Chapter 18
Colton
Pale light leaked through a gap in the curtains, casting a thin line across the bed where Deanna lay curled into him. Her hair fanned across his shoulder, breath even and warm on his collarbone.
Colton didn’t move. He didn’t want to disturb her, didn’t want to change position.
Last night had rearranged his priorities. He’d spent years holding people at arm’s length after Mack died. Reeva had slipped past those defenses, which led to his rude awakening when she showed him why he’d had them in the first place.
Then Deanna barreled into his life with her father’s worn river book, and her honest account of the wrong turns she’d taken. Somewhere between their first kiss by the lake and last night’s lovemaking, her barriers had dissolved along with his.
She stirred beside him, made a small sound, nestled deeper. His hand found the curve of her hip on its own. A thought flashed.
I could lose this.
The list of threats had grown long. Sabotage incidents, near misses in the air, Deanna’s close calls, and Marsh’s declaration that the common denominator was usually the operator. Colton buried it, just as he always had before a full-throttle drop run.
Fly the plane in front of you, not the one in your head.
Deanna’s lashes fluttered. She blinked at him and smiled.
“Morning, Sky King.”
“Morning, Brooks.”
She stretched, and his self-control evaporated in two seconds. He bent his head to kiss her, wanting to make love to her again.
Her arm slid up around his neck. “We should get up,” she murmured.
“We should, but we don’t have to.” He kissed the corner of her jaw, his arousal kicking in.
The pounding on the door was a brutal interruption. “Colton! Open up!” Ace sounded upset.
“What’s he doin’ here? What the hell time is it?” sputtered Colton.
Deanna lifted onto her elbows, bleary-eyed, peering at the clock on the nightstand. “Only six thirty.” She flopped back down and groaned.
The pounding continued. “Open up, Colt!”
“Hold your horses!” Colton pushed himself out of bed, reached for his underwear, and tugged it on as he stumbled toward the door. He opened it a crack.
Ace stood there looking as though he hadn’t slept in decades. “Have either of you seen Kylie? I checked her sleeping quarters. Her phone is there, but she’s nowhere to be found. Her cot looks like she didn’t sleep in it last night.”
“What? Hold on a minute, Ace.” He closed the door as Deanna sprang from the bed and snatched Colton’s T-shirt and tugged it on. She wriggled into her jeans, and when she was decent, he opened the door again.
“Come on in.”
His buddy’s eyes widened as Deanna stood in the middle of the room, twisting her hair into a messy bun.
“Whoops, sorry, didn’t mean to interrupt . . .”
“What do you mean, you can’t find Kylie?” Deanna cut in. “Maybe she’s in the shower or at the jump shack?”
“I’ve checked those places. It’s like she vanished into thin air.” Ace threw up his arms and dropped them to his sides.
“Jeez, Ace, where could she be this early in the morning?” Colton’s blood went cold.
The sabotages, the stalker messages, now Kylie disappears?
He didn’t like the looks of this.
“When did you talk to her last?” Colton stepped into his sage-green flight suit and did a double-take on Deanna wearing his T-shirt, Precision Aviation emblazoned across the front.
“She texted me around 2100 hours before heading to the restroom in the school.” He held up Kylie’s phone.
Deanna took it and scrolled through the text messages. “If she hasn’t turned up by the time we reach the fire base, we need to notify the IC and county law enforcement. With threatening texts like these, they’ll have the FBI in on it, too.”
Ace glanced at Deanna, then at Colton. “Congratulations, it’s about time you two hooked up. Just wanted both of you to know. I’m heading to the base. See you there.” Ace disappeared out the door, shaking his head.
As they rushed to get dressed, Deanna caught Colton’s eye. “Last night was . . . well, it meant everything to me. I mean that with all my heart.”
He stopped lacing his boots and stepped over to slide his arms around her. “It meant everything to me, too. I planned to show you how much again this morning until reality smacked us in the ass.”
She placed a palm on his cheek. “There’ll be another time. First, we must find Kylie.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll get to the bottom of this,” he said firmly, knowing they had no other choice.
Neither of them spoke on the drive to the Command Center. Deanna stared out the windshield, clasping her hands so tightly her knuckles whitened.
Her voice quavered. “I should have kept better track of her.”
Colton gave her a side-eye. “This isn’t your fault.”
“I should have been in the tent with her, not—”
“Not what?” he interrupted. “Not taking one night for yourself after jumping from a plane to fight fires to spend with someone who cares for you?”
