Flashover

Chapter 5

Sophie squeezedthe phone pressed up to her ear. “Sheriff, do I need to repeat the numbers or…?”

As her truck fishtailed around a corner, she pumped her right foot harder against the passenger side floorboard. If only Houston could drive both faster and slower all at the same time.

“Or do you…”

Her phone beeped in reply.

She held out her screen to see her fear revealed—no signal. A groan escaped her lips. “Can’t something go right today?”

“I can still see the car up ahead. He hasn’t gotten away.” Houston’s hand landed on top of her trembling fingers.

She took in a deep breath. The tension in her shoulders released a fraction. Maybe at least one thing had gone okay. If the break-in had to happen, maybe it wasn’t the worst thing to have had Houston around.

He put his hand back on the wheel, and Sophie fisted her fingers. “So if this person may have known or worked with your brother, why would he track you down and take a picture?”

Should she tell him about what led her to change her name?

Instead, she shrugged. “Maybe there was something on the back of the picture that helps Crispin be found? I know that sounds crazy but…” She pointed to an angled tree with its branch stretching out ahead. “The road curves after that low branch.”

“If I slow down…”

Then they might lose whoever had been in her house. Lose her chance at finding something out about her brother. “Don’t slow down.” There were too many unanswered questions at stake. “The only way any of this makes sense is if someone has made a connection between me and Crispin.”

The truck caught air over the top of a hill, and her stomach seemed to bounce off the ceiling and back to her seat. When the tires hit the gravel again, Houston flinched. “I think now would be the perfect time to tell me why you go by Sophie instead of Rachel.”

She closed her eyes. Of course he was right. She could hardly let the man drive her on a speeding chase and not know more.

Hadn’t he proven himself to be trustworthy? “In one of the towns I lived in after Last Chance County, I thought I was followed one night after getting ice cream. I was in my mid-twenties. Crispin was off on another mission. I just thought it was my nerves getting to me. Then the next day, the same car caused me to wreck into a bridge. I got lucky. My ankle was the only thing that was broken. After Crispin returned home and found out what happened, he said it was no accident. Then he came up with the plan for me to change my name and to move again. That time, I moved to Wyoming.”

Houston let off the gas. “You should have told me this first. The people we’re chasing could be the people from back then. Sophie, you could be in danger.”

She placed her useless phone in her lap. “I hope they are the same people and we stop them. I don’t want to move and hide again. If we figure out who is after me or Crispin, I can finally be done with all this. I can finally have some answers.”

He clenched his jaw, and his Adam’s apple bobbed slowly.

The dimming sunshine sparked off the loose gravel country road ahead of them. Not exactly the ideal situation for a car chase. That and the fact her driver from out of town had probably never seen this road before.

They slid around a curve. Her hands braced against the door. The truck fishtailed until the back wheel hit the edge of the road. When they straightened, Houston grunted and leaned closer to the door, toward his left—the side that hadn’t been hit by the car.

Oh, poor Houston. “Stop. We have to go the other way.”

She’d only been worried about her home and the stolen photo. Meanwhile, Houston had been clipped by that tan car.

He sent her a side glare. “Got a shortcut?”

“Yes, straight to the hospital.” She lifted the edge of his yellow Nomex shirt.

He winced. An angry, purple bruise formed a knot above his hip bone.

“See. You’re hurt. Turn. Around.”

He swatted her hand away and pushed the gas pedal down farther. The engine roared, and gravel on the road spit up and pinged against the underbelly of the truck. “I’ve been through much worse. This was nothing compared to after I donated bone marrow to Macon.”

“Which only proves you’ll risk your life for others. This is so not the time to be a stubborn hero.” Her fingers touched the hem of his shirt. “Is there more above what I saw? I need to find out if you’re bleeding. Being hurt in the past doesn’t mean you’re immune to it forever.”

Before she could see the condition of his side, one of the front tires struck a pothole and bounced her in the seat. Houston’s arm locked around her, pulling her tighter against his side. He grunted as he let off the gas.

