Expectant Father

“Probably not. She’s California Overhead.” Meaning the California division of Incident Command. “Socrates picked her up as an end-of-the season replacement. I’ve heard she’s one of the best FBANS around, though.”

Spider wasn’t impressed. He’d heard too many times before about “the best” and found them sorely lacking in the field. He looked at Becca again. Where had he seen her? And why was the memory bugging him?

“This fire’s going to be a tough one. I’ll need your help keeping the team’s spirits up, including tonight,” Golden clarified, with a glance back at the Fire Behavior Analyst. “Don’t get distracted.”

“She’s hardly my type,” Spider said too quickly, unable to resist looking back, too. Pregnant and bossy. Not his style at all.

With long fingers, Becca twisted and tucked stray golden strands of hair behind her ears, and blinked heavily at Victoria as if she were fighting off fatigue.

“Oh, man,” Spider said under his breath as the images flooded his brain. He’d met her in Vegas—a tall, blond goddess who’d seduced him while he was at a firefighting convention the day after New Year’s. He’d been nursing one in a string of too many beers, trying unsuccessfully to forget what his father had just told him—about a half brother and a half sister he hadn’t known existed, two children Randy Rodas had fathered while married to Spider’s mom.

Becca Thomas had worn this amazing, flimsy white dress that had clung to her curves and exposed most of her creamy skin and long legs. She’d walked over to him, sizing him up, taking his measure and finding him wanting…her.

Spider wasn’t normally picky about a woman’s intellect, as long as her features caught his attention. But his nameless goddess was no slouch in the brains department and had a face that was proud with high cheekbones and bright blue eyes. The sex had been great. The conversation had been great.

And come morning, she’d disappeared without so much as a “thanks, it’s been fun.” Not that he was complaining. Earth-shattering sex and no complications was primo. He just wasn’t used to being the one who woke up alone.

No wonder he hadn’t recognized Becca at first. Her body was plumped up from the pregnancy, from her ankles to her cheeks. But the hair was the same, her gestures were the same and her sharp wit was the same. Only she looked about ready to give birth, too far along to be carrying something he’d left behind. She had to have been pregnant before they’d met. An older woman like her didn’t just get pregnant unless they were married.

Spider squinted at Becca, angry now. She hadn’t mentioned she was married in Vegas. Spider didn’t screw around with married women. That was just wrong. Unlike his father, he considered marriage as something sacred, to be honored. If Spider even spotted a glimmer of a ring on a woman’s finger, it was a no-go.

Becca Thomas had used him for her own purposes, whatever those might be, and had made him into a filthy, stinkin’ cheater.

“SIRUS REVIEWED HOW THIS FIRE made a large, hot run this afternoon,” Becca spoke into the portable microphone outside the Incident Command tent as she began her part in the evening-shift briefing.

Blanketed in thick smoke, the sun was receding behind the towering Flathead mountain ridges. It would still bathe them in soft light for another hour, but already the air was cooling. Once the teams were briefed, the crews on the evening shift were heading up to the drop point. Often the winds lessened or died down at night, so some of the best suppression efforts on the ground were possible when the sun went down. Those crews on R & R tended to come over to listen to the brief, to hear the latest on the fire, which was why the group was larger than the number of men and women going out to fight the fire this evening.

Aiden stood at the back of the crowd, probably waiting to talk with her. She tried not to let his stare intimidate her. He was probably still irritated at her snappy comeback in Victoria’s defense.

Becca’s head pounded beneath her stitches. It didn’t matter that Fire Camp Aiden was cold and cocky, vastly different from the Aiden that had charmed her in Las Vegas. As long as Aiden didn’t remember her, he could glower as much as he liked.

“I’m here to tell you that we can expect to see the fire make even more runs.” Becca hated delivering bad news, especially when this fire seemed so low in priority to NIFC that the resources they needed to contain the fire weren’t readily available.

“The winds are predicted to continue to come from the north, hot and dry, which means we’ll have to be vigilant on the south slopes where the fuels are drier still. As you’ve probably heard, these winds kick up without much warning as the temperature rises in the afternoon. I know I don’t need to tell you to set a lookout, but—” she paused to pat her belly “—you’ll forgive me if I sound a little maternal toward you all. Please be careful.”

As she’d hoped, that elicited chuckles from the group.

“Now, as for the conditions you’re likely to encounter out there tonight…” Becca proceeded to go over the possible scenarios the crews were going to be working in that night, as well as trigger points—the geographical limit where a fire became unsafe for the manpower assigned and a retreat was ordered.

She could remember when she’d first started as a Fire Behavior Analyst. She’d been too earnest, all monotone urgency. The fire crews hadn’t paid much attention to her at all. It had scared her to death. If she couldn’t get through to them, their risk of injury increased. Now, after fifteen years of fire prediction, Becca knew how to keep their attention.

When the briefing ended, Becca asked Sirus to walk with her back through the sea of tents to the Fire Behavior tent, hoping to talk to him more about an idea she had to contain the fire—an idea the IC team hadn’t been receptive to—as well as a more personal issue.

Energetic crews were loading into trucks and heading up the mountain. Becca had to give it to the firefighters. They couldn’t wait to get out there and risk their lives. They thrived on the kind of danger she tried to help them avoid.

And, even though she knew so few of them personally, she knew them in spirit. Firefighters with mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters, spouses and lovers at home in their air-conditioned houses, hoping for their safe return. Becca hoped she was doing her part to see they made it home unscathed.

“Have you worked a lot in Montana?” she asked Sirus.

“Some,” he admitted. “But not in the fall. NIFC usually has me shifting to special projects by then. Desk work.” This last was said with the distaste of a man who loved the outdoors. “Why do you ask?”

“I was just wondering what you knew about the weather here this time of year. Some of the locals have been saying the wind shifts when the temperature cools off. With the steepness of these ridges, we could be putting a lot of people at risk if we aren’t careful. Perhaps we should pull back. You know, build a line in a place where we know we can stop it.” This was her first experience working for Sirus. She’d served on special committees with him in the past and had learned the value of Sirus’s opinion. He knew how to work the politics and the crews without losing the respect and liking of either side of the fire line, and he cut right to the chase—no hidden agendas.

He slanted a dark glance her way. “Do you have solid information about the weather that Carl or I don’t have?”

Ignoring the implied warning, Becca pressed on. She desperately wanted Sirus to see the logic of her thinking. “Historical weather patterns can be tremendously helpful—”

“I know you want to change tactics on this fire, Becca, but you’re one voice of several that I have to listen to as I decide what we’ll do. Don’t push me,” he snapped. After a moment, Sirus sighed and when he spoke again, his words were calmer. “Sorry. Lack of sleep tends to give me a short fuse. Look, if they send us more support for the fire, or if you can get Carl on your side, I’m more likely to reconsider that idea of yours. It’s just too soon to change tactics.”

Their current strategy was to fight the fire close to the flame. Becca believed pulling back and preparing for it was a safer strategy, and gave them a better chance to contain the fire with the resources they had to fight it.

It was going to take a good bit of convincing to get Carl to believe in her theory. Perhaps her hopes