“Someone who cares for me?” She seemed to like his sentiment. “Kylie’s my best friend. She’s been there for me through everything. But when she needed me, I wasn’t there.”
She peered out the window where the smoke plume had turned the rising sun into a red rubber ball.
Colton recognized the spiral of guilt he knew all too well. “Beating yourself up won’t do you or her any good.”
She didn’t respond, only stared out the window.
The ICC had sunk into chaos when they arrived.
After the morning fire briefing, IC Westlake stood near the communications tent with two Anaconda-Deer Lodge County law enforcement officers.
The situation map showed the fire had consumed another seven thousand acres.
Red pins marked spot fires, yellow showed containment lines, and too many black X’s marked equipment out of commission.
Colton and Deanna hurried to join them. Ace had already engaged the IC and the two officers. “She’s missing. We need to get a search going right away.”
“We got on it when your IC reported it,” said the male officer, his badge displaying Sergeant Mills. “We have units checking the roads between here and town.”
Westlake’s phone buzzed. “Unknown number.” He hit speaker and lifted the phone. “Hello.”
The voice sounded distorted, electronic. “You’re all standing around like idiots, and I also see you have two cops present. You call any more cops, and the pretty little firefighter loses a finger.”
Colton caught Deanna’s look of alarm, her cheeks paling.
“Identify yourself, since you’re making threats,” said Westlake.
The person laughed. “Yeah, I’ll get right on it.
Here’s how this works. Two million to a bank account of my choosing.
You have forty-eight hours. Any cop involvement beyond what’s there, and she dies.
Trace this call and she dies. Try to stop the fires before you pay, and she dies. Get the picture?”
“Proof of life,” Officer Samuelson cut in. “We need proof she’s alive.”
A pause, then the sound of rustling. “Say hello, sweetheart.”
“Don’t pay them anything!” Kylie sounded strong, despite how scared she must be. Her words cut off with a cry of pain.
“Kylie!” Ace lunged for the phone, but Sergeant Mills held him back.
“Check your phones,” the distorted voice said. “There’s your proof. You have forty-eight hours. Precision Aviation’s insurance money should cover it. I’ll be in touch with delivery instructions.”
The second the call ended, several phones buzzed with a video message. Colton opened his, and the others did the same.
The video came grainy but clear enough. Kylie sat tied to a chair in what looked like a log cabin, a stone fireplace behind her. She had on jeans and a T-shirt.
“Time stamp shows 6:47 this morning,” said Sergeant Mills, studying his phone.
“These mountains in the window are—wait, this faces northwest!” Colton burst out.
“See the ridge line? This is the eastern Anaconda Range we call the Pintlers. But look at the smoke pattern outside the window. The wind’s pushin’ it southeast, which means Kylie is probably on the windward side of the Copper Creek Fire. ”
Officer Samuelson nodded in agreement. “Good eye. That narrows it down considerably. We’ll have our techs analyze the video for more location markers.”
Ace crossed his arms. “She’s tied up in some cabin with some psycho, and you want to analyze video? We need to be searching every mother-freaking cabin in these mountains!”
“There are hundreds of cabins up there, Ace,” said Colton. “Half of them are in the fire’s path. We need to be smart about this.”
“This is my fault,” Ace blurted. “I should have walked her to her tent. I should have . . .” He stopped. “If anything happens to her . . .”
“It’s not your fault. If it’s anyone’s fault, it’s mine. I’m her best friend.” Deanna shook her head, guilt written on her face.
“Stop.” Westlake’s command cut through their self-recrimination. “This isn’t about fault. Someone targeted her, probably the same someone who’s been sabotaging us. Blaming yourselves won’t solve anything. What I want to know is how they knew about the insurance money.”
“Two million,” said Officer Samuelson. “Someone knows what’s available.”
Westlake snorted. “The Forest Service doesn’t have a discretionary fund. No fire agency does.”
“But Precision Aviation might,” said Colton. All eyes turned to him. “The aerial firefighting community has lost a few planes in recent years. Insurance pay-outs from crashed tankers are probably still sitting in escrow. I wonder how many might have been sabotaged, but no one caught it?”
“How would anyone know about all that?” asked Deanna.
“Someone with inside knowledge. Someone who knows our maintenance schedules, equipment, insurance policies, how much we’re insured for, and how quickly that money could be accessed in an emergency.”
“Reeva,” muttered Deanna, her eyes flicking to Colton.
