Chapter Thirty-One
Tinderbox
Bryce straddled his way over the second-floor railing and set his foot on the rung of the ladder set against the house.
‘You got it steady?’ I called to Lia as she waited below.
She gave me a thumbs-up.
‘Bryce, she’s anchored the ladder below. Go ahead and climb.’
He hesitated like he was measuring the drop to the ground.
‘Second thoughts? You don’t have to do this.’
‘It’s not that. There are so many things I want to say to you.’ The hitch in his voice was too raw.
‘Lia’s right. This isn’t the time. We need to get the roof sprayed down. When this is over, when Clo’s house is safe, we’ll talk.’
He bit into his lower lip, tucked the spout of the hose under his arm and began to climb, stopping at the roof’s apex. Once he was set, I leaned over the railing and called out, ‘Ready for the water.’
A screech of air passed through the tubing and a wide stream shot out of the spout. Bryce steadied himself on a rung and sprayed the hose back and forth, soaking every wood shingle.
I wanted to stay angry with him, but he’d sent my best friend and sisters to be with me after the ridiculous show we’d put on inside the tavern.
He’d left that envelope by my door to prove he was telling the truth, at least about the pictures.
And now, he was here, balanced precariously on a roof, helping us try and save my grandmother’s house.
‘Dani!’ Lia shouted. ‘Get your ass down here and start covering the dry brush.’
I rushed into the house and Belladonna followed me to the top of the stairs.
‘What can I do?’
‘Stay out of the way.’
Clo let out an irritated huff from where she stood in the kitchen.
‘Fine. Keep Clo company until the judge and Eric get here with the water rig.’
I raced down the stairs, out the door and around the side of the house.
Bryce was flanked in shadow. The wide arc of his spray conjured a colorful spectrum.
He took short, measured footsteps across the roof, dousing every shingle.
Panic expanded like a balloon in my chest. One wrong move and he could pitch right off the side, which was at least a fifteen-foot drop.
I wasn’t mad enough to want to see him in traction.
I pushed the thought from my head as the sky filled with a deep gray haze. Waves suddenly spiked in the lake, sending water crashing against the dirt shores. The tang of burnt wood and dry brush filled my nose. The fire was eating up ground faster than expected.
At the side of the house I untangled the hose, stretching it out as far as possible. Once I had the knob turned, a warm blast of water hit the dry grass and weeds.
For the next half hour, I soaked every inch of ground around the north side of the house, including Clo’s garden, which now resembled a mud bog. A few lost carrots, heads of romaine, were better than a charred house.
The judge and Eric ripped up the driveway in their truck, did a quick three-point turn, and backed in the mobile water tank. Another truck and SUV were right behind them. Mo jumped out of the truck with Elena climbing out of her passenger seat. Dalton scrambled out of his own car.
Belladonna rushed out the front door. There was no time for pleasantries as the judge, Eric and Mo started connecting the hosing lines to the tank and handed them off.
Elena and Dalton raced up to me.
‘Give us a job,’ Elena pleaded.
‘Go help Belladonna on the other side of the house. Dalton, can you climb up onto the roof with another line and help Bryce spray it down?’
They quickly took off in the direction of their assignments.
Belladonna and Elena took turns working the area around the south side of the house, doing their best to wet down the trees, but even I knew that with one shift of the wind, a single spark, the area would flame up like a tinderbox. It wouldn’t take long after that for the entire house to go.
Time was not on our side. The sun was dipping toward the horizon, and it wouldn’t be safe for Bryce and Dalton to stay on the roof much longer.
I called to Belladonna, and she met me on the side of the house where I was working. ‘Keep soaking. I need to get Bryce off the roof.’
‘I like how he showed up and went right to work helping.’
‘Don’t start.’ I turned away and rushed to where the ladder was propped on the front of the house.
Clo walked out the front door. She clutched two cardboard boxes spilling over with family pictures and small mementos like Grandpa Beau’s whittling knives and his favorite Zane Grey novels.
‘What are you doing? Why do you have Grandpa Beau’s things?’ I said.
Clo clutched the boxes tighter to her chest like they were precious. ‘I’m getting the car ready to go.’
‘Why?’
Her shoulders trembled as Lia rushed out the front door.
‘What the hell is going on?’ I said.
Elena raced around the side of the house. She always came running when she heard my panicked voice.
‘Fire has turned, thanks to the winds. It’s headed this way,’ Lia said.
‘We’re not ready. Eric and the judge haven’t been able to drive closer to where the brush is thicker near the lake,’ I said.
‘There’s no time,’ Lia shot back. ‘The chief called and told me we have to evacuate Clo. We need to get her out of here in five minutes. Go inside and help her with the rest of the boxes.’
