivner got in his face.

“You’re late.” He adjusted one of three radios rigged to his chest harness. Sweat beaded between the receding banks of hair atop his tan-skinned head.

“Evening, Chief.” Silas shouldered his rucksack and nodded toward Warren. “You might want to talk to the man in charge.”

“Adams.”

Warren descended from the plane, a grin beaming out from his growing beard. “Yes, sir, Chief. Give me something good, ’cause you know these boys like to fight fire.”

Shivner looked sideways at Silas and took Warren by the arm. “Over here.”

They strolled to the nose of the aircraft. Warren’s expression drew somber.

Silas scratched the back of his neck. The rest of the crew filed out of the plane. Elle walked into the crew compartment and knelt by Maddie. She caught Silas’s eye and smiled. Maddie waved with her fingers. Silas returned the gesture.

Warren returned. “Sounds like things in the last twelve hours have pretty much gone to—”

“Pretty much is an understatement.” Shivner waddled past with a limp and waved them along. “Talk on the way, gentlemen.” The edges of his yellow Nomex shirt stretched around the pear-shaped arc of his belly. “The next operational period is set to start at twenty hundred hours. You’ll both be there.”

Both?

Warren nodded. “Absolutely.”

Shivner hadn’t phrased it as a question. He paused, already winded. “All right. I’ll give you the opportunity to talk, then.”

“Thanks, Chief.”

Shivner glanced at Silas and plodded ahead.

Warren brought both hands behind his head and blew out a breath. “We lost a guy today, Silas.”

His gut dropped. “What? Who?”

“Pendleton.”

“The spotter?”

Warren nodded.

“Plane go down?”

“He was on the ground.”

“Why wasn’t he with his plane?”

“I didn’t stay with the plane when we went after the radio tech.”

“That was different. We had a rescue mission. Out here—”

“You know how it is—if another qualified spotter is available, then sometimes we’ll jump with the crew. Fact is, with all these fires and resources stretched thin, Command has assigned one incident spotter to coordinate all the jumper crews. It frees up another man on the ground for every crew.”

Silas took a deep breath. “What happened?”

“The details are still sketchy. Sounds like the winds changed and the fire blew up. The crew tried to outrun it with their fire shelters deployed on their backs to reflect the heat. Pendleton was the last one, making sure he had his whole crew out. The fire overtook him.”

“Others get burned?”

“Not that I’ve heard.”

How does the head of a jumper crew get killed and none of the others get so much as a burn? Silas would drag Warren’s body through hell if he had to.

Ahead, Shivner turned and glanced at his wristwatch.

Warren motioned. “Let’s go.”

CHAPTER

16

T
he command room occupied a portion of the South Lake Tahoe aircraft control tower. Can lights illuminated an otherwise darkened room, casting warm cones over a large topographic map spread across a drafting table. A makeshift work area of collapsible tables supported a network of laptops and printers and a conflux of wires snaking to and from power strips and Internet routers. A muffled din of radio traffic and phone conversations filled the air. Elevated voices emitted from a circle of men standing around the map.

“We’re getting lit up like a lab on a shock collar.”

“Hanes Index has topped out at six for two straight weeks now. When are we going to realize that what we’re doing isn’t en—”

The conversation broke as Shivner approached. The circle split to accommodate them. Silas recognized the incident commander as Chief Weathers from the Redmond, Oregon base. Weathers headed up the most respected type-one incident management team in the nation. If these guys couldn’t manage this thing . . .

Weathers acknowledged Shivner. “Welcome back. I assume these two have been briefed.”

“Briefly,” Shivner said, drawing scattered chuckles.

Weathers glanced at Warren. “Adams, good to have you here.” He turned to Silas. “Mr. Kent, I assume you know what a battlefield promotion is?”

Silas shifted the rucksack on his shoulder. “Yes, sir.”

“Warren tells me that he’s been grooming you as his replacement. Problem is, the old goat ain’t bound to quit anytime soon.”

Silas let a smile escape.