“What?” Colton stared at her.
“Think about it. Reeva and the sabotage showed up at the same time. Your past relationship gave her access to Precision Aviation. She knows these mountains, knows the firefighting routines, and she knows about insurance policies and coverage amounts.”
“Reeva got injured in a helicopter crash yesterday,” Colton pointed out, even as doubt crept in. “She’s in the hospital.”
“Are you sure?” Sergeant Mills held his phone. “I’ll verify it.”
“The fires,” Westlake cut in. “They want us to let them burn. The kidnapper specifically said not to stop the fires before we pay. Why?”
“Maybe they want the land cleared,” suggested Officer Samuelson. “Developers have circled this area for years, wanting to build resorts. Hard to do with all the environmental protections, but after a catastrophic fire, well . . .”
“They’d buy it cheap and rebuild however they want,” Colton finished. “And if our firefighting capability is crippled by sabotage, the fires burn longer, destroying more land.”
Ace stopped pacing, his face hardening. “I don’t care who it is. They better not hurt Kylie Sumner.”
“We’ll get her back.” Colton hoped saying it out loud would make it more real.
Sergeant Mills lowered his phone, mouth set in a grim line.
“The hospital has no record of Reeva Dunsmore being discharged, but her bed’s been empty since 11 p.m. last night.
Security cameras show her leaving in scrubs she apparently stole from a supply closet.
Cameras caught her getting into a dark pickup truck. Driver’s face stayed out of view.”
No one spoke. Colton struggled to make sense of it.
Reeva? His ex-fiancée had the capacity for this? Kidnapping? Ransom demands? It didn’t make sense. Unless she hadn’t been working alone.
Colton spoke up. “The sabotage required technical knowledge Reeva doesn’t have, meaning someone else is involved. Someone who knows aircraft mechanics and has access to our fire crew deployment schedules.”
“We need ransom money. I’ll sign over my salary, my truck, everything I own.” Ace’s offer left Colton speechless. He cared about Kylie more than Colton thought.
“We don’t recommend paying ransom,” said Officer Samuelson.
“I don’t care what you recommend!” shouted Ace. “This is Kylie’s life we’re talking about! Every minute we waste, those fires get bigger, and she’s still out there!”
Deanna crossed to Ace and gripped his shoulders. “We’ll find her, don’t worry.” She echoed Colton’s words but with steel behind them. “Kylie’s tough. She survived Alaska, so she’ll survive this.”
Colton thought about Kylie’s smile, her competence on the fireline, and how she’d regarded Ace with admiration.
Behind them, the Command Center’s radios crackled with reports of new spot fires, requests for water drops, crews calling for backup they wouldn’t get because half their resources sat sabotaged or grounded.
Colton glanced at Ace. “I’ve been keeping Precision Aviation’s owners briefed on all this. I’ll call them to get started on releasing those funds, in case we need them.”
Sergeant Mills looked up from his radio.
“We’re coordinating with the FBI since kidnapping and ransom are in play.
The Bureau’s running the ransom side, tracing the phone, advising us on the texts.
Our county officers are combing the mountains, especially the windward side of the fire, and pulling traffic cameras and gas station footage from last night.
Roadblocks are going up on every route out of those mountains.
” His jaw tightened. “If she’s up there, we’ll find her.
And we’ll find Reeva Dunsmore and whoever she’s working with. ”
“What about the fires?” asked Deanna. “We have dwindling resources, and if we don’t stop fighting the fires like they demanded—”
Westlake cut in. “Our job is to stay focused on fighting fire. We’ll pull back from the northwest section near the Pintlers, to make it look like we’re complying, to buy us time.”
When the briefing concluded, Deanna turned to Colton. “I’m going to the jump shack to request Rooster to remove me from the jump list for a day or two. I can’t jump fires when I could be looking for Kylie.”
Colton opened his mouth to respond, but she was already jogging toward the jump shack. He dug his phone from his pocket to call Precision, his mind spinning.
Reeva. The woman he’d once loved and considered building a future with. Had she orchestrated this? Not alone. Someone else pulled the strings. Someone with a bigger plan than ransom money, who wanted these forests to burn.
Good thing I didn’t marry her. She would’ve dragged me into her messed up world.
Forty-eight hours. That was all they had to find Kylie or come up with two million bucks as their resources dwindled and the fires raged closer to Copper Creek.
Colton promised himself that no matter what it took, they’d get Kylie back.
They had to. There was no other option.