Mountain Fire (10 page)

She juggled the handles of the bags so she could open the door and let her father through before her. According to Karl, he never worried about anything, but his wife worried about a lot.

“I know you’ve been helping him out, like you help me by not charging proper rent for the house. I guess you’re lucky Sean and Matthew didn’t want to keep going to school. It’s too soon to tell with Zachary.” She added in a teasing tone, “We might have put you in the poor house.”

Karl gave her a quiet look. “You know we’re happy to help in any way we can.”

She placed the parcels on the floor with relief. “Oh, Dad.” She gave him a hug. “I know you are. And don’t worry,” she said lightly, “we’ll do our best to keep you in the style to which you’ve become accustomed. You know, when you’re old and decrepit.”

Karl smiled at her nonsense.

Dominating every part of the house was the giant cedar trunk supporting the dome-like roof. To the left, a hallway curved around, with rooms along the outside, each with at least one porthole window. To the right, the space was open, with a sitting area leading into a dining area leading into the kitchen. The outer walls, dotted by the butt ends of logs, were mellowed by the tapestries June’s mother favoured over framed artwork. Squishy leather furniture surrounded a low table made from a giant burl, and tall leafy plants formed an unusual divider between the living room and eating/kitchen space.

A large mound of brown fur sprawled on a battered and beaten floor cushion. Its dust mop of a tail beat a soft tattoo.

“Is that all the welcome I get, Bauer?” She bent over and ruffled the long hair hanging over the sad brown eyes. “You won’t even get up to say hello?”

“He’s getting old.” Her father sank into his accustomed place on the couch and reached for a beer waiting for him.

June headed to the kitchen, where her mother was standing next to the stove, stirring a large pot. Almost as tall as her husband, Monica was as fair as he was dark, sharing her colouring with her only daughter, while their sons had taken after their father.

“Hello, there.” June sniffed the deliciousness rising from the pot. “You’re barely been home. How’d you have time to make soup?”

“I know you have a freezer.” Monica handed June the spoon to take over. “I’ve seen it. Full of TV dinners.”

“Are you saying I can’t cook?”

“Oh, I know you can cook,” Monica said sweetly, patting June’s cheek as she passed by on her way to set the table. “I also know you don’t do it very often.”

The three of them sat down to a dinner of homemade turkey soup and fresh multigrain bread from a local bakery.

As Monica handed over a steaming bowl, she took a closer look at June. “Is that a scrape on your chin?”

June reached up to touch the mark on her face. While her bruises were practically healed, the road rash was still faintly visible, although it no longer bothered her and she tended to forget about it.

By the time she’d filled her parents in on everything, beginning with Alex’s arrival at Longworth, glossing over getting knocked down by a rogue motorcyclist, and ending with the capture of the bear cub yesterday, they’d finished the meal and were sitting with coffee in the living room.

“Oh, yeah, one more thing,” she said, “I also have a part time job with RiverForce this summer.”

“Doing what?” asked Karl.

“Working in the office. It’s going to be boring, I think.”

“Will it keep you away from poachers?”

“Oh, Dad.” June shook her head. “You’re as bad as Richard. I got the feeling yesterday he offered me the job partly to keep me away from Alex.”

“I’m still not sure why he took you along on the second trip.”

“He knew I was interested. After all, it is connected to my studies. There’s nothing else to it.”

Monica raised an eyebrow. “Really?”

To June’s surprise a blush heated her cheeks. “How do you do that! Okay, okay. Alex and I have been seeing each other. We’ve had one date and last night we had dinner at my place.” Her good spirits faded slightly when she recalled how the evening ended, although she regarded their upcoming hike with cautious optimism.

Monica was curled up next to Karl, his arm around her shoulders, and June regarded them fondly. “You two have spoiled me, because whenever I’m with someone I compare them to what you have,” she said with a touch of longing.

“Are we going to have a chance to meet him?”

“I don’t know yet. We’re still getting to know each other.”