As the truck slowed just before another turn, his face was right beside hers. “Please tighten your seatbelt.”

“Please let me check your side?”

The truck steadied, and he punched the gas. “Does the road straighten after the next curve?”

She pressed her palm on the heated dashboard above the radio as they zoomed around the next bend. “I think there’s a little incline and then a much bigger drop on the other side.”

She lifted the bottom of his shirt, and Houston sucked in a breath.

His skin was puckered in places she assumed were from the healed burns. A scrape about the size of her fist was above the bruise. No blood. And no bones seemed out of place.

“See, I’m fine.” His knuckles paled around the steering wheel. “Like I said.”

“Lying does neither of us any good. You could have internal damage.”

“It’s a bruise, Soph. Now tighten your seatbelt because you shouldn’t be able to slide halfway across the bench.”

Despite missing the feel of his shoulder against hers, she scooted over to the passenger side and pulled on the worn belt. “Happy?”

She wasn’t.

Why had she only been thinking about herself?

He swerved the truck over to the far side of the incline. “Ask me that again later.”

As the truck roared over the hill, the motion took her stomach, and she grabbed hold of Houston’s leg.

The front tires returned to the ground and the shocks groaned. In front of them, the cloud of dust seemed more concentrated. But where was the car? They had to be catching up, and yet Houston braked down the hill.

“What are you doing?”

“Slowing down, so we don’t end up like that.” He pointed about half a mile up ahead.

She squinted through the air coated with dust and found brake lights. The reason she no longer saw the tan vehicle in front of them was because the car had flipped over on the side of the road. The metal underbelly portions of the car matched the gravel and dusty weeds.

“It looks like he was trying to take that path through the woods there.”

A trail she’d never noticed before. One that might connect back to her ranch. “That path could be how someone buried the dead body.”

“Yet another reason to wait for the sheriff.”

“But he didn’t hear where we were.”

A hooded man crawled out of the broken side window of the tan car and sprinted for the woods beside the road.

Houston pulled the truck to the shoulder. She unbuckled and then opened the door and jumped out before Houston had completely stopped.

The shadowy form was tallish. For sure lanky. His hood fell back, revealing familiar dark hair on the young man’s head. She knew who had broken into her house.

“Lewis!” She pumped her arms faster.

The teen darted off the path and into the trees. It could be one of the other boys Lewis shouldn’t be hanging with, one with the same hair color, but she was ninety percent sure it was her best friend’s nephew.

The truck door slammed behind her, but she kept her focus on Lewis’s form as he weaved through the trees ahead of her.

Sticker bush branches scraped her arm, and she stumbled over a tree root. “Lewis. Stop!”

Up ahead, Lewis glanced back at her right before he jumped down into a dried riverbed.

A pile of withering leaves acted like a surfboard for Sophie’s foot as she slid down to the bottom. “Lewis!”

Her boot hit only a trickle of water. Pieces of driftwood, pine needles, and stones lined what was more than likely a creek only during the rainy season.

Lewis peered over his shoulder, but this time his foot struck one of the rocks half covered in leaves. Before he pushed himself all the way up, Sophie dove for him.

He’d taken her photo of Crispin. She didn’t know why, but she was tired of him stealing from her.

She landed on his leg, and she wrapped her arms around his thigh. “Don’t you move, Lewis. Marley is worried sick about you, and you’re in a world of trouble. Why’d you break in? Why’d you steal my brother’s picture off my wall?”

“I didn’t break in.” He rose onto one of his knees. “Never took a picture. I was only looking for my earbuds I’d lost one day with Peanut. Just let me go!”

The sheriff had been right. She should have filed a report on him for stealing money from her earlier. Maybe then he might not have caused this mess. But she had tried to lighten Marley’s load.

When Lewis squirmed in her grip, something shiny around his throat caught her attention. She released her grip and grabbed hold of the necklace.

At the bottom of the chain was a pair of rings. A man’s and a woman’s. Both gold with one tiny diamond. She knew if she flipped the smaller one over, it would be engraved with a sunflower on the inside—her mother’s favorite flower.

