Chapter 12
GWEN
Bruised, unnatural orange light bled through the kitchen window glass, staining the white porcelain of the farmhouse sink a sickly, metallic shade of rust.
I stood completely motionless, my hands submerged in the cooling, soapy dishwater, staring blankly at the chipped rim of a ceramic coffee mug I had been washing for the better part of twenty minutes.
Time had fractured into disjointed, meaningless segments since I walked out of the Mitchell Energy executive suite in downtown Seattle.
The ferry ride back to the San Juan Islands had passed in a numb, detached trance.
I had stood on the open deck of the vessel for the entire ninety-minute crossing, letting the cold spray off the water mist my face, entirely consumed by the echoing finality of my own voice demanding a divorce.
Returning to the isolated property hadn't brought the peace I desperately craved.
It had only provided a silent, echoing cavern to house my grief.
I was entirely alone with the phantom limb of my marriage, surrounded by the physical ghosts of a life that no longer existed.
The quiet was so absolute it physically ached, a ringing silence that offered no comfort and no answers.
A subtle, creeping shift in the draft pulled me back from the void.
The sharp, clean bite of saltwater that eternally permeated the coastal air was completely gone.
In its place, a thick, resinous scent actively seeped through the tiny, weathered gaps in the old wooden window frames.
I inhaled automatically, and my lungs instantly rejected the air, my throat closing around a harsh, dry cough.
It smelled like burning Douglas fir and the distinct, acrid tang of scorched madrona bark.
It was the heavy, suffocating scent of ancient, dry timber turning to carbon.
Dropping the mug back into the water, I grabbed a cotton dish towel, drying my hands with rapid, jerky movements. I tossed the towel onto the counter, walked purposefully toward the back door, pushed the warped wood open, and stepped out onto the wraparound porch.
The wind whipped violently across my face, carrying a dry, oppressive heat that absolutely did not belong on the Pacific Northwest coast. I walked to the edge of the wooden railing, my boots thudding against the boards, gripping the painted timber so hard my knuckles instantly turned white.
I looked east, away from the water and toward the dense, rolling interior of the island.
A massive, churning column of gray-black smoke blotted out the sun over the distant timberline.
It twisted and rolled like a living, breathing monster, devouring the clear July sky and casting a sinister, apocalyptic pallor over the entire landscape.
The underbelly of the massive smoke cloud glowed with a faint, terrifying luminescence—the angry, violent reflection of open flames consuming the dry forest floor miles away.
Inside the front pocket of my denim jeans, my cell phone suddenly blared.
It wasn't the standard, melodic ringtone of an incoming call or the brief chime of a text message.
It was the harsh, piercing, discordant shriek of a regional emergency broadcast. The noise was designed to trigger pure biological panic.
I yanked the device out of my pocket with trembling fingers.
The screen flashed blindingly bright with an incoming, high-priority notification from the county emergency management office.
Level 2 Evacuation Warning. Wildfire approaching your sector. Be set. Be ready to leave at a moment's notice.
That piercing, electronic noise cut straight through my chest, severing the absolute last fragile thread holding my composure together.
A sudden wave of nausea hit me, twisting my empty stomach into tight, painful knots.
I braced my forearm against one of the heavy porch pillars, squeezing my eyes shut as the ground seemed to sway dangerously beneath my boots.
This felt like a cruel, targeted punishment. It was an unbearable piling on by a universe that had already demanded my absolute, unconditional surrender.
I had fled to this island specifically because it was my final remaining sanctuary.
It was the one piece of ground insulated from the destruction of my marriage, a place where Victoria Albright and Reid Mitchell couldn't touch me.
I had come here to mourn the betrayal, to process the sickening reality that Reid had been taking his lead consultant to his bed while using me as a public relations shield to placate his investors.
This lighthouse was the only thing I had left that felt remotely safe.
Now, the very earth was threatening to burn my sanctuary to the ground.
The compounding weight of the loss pressed down heavily on my shoulders, threatening to crush my lungs entirely.
