Up in Flames

  “Cole,” I groaned again, this time more quietly, “I chose you.”

  His eyebrow peaked. “But he doesn’t know that. He still thinks you’re all his. He still dreams about you every night and believes you’re his present and his future. While another man still believes you are his, I just can’t be near you or else you and I both know things will slowly spiral out of control.” He gave me a sheepish expression. “You and I are not so good at that whole self-control thing when we’re together.”

  “Really?” I said around a groan before rolling onto my back in defeat. “Are you serious, Cole? We can’t see, touch, or have mind-blowing, world-rocking sex until next weekend?” The thought was too much; how was actually living it going to work?

  “Unfortunately, yes. I am serious,” he said, trying to hide his smile as he inspected me pouting like a child. “How’s that phone call sounding right about now? Because from where I’m lying . . .” his voice dropped a few notes, and his legs tangled through mine.

  I closed my eyes and put my proverbial foot down. Of course I wasn’t looking forward to a week of celibacy from Cole, but Logan deserved better than an over-the-phone break up. I wouldn’t let my need for the man above me, sucking on my neck like it was keeping him alive, totally derail me from doing the right thing when it came to breaking it off with Logan.

  “You’d better stop doing that then,” I said, wanting to bite my tongue to silence it. Even now, I could feel my body start the upward spiral to that downward one that had me screaming his name last night. “Because it doesn’t look like you’ll be getting any satisfaction from me until next weekend.”

  Cole groaned against my neck, but his mouth didn’t pull back right away. Then his hips flexed against me and I felt his erection hard against my hip.

  I joined in the groaning game. “You don’t play fair.”

  He flexed again. “Neither do you.”

  If I didn’t get out of this bed and a few feet away from this naked and ready-to-go man, I’d never be able to resist him. Just as I was trying and failing to scoot away from him, a thundering set of footsteps pounded inside the quiet room.

  “Everyone up!” someone shouted. “Suit up and be ready to go in T minus fifteen. We’re headed to Chelan!”

  The silent room exploded with noise and movement, but me, I froze in panic.

  “Elle?” Cole looked down at my face with confusion before understanding. “This is what I do. This is what we all do. I’ll be safe and back before you know it.”

  I nodded, but panic still sat heavy in my stomach. Cole was going to get in a plane, jump out of it, and fight a forest fire today. This wasn’t the kind of career field someone got used to easily.

  “I suppose it’s a good thing I’ll be stuck in the middle of some middle-of-nowhere forest because I highly doubt I could have stayed away from you this week.” He grinned and sat up.

  “You’re a good bluffer,” I said as he grabbed his boxers at the end of the mattress and tugged them on.

  “I know,” he chuckled.

  “What the hell, Carson?” Suddenly, a familiar face popped above the mattress. “You had a hot girl in bed with you this whole time and didn’t even let me know so I could jack-off knowing a sweet naked ass was hanging four feet above my head?” Matt slid me a sly smile before reaching up and shoving Cole’s arm. “I thought we were friends, man.”

  “If I knew you were even thinking about jacking off to my girl, Matt,” Cole leveled him with a serious look, “I’d consider removing your parachute and shoving you out of the plane.”

  “Two words, Carson,” Matt said, making an unimpressed face. “Idle. Threat.”

  “You’ve got one of two correct, that’s for sure.”

  Matt waved off Cole’s comment before turning his attention back to me. I slid the sheet up to my chin and tried not to squirm as he smiled stupidly at my face.

  “You’ve got one second to take that smile off your face and look away before I make you,” Cole warned, tossing a pillow at Matt’s face.

  “Wait. Hold up.” Matt’s face changed. “Holy shit, man! This is the girl from that thin pancake place. And you nailed her?” Matt continued on, like he was recapping a sports game. “Wasn’t she with another guy? Some local? And didn’t I also hear that she is . . .” Matt’s eyes amplified. “Correction, was a virgin?”

  Could my face have gotten any more red?

  No. No, it could not have.