She gripped the necklace tighter. “W-where did you get this?”

That first postcard she’d received after her brother’s death had said, remember when we picked the neighbor’s sunflowers?

Only Crispin and Sophie had picked flowers for Mother’s Day only to get in trouble for it afterwards because they had cut down their neighbor’s prized sunflowers.

“How…”

Lewis’s widened eyes set on something behind her, and he slipped from her grasp, backpedaling on the ground.

Houston leaped from the top of the hill and bumped into Lewis, who somehow kept his feet. As the teen steadied himself on a tree trunk, Houston lunged and landed on top of Lewis.

Lewis wiggled underneath Houston’s weight, but was no match for the man.

Houston sat up and sank his knee onto Lewis’s chest. “Now would be a good time to answer her.”

Lewis coughed and pushed his arms against Houston. “I didn’t do it. I swear.”

Sophie’s numb feet stepped over to him, and she lifted the rings on the chain. “Where did you get this necklace? It wasn’t in my house. I haven’t seen it in three years.”

Crispin.

He’d last had the necklace. But it had disappeared with her brother.

Her breath caught.

Houston lifted his body off of Lewis and helped him sit, keeping his hands around the boy’s shirt. Lewis shook his head, and the chain slipped right into Sophie’s hands.

With leaves sticking to his hoodie, he licked his chapped lips. “W-we found it in the woods.”

Houston narrowed his eyes. “Where? By the squirrels you and your friends were?—”

“B-by a body.” His gaze bounced between Houston and Sophie. “But we didn’t kill him or bury him. We only found the body like that. I swear it.”

Sophie’s hands shook. Yes, they indeed looked like her parents’ rings. The ones her brother wore to remind him of what truly mattered in the world. God and family.

Her legs froze beneath her. “You found this necklace by the burned body?”

Tears formed in her eyes. The body…She bit down on her quivering bottom lip. “That’s why I haven’t received a postcard yet this year. Because…”

“Sophie?” Houston blurred before her.

Her next step backward hit a softer section of ground, and her ankle twisted. Pain exploded up her leg. A cry ripped through her mouth as she fell.

She crashed onto the ground. Her knee knocked against something hard—a root or tree stump. Or just rock bottom.

Yet that wasn’t what hurt the worst. Her brother might really be dead this time, and there was nothing she could do to save him. Like her parents, she had to figure out how to live after the dirt covered the grave that laid them to rest.

Why did God take away everyone she loved?

She groaned as her hands wrapped around her ankle. The one that never seemed to heal since the car accident. And before that, the earthquake.

Houston knelt over her. “Is it your leg? Ankle? Talk to me, Soph.”

Sophie blinked. Houston’s arms encircled her. She leaned into his chest.

But if Houston held her, then where was Lewis?

She shoved Houston’s chest. “Where’s Lewis? We’ve got to go get him.”

Houston lowered his chin, blocking her view of Lewis’s retreating form. “A hotshot does not abandon their crewmembers. I’m not leaving you alone when you’re hurt.”

A hot tear leaked from her eye. “Please, Houston.” She pressed against his chest again. She needed answers. Needed closure. Needed help.

Houston wiped the tear from her cheek. “Is anything broken?”

Her eyes snapped to his. He didn’t look away, only held her attention with those golden flakes that made her want to think of good things.

His fingers lightly grazed around hers and moved down her leg.

“No,” she whispered. Lewis was gone, her brother could be the burned body, and then she would have no one left. “My ankle isn’t broken.”

But her heart was in pieces.

* * *

Houston’s heart hurt worse than his bruised hip. Sophie’s tears made him want to take on her pain. But he couldn’t. Life didn’t exactly work that way. “Let’s keep your boot on for compression. I don’t think I have anything that will help you in my pack back at the truck, other than some pain reliever.”

She placed one of her hands on his arm and lifted her trembling fingers, which held the necklace that Lewis had been wearing. “This was my brother’s necklace. If Lewis found it by the burned body. That means…”

“The body could be your brother’s.” All Houston could do was wrap his arms around her.