“We’re having a barbeque on Friday. Sean and Hillary will be here with Brian, and Zach, of course. A couple more won’t make that much difference.”

“We’ll see, Mom, we’ll see.” She tucked her feet up, wiggling into a comfy position on the soft-cushioned couch. “Now, tell me more about your trip.”

****

No streetlights illuminated the winding road, and the dark was deep and velvet. Her headlights cut a dim swath, barely brightening the ditches. June kept a wary watch for the glimmering green that might be the eyes of a bear, moose or deer, ready to brake if one of them wandered into her path.

While she loved her truck, it wasn’t the most comfortable of rides. Tonight it seemed especially rough, with a new vibration shivering through the frame. Maybe it was time to bring her baby in for some work.

As she followed a bend in the road, the shuddering increased dramatically. The steering wheel twisted violently. Making a grab for it, she clamped on and resisted the impulse to stomp on the brakes. An ear-rending screech pulsed through her bones.

The truck headed for the ditch. She fought to keep it on the road.

After anxious ages the truck’s momentum slowed. Hesitantly she tapped the brakes, easing onto the shoulder. She shoved it into park with a shaking hand. Her heart throbbed in her throat, making it difficult to breathe. She sat, waiting for calm, until she felt steady enough to step out and assess the situation.

The right front tire was a limp, shapeless piece of rubber, and the truck tilted drunkenly as it rested on the rim.

She’d never experienced a flat tire before and blamed herself for not noticing the symptoms. She kicked the dirt, then cursed when she connected with a buried rock. Limping to the back, she let down the tailgate, climbed in, and rummaged in the toolbox behind the cab for the jack.

She could have called her father. But she’d gotten herself into the mess, and she was going to get herself out.

It was maddening, frustrating work. The jack kept slipping in the scrabbly gravel, but she finally got it secure enough to support the front end. She had to hold her flashlight in her teeth to see what she was doing. The nuts were so tight she needed all her body weight to loosen them, and then she lost one in the long grass of the ditch and had to grovel around for it.

By now she was so aggravated she wouldn’t have accepted help if the Michelin Man himself had offered it. Not that anyone was around. She hadn’t seen another vehicle since she’d left her parents.

The rusted hub refused to budge. She vented her frustration by bashing the spare tire against it, trying to loosen it. Nothing. Throwing the spare down in disgust, she rested one arm on the passenger side mirror and leaned her forehead on it. After a couple of deep breaths, she bent over for another assault on the hub.

The crash of a gunshot fractured the night. She spun on her heel and stared wild-eyed into the blackness of the forest. The explosion echoed. Terror prickled on her skin.

Was she overreacting? She was in a rural area, after all. Gunshots were a common sound.

Then she saw the small round hole in the fender. It hadn’t been there a second ago.

She flung herself into the ditch.

The pickup’s windows thundered into fragments.

Chapter Nine

The brainstorming meeting had gone on longer than expected. Alex had barely kicked off his shoes and flopped onto the couch, ready to spend what remained of the evening in front of the TV, when his phone rang. He almost ignored it, until he saw it was June.

“I need you. Please come.” Her voice was breathless, shaky.

He snapped to a sitting position. “What’s wrong?”

“Someone shot at me. I need you.”

He flew out the door of his condo. “Are you hurt? Are you shot?”

“No.”

“Where are you?” She gave him directions between hiccoughing sobs. Diving into his Jeep, he took the phone away from his ear only long enough to set up the hands free system. “Have you called 911?”

“Yes. The police are here. I had to stay on the line. They wouldn’t let me call you.”

“It’s okay. I’ll be there. I’m on my way.”

He blew through a red light at a deserted intersection. His knuckles were white on the wheel, but his voice was calm. He kept June talking as he barreled through town, weaving through the sparse traffic. Once he hit the highway he punched the accelerator. She told him where to turn onto the secondary road. Minutes later he screeched to a stop near a medley of emergency vehicles.

“I’m here. Where are you?”

“The ambulance.”

