Firestorm (7 page)

“Ready?” Logan asked her. He started to check all the connections on her gear himself, but she batted his hands away.

“I’m fine. Let’s go.”

He raised his eyebrows in concern but nodded. “Okay. Here we go.”

Logan pressed two buttons, and an electric winch sprang into action, hoisting them high above. Reyne fought not to gasp as they sailed upward, her stomach flipping as they did so. When they finally came to a halt, she said, “Well, I’ve smokejumped enough down, but never up.”

“I know,” he said, grinning at her. “Isn’t it great? This way we can simulate tree accidents and figure out if our equipment will work. You said you’ve been a smokejumper?”

“Spent a summer on a jumper crew.”

“Good. Then you’re aware of what danger a jumper is in when he gets hung up in the trees.”

“Or when
she
gets hung up.”

“Yeah. Sure,” he said with a grin. “The trouble is that you’re sitting up here, waiting for your buddies to find you, praying that it’s before the wind changes and makes you a big smokin’ hot dog on a stick, and there isn’t much you can do. If your chute is caught on a
branch”—he motioned above him at the fictional parachute—“that will give way when you clip your letdown gear to it, you’re in big trouble.

“Up to now, as you know, jumpers had to pray that the chute would stay put or that there was a nearby sturdy branch. But with my support pouch, hopefully that will be a thing of the past.”

“So what do you want from me?” Reyne asked. “You need help figuring out what to put in the pouch?”

Logan ignored her sarcasm. “I need help on a lot of fronts. We need to figure out how to build this device and then make the contents as small as possible. Obviously, the less they have to carry the better.”

Reyne smiled, thinking of her jumper days. Smokejumpers traditionally donned heavy, thick apparel and wire-masked helmets as protection from the trees. The last thing they needed was another piece of equipment to carry. But Logan was right. If she was hung up in the trees, she’d want a better way out than the Swiss army knife they all carried. Reyne had been hung up before, but she had been situated in a way that she was able to cut the cords and climb down the sturdy trunk, not rely on a chute caught in flimsy branches and a letdown rope dangling beneath it.

Her friend had been lowering herself from a perch sixty feet up when the wind had changed and her chute had become unsnagged. It had taken Reyne’s team hours to carry her broken, twisted body to a clearing for a helicopter pickup. And it had taken months for her to recuperate. She had never returned to fight fire.

“Okay,” Reyne said slowly. “This really is not my field of expertise, but I’d say we need some trees with sturdy branches or planking in here to simulate a hang-up. And you and I can talk equipment
 … how we can get it down to bare minimums, where we place the pouch, and then how we modify it all.”

Logan dangled beside her, smiling.

“What?” she asked, irritated by his smug look.

“You’re buying into my project. Taking ownership. I like it.”

“Yeah, well, I don’t have much choice now, do I?”

“Nope,” he said, grinning even more widely.

“I can give you three to five hours a week, tops. I’ve got a regular job to hold down too, you know.”

“That’s fine. Can you clear your desk a little so we can start next week?”

“Probably,” she said. “Why don’t you come to my office, and I’ll show you some of the metal samples that might work for this project. I say we make it work in whatever size is easiest to develop, then concentrate on making it as small as possible.”

“Okay,” he said, grinning again.

Reyne tried to push away her irritation but failed. “Listen, Logan, I don’t need you gloating over all of this.”

His face fell. “Oh, I’m not gloating. I’m just glad to have a partner in this research. It really will save lives.”

Reyne considered his words and then nodded. “Okay. Then let’s get on with it. Show me what you have so far.”

Logan pushed two more buttons, and the winches let them descend slowly.

Reyne unbuckled herself and walked with him to a worktable covered with various straps and climbing equipment. After they talked awhile, Logan fetched a gas can, filled it from a huge tank outside, and came back to her. “I’ll carry it to your truck for you if you’ll go salvage-yard hunting with me next Saturday,” he said, trying again.

She took the can from him and smiled sassily back into his eyes. “No need. I can manage quite well on my own,” she said. “And I already told you. I have plans for Saturday.” With that, she turned and walked toward the door. As she was leaving, Logan’s voice called to her.

“We’ll see about Saturday. I haven’t given up. Give me half a chance, Reyne Oldre, and I’ll give you better things to do on the weekend as well as during the workweek!”