She laid her forehead on his chest. Her tears were warm through his uniform. “How can Crispin be dead?”

He rubbed his fingertips up and down her back. “We don’t know for sure if the body is your brother.” Houston kept his voice steady. “There’s still hope.”

That’s what he’d spent years teaching the youth group, that there’s always hope. Hope in Christ. Which was still true—and always would be. But the past few months, with the trials he’d faced, God seemed farther away than ever.

Yet hope in Christ didn’t mean there would be no more hardships.

Tears weaved around her lashes until her eyes popped back open. Her chest rose and fell as if she’d galloped away on Daisy.

Her hands went to her chest. “Every holiday I’d gotten a postcard that only he could have sent. Except this year. And now I know why.” As her hand drifted from his to wrap around her hurt ankle, a silent sob quaked through her body.

And his heart.

A familiar sound rumbled in the distance. Something that sounded too much like Sophie’s retro truck engine and the crunch of spinning wheels on gravel. Her vehicle was being stolen—leaving them stranded here.

Sophie released her ankle. “My truck!”

Houston’s shoulders sagged, but he didn’t lessen his grip from around her. “I left the keys…my pack. I never thought…Lewis must have circled back and taken it as his means of escape.”

Houston should have kept a hold of the teen, but Sophie had needed him more. He’d made the tough choice, and now they were alone out here.

“I’m sorry, Sophie.” His mistake tasted like ash.

Wait.

He whipped his gaze around in the shadowed trees standing guard. Amongst the smoke snaking toward them, there was light in the distance. But it wasn’t the sun. Flames rocketed up a tree branch that canopied the valley ahead. The smoky air hit his face and caused him to draw in an unsteady breath.

The wind had changed directions. Good for Sophie’s ranch. Bad for their current location.

He scooped up Sophie in his arms. “We’ve got to move. Now. A dried-up valley is not the place we need to be.”

She wrapped one of her arms around his neck, and the shift of the weight helped him take his next steps faster back up the incline. Her wide eyes were fixed on something over his shoulder. “Houston…”

A snap echoed in the woods, and Houston turned to see an ablaze overhanging branch drop into the dried riverbed.

Houston picked up his pace. His hip screamed at him to stop. But he couldn’t. He was going to have to live through another fire.

Lord, where are You in this?

At least he had his fire shelter in his pocket.

A cough shook Sophie in his arms. “Let me down. I think I can put some weight on my ankle.”

He flexed his arms around Sophie. They’d need all the speed they could get. “No, I’ve got you.”

His scars on the back of his head and neck tickled as if they trembled at the heat coming for them. “That fire can travel uphill at sixty miles an hour. We’ve got to push hard to the road. It isn’t that far.” And it was a barrier that might slow down the fire. “At the very least, we can get under a shelter.” Her eyes widened further at the sight behind him. “Oh?—”

He didn’t turn around. Didn’t need to. He heard the sizzle of the sap. The hiss of flames consuming leaves. He squeezed his arms tighter around her, and she leaned into him as he ran toward their only hope.

He dodged the trees and lifted Sophie through the sticker bushes. Smoke entangled them. His eyes burned. He squinted. There. Finally. Ahead through the swaying branches, a clear path to the road.

He breathed through the pain in his hip. Smoke clung to his lungs. He could do this. They were going to make it. Then he spotted the tan car at the bottom of the hill. Houston slowed his pace. “I forgot about Lewis’s flipped car.”

“That car was not owned by Lewis or his aunt. Not that that’s the point right now. Can you push it over?”

“Any other moment your faith in my strength would boost my ego, but no, not feeling any superhuman abilities presently. But that’s not the problem.” He veered off toward his right, where the road curved up ahead. His legs numbed with each step toward nowhere. “I failed to factor the car’s gasoline tank into the fire barrier and survival equation. If the fire is moving as fast as the wind is whipping through the trees, the flames will light the gas and the explosion will probably reach us even in the fire shelter.”

Her hands fisted around his shirt. “Your pack was in the truck. We don’t have your fire shelter.”

