Flash of Fire (12 page)

“You're staring,” she said when she had the long johns off all but one leg.

“Damn straight!” A firestorm wasn't going to make him look away.

“You're also still fully dressed. If I'm the only one naked in this tent, then there sure as hell isn't going to be any more sex.”

“Right.” Mickey got to work and was soon out of all his gear.

“Oh, yum.” Robin pushed him down on his back before he could maneuver for position. She put her head down on the middle of his chest and rubbed her face there so hard that it tickled.

She pulled the protection from his hand and slid it over him.

“We can be slow next time. Right now, I'm afraid slow might kill you.” Then she straddled him and took him in.

He wasn't in any condition to argue with her. So much need had flared through him as he had given her a release that he had little control and no patience for finesse. The moment he entered her, he was arching his hips up to drive deeper, as deep as he could. Lifting her until her hair brushed the low ceiling of the tent.

He grabbed her hips to drag her down against him.

She unleashed her full body weight to press them together at the same moment. Her torso arched over him made him pray for a thousand wishes. He wished for time to admire and taste those enticing breasts. He wished to nuzzle her neck for hours. To discover the texture of her skin and how it varied over every inch of her powerful torso.

But all he could do was hold her tight against him and drive into her. She was like her helicopter, powerful. Like that stupid motorcycle that she didn't own, fast. And most of all, the mountain cool scent of her had shifted; a wildfire's worth of heat now wrapped around him until—with one final upward plunge—he was gone.

“Oh, yes.” Robin's sigh of contentment was soft as she slowly melted down to lay full upon him. “I knew this was going to be a good summer.”

Mickey hadn't known, but he couldn't agree more.

There was only one problem. And it was not a good one. Only way to address it was straight on…he supposed.

He managed to wrap his arms over her back to delay any attempt at a quick getaway.

“Robin?”

“Hmm?”

“I have a really stupid question.”

“Ask away.” She nibbled at the skin along his neck.

Mickey looked up at the ceiling of the tent, tinted gold through the flyaway edges of her hair.

“C'mon.” She squirmed slightly, settling even more comfortably in his arms.

“Okay. I hate to be cliché, but…”

“What, Hamilton?”

And there it was.

“You're being awfully evasive. Not like you.”

She already knew that about him? Fine.

He took another breath. “What the hell is your last name?”

There was a pause, during which he braced his arms to keep her close.

Then she laughed that delightful, soft laugh into the crook between his shoulder and his neck. He could feel it start in her belly and ripple through her.

“You bedded a woman and don't know her—”

“No, I don't. I'm sorry. Okay? I have lousy sources. I'll kill Gordon later, but he didn't know your last name either.”

Again the delighted laugh. She pushed up just enough to look down at him. Though he kept his arms around her to ensure that it wasn't a fake to an abrupt departure.

“Robin Harrow, pleased to meet you.” Then she shifted her hips delightfully where he was still deep inside her before collapsing once more to laugh against his neck.

“Very pleased to meet you.” He did his best to make it sound proper, but it was a hard thing to do in their current positions.

Robin Harrow.

Robin of the Hood's Arrow.

Pierced him straight through the heart.

He wasn't in love. That didn't happen in twenty-four hours, no matter what anyone said.

But if he had to pick one woman out of the crowd to fall in love with, he knew that he'd never find another like the one presently convulsing with laughter in his arms.

The fire fought back for five more days. They would block it to the north, and the wind would turn south. They'd airlift a team of shattered smokejumpers back to camp, only to have to roust them four hours later because of fire breaching the hard-won fire line of cut and backburn.

Robin had flown hard fires, but this was getting ridiculous. She started juggling crews not based on how she thought their skills might be best applied, but rather by whose eyes were least bloodshot with fatigue. It was a good thing that there wasn't a mirror anywhere on camp—she wasn't willing to see how she herself was faring.

Sometimes she'd crash in her own tent, which she had eventually found. Not because she didn't want to sleep with Mickey, but because it was fifty steps closer to where she parked Firehawk One.

Last night, she stumbled on him asleep in the grass close by the food tent. Someone, Betsy probably, had spread a blanket over him. Robin ate the rest of the barely started deep-fried chicken breast on his plate, even though it had gone cold, before slipping under the blanket beside him.

She'd woken six hours later with Mickey and the Twin 212 gone, but the blanket neatly tucked around her and a sliced orange sitting on a fresh plate under an inverted bowl to keep it ash and fly free. She spent a luxurious ten minutes lying on her back, sucking on orange slices while watching the morning sky. It was dark gray with the approaching fire, and most of the town's residents were now wearing those little paper masks.

Denise came over and sat beside her. She wore a goofy straw hat and a long scarf over her hair that kept it more blond than ash gray.

“Why do you look so much better than we do?” And Denise did. She looked tired but happy tired. “You're not working any less hard than we are.” Actually, she was probably doing more, flying with Vern when she could and maintaining the helicopters the rest of the time.