Shaking her head with a stifled grin, she walked out into the sunshine.

As the door closed behind her, Mike Moser called over to Logan. “So, what do you owe me, buddy?”

“You owe
me
ten,” he said. “But I owe you twenty. I got under the hood of the truck, but I made no headway on the dating highway.”

Mike and three other guys hooted in laughter. Logan soon learned that Reyne Oldre, although widely admired, had let few men near her. She was friendly enough, just never open to anything more than that.

“Until me,” he said with bravado, straddling a chair backward and looking them all over. “I’ll get her to give me a second look soon enough.”

“Oh yeah?” Mike challenged. He pulled up a chair to the table and brought out a deck of cards, expertly shuffling. “From what you told me, you’re fighting an uphill battle. You captured her R&D money. Now you think you can get her interested in you?”

“Better than that. Let’s make our bet more interesting,” Logan said quietly. “Give me until the end of the summer to marry that
woman. You can give her fifty bucks at our wedding dance, or I’ll give you a hundred as you walk out the door for the winter.”

The guys hooted and hollered, the sounds echoing in the rafters above them. “You’re on,” Mike said, shaking Logan’s hand. “Easiest money I’ve ever made, my friend. Easiest money I’ve ever made.”

R
eyne frowned as she drove up to the Tanners’ on Saturday afternoon, wondering who was there besides herself and the Morgans. She did not recognize the other car.

Her attention was drawn away from the house by the horses in the adjoining field, who were prancing about like circus performers. Reyne laughed out loud as a large, gray stallion named Cyrano charged a dun-colored mare and then shied away at the last instant when she stood her ground, unperturbed.

I hope we can ride today
, she thought as she drove by the cavorting horses. They seemed ready to get out, and she winced at the thought of sitting inside on such a gorgeous day. She pulled up beside the Morgans’ new Suburban and hopped out of her truck.

She knocked briefly on the front door and then let herself in when no one answered. “Hello?” she called. “Hello! Anyone home?” She heard voices in the kitchen and headed toward the sound. That was when she made out Logan’s voice and the response of her friends’ great belly laughter. Hope’s delighted squeals and screams rang in the midst of it all.

Reyne rounded the corner, peeking in. Logan was lifting the child high up in the air and then swooping her down in a deft move. She dissolved into wild giggles, and Logan laughed with her. For the first time Reyne noticed how his face was creased at the eyes and cheeks, obviously from smiling all the time.
What a happy man he is
,
she mused. She took a few steps backward into the Tanners’ living room, then moved forward again to feign recent entry.

“Hey, you guys!” she said, “Are you trying to pretend that you’re not home so I’ll go away?”

“Reyne!” “Hi there!” “Where’ve you been?” was their chorused response.

“Hi, Reyne,” Logan said quietly, drawing near. “It’s good to see you.”

Reyne ignored her quickened pulse, playing it cool. “Logan,” she said with a nod. “I didn’t realize you had made my friends yours already.” She winced inwardly at her own words. “I mean … I didn’t mean …”

“Reyne,” he said, reaching out to touch her forearm. “It’s okay. Yeah, they were nice enough to invite me over for an afternoon of riding and dinner.”

“We’re going riding?” Reyne said excitedly, glad to turn the conversation. She glanced at Beth, who looked rather ashen. Reyne immediately curbed her excitement. “I had hoped we could. Do you feel up to it, Beth? I mean, we could sit and play cards.”

“No way,” Beth said, her tone brooking no argument. “It’s too beautiful to be stuck inside. Matt and I are going to baby-sit the kids and work on supper while you four ride. We’ll expect you back by six. Now all of you … get going!”

“Are you sure—,” Rachel began, obviously feeling guilty about leaving Samuel with them too.

“Out!” Beth said, her face a mock warning. “Don’t argue with someone who has cancer. Running other people’s lives is one of the last things I have left to enjoy.”

Beth’s forced laughter encouraged everyone to get going, out of
the house. They shook off the pall that had overtaken them with her words and headed to the stables.

While Dirk and Logan went to get the saddles from the barn, Rachel and Reyne climbed the corral railing to bring in the horses. “She looks bad today,” Reyne said quietly.

“Yes.”

