Page 26 of Falling for the Hotshot

“Blaze—we need to evacuate! Aerial support is on its way!” Don hollered at me as hotshots piled into the back of pickup trucks. But I wasn’t ready to leave yet. There was still work to be done on this fire—to prevent something worse from happening. “Blaze—in the truck, NOW!” And I relented. I got into the truck with the rest of my crew.

The fire had no casualties, but it burned up several historic lodges and an area that had been long known as a grizzly base for summer moth-feeding. In late August, grizzly bears would travel to peaks and ridges where they were estimated to consume twenty-thousand calories or more of moths in preparation for winter hibernation.

After nearly an hour spent conversing with Tower Two, Don, and the team back at the base of Maple Haven Fire District, I finally picked up the radio for Tower Three again when I was in the clear. I had my eyes back on the camera locations for all towers.

“Dispatch to Autumn,” I said, keeping up some formality, just in case the chief of fire decided to stop by her tower for a visit. Which wouldn’t happen, but still...

“Autumn to Blaze, over,” she teased back. “Is everything okay?”

“We have a fire to the south of you,” I said, still feeling the adrenaline course through my body.

“Oh!” she exclaimed.

“I’m watching smoke form on the cameras right now.”

“Where are the cameras?” she asked, urgently.

“We have a camera on each of the lookout towers, at the very top of the roof peak.”

“Can you… see me?” she asked hesitantly.

“No, I mean, not really, anyway.” Her contesting my answer was immediate.

“What do you mean, not really?”

“Well, the cameras are here on the monitors all the time. Twenty-four hours a day, so I don’t want this to sound creepy or anything…” I trailed off.

“Blaze, just tell me.”

“Okay, this morning, when you didn’t answer, I was watching your screen just to make sure things weren’t on fire and… I think I saw some of your hair blowing in the wind off of the front porch.”

“Oh,” she said, a different tone to her voice. Pleased, perhaps? I couldn’t tell. “Here I was thinking… There’s a sun shower at the bottom and…”

“No, absolutely not, Autumn. We just get a view like you have, over the trees, but the quality is garbage, and it is really just to make sure the tower is still standing.”

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Autumn pressed, and I laughed.

“Let’s not go there,” and she laughed with me.

“Anyway, about your hair…” I paused.

“What about it?” There was a coyness to her voice.

“Is it.. red?” My cheeks certainly were at this time.

“Maybe.”

“Maybe? What does that mean?” It either is or it isn’t, is what I wanted to say.

“It’s more of a... fire color. Sort of red, sort of orange. It’s lighter in the summer, when I’ve been in the sun.” My heart was pounding out of my chest at the talk of this woman's hair color, and I knew I had it bad.

Chapter 23

Pray for Rain

Autumn

After all of the adrenaline from a fire breaking out nearby, you’d think I would’ve been standing at the edge of my lookout, watching for signs. Instead, I was sitting at the little cushioned seat in the dining area of the small tower, teasing the color of my hair, like it was the early 1900’s, and the sight of my wrist was enough for a man to faint. What I didn’t tell Blaze was how much I liked all of this. How much I liked him.