The Family Man. Melinda Curtis

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СКАЧАТЬ Nick was Steve, short for Stephanapolis; Doc because he went to medical school during the winter; and The Queen, so dubbed because she was a redhead named Victoria. Logan’s nickname was Tin Man, a name he’d earned by being the most confirmed bachelor among his crew. They gave each other monikers to lighten the mood when battling the deadly flames.

      Not to say that they weren’t businesslike on the fire line.

      “Lots of ski bunnies down that slope at the ski lodge, Tin Man.” Chainsaw nudged Logan with his elbow, his namesake resting on his broad shoulders. He, Steve and a bulldozer had cleared a twenty-foot wide path through the trees that cut across their side of Hyndman Park. “We’ll look like heroes.”

      Well, they might not always be businesslike, but they got the job done.

      “Send my group out first, Golden, before Tin Man starts breakin’ hearts and makin’ all of mankind look bad.” Spider’s words were baiting, almost itching for a fight.

      Logan looked away, heat burning in his gut near as hot as the fire above them. Since losing his twin sister six months ago, Logan’s temper rarely receded. He’d taken to avoiding his friends because he couldn’t escape the cloud that seemed to shadow him everywhere.

      Golden shook his head. He was the superintendent of the Silver Bend Hot Shots based in Silver Bend, Idaho, and had the patience of a saint. Logan and Spider were his two assistant superintendents, each in command of a team of nine men and women.

      Last year, Golden had volunteered to train firefighters in Russia, and while he was on leave, Logan had taken over the superintendent position. At the time, Spider had seemed to accept Logan’s advancement over him. Then, just after Golden returned from Russia, the team had fought a huge fire in Garden Valley, Idaho, and things had changed.

      Logan had been baby-sitting some of NIFC’s Incident Command team when they’d been trapped by a fire on a steep slope. NIFC, short for National Interagency Fire Center, coordinated fire crews and resources in the United States when a fire outgrew the capabilities of a local fire district. The incident commander, Sirus Socrath, who went by the Hot Shot name of Socrates, had bounced down the slope toward the advancing flames like a rag doll, breaking his arm. Logan had slid after him in the hopes of saving him, only to take a tumble and break his own leg. They’d waited out most of the fire in a cave until Golden showed up and saved Logan’s ass, cracking his own ribs and noggin in the process.

      While Logan and Golden were on the mend, Spider took over the team. Shortly thereafter, he’d started giving Logan nothing but his own dark brand of bullshit. Logan was finding it increasingly hard to ignore his friend’s digs, increasingly hard not to plant a fist in Spider’s grinning face.

      “Our team is watching the line here.” Golden banished any hope of recreational action at the ski lodge, eliciting a series of muffled grumbles among the team. “They’re sending the Snakes,” he added, meaning the Snake River Hot Shot crew from Pocatello, Idaho.

      The groans weren’t held back at this news. Three-quarters of the Hot Shots were single and under age thirty-five.

      “Let’s do what the boss says,” Logan called out to his team even as the wind whistled past him from a new direction. “Spread out and make sure this beast doesn’t jump our line.”

      “Come on, let’s go help the Snakes, Golden,” Spider was saying, disregarding Golden’s command—that they get back to their jobs. Then he turned to Logan with that infuriating grin of his. “To look at you, Tin Man, I wouldn’t think you’d be so heartless and give up so easily. It’s been a long winter for some of our crew.”

      “Shove it, Spider,” Logan said through gritted teeth, trying to rein in his explosive temper even as it burned its way through his veins, trying to force his feet in the opposite direction, away from the challenge Spider continued to flaunt in his face.

      Neither effort worked. His body shook with nearly uncontrollable energy.

      “I’m just saying you’re colder than ever,” Spider continued, a mild smile on his face, as if he were making a joke Logan was too stupid to understand.

      Before Logan realized what he was doing, he had Spider by the straps of his backpack and his face pressed almost into Spider’s. “I said, shove it!”

      Hands yanked Logan back, away from Spider and his taunts. Then Golden dragged him farther down the road, away from the others. But the anger came with him.

      “Damn it, Tin Man.” Jackson looked him square in the eye before lowering his voice. “Logan, what the hell happened to you? Your temper was never as bad as this.”

      The anger was choking, making it impossible for Logan to form a reply. How he wished he could rid himself of it.

      The person he’d been closest to in the world, his twin sister, Deb, had known how to ease his anger with a word. But she was gone. And Logan hadn’t been able to honor her request and be a guardian for her two girls. While Logan was lost in grief, Deb’s slimy husband had taken them and disappeared. It was probably for the best, considering Logan’s temper, lifestyle and upbringing.

      Still, Logan had never imagined that doing the right thing would tear him apart.

      “I’M SORRY, ma’am. There’s no answer.”

      Thea thanked the operator and hung up the pay phone at the gas station on the outskirts of Boise. Things didn’t look good. Hannah was insisting that her uncle lived in Silver Bend, Idaho. There was a listing for Logan McCall; however, the guy never answered his phone. Thea had been trying to call him every four hours since they started on their trip. Now they were less than two hours away from Silver Bend and the twins’ uncle was nowhere to be found. Just like their father.

      Which meant they’d come all this way for nothing.

      “Thea! Thea, come quick!” It was Hannah, standing over by the gas station’s rusty garbage bin. She looked okay. Her white T-shirt was a little dirty, but…

      Tess. Where was Tess? Thea’s heart stopped until she caught a glimpse of Tess’s head bobbing up in the Volkswagen. Nevertheless, Thea ran over to Hannah.

      “What is it? What’s wrong?”

      Hannah pointed at something between the garbage bin and the brick wall. “There.”

      “Are you okay?” Thea struggled to catch her breath, more from the scare that something had happened to Tess or Hannah than the run.

      Hannah bobbed her head. “There’s something back there. I think it’s a puppy. I think it’s stuck.” She’d stepped back and pointed behind the bin.

      “Let me look.” Thea put her head near the wall and looked into the narrow gap. All she could see was a pile of greasy rags stuck between the brick wall and the bin’s corner wheel.

      “Hannah, there’s nothing—”

      Something whimpered beneath the rags, interrupting whatever protests Thea had been about to voice. Still, it could be a rat or something equally nasty back there.

      “It’s a puppy, Thea,” Hannah repeated stubbornly. “I think it’s stuck.”

      Ooohh-ooohh-ooohh. It was a weak dog’s cry for help.

      There was no СКАЧАТЬ