  “Why don’t you go find someone else to irritate?” Cole said, leaning over me and shoving Matt’s face back.

  Matt lowered back down, but he was still chuckling evilly a whole minute later. “You de-virginizer, you,” he said after he’d dressed and starting heading out of the room. “You are officially my hero, Carson. Higher up on the totem pole than Superman.”

  Cole motioned him to keep moving.

  “See you on the plane, virgin snatcher.”

  “Remind me next time he sets foot in the diner to drop his crepe into his lap,” I said as Cole leapt down from the bunk.

  “I’ll do it for you,” he said, sliding into a pair of pants. “Happily.”

  All the other guys had already exited the room by the time Cole finished tying his boots. Standing up on Matt’s bed, his face was level with mine.

  “I’ll be all right. I promise,” he said, guessing the reason I was gnawing my lip to pieces. “Now get over here and give me something to think about while I’m off saving trees and bunnies.”

  After a second or two more of worrying my lip, I rolled over, covered his mouth with mine, and made sure he had plenty to think about while he was saving trees and bunnies.

  This wasn’t going to end well. It wasn’t going to start well, either. Dad’s form had been shadowing his office window when I pulled in the driveway and nothing about his expression gave away that he was happy to see his missing daughter had made it home.

  He hadn’t been worried that some sort of bad found me to make me go missing; he’d been worried I was out searching for the bad.

  He was right and he was wrong.

  No bad thing had happened upon me last night, but I hadn’t found a bad thing either. From the time Cole found me until I pulled into the driveway, it had all been good. One giant mess of good.

  I knew dad wouldn’t feel the same when I explained where I’d been last night and who I’d been with.

  After Cole and his fellow smokejumpers had suited up and flown off in the direction of Chelan, I crawled out of bed, dressed, and grudgingly checked my phone. I cringed when I saw the number of missed calls and voicemails. I didn’t listen to a single one because I was about to get the full, unedited version the moment I walked through that front door.

  Sucking in a deep breath, I slid out of the Jeep and headed to meet the inevitable. I had to suck in one more before I could force myself to open the door.

  Three, two, one . . .

  “Where the hell have you been, Elle?” Dad shouted, charging into the entryway. “What were you thinking not coming home last night, or in the very least calling to let me know you weren’t planning on coming home?”

  “I’m sorry, Dad,” I said, not able to look at him. His face was red, the crescents under his eyes were black, and his entire body was nearly trembling as he boiled over.

  “You’re sorry?” He crossed his arms. “Sorry for what? Not coming home? Not calling? Sorry your Grandma M, your uncle, and I didn’t sleep a wink last night? Sorry for getting caught? Or are you sorry for what you were up to last night?” Pinching the bridge of his nose, he exhaled.

  “I’m sorry for not calling,” I replied, forcing myself to keep looking him in the eye. “And I’m sorry you and Grandma M and Uncle Ben didn’t get any sleep last night because you were up worrying about me. But I’m not sorry about anything else.”

  Dad’s brows came together. He wasn’t used to seeing me stand up for myself or talk back to him. “You’re not sorry for not coming home last night when you’re a young woman
who has a boyfriend who isn’t, at present, in town?”

  I didn’t like the accusation in his voice.

  “You might be naive, Elle, but you’re not stupid, so you should know better than to try to treat me like I am.”

  This conversation was going nowhere. “What do you want from me, Dad?”

  “For starters . . . what were you doing last night?”

  I didn’t want to lie, but I didn’t want to give a full disclosure. “Figuring some things out.” Vague, honest answer.

  “Figuring exactly what out?”

  In keeping with the vague, honest answer theme, I said, “My life.”

  “How very specific of you. Thank you, Elle.”

  Times like these, when my dad was so much more of a tyrant than a parent, I wondered what my mom had ever seen in him. Sure, Biggie wasn’t exactly a golden boy, but I doubted he would have looked at his own daughter like he was disgusted by her.

  “And who—while you were out figuring your life out—were you with?”

  I held the wince inside. This answer had no vague one that was honest and no honest one that was vague.