He jumped out, striding toward the red and white vehicle. The back doors were open, and June sat, washed in strobing lights, clutching a tan blanket over her shoulders. A paramedic crouched before her with his hand on her knee. She saw Alex approaching and for a moment her face crumpled, then, throwing off the blanket, she raced into his arms. The feel of her, warm and whole, had relief rolling over him.

He cradled her face in his hands. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Just petrified.”

“What the hell happened?”

They sat on the bumper of the ambulance as June told her story. A pair of police officers searched the cab of her pickup, while the flickering flashes of brilliant LED’s indicated others deep in the woods.

“Do you want to go back to your parents?”

She nodded. Adrenalin had kept her on her feet until now, but she was clearly fading. Her head drooped on her slender neck, muscles slack under the palm he had curled around her nape.

Alex stopped one of the RCMP members to tell him where he was taking June. Then he helped her to the Jeep and followed the simple instructions to her parent’s home.

She introduced him, but Karl and Monica were so intent on their daughter they barely glanced at him. He stayed long enough to see her settled, then excused himself. As he closed the door, his last sight was of June, eyes shut, head on her father’s shoulder, her mother rubbing her back.

****

The sun was shining with unseasonable heat as Alex and June stepped out of his Jeep in the otherwise empty parking lot at the head of the trail to Fort George Canyon.

Their hiking trip had been delayed by a day, but June refused to let him cancel it all together. She was also refusing to make other concessions. Her parents had wanted her to stay with them, yet she had returned to her own home the next morning. She’d even gone into the RiverForce office for a couple of hours. He didn’t know whether to be pissed or proud at her stubbornness.

During the drive out, she updated him on the investigation. The police believed the shooter had fired from a small, disused gravel pit overlooking the stretch of road where she had pulled to a stop. A person belly-down on the bank would have had a good view. An examination of the tire revealed a tear, but the tread was so old and worn it was possible it had simply ripped open under stress. Coupled with the motorcycle assault, however, the investigators were decidedly skeptical when June insisted she had no idea who might be making her a target.

“Anyway, enough of that.” She pulled her small day pack from the rear seat, and he slung his own over his shoulder. “We’re here to enjoy ourselves.” She threaded her long ponytail through the back of a bright yellow ball cap. A large bumblebee decorated the crown.

Alex eyed it warily. “Nice hat.”

“My nephew gave it to me,” she said, slightly defensive. “His name is Brian, and I call him Bee. He’s three.”

“Ah. That explains it.” He snapped the brim down over those sparkling eyes, and set off on the five kilometre hike to the canyon.

Alex let June set the pace, following behind her on the well-trod path. A comfortable silence descended. The sun dappled through the fresh new poplar and birch leaves, and squirrels chittered constantly. They crossed tiny rivulets and ducked under shadowy spruce. Alex inhaled the scent of rising sap and the dampness of spring thaw lingering in the shadows.

He swung over a winter deadfall blocking the path. June was waiting for him, and he took her hand. They strolled along, linked together, until the trail narrowed and they had to go single file again.

It took about an hour to reach the plateau above the canyon. This section of the Fraser River was a traditional place for First Nations people to fish for salmon. European explorers soon learned the canyon was a treacherous place, with rushing currents, foaming whirlpools and rocky dangers lurking below the surface of the silty brown water. In the early 1900’s, when stern wheelers were still in regular use, passengers would have to disembark and portage around, while the boat itself was winched through the narrow rapids.

They paused at the top of the long drop down. A stout wooden staircase clung to the side of the cliff wall, leading to the worn pinnacles of volcanic rock jutting out of the river. The flow was relatively high, with spring runoff swelling its volume.

“It’s quite the sight, isn’t it.” Alex deliberately shifted closer, letting his shoulder skim hers, feeling the flushed dampness of her skin. “Wild. Amazing that anybody ever managed to get a boat through it...talk about determination.”

“It’s fantastic,” she agreed, surveying the chaos below. “I haven’t been here for ages. I’m glad we came.”