Page 54 of The Fire Line

“Why you?”

The question was professionally reasonable and therefore irritating. Eli was the better cinematographer and remained the better rider, despite the private lesson that had recently upgraded Jay from probable danger to himself and livestock to capable of stopping an elderly mare without insulting her mouth.

Jay looked over the route again. “Director privilege?”

“That is not usually how you describe carrying the equipment yourself.”

“Dangerous precedent. I agree.”

Priya studied the overnight stops, distance, water sources, and weather contingency. “Did you ask him for this?”

“I’ve asked him for access to the high country approximately fourteen times.”

“You asked him to take you alone?”

“No.”

She handed the map back. “Make sure the satellite phone is charged.”

That was all. No raised eyebrow or invitation for Jay to explain why Harris had dismissed an entire camera department.

Jay turned the page over. Nothing on the back. Of course not. Harris Shaw had communicated everything he considered necessary in fewer than thirty words and a route map. There were ransom notes with more emotional transparency.

Beyond the conference-room window, the ranch fields climbed toward timber and the darker rise of the mountains.

Two nights. Maybe three. Alone with Harris.

Jay’s brain, which had been extremely well behaved for almost twelve consecutive hours, immediately produced several possibilities that were neither professional nor useful.

He shut them down.

Harris was straight. Harris was emotionally unavailable. Harris had also spent several days acting strange after learning Jay was gay—and yet he’d just chosen Jay, specifically, for three days alone in the mountains.

Jay picked up the itinerary again.

Navarro only.

Annoyingly interesting phrasing.

* * *

Jay had ridden under Harris’s supervision exactly once. Evidently, that was enough for Harris to form permanent opinions about his abilities.

At five Tuesday morning, Harris watched him approach Red and said, “Remember what I told you.”

“You told me many things. Most of them deeply critical.”

“Hands. Knees. Let him pick his feet.”

“See? Criticism.”

The ranch remained mostly dark, the eastern sky only beginning to pale behind the mountains. Somewhere inside the lodge, Della had already been awake long enough to leave two thermoses and enough food for three men on the rear counter. A note on top threatened Harris by his full name if any of it returned uneaten.

Red stood beside the barn half asleep with one hind leg resting. Harris had chosen a younger dark gelding for himself rather than Rain, who was still recovering from the cut to her leg and, according to Harris, had earned the right not to carry his ass into the mountains at twenty.

They had stripped the equipment down to what the horses—and eventually the two men—could carry beyond the north ridge. Jay had lost the tripod, two lenses, most of the audio kit, and an eleven-minute argument.

Priya had called the final kit barbaric. Harris called it sufficient. Jay remained privately offended on behalf of the visual arts.