  “I’m not going to answer that,” I said, my voice not wavering once.

  Dad’s eyes widened before they narrowed. “Why not?”

  “Because I’m not a little girl anymore whose life you get to know everything about,” I said, almost shouting. “I’m eighteen, Dad. I’m entitled to some privacy and some secrets and some god damned mutual respect!”

  I had a knee-jerk reaction to cover my mouth, but I didn’t. Dad’s eyes widened again and this time, they stayed this way.

  Finally, when I was sure he was about to blow a gasket, he sighed. “You’re still living under my roof, Elle. Therefore, my rules, too. I don’t know what you were doing or who you were doing it with and I can’t force you to tell me if you refuse, but I can order you never to do that again, you hear me?”

  I breathed faster as I neared my blow-a-gasket stage. “Yeah, I hear you,” I said, heading for the stairs. “Your house, your rules? Fine. Consider me no longer a tenant in about ten minutes.” Without another word or glance, I lunged up the stairs and flew into my room. I even slammed the door, which was a first.

  Now that I was locked away, I let my brave act crumble a little. I sat on the edge of my bed, took a few deep breaths, then popped back up and stormed over to the closet. After rummaging through a heap of clothes and shoes, I managed to find my old duffel bag. It hadn’t been used in a while.

  I threw the first few tops and bottoms my hands fell on into the bag. When the bag was almost full, I marched into the bathroom adjoining my bedroom and tossed my toiletry bag inside. I couldn’t think about what all this meant or the long-term repercussions. If I did, the fear of the unknown would have paralyzed me. So I let myself focus on what I needed to pack for a few nights away and where I could crash tonight.

  Grandma M was the obvious choice. Dani’s place was the second runner up, and the swimming hole was the third. My backpacking bag was fully stocked with a little pup tent, sleeping bag, a few dehydrated meals, and even a pack of iodine tablets to purify the water.

  As much as I loved being in the great outdoors, when it came to day-to-day life, I preferred a warm shower and electricity.

  Just as I stormed over to my nightstand to grab the jar I kept a chunk of my tips in, a soft knock sounded at my door.

  Squaring myself, I crossed my arms and waited.

  And waited.

  “Dad?” I called out after a good thirty seconds had gone by.

  “Can I come in?”

  My face twisted with confusion. Dad’s standard approach when entering my room was a quick warning knock before coming inside. He didn’t wait for an invitation. It had become such a pattern I hadn’t ever thought to give an invitation.

  “Sure?”

  My door opened slowly as Dad made his way inside. When he saw the stuffed bag in my hands, he frowned. In ten minutes, he had transformed into a different man. Instead of red, his face was more an ashen white. The hollows under his eyes were now purple instead of black, and instead of trembling, his whole body sagged. Like he was defeated.

  “Dad?” I took a step towards him. He looked like he might topple over any minute.

  “I never told you about the day your mom died, did I?” His voice had also changed. It was so quiet I had to crane my head closer to hear him.

  I swallowed. Dad and I never talked about Mom anymore.

  “Yeah . . .” I started. “You’ve told me how she died.”

  Dad nodded and leaned against my wall. “But I’ve never told you why she died,” he said, pausing. Almost like he was choking on the words. “Or about how I failed to keep her safe.”

  No, this part of the encounter I’d never heard before. I wasn’t sure I wanted to hear it now.

  Taking my silence as my answer, Dad pinched the bridge of his nose and continued, “Your mom was wild in her youth. I was wilder.” My eyes narrowed; this didn’t fit with the man I’d known as my father. “We loved any and every chance to test ourselves against the great outdoors, and when we weren’t working or sleeping, we were doing something outside that put us an inch or two above death. Once you came along, we toned down and pulled back a lot. As much as we loved putting ourselves to the test, we loved you more and we didn’t want you to be raised without a mom, a dad, or both.”

  I had to take a seat on the edge of my bed. I already knew from the tone of things this was going to drain me.

