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“What about you?” she cried.
“I have to go back. Your house will probably be okay, but I don’t want to take any chances. I need to get back.” He leaned over and kissed her, but pushed her toward the door. “Go.”
She got out and stood in the driveway, watching him back out, wave once more, and head back to wherever he was summoned. The futility of it, all the waste and the loss of property, hit her, and she started to sob when the truck was finally out of view. She didn’t want to leave her house, they’d already had that fire in early summer that pretty much wiped out the brush, but Paul was probably right to err on the side of caution because it would be so easy to get trapped up there.
Glancing over at Billy’s house, she saw his truck wasn’t in the driveway. On the other side, her neighbors were loading up their car.
“We’re leaving,” the wife called out.
“Me too,” Emily replied. “I hope to see you back here later today.”
It had been hours since she looked at her phone, so digging it out of her jeans pocket on the way back in the house, she saw there were calls missed and texts to be answered. Scrolling through, she realized that her father had been frantic, probably listening to police calls all night, so she called him first.
“I just got back home,” she said. “Billy and Kathy and I went over to the vet clinic to help evacuate all their animals.”
“Please get out of there now,” Rob said.
“I will. I’m going to grab a bag and my computer, and I’ll be there in an hour or so.”
“Okay. Thank you for not arguing with me.”
“Love you, Colonel,” she said, and hung up.
Trying to get into the frame of mind that she might never see her house again wasn’t easy, so she just did what she said she would, grabbed her makeup bag, stuffed clean clothes into another bag, and got her electronics and charge cords. Her house had sprinklers all over the place, so hopefully it would survive.
After locking up, she opened the garage door and got inside her car just as Billy pulled up behind her.
“Are you leaving?” he asked. “Well, it’s clear you’re leaving. Do I have to leave?”
Then she could see he’d been crying, the fear of losing his house even after multiple deployments to war zones was too much for such a gentle soul. “You have to leave. Come to the colonel’s house. Where’s Kathy?”
“She’s headed home. She didn’t invite me,” he said, laughing through his tears. “So I’ll follow you if you’ll give me a minute to grab a few things.”
They pulled out of her driveway and into his, and while she waited, she sent her mother a text that Billy was coming along. He didn’t have any family close by, and since his crazy girlfriend didn’t invite him, the Porters’ house was the only place left to go.
Chapter 8
Summer vacation ended and school started on Monday. Reaching for her phone to shut off the alarm, Emily had a big smile on her face. Waking up in her own bed was the first thing for which she’d be grateful. When the all-clear alert went out that evacuees could return to their homes, she was so happy and relieved. She’d stayed at her parents’ house for three days before coming back home.
The second thing she was grateful for was that the cabin at Firehouse Ranch and the surrounding structures on that road had narrowly missed being burned to the ground, but they were still standing. It had taken a week to get all the animals back in place, including Blackie, Gloria and Alfred the mule.
And the third, final and most important thing was that Paul was safe. He was exhausted almost a week after the fire. No one got any time off because it was still all hands working mopping up.
But the caveat, the fire station was gone. Oddly, for all of its state-of-the-art firefighting gear, the building itself was antiquated with no external sprinkling system. Paul confided that in a way it was a blessing because when they rebuilt, it too would be state of the art.
With the station gone, they’d have to rethink where they’d get married. The day after the fire was finally out, Paul had Emily come to the station to see what was left of it. Being confronted with twisted steel and charred wood left her speechless. Mitigation experts were on the scene as soon as the fire was extinguished, and it had been determined that the building was a total loss.
Temporary firehouse and garage structures were being erected until plans could be drawn up and approved for a new fire station, but it wasn’t going to happen overnight.
“There’s definitely no room for a wedding reception,” Emily said. “We’re sort of back to square one. Are you okay with that?”
“I just want to make you happy.”
“Let’s forget a reception, then. I’m serious; we can have a small party with our family.”
“Why don’t you rent one of those big tents and put it right in the front yard of the cabin,” Robin suggested that Monday morning when life was trying to return to normal. “You can even get porta-potties.”
She was yelling these ideas over the fence while Paul raked leaves out of the flower beds. With Karin back in college, the outside yard maintenance would revert to his shoulders, and this was the first day off he’d had since the fire. The smell of smoke lingered in the air, burnt trees just across the street a vivid reminder of how close the fire had come.