She shrugged. “I'm not sure. I hit a turning point last winter, a turn that changed my life and brought Vern and me together. Or perhaps it was the other way around. The events and decisions were pretty interlaced. Anyway, I'm so happy about what I get to do each and every day.” She shrugged again. “I guess. And then there's Vern, who makes me feel quite wonderful.”

“I knew there was a reason I liked you,” Robin confessed and realized it was true. Denise was probably the smartest person on the team, pleasant and funny—though perhaps the latter wasn't intentional.

“You do?”

Robin nodded and turned to look at the sky. She checked her watch again. She couldn't go aloft for another hour yet, and it was starting to chafe at her.

“Why?”

She looked back at the mechanic. “What do you mean,
why
?”

“Uh…” Denise adjusted her hat to no purpose that Robin could see. “I'm not used to people doing that. Liking me. Though Vern does.”

“No, he doesn't. He worships you.”

“He does,” Denise admitted with a blooming smile. “It still surprises me every day. We've only been married a few months and I'm still not used to it.”

Robin sat up cross-legged and faced Denise. “I like you because I do.”

“Okay.” Denise squinted out from beneath the floppy straw brim. “But I still think it's odd.”

“Calling me odd. Gee, thanks,” Robin teased her.

“I suppose I was. I didn't mean to.” Denise didn't look abashed, simply stating facts.

Robin laughed. She couldn't help herself. Robin leaned forward and gave Denise a quick hug. She wasn't used to having girlfriends. But if she had to choose one to start with, she couldn't imagine one better than the straight-ahead, plainspoken mechanic.

“What?”

“You're hilarious, Denise.”

“I am?”

“Way.”

“Is that a good thing?”

“Double way,” Robin confirmed.

“I'll have to think about that.”

“That doesn't surprise me.”

That elicited a merry look from Denise. “I suppose it shouldn't. I overthink the daylights out of everything.”

“Duh!” Robin couldn't stand it any longer. She had to get to a radio and at least find out what was going on with the fire. “Was there something you needed?”

“No.” Denise shook her head. “I just saw you were awake and I thought I'd come keep you company for a minute.”

“See, that's why I like you.”

Denise again squinted at her from beneath her hat brim.

Robin was either going to laugh in her face or…

She stood, gathered the plates, and draped the blanket over one shoulder. “Come on. I need some breakfast and then let's find out what's going on.” She reached down to help Denise to her feet.

The straw brim raised enough that Robin knew Denise was looking at her offered hand in surprise.

Then she reached up and Robin helped her to her feet. She held Robin's hand for an extra moment and then nodded.

“Food and information. A good plan,” Denise stated from beneath her hat, and with that, they headed for Betsy's tent.

Now that Dawson City's big three-day fundraiser motorcycle event was over, the townsfolk had started paying attention to the firefight.
About goddamn time, people.
There were always a couple of the townies working with Betsy now. A young mechanic, with an obviously serious crush on Denise, had apprenticed himself to the team and was doing run-and-fetch tasks for her.

Despite the inaccessibility of the fire line, others had crossed the Yukon River on the ferry and driven into the wilderness on ATVs stocked with water and food that hadn't been freeze-dried, supplying the smokejumpers in the field.

Any of Robin's early thoughts of money earned had long since given way to estimates of minutes slept.

MHA's calls for more support from both the Canadians and the Alaska Fire Service simply elicited UTFs—Unable To Fill replies. No National Guard to call out in the middle of the Yukon Territory.

Robin ate breakfast sitting alone on the beaten-down grass while Denise and her apprentice went to prepare a container of supplies to drop to the smokejumpers. It was easier to appreciate where she'd landed and harder to understand how she had.

Robin knew she was already a better pilot than she'd ever been. It didn't matter that Mickey and Jeannie had never flown into war zones or that Vern had only flown Coast Guard; they were good enough to push her. Robin knew she was a competitive bitch by nature, and drove herself to match them. It also helped her keep an edge when the tower of exhaustion had loomed even higher above her than the flames and smoke.

Denise was holding to her hundred percent availability—every bird was ready for every flight. Twice that Robin knew of, their mechanic had gone right around the clock to keep them in the air.

And then there was Mickey.

In five days, she should have had sex a lot more than three additional times, a whole lot more with how good Mickey was at it. Twice had been merely frantic couplings before they both collapsed. Glorious, hard, fast, and sweaty, just the way she liked it.

But once they'd been on the same schedule and both woken for an hour in the darkest moment of the subarctic summer night. Each time she'd tried to hurry him along, he had lightly brushed those hands over her. She was powerless before their direction, going quiet and still despite the needs building inside her.

He'd studied her, there was no other explanation for it. Sometimes digging those strong fingers into tight muscles until she moaned into their kiss. Other times their only point of contact was his fingertip tracing the lines of her face so delicately that it was more a feather brush than a touch. And when at long last he'd taken her, it had been a slow, silent, delicious journey to—

A shadow blocked out even the feebleness of the smoke-shrouded sun.

