Dakota Heat (Book 3 - Dakota Hearts) (9 page)

She’d spent the last hour revisiting every moment she’d shared with Sam. From the first time they’d kissed, Summer had known she wanted much more. She wanted the warmth and safety that Sam’s arms offered, she wanted his lips to caress her skin, she wanted his fingers to explore her body and she wanted to feel him joined to her as they made love.

She couldn’t forget the feel of his lips on hers and the soft brush of his tongue against her lips. And it only made her want him more with each passing day.

Every moment Sam was gone, memories of him haunted Summer. Her only lifeline was the radio and hearing Sam’s voice come through. And then relief would wash over her that he was safe.

Summer walked to the window and pushed back the drapes, giving her a hazy view of the night sky. As she stared out window, Summer thought of Sam and the monster fire he and the rest of the crew were facing. She didn’t want to be back in her room, safe and sound in a warm bed without Sam. She wanted to be at the basecamp, listening to the radio and making sure the man she’d fallen helplessly in love with was safe and would come home to her.

Home
. This wasn’t her home. It was Sam’s. And only when he was in Rudolph. When all was said and done, she’d be going back to Providence. Alone. And Sam would go off somewhere else.

A light in the kitchen turned on in the main house. Someone was awake. And Summer had a good idea who it was.

* * *

“Sometimes I think it’s worse when he’s home,” Kate said, sitting at the table with a cup of tea in front of her.

She hadn’t taken a sip. Neither had Summer.

“Donald can sleep through anything. Me? I’m a zombie. When Sam is in Colorado or California or wherever he goes, I worry when I listen to the news. But here…”

“You can’t get away from it,” Summer said. “You know when he’s out there.”

Kate nodded. “Ethan said there has been no word about the serial killer in Providence. No lead on where he is.”

Summer drew in a deep breath, thankful for the change of subject and finding it odd that she’d rather talk about a serial killer hunting her than a monster fire Sam was in the middle of. “But there haven’t been any more killings, so that’s a good thing.”

“What will you do if they don’t find him? Where will you go?”

She hadn’t thought that far ahead. “I guess I always assumed they’d find him. But if they don’t…I guess I could always move to Florida with my parents.”

“What about Sam?”

“What about him?”

“You two have become quite close.”

Summer smiled. She couldn’t deny it, nor did she want to hide her feelings from Kate. She genuinely liked the woman and felt comfortable with her.

“Sam hasn’t even told me he loves me.”

“But you love him.”

Feeling the weight of emotion deep in her chest, Summer nodded.

“I don’t even know what I’m doing here when all I want to do is be on the other end of that radio so I can hear what’s going on. It’s killing me.”

Kate smiled slowly, fatigue pulling at her tired eyes. “So what’s keeping you?”

Summer didn’t have an answer to that. There were probably a thousand good reasons why she should stay put in her room. Ethan and Donald were asleep upstairs. She’d promised Sam she wouldn’t take any chances or venture out on her own. But she knew she was safer at basecamp than anywhere else.

Summer put her hands on the table and stood up. “Absolutely nothing.”

* * *

It took Sam and the other Hotshots three days to bring the fire under control. Summer hadn’t left the base for a single moment in those three days. Ethan had a guard stationed outside the dispatch office just in case because all of the activity at basecamp and the new faces of fire fighters coming in from out of state made it difficult to keep track of who did and didn’t belong there.

Summer barely noticed him. But always remembered to get a cup of coffee or a plate of food from the mess hall for him so he wouldn’t starve.

Ethan gave her daily updates on the serial killer investigation and the murder in Montgomery. But none of that mattered to Summer. Her fear no longer stemmed from the fact that a serial killer had been fixated on her, forcing her to leave her home. Now that fear was rooted in the fact that she could lose Sam to something far deadlier. And she knew that if she lost him, she would lose herself.

She could no longer ignore the voice that had gone from a soft whisper to a deafening shout. She was in love with Sam. And she couldn’t bear to lose him.

She was eighteen hours into her shift when Sam’s voice crackled over the radio. Summer jumped to her feet as she jotted down the message that she had to relay to the Adam. And it was when Sam clicked off the radio that something within Summer shattered. She bolted from the chair and ran to Adam’s office, pushing through the door without knocking.

Adam’s face went ashen when he saw her with the paper in her hand.

“That bad?”

Tears welled up in her eyes. “Worse.”

# # #

“I’ll take over,” Derek said. “You need a break.”

“No, I don’t,” Summer said. “I don’t get a break until Sam and the others radio in that they’re in the clear.”

“Look at you. You’re shivering and it’s ninety degrees out there.”

“I’m fine.”

Behind her, Summer could feel Adam’s eyes on her back. All it would take is for Adam to pull her off the desk and her connection to Sam would be gone. She turned to him and saw the concerned look on his face.

“I made the call for another two air tankers to come in and another supply of fire retardant. But they’re still an hour away.”

“What about the Smokejumpers?”

Derek looked at the notes, “They’re out. They made it to the river and are cleared.”

Summer took a deep breath, then swallowed hard. “The wind has picked up again. The new burn that was started by the heat lightning has grown. I’ve been in constant contact with the crew. All twenty are accounted for. The rock still has them boxed in at the base of the canyon wall, and the fire is building on the canyon floor. But Sam put two men on lookout and they still have eyes on the rest of the crew. They’re all safe for now. There’s not enough of a clearing for a safe escape route out of the canyon floor yet. We need the air tankers to drop enough retardant to knock out one of the lines of fire to give them a clear path out. I already have the helicopter pilots on alert to fly in and retrieve them when they get in the clear.” She took a deep breath and waited for Adam’s instruction.

