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“Easy, boy! Easy! Yah!”
He landed back on his front legs with a thud, and we took off. I knew this trail like the back of my hand, better than the others. There were things about this trail that never changed, not since my childhood. There were carvings in the trees, put there by my mother. She hiked this trail every day.
My heart was pounding in my chest as my eyes scanned the burning forest. The flames were near me now, less than twenty feet away, showing no mercy as it spread, incinerating the green grass and climbing the tall trees, ready to burn it to the ground. I knew this land. I knew these trees.
They would still be standing long after I was buried in the ground.
Ranger made a noise again, but I couldn’t take my eyes off the other side of the wall of flames. My woman was on the other side of it.
I knew it.
I backed Ranger up and leaned forward. “Gotta get her, bud.”
My fists tightened on the reigns, and I tightened my thighs around the beast—my friend.
To my right, I heard Mags call out to me. I turned my head and found him staring at me atop his mare. He was shaking his head.
“No! Denver, the fire is out of control!” he screamed, bringing Midnight closer to me.
Don’t be stupid, sweet boy.
Momma’s voice echoed in my head, but then another voice followed.
A voice that I wanted to hear for the rest of my life.
Smoke, please.
I turned to my best friend; he was closer to me now. “Don’t,” he warned. “They’re calling for a chopper. Let’s head back.”
I adjusted my hat, pushing it down. “Been a cowboy all my life, Mags.” I shook my head and looked up at the smoke rising from the trees around us.
“I get it now, ya know?” I tightened my hold on the reigns again, and patted Ranger, giving him the reassurance he needed.
“Kings,” he snapped.
“Love ain’t meant for cowboys. Because when a cowboy falls in love, not even the fires of hell could stop him from being with her.”
He didn’t have time to respond, because Ranger was already charging for the flames with me on his back.
My steed jumped into the flames, sending us both into hell.
Valerie
Air.
I needed air.
I was surrounded by thick, dark smoke.
It wasn’t like my cowboy’s smoke, intoxicating and full of promise.
No, this smoke was filled with death and pain.
I yanked on my binds again, praying this would be the time I would break free. It didn’t work. I banged my head against the bark of the tree. My kidnapper had drugged me again and when I woke, I was on the ground, chained to a tree by my ankle.
The man didn’t speak or look at me when I woke. He turned on his heel and left. Minutes later, the fire ignited. It had been far away from me, further down the mountain, but the fire didn’t care about direction. It spread across everything and anything, leaving a path of scorched land behind. However, smoke cared about direction. It rose.
Perhaps that was Moonie’s goal, for me to die of suffocation. How fitting, considering I’d fallen in love with a man with smoke in his eyes and darkness in his heart.