He quickened his strides. “It’s in my pocket. We have to stay on the road, away from the fire load.”

“English, please. What does fire load mean in firefighter language?” A cough thundered through her. It was hard to tell if the air was getting darker from smoke or from the setting sun. But her cough let him know exactly which.

Before he could answer, Houston’s foot hit a raised root, and he stumbled.

Sophie gasped.

He stutter-stepped and found his balance. With a twinge of pain from his side, he pulled Sophie back up against his heaving chest. “I’m all right, are you?”

“Honestly?” Her word tickled against his neck. “I’ve actually been worse. Once. During an earthquake.”

He wanted to ask when. Wanted to learn more about the woman Sophie had become. But instead, he said, “Then let’s keep it that way.”

After a few jogging steps, Sophie motioned toward the shadowed road in front of them that appeared to go straight off into the trees. “The road hooks hard up to the left. We should cut through the woods. It would save us time.”

“We need to be on the road away from the debris that can catch fire when we deploy the fire shelter.”

“But can’t the hill act as another barrier for the fire?” Her voice had a calmness to it. No longer shaky. That made one of them.

“Yes. The flames might not jump across the gravel to the trees on the other side.”

She met his gaze. “Then let’s take the shortcut. We’ll stay close to the road in case it comes time to deploy the fire shelter. Maybe we won’t need it.”

“Maybe.” But he wasn’t counting on it.

His second wind would come. It had to. Or they needed to take the shortcut and pray for the best.

He repositioned his tingling arms around Sophie. The wind whipped through the branches overhead, and a thick cloud of smoke blocked out any help from the sun.

Houston sucked in air and coughed.

Sophie placed her palm against his chest. “Let me down. My ankle isn’t throbbing much right now.”

“I’m sure you can walk, but I still think me carrying you will be faster.”

“Houston, you’re getting tired. It’s that or we have to take the shortcut.”

Sweat dripped down the back of his shirt as if to prove her observation.

Lord, what do we do?

Houston eyed Sophie’s ankle. “Okay, we’ll try the shortcut.”

The only sound over the popping fire that filled the woods was his footsteps thumping on the ground, the wind, and his uneven breaths. His feet stepped even faster into the tree line on the opposite side of the road.

“Soph?”

“Hmm.”

Ten more steps and they’d reach the top of the next hill. Then he could spot the curved road once more.

Inhale. Exhale. Sweat dripped into his eye. Sophie sagged against his chest. All except her arms that snaked around his neck, tightening. Another round of coughs rattled through her.

He needed to get her out of the smoky air. But that was hardly an option.

“Might have to nickname you python soon.”

Her arms loosened. “Sorry.”

Another cough coursed through his body, shaking him. His feet slowed. His next pant brought in more smoke than air.

She tapped his shoulder. “Hey, talk to me.”

It was growing darker ahead of them, which meant the fire might be slowing down. Maybe they could keep hiking and not deploy the shelter. If only he had his walkie and could radio HQ for the fire’s path.

Please, Lord. Please give me the easy way for once.

The toe of his boot whacked against a stump hidden in the leaves swirling on the ground, and he pitched forward. A yelp came from Sophie, and he released her legs in time for him to fall on his hands and not squish her.

He met the ground with a groan. His hip pain made him grit his teeth. He spat out a piece of dirt from his mouth. “You good?”

She scooted closer to him. “I think so.”

He rolled over onto his back and waited for any further pain, but there wasn’t any. His lungs squeezed. His side ached as if someone had given him an uppercut gut punch.

He pushed himself up. An ache quaked through his side. From their position on the hillside, he took in the horizon behind them. The fire had roared up the tallest pine tree. Its branches melting in the heated flames and dropping on anything that wasn’t already aflame.

Another rookie mistake. He never should have left the road. Now they were surrounded by trees and dead leaves and sticks. Perfect food for the hungry flames.

Disaster was coming, and unless God provided a miracle, whether Houston liked it or not, he was about to endure another fire. This time, he’d brought Sophie into his mess. And he’d picked the worst spot to have to deploy their only shelter.