“It’s going to be a rough place for the air tankers to get into low enough to drop the retardant. Let’s hope they get here soon. Derek, how long have you been at the desk?”

“About thirty-six hours.”

“Summer?”

“Just over twenty-four.” It was probably a little more than that, but Summer knew where Adam was going with this and there was no way she was leaving her only connection to Sam.

“Okay, Derek, get some rest and then relieve Summer in the morning. It’s going to be a long night and I need you two rested. I have called for more dispatchers to give you both relief. They should be here in the morning.”

Both Adam and Derek left the dispatch room and Summer was alone. She couldn’t cry. Couldn’t feel anything because if she did it would break her concentration and she needed to stay focused on the voices coming in over the radio.

Closing her eyes, she said a silent prayer for the safety of Sam and the rest of the fire crew. A firm hand on her shoulder nearly had her jumping out of her skin. It was nearly two-thirty in the morning. Everyone was either out in the field working or getting sleep so they could do battle on this mammoth fire as soon as the sun came up. She was supposed to be alone. And yet the squeeze of pressure on her shoulder proved she wasn’t.

She turned around quickly and nearly wept. Looking down at her were the warm eyes of a man who understood exactly what she was going through.

Donald McKinnon settled into the seat next to her. “Ethan, Logan and Hawk are home with Kate. I thought it might be easier for us to get through this night if we do it together. You’re not alone.”

Summer thought back to the day Sam sat in that chair and said those very words to her.
You’re not alone.
She placed her hand over Donald’s and welcomed him with a trembling smile.

* * *

They were cursed by the beauty and trappings of the canyon walls. Sam kept his eyes on his crew to make sure no one was failing and everyone was accounted for. They were sitting in a bowl of heat on the canyon floor thanks to a disastrous explosion of felled trees ignited by the heat lightning they’d experienced earlier. It gave them no time to escape before the wall of fast moving fire closed them in.

The LCES had been in place and was now fractured by a force beyond their control. Sam was infinitely glad he’d opted for two lookout men on the hill. At least two of the twenty man crew were in a clearing and had a way out of this fire storm. He knew the men would not leave their lookout positions unless the fire forced them too. They were in constant communication with the crew and with the basecamp. The lookouts would scout escape routes and safety zones should they become available until the air tankers arrived.

“Sam?” the lookout crewmember named Barry called out over the radio.

“Go head,” he said into the radio.

“Basecamp gives ETA of the air tankers at thirty minutes.”

Sam cursed under his breath. The smoke around them was getting thicker. They were all well suited up with gear. But thirty minutes was an eternity.

“Sam? The wind is shifting your way.”

He looked at up the sky to see if he could tell which way the smoke was moving above them, thankful the moon was bright tonight. As he feared, the wind was moving them closer to the canyon wall.

“You’re going to feel a blast of heat soon, if you aren’t already. It’s moving fast,” Barry said.

“Where the hell are those air tankers?” Sam said. “Okay, everyone, get in your fire shelters!”

Upon command, the crew dropped their gear and pulled out the silver blankets, wrapped up like a brick in their packs, opened them up and crawled inside as instructed. Once inside, the air closest to the ground would be cooler and cleaner. It gave them at least a fighting chance of survival if a heat blast blew over them and coiled around the base of the canyon wall, baking them where they lay.

Sam climbed into the fire shelter and prayed. The shelter would provide some protection against the heat, but only to five hundred degrees before the fabric started disintegrating and the heat inside the shelter rose beyond a temperature their lungs could handle.

There’d been many fires throughout his years as a Hotshot where Sam thought things were touch and go. He’d been in close calls just like the rest of his crew. But this was the first time he truly believed he might not make it home alive. He thought of his parents and his brother, Wade, and how his family would survive another heartbreak.

As the roar of the wind whipped over him, he pressed his face to the ground and thoughts of Summer drifted to his mind. Good Lord, what must she be going through knowing every detail of what was transpiring? He closed his eyes and tried to remember the sweet scent of her hair, and the feel of her skin, and the taste of her mouth as he kissed her.

Fear bubbled up inside him. He had a crew of men lying on the ground praying for hope along with him. But he knew that Summer was sitting there at the other end of the radio.

His lifeline.

“Basecamp?” he said into the radio.

“Go ahead, Sam,” Summer said.

“The crew is in their fire shelters. I have two lookouts on the ridge above the canyon. They’ve confirmed they’re out of harm’s way.”

“Got that.”

Hot tears stung his eyes. He wanted to hear her voice. If he was going to die tonight then Sam wanted Summer’s voice to be the last thing he heard. He needed the comfort of her smooth voice, to remember that look on her face before she reached up on her toes and kissed him. He needed it like a drug he had to have to survive.

“Talk to me, Summer,” he said quietly, pulling in a breath of air that was growing hotter by the second. He knew she couldn’t say what he wanted her to say, that she loved him as much as he loved her. And he did. He’d never thought he’d ever feel this way about a woman, but now he knew without a doubt that he loved Summer Bigelow.

“The air tankers are on their way. ETA ten minutes,” she said. He knew her so well that even though her voice sounded steady, she was as scared as he was at that moment. “Um, another fire crew is attacking the fire on the west ridge above where you are. Barry thinks it’s the safest route for all of you to climb out of the canyon and the best location for the air tankers to make the drop of retardant.”

“I love you.” He didn’t know how much time he had left and he didn’t care who heard him.

The radio was silent for a few seconds. But when she finally spoke, her voice cracked. “I want to be in your arms looking straight at you the next time you say that, Sam.”