  “That day your mom went out kayaking, I was with her. It was during spring run-off and we’d had an especially snowy winter and an unseasonably warm spring. Your mom and I had kayaked that river dozens of times, probably even hundreds, but when I saw the rapids that day before dropping in, I knew those conditions, even for experienced river kayakers, could get sketchy. Your mom reassured me she felt up to it and I was so excited to have an afternoon off with her, I was careless.” Closing his eyes, his face went a shade paler. “As soon as we shoved off, I knew it was bad. I knew we never should have attempted it. We hadn’t been in for a minute before your mom’s kayak rolled. She couldn’t get it rolled back and no matter how hard I paddled toward her, the rapids I was in seemed to steer me farther away from her.”

  I didn’t realize I was crying until I felt tears hit my legs.

  “She’d been under a long time, but she was still fighting. I caught glimpses of her oar bobbing to the surface, trying to right herself . . . and then her kayak crashed into a boulder and your mom’s paddle stopped breaking through the surface.” Dad rubbed his eyes and took a slow, tortured breath. “Your mom died there at Haven Rock, but her body washed up on shore a few miles downstream. She died because I was careless. She died because I wasn’t strong enough to save her. She died because of my weakness.”

  “Dad,” I whispered, shaking my head. I’d never guessed he’d carried this kind of baggage around with him for so long.

  “No, no. I know what you’re going to say. I’ve heard it a million times before,” he said, staring at the carpet unseeingly. “It’s not my fault. There was nothing I could have done. It was God’s plan.” His voice took on a bitter hue. “And maybe that’s what others believe, but the point I’m trying and probably failing to make with you is that’s not what I believe. I believe I failed your mother . . . and I swore to myself I would never fail you.”

  I felt emotionally drained already, and Dad was just getting to the point.

  “I thought that if I kept you close, didn’t give you a long lead, and plotted out your life, I could keep you safe. Keep from failing you. And it seemed to work according to plan—you never expressed any resistance to the strict rules and lifestyle I expected of you—until lately.”

  I suppose “lately” could have been defined as the last month.

  “I don’t know who or what is to blame for this newfound asserting yourself thing you have going on . . .” Dad’s face lightened ever so slightly, “but I guess I do
n’t really care who or what is responsible because, at the end of the day, I’m proud of you, Elle.”

  Say what? When I pulled up to the house, I knew the forthcoming exchange between dad and me would be epic. I didn’t expect it to be epically good.

  “You’ve got so much of your mom in you, sweetie, so much spirit. I hated watching you repress that. I hated knowing I was to blame even more. I’m sorry I didn’t do a better job raising you. I was so busy running from the ghosts of the past that I ignored I was suffocating the life out of the living. I was suffocating you by not encouraging you to be the vibrant, tenacious young lady I know you are.” Dad smiled at me. It wasn’t an ear-to-ear grin, it couldn’t even be considered a wide one, but it was as big and as genuine a smile I’d seen on his face in a while. “But you’re also that sweet, thoughtful girl you’ve been leading with. You’re two different people living in one body like we all are. Most of us just choose to show one of those sides to the world and strangle the other until, eventually, it dies off. But you, Elle, you’ve found the courage to let both sides show. Whatever’s responsible for this change . . .” Dad shoved off the wall and nodded, “don’t let it get away from you.”

  I wondered if Dad would still feel the same way if he knew the “something” responsible for my change was a young smokejumper with a checkered past and a day-by-day style approach to life. Maybe he wouldn’t care; this man standing before me spilling his guts was an alien life form in a kind of way. But it was an alien life form I hoped was here to stay.

  “And, Elle?” he said, clearing his throat. “I don’t know where this leaves you and Logan, and you don’t need to tell me. But I can make an educated guess. You might not want him to be your husband anymore, but don’t forget he was your friend first. One of your best friends. Just be honest with him. Win, lose, or draw, Logan will be okay.”

  Dad might have been right, but he wasn’t the one who would have to look Logan in the eyes, call it off, and hand him back a ring. Just thinking about it made me sick to my stomach.