First Reid, and now this. The fire felt like a physical manifestation of Victoria herself—a destructive and invasive force chewing through the established boundaries of my life, intent on leaving absolutely nothing but scorched ash and ruin in its wake.
I pulled up the local emergency broadcast application on my phone, my fingers shaking so badly I had to tap the icon three times before it opened.
The digital map had yet to be updated, but from what little I could infer from the sparse information, the main fire line was still a few ridges away, chewing hungrily through the dense, dry interior forests of the island, fueled by months of below-average rainfall.
But the fierce coastal wind was acting as a massive bellows. It was driving the heat, the thick smoke, and the toxic, burning fallout directly toward the lighthouse.
It was a creeping, agonizing threat. The geography of the island was inherently unforgiving.
If the wind speeds escalated, if the fire jumped the containment lines and that alert upgraded to a Level 3—Go Now—the narrow, winding, single-lane gravel roads leading back to the ferry terminal would instantly become a choked, impassable nightmare of blind panic and fleeing vehicles.
I would only have a matter of minutes to secure an escape route before the fire cut off the only road back to the mainland.
And I was completely alone to face it.
Paralysis tugged heavily at my limbs, whispering a dark, seductive invitation to simply sink down onto the porch boards, pull my knees to my chest, and let the smoke take me.
I was so incredibly tired. The physical exhaustion of tearing out the invasive blackberry brambles days ago paled in comparison to the soul-crushing spiritual fatigue of ending my marriage.
I didn't want to fight anymore. I didn't want to run.
I fought the profound, bone-deep exhaustion. I forced my boots to move, pivoting sharply away from the railing and marching back inside the house, slamming the heavy wooden door shut against the thickening smoke.
I was not going to surrender to the flames. I had survived the agonizing death of my marriage; I would survive the fire.
Adrenaline finally kicked back into my bloodstream in a massive, hot surge, overriding the profound fatigue and forcing my survival instincts online.
I hurried down the narrow wooden stairs into the basement, my boots clattering against the steps.
I bypassed the stored holiday decorations, the neatly stacked patio furniture, and the racks of winter gear, heading straight for the utility closet.
I dragged a thick stack of flattened, reinforced cardboard moving boxes out from the corner.
I hauled the heavy, awkward stack up to the main floor, dropping them onto the braided rug in the living room and quickly taping the bottoms secure with a plastic dispenser I pulled from the kitchen drawer.
Moving rapidly through the living quarters, my eyes swept over the property.
I loved this house. I loved the exposed timber beams, the massive stone fireplace, the wide-plank floors that creaked in the winter.
I wanted to save every single piece of it, to pack the entire structure into my SUV and drive it away from the encroaching destruction.
But the smoke outside the windows seemed to grow thicker by the second, shifting from a hazy gray to a dense, bruised charcoal.
The reality of the timeline was brutal and absolute.
I couldn't save the heavy oak dining table that was original to the house. Just like I couldn’t save the decommissioned lamp in the lighthouse tower.
But I could still save some of the history.
I grabbed three empty boxes and turned toward the center of the structure, beginning to climb the spiral iron staircase that led up into the throat of the old lighthouse tower. The metal steps clanged dully under my boots, a frantic, echoing rhythm that matched the hammering of my pulse.
As I ascended higher into the narrow, uninsulated structure, the air grew noticeably hotter and significantly harder to breathe.
Acrid smoke was already beginning to actively permeate the building, finding its insidious way through the brass ventilation grates and the tiny, weathered mortar seams of the old brickwork.
I coughed, pulling the collar of my cotton shirt up over my nose and mouth to filter the sting.
I blinked rapidly against the intense watering in my eyes, forcing my vision to remain clear.
Reaching the top landing just below the glass lantern room, I dropped heavily to my knees in front of an antique wooden chest we had bolted to the floor years ago. I threw open the rusted iron latch, the metal screeching in protest, and pushed the heavy, curved lid back.
Inside rested the original nineteenth-century keeper’s logbooks.