Robin opened her eyes, not even realizing that she'd laid back down and closed them again after finishing her salmon breakfast burrito. She tipped her head back to see Mark Henderson standing there glaring down at her—at least she assumed there was a glare going on behind those mirrored shades. Clearly she hadn't become any less of a pain in his ass over these five days.

“Morning!” She did her best to sound cheerful. “You know that you're upside down.” Like a skyscraper about to collapse downward and crush her. A tower of handsome, frustrated male.

“If you weren't sleeping in, you'd be standing and I'd be right-side up.”

“Guess I'm just lazy.” Robin shed the blanket and rolled up to her feet. She felt almost as good as if she and Mickey had had sex last night.

“Noticed a lot of things about you, Harrow, but that wasn't one of them.”

“Aw, gee, boss man. Was that a compliment?”

Even standing and facing him, the man was daunting. One of those officers who merely had to enter a room to command it. Again he offered that odd half smile that could mean anything.

She could see how Emily might fall for such a man. He and Robin would be a national disaster area inside a week and a declared war zone inside two—she'd never be able to resist poking at all that pride. No, it wasn't pride. It was the self-assuredness that came from knowing that he was exceptional. Probably the Night Stalker in him.

Apparently she brought out the same in him, as he began listing a new set of things she could be doing better.

She considered her reaction as she listened and cataloged. But he was right on every point.

Maybe he felt as much need to prod at her as she did at him.

About item five on the list, Robin noticed something. His language had shifted, if not his holier-than-thou tone of delivery.

When Robin was instructing a newbie National Guarder or a newbie waitress at the truck stop, she spoke to them in simple terms. Protocols, tasks, efficiency. Once they were the next level up and had their feet under them, instructions were mostly situational awareness—whether it was an approaching enemy craft or an empty coffee cup in need of a refill at another waitress's table. Third tier was fine-tuning, like telling her how to change her rollouts after a water drop on the fire line.

This was something else again. Something more.

“Your utilization of the team's resources is good on the ground,” Mark was telling her. “But you need to think about their skill sets in the air. Don't be fooled by their genders. As pilots, Jeannie and Vern are natural followers. You're often pairing them together, but think about mixing that.”

Robin waved down the line to indicate that her Firehawk One and Vern's Firehawk Three were still in camp. Mickey and Jeannie were aloft.
Mixed. Hello.

“Yes, but you did that based on their need for downtime on the ground—ignoring your own, which was probably worse.”

Robin had mostly kept Mickey beside her but finally switched things up because it was getting a little intense between them for her idea of a simple fling. And she'd wager that Mark could see that. She didn't like being so transparent, not even to a former Night Stalker.

“Mickey and Vern are close,” Mark rolled right on. “Think about how a little friendly competition will help them keep their edge as this drags out.”

“But that means—”

“Flying with Jeannie, I know.”

And clearly he knew why Robin had been reluctant to pair with her. Jeannie had been the obvious choice for the coveted Queen Bee Beale's seat…the seat Robin had slid into for reasons she still didn't understand. She wasn't sure about the other woman's reaction, but it was more comfortable to keep her at a little distance.

Mark finished, again with that half smile.

Again, Robin had to resist the urge to pop him one right in the grin.

Now he was waiting for her reaction. To see if she was willing to digest yet another round of advice from on high. But it wasn't the advice given to a newbie or even someone merely skilled. It was the advice of a skilled observer to another skilled observer. No, a skilled leader to a less skilled one.

Pair Mickey and Vern? It made sense. It would also still buy her a little distance. She and Mickey would be in the air together, but perhaps a little less on the ground. He wasn't smothering her like water dropped on a fire—

Mickey wasn't smothering her at all really. She was the one who had chosen to crawl under the blanket with him last night, but she was having feelings for him that she didn't have for men she was sleeping with. Maybe with a little more distance, she could also gain a little more perspective.

And she was more comfortable with Jeannie than she had been five days ago.

“Okay.” After deciding there was nothing hard to swallow in his instructions, it was easy to digest and integrate them. She'd just have to wait for the right moment aloft to make the switch.

Mark looked at her for a long moment, then smiled that powerful smile that was as rare and as potent as his wife's. Their girl, Tessa, was already cute, but the gene pool these two kids had going for them was pretty damned impressive.

“What?”

He shook his head and then decided to reply anyway. “Sometimes I enjoy being proven wrong. I couldn't understand why Emily wanted to hire a National Guard dropout.”

“That is the most backhanded compliment I've received in a long time.
Hey, darlin
'.” She put on Henderson's favorite bad-Texas accent. “
Y'all keep not fuckin' up when I expect ya to
.”

“Yep! Purdy much covers it.” Then he turned for the chow tent.

“Hey, Henderson.”

He stopped to look back at her.

“I notice you've flown with Jeannie, Vern, and Mickey. And I can see them getting better. I note that you haven't flown with me.”

He nodded.

Damn man. Had to drag even that out of him. “Why?”

“Because they need it.”

Robin almost bought it. “Nope, doesn't fly. They're all much better at flying to fire than I am. I'm gaining, but they're better.”