Weathers ran his fingers over the topo map and exhaled. “Before today, I’d never lost a man under my command. I, my team, we’ve been here all of twenty-two hours. We were tossed a bag of hot potatoes and then got dumped on with a truckload. It is unfortunate that your elevation in rank has to come about this way. Pendleton was a good man, and in the proper time his body will be recovered and he’ll get the kind of burial he deserves. There isn’t a guy here whose heart doesn’t feel like a ton of bricks. But right now we have the potential for the largest lightning-caused fire complex the Sierra Nevada has seen in over a century, and there is an immediate need for a spotter. I’d like you to be the one to head up Pendleton’s jumper crew. I’m sure you’re aware that we have an incident spotter assigned, so you’d be acting primarily on the ground as their jumper in charge.”

Silas shifted his weight.
Why me?
“Isn’t . . . I mean, thank you for the acknowledgment, Chief. But would it perhaps be better if a jumper from Pendleton’s own crew served in that role?”

Weathers scratched an eyebrow and glanced at a man with a moustache and navy blue ball cap standing at the edge of the light shadow. Weathers seemed to choose his words with care. “You’ll have Caleb Parson to draw information and history from. He’s the senior member of their crew.”

“Forgive me, Chief. But why not designate him as the new spotter?”

“Call it a hunch, but I suspect that, after the loss of Pendleton, most of those guys are wound a little tight right now. We need someone out there with a clear head. Someone less encumbered. Caleb’s a good fireman. And under ordinary circumstances we’d have that whole crew off on administrative leave and assigned to a critical-incident stress management team. But we need the feet on the ground, and I’m going with my gut on this. I need someone who can act decisively and adapt to rapidly changing circumstances. Can I count on you to do that?”

Silas eyed the men in the circle, catching Warren’s eye last. He set his chin and straightened. “Yes, sir, Chief.”

“Very good. Now come in closer here to see what we’re dealing with.”

Silas set his rucksack on the floor and propped his hands on the table’s edge. Red borders were drawn around a vast amoeba-shaped area. Smaller independent cells hovered in close proximity to the large mass, appearing in jeopardy of being absorbed by it.

“As you can see, the fires are burning together, though there are still a myriad of spots and isolated strikes. Several thirty-to-forty acre fires are presently burning unattended. The main fire has been drawing most of them into a massive timber fire burning all the way to the crown tips of these trees. At present, the complex is zero percent contained.”

A bearded man with a clipboard waved. “Rocklin, fire behavior analyst. Activity has been difficult to predict. Erratic changes have been the only reliable occurrence. Long story short, the weather largely depends on where you’re standing.”

Silas stared at the map and nodded. “What’s the LAL at?”

“Lightning activity level is high and dry at four, fuel moistures at record lows, though we did get a little unexpected precipitation in the basin this afternoon.”

Ball Cap shook his head. “Just enough to stir it all up even more with the downdrafts.”

Rocklin shrugged. “Pretty much.”

Weathers studied the fire perimeter. “The primary issue is that the fronts are expanding in multiple directions faster than we can get equipment to keep up with them. Last numbers put the main fire at upwards of thirty thousand acres. We expect that to double in the next two days.”

“How many strike teams did you order up?”

“Oh, I ordered plenty. There ain’t any coming quick enough, though. Closest thing we’ve got coming is a couple type-one hand crews from Montana and three brush rigs from Florida.”

“Florida?”

Shivner edged into the light. “Last year’s budget cuts went deep. Everybody’s feeling it. But guess what? Mother Nature don’t—”

“We do have a hand crew that just arrived in staging. Otherwise, nothing.” Weathers shook his head. “I’ve never seen it like this.”

Ball Cap folded his arms. “We got guys who’ve been sleeping in the dirt on other fires for twenty-one days straight already, and then they get sent straight here with no sign of letup.”

Silas exhaled. “So, what’s the plan?”

Shivner pointed to the lower left section of the map. “For now we are obviously on the defensive. We’ve got rigs at five-mile intervals defending the populated perimeter, trying to keep this thing from running through the houses. Due to the fire’s relatively remote location, we’ve only lost a dozen structures so far. Right now the wind is pushing it westward and back into the wilderness. That’s the good news.”

Warren folded his arms. “Five-mile intervals?”

“It’s the closest we could get the engines and still cover all the area. Eventually the eastern and northern fronts of this fire will threaten just about every neighborhood from South Lake to the North Shore.”