Wildfire at Dawn by M. L. Buchman Page B

on the edge of the porch he loomed, his back casually against one of the posts. All he needed was a cowboy hat and a six-gun slung around his fire gear to look totally, well, out of place.
    “But he is great,” his teasing expression suddenly shifted to a serious one. “Best crew boss I ever walked fire with. Even better than TJ, but don’t you dare tell him I said that.”
    She crossed her heart.
    He chatted a bit more without saying much. But she had the impression that she was being more thoroughly examined by him than any of the others.
    After he moved off, Laura observed quietly to herself, “Well, he’s a deep one.”
    Jeannie beside her nodded, “Two-Tall is an ogre.”
    Laura looked over, but figured it out before she had to ask. Like Shrek the ogre comparing himself to an onion, Tim had layers upon layers despite the carefree womanizer he presented to the world.
    Like Johnny Akbar Jepps.
    Her lover constantly revealed new aspects to himself. His knowledge of fires was his main focus, but he would often lead her off into head-spinning explanations of the science behind combustion or how the historical impact of the burning of Ancient Rome upon literature of all crazy things. It was as if his lack of a college education and his voracious reading habits had combined to create an intensely out of the box thinker.
    Soon the smokies began shifting back to finish the trees. In a matter of minutes, they were back in the woods, chainsaws at the roar. Then they fired up the big chipper and the clearing once again reverberated with the clean-up operation.
    She felt she should go help, but knew she’d be in their way. They had it down to a science. Johnny and Tim were switching off on successive trees, taking turns cutting and swamping the cut branches. They covered half again the ground of any other team.
    “They’re something, aren’t they?” Jeannie still sat in the chair Johnny usually occupied. She’d been so quiet that Laura had almost forgotten she was there.
    “They make it look like a ballet.”
    Jeannie nodded amiably, “They’re the very best in the business. It would help if they didn’t know it, but they do. And only Carly can read a fire better than Akbar; she’s scary good. Kind of on the level of our lead pilot Emily.”
    Laura could hear the worshipful tone in Jeannie’s voice. She knew from following the articles this last month that MHA’s reputation was the gold standard of wildland firefighting. If Johnny was the gold standard of that… The breath whooshed out of her a bit. What in the world had she hooked herself up to?
    “You want another piece?” Jeannie clambered to her feet.
    Laura nodded.
    Jeannie returned with a paper plate bearing a couple slices of Hawaiian without even asking and another plate with a couple combos, but she didn’t sit back down after handing Laura’s over.
    “Been watching you.”
    Oh great. She’d been right the first time. Jeannie had a thing for Johnny and he’d been too blind to see it. Now she was going to really catch it.
    “If Akbar screws this up, I’m gonna kill him. You’re great!” Then she flashed an impish smile and headed toward her chopper as she ate her pizza.
    Too stunned to respond, Laura could only watch her go.
    Well if that didn’t beat all.
    # # #
    After they finished with the trees, a fire had been started in her brick-lined fire pit. Cold pizza was inhaled and a cooler of beer had been recovered from one of the trucks. Almost no one had more than one, though, in case they were called in the morning.
    They’d sat for hours, talking about fires and, perhaps inevitably, women. Krista, a broad-shouldered Nordic blond and apparently Johnny’s other main assistant, sat across the fire beside Two-Tall, razzing the men about all of things they didn’t understand about women. She was as brash and salty as many of the guys—funny, but a little out there for Laura. She wished Jeannie had stayed; she would have liked to get to know