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His brothers did the same, and then they all looked up at one another, their eyes wide. The silence practically rang in Kyle’s ears after such a racket.
“What is it?” Mama asked.
“Fire,” he said right before his phone blew up with texts. This time they streamed in on the ranch group text, and Blake and Todd were mobilizing everyone they could to the far north border of the ranch, as the fire was coming south toward them.
“Let’s go,” he said, and he headed for the door. “Thanks for breakfast, Mama.” He stopped to kiss and hug his mother, and then he and his brothers left to go find out what they could do to preserve their land.
ChapterTwenty-Nine
Maddy brushed her teeth, and when she spat out the foamy toothpaste, she did a double-take. It was almost black.
She looked up and into her wide eyes. She hadn’t showered yet, but she definitely looked one step away from a chimney sweep. The smoke and debris, ash and char, outside was unbelievable.
The fire hadn’t touched the Texas Longhorn Ranch—yet—but they’d been battling it for two straight days. Everyone on the ranch had been pulled from their regular activities and moved to the north line. The Stewarts had driven out RVs and set up tents and had been living out there since the call had come in about the Longhorn Cavern Wildfire, as it had now been named.
All the guests at the lodge and on the ranch had been evacuated, and upcoming reservations cancelled. Concerts didn’t happen. The only people still on the ranch lived and worked here, and Maddy reached up and wiped a smudge of pure black soot along her cheek. She’d just come in from a six-hour shift working a section of the fence line. They’d been pouring water over wood, dry grass, anything and everything.
She hadn’t seen any flames approaching yet, but sparks flew in the air, drifting for miles and starting more fires in remote areas. The Texas governor had declared Burnet County a disaster area, and a lot of resources had been sent to help put the fire out.
“That dreamy anchorman on channel four just said they’ve contained eighty-five percent of the fire,” Hadley said, appearing in the open doorway of the bathroom. Even as model-like as she was, she’d been out in the fields, dressed from head to toe in clothes, her mouth and nose covered to limit smoke inhalation, scraping the ground right down to the dirt. If there was nothing for the fire to consume, it would go out.
That was the theory anyway. Adam had once been a wildfire firefighter, and he’d led the efforts to build a fire line between the Longhorn Ranch, and the one to the north of them. Just in case. The owners and people who worked at Cedar Valley were busy on their northwest side, doing the same thing.
After the ground had been cleared, Adam had ordered everything be soaked until it dripped.
“That’s great,” she said. Maddy had been on that job today, and her boots, jeans, and hair was soaked. Her next stop was the shower, but she’d really needed to get the soot out of her teeth. She flipped on the water and rinsed down the toothpaste. “I’m going to shower. When’s your next shift?”
“A few hours,” Hadley said. “I’ll be out until midnight.” She leaned a hip into the doorframe. “You?”
“We’ll be ships in the night.” Maddy gave her a ghost of a smile. “I’m reporting in at midnight.”
Hadley nodded and said, “Okay, I’ll see you over at the lodge for dinner?”
“I’m showering, and then I’ll be right behind you.”
Hadley left and Maddy did get in the shower. Dirt, dust, soot, and ash ran down the drain, and she washed her hair three times before it didn’t feel grainy or grimy. Hadley used amazing hair products, so she let the creamy conditioner sink into her hair for a few minutes, and then she got out and toweled off.
Once she was dressed, she brushed out her hair and combed her fingers through it. It was so thin, it would dry on the walk to the lodge. If she was going to walk, which she wasn’t. With all the smoke in the air, the authorities had advised everyone who could to leave town or stay indoors.
Maddy enjoyed the quiet stillness of her cabin, the air conditioner pumping hard. Though she’d been out on the front lines for the past couple of days along with all the other employees here at the ranch, she hadn’t spoken to Kyle. She’d seen him once, and her heartbeat had frozen inside her chest.
She thought about that as she made a cup of tea, sadness running through her. She’d though it would be easier to see him and not be with him as more time passed. It sure felt like the opposite though.
“You’re in love with him.” Maddy spoke the words in a whisper, because she’d never said them out loud before. She stirred her tea absently, trying to find a thread of thought. She’d never been terribly bold when it came to men.
Kyle was actually the first man she’d done anything drastic for. She’d exhibited some bravery when she’d packed up for the summer, driven an hour, and shown up on the ranch without telling him.
He’d come right back to her, and she ached to hear his voice whisper her name again. She longed to feel his hand in hers and kiss him as he dropped her off on the porch late-late at night, long after the concert had ended and they’d danced in the darkness.
“Then do something about it,” she said, and she blinked her way back to her reality. She could do something to get Kyle back. Worry streamed through her. What if he hadn’t changed? What if he didn’t want her back? What if she went through more months like this summer, only to learn they really wouldn’t be able to make a relationship work?
It was a risk for sure. Her heart wailed at her to take the risk. Claim her cowboy.
Maddy turned away from the tea, and she left it sitting on the counter, steaming. She grabbed her car keys from the hook by the back door and spun toward the front of the cabin. Her heart pounded in her ears and up into her head, the same way it had when she’d first gotten the text about the wildfire.
She’d lived on nerves, coffee, and doughnuts for the past couple of days, and it was time to regain control of her life. To do that, she needed to find her safe place. That had been Kyle for the past several months, and she wanted it to be him again.
She drove over to the lodge, unsure of where Kyle would be right now. Everyone worked in shifts, and Blake had gone to great lengths to make sure everyone stayed fed and as happy as possible during this stressful time.