“Has she said anything to you? Is she in pain? Has she been to the doctor recently?”

“In response to your questions, no, I don’t know, and I don’t think so,” Rachel said, waving her arms to herd a mare toward the barn.

“Oh, Rachel. I get so worried about her!”

“I know. I know. She’s so independent that she won’t even talk to me about it anymore. I hope she’s talking to Matt. She needs someone.”

They grew silent, thinking. Neither wanted to intrude on Beth’s privacy. But neither of them wanted her to die. They needed her. Matt needed her. Little Hope needed her.

The group spent the afternoon riding high into the mountains behind the ranch, stopping periodically to look across the valley to the towering Rockies, and talking about whatever came to mind.

“I can see why they call it the Continental Divide,” Rachel said in admiration as they paused once more at a clearing. “No matter how long I live here, I’m still amazed every time I take the time to see it. It’s as if you could just picture the two plates of the continent colliding and then pushing upward.”

“They are beautiful,” Reyne said. The men nodded, silent in their agreement. She looked up at Logan and found him staring at her rather than at the mountains. Reyne quickly glanced away,
blushing at his open admiration. She was relieved to hear Dirk suggest they head back.

“Beth will have supper on soon, and I for one don’t want to be late,” he said. Reyne pictured Beth with a wooden spoon, feigning anger over their tardiness.

“Me neither,” she said with a laugh.

They moved into single file and were heading down a narrow path over a rock-slide area when Reyne’s mare slipped on the loose shale and stumbled before regaining her footing. Before she knew what was happening, Reyne was out of the saddle and struggling to keep herself from somersaulting down the mountain. She managed to finally stop her descent about forty feet from where she fell.

“Reyne!” Rachel called. “Are you okay?”

She shook her head to clear her vision and was about to answer when the crunch of rocks made her aware that someone had come after her. She squinted into the sun and sighed when she made out Logan’s body and face. He knelt beside her, earnestly scanning for injuries.

Logan took her hand and cradled her face with his hand. “Did you break anything?” he asked worriedly.

“No,” she said, embarrassed by his attention. “I’m fine. Just a little scraped and bruised.”

“You’re sure? You’re bleeding all over. No neck or back problems? That was a nasty fall.” He again looked her over like a paramedic on the combat field.

“Logan, I’m fine. If you’ll just help me up—”

But before she was to a standing position, Logan had swept her up and was carrying her back to the trail as if she were as light as a feather.
And I’m hardly a feather
, she thought. “Logan! Really, I can walk.”

“Let me do this, Reyne. I want to get you up to the trail and have another look at you. You may be in shock.”

“Well, sure,” she allowed. “But I’m aware enough to know that I’m not in mortal danger. Now put me down. I’ll walk the rest of the way.”

“No chance, Oldre. You’re the accident victim,” he huffed, still moving upward. “I’m the mighty rescuer,” he added. “Don’t ruin my big moment.”

Reyne smiled in spite of herself and allowed him to carry her the rest of the way in peace. But she avoided meeting Rachel and Dirk’s eyes when they reached the trail.
What has gotten into me
?

Logan set her down on the path.

“Are you okay?” Rachel asked worriedly, rushing over to her side. Logan pressed on her bleeding wounds with a handkerchief.

“I’m fine, Rachel. I think the only thing that’s really hurt is my pride. I’ve been bucked off a horse, but I’ve never fallen off one.” All of a sudden, she thought of the mare. “How’s Cookie? Is she okay?”

Dirk nodded slightly. “She’s thrown a shoe, and she’s got a nasty cut on her fetlock, but it’s nothing that won’t heal.” He looked sick to his stomach as he took in Reyne’s injuries. “I’m sorry, Reyne. I was in the lead. I should’ve known better. We should’ve been leading the horses instead of riding. You could have been killed.”

“Oh, Dirk, it’s okay. I could’ve gotten off Cookie if I’d wanted to. I just thought we’d have no problem. She didn’t slip a bit on the way up. It’s not your fault.”

Logan knelt and began checking her leg, obviously looking for breaks.

“Logan!” she said, shooing his hands away. “I’m fine! I told you, I’m all right.”

He looked at her with mistrust in his eyes. “Are you sure you’re not in shock and just not able to differentiate what’s broken and what’s not?”