‘No, someone needs to get to the brush surrounding the lake,’ I insisted.
‘I’ll do it,’ Elena jumped in.
‘Grab Mo. She can help too,’ Lia said.
Elena took off and Lia gave me a heavy look.
‘Aster can take Clo. I am not leaving.’
She pushed out a heavy breath. ‘Get Belladonna. Let her know the situation. She can go with Clo. The less people in the way of the crew when they get here, the better.’
‘I’ll tell her.’
The sky had turned the color of a badly bruised peach. A thick wall of smoke blocked us in on all sides. Wind shook the trees like an angry phantom. I rounded the house and found the hose on the ground making a gigantic puddle.
‘Are you freaking kidding me,’ I cursed. Why couldn’t Belladonna handle the simplest task?
I stalked in the direction of her footprints leading away from the house and into the woods. The trail led to a downhill slope and into a wide sweep of forest. Flashes of red and yellow flames danced between the trees.
It was too close. I jogged my way down the slope, but there was no sign of my mother. The wind picked up again, and I had to shield my eyes from the dust and dry leaves spiraling through the air. I turned in a circle, finally finding her footprints moving into a dense patch of forest.
The farther I walked, the heavier the heat licked across my skin. In the distance the roar of flame, cracking of branches, was deafening. She was close. I could sense her somehow. Like there was a force pushing me deeper into the trees.
Rabbits, deer and elk scattered. Ahead Belladonna’s footprints were still visible. Why was she heading into the fire? Did she have a death wish?
I should have turned around, followed the animals out, but I had to know what the hell my mother was doing.
A few feet ahead, the forest parted into a wide circle void of trees.
A flash from my childhood hit me. Grandpa Beau striding out here with a chainsaw, while we three girls chased after him.
He’d shooed us back to the house. Told us we deserved a special spot in the forest to play.
To have campouts. To learn about the beauty of nature.
None of us had been here in years. Not since the incident with Clo in the hospital when we thought the county might split us up.
The day all three of us lost our childhoods.
The smoke turned the air into a gray, suffocating blanket that clawed at my lungs. Cracks and moans came from the trees. Heat filled the air, and I called for Belladonna.
No answer.
She was probably running again. Too scared to face what was happening to her mother. To her own children. I hated what she’d done to us, but I kept searching because I didn’t want her to get hurt out here.
‘Belladonna!’ My voice echoed like a boomerang, scattering into the wind and then whirring its way straight back at me.
I hurried past the circle and strode farther into the woods. If Lia was here she’d be cursing me out, warning me to go back to the house, but I had to find my mother.
About one hundred steps ahead, the flickers of red and gold grew brighter. Branches tumbled from trees. Birds squawked as they departed their nests. Mice, squirrels and chipmunks raced to higher ground.
Ten feet ahead, Belladonna stood among the chaos, her image flickering in and out of the haze of smoke. I called her name again, but she didn’t move. Was she sick? It made no sense why she wasn’t responding.
I inched closer until a monstrous wet hiss filled the air. The smoke crowding the woods went from charred black to a pale gray in an instant. My gaze darted skyward. The chief must have called in water tankers. But there was no drone of engines or loud churn of propellers.
That hiss and spewing sound filled the air again.
The smoke parted and Belladonna stood like a scarecrow propped up in a cornfield – eyes closed, hands stretched straight out from her body.
Water bubbled up from the ground like a hidden spring, rising inch by inch, dousing the white-hot embers once they struck the ground.
The smoke grew murky, stinging my eyes. I rubbed at them, not sure what I was seeing. Ten paces away another stream of water rushed across the dry soil, this time spilling out in a gush and soaking my tennis shoes.
Bryce’s words from our dinner with Clo throbbed inside my skull.
Documents state her mother had the ability to divine water.
No. It couldn’t be. My mother often spoke of magic, but she couldn’t do magic.
‘What the hell, Belladonna?’
My mother snapped out of her trance, spun toward me and her mouth opened in a silent scream.
The crack behind me rattled in my ears. A massive branch broke away from a hundred-year-old ponderosa tree above me.
I should have moved, dived out of the way, but the shock of the sight held me in place.
Belladonna’s blood-curdling cry filled the air, and then I was airborne, my body thrown sideways like a rag doll.
I rolled three times until my shoulder crashed against the base of another tree.
My head knocked against the bark as the falling branch missed me by mere inches.
My bones ached. Smoke filled my lungs. My mother’s cries vibrated through the forest.
‘Dani, are you all right? Can you hear me?’ Bryce cradled me in his arms. Ash and wet leaves were tangled in his hair. Blood trickled from his freckled nose. I tried to speak. Ask about my mother, but stars swam across my vision until the world sank into a hazy swirl of black.