Summer of Fire - Linda Jacobs [112]
Clare sank into a chair and put her face in her hands. Steve sat beside her and said, “Devon is old enough to take care of herself.”
“How can you say that?” Clare turned on him. “She didn’t show any judgment when she ran away.”
“Point taken, but Butler’s probably right. If she’s running, she’s already gone.”
For the rest of the morning, Clare and Steve tracked back and forth across the complex. From the post office and Snow Lodge on the southeast to the Hamilton Store and Conoco station on the northwest, they scanned the common areas, both indoors and out. Just past noon, they took a seat on one of the vacant benches surrounding Old Faithful.
“Now what?” Clare asked.
“We hope she’s in West Yellowstone or Mammoth with other evacuees,” Steve said. “If so, she’ll ask around and find Fire Command or Headquarters.”
Clare hoped it would be that simple.
She looked over at Steve watching the opening of Old Faithful’s show. Strands of his hair blew over his forehead and the collar of the yellow shirt he’d put on. She thought about smoothing them. The memory of being in his arms last night came back as they watched the geyser.
The deep familiar growl of a fire truck sounded behind them. In the parking lot beyond the Visitor Center a group of structural firefighters mustered.
Steve rose, “I’m going to the snack bar and see if they’re still open. Get us something to eat.”
Clare nodded, watching the firefighters. She recognized Javier Fuentes, standing out above the crowd in the same moment that he saw her. He came to her with his long-legged gait, dark eyes bright. She reached up to hug him.
She’d seen him off and on during the firefighting effort, but today his embrace reminded her that he’d done the same after Frank had died. Javier had picked her up from the gutter and taken her from the scene, given her strong coffee, and refused to let her succumb to feeling guilty.
Her arms tightened convulsively.
“Hey, hey? What’s this?” he asked.
A sob burst from her, startling them both.
“What in hell’s happened?” Javier drew back to look at her.
“We lost a soldier the other day. A guy I was training.”
“That’s tough.” Javier checked her face again. “Ah, God, Clare, you can’t do this.”
“Who says I can’t?” she exploded.
“I say,” he insisted. “You refused to come back to the station. You wanted to rush off up here so I decided to come, too. But you can’t run away from the fact that it’s a dangerous goddamn business.”
“I’m thinking of getting out of it,” she said grimly.
Javier’s eyes went wide. “You can’t. For every student of yours who dies, there are the rest you taught something to save their life . . . and the lives of others. I’d back you up on the hose any day.”
Behind him, one of the firefighters pointed to the southwest, where a towering column of smoke looked like a nuclear weapon had exploded over the horizon.
Javier pointed toward the inferno. “We need every hand we can get.” He lifted hers and looked at them. “There are a hell of a lot of folks alive today because these are some of the best hands in the business.”
The roiling firestorm was the kind of enemy that called for somebody, anybody, to rise up and fight. Clare shook her head. “I can’t.”
“The hell you can’t!” Steve said from behind her. She thought he’d gone to the snack bar.
She turned. His eyes looked like flint chips.
Javier dropped her hands and stood back.
Her eyes held Steve’s for a long moment while his softened.
His look of encouragement spoke volumes, but he simply said, “Frank and Billy would want you to.” Putting a quick grip-and-release on her shoulder, he walked away.
Javier waited.
Clare stared at the pavement, sprinkled with little marble-sized chunks of obsidian. As she had done so many times, she ached for a sign from Frank. Was it possible that he was irrevocably gone? Could all those people who believed in ghosts and portents from beyond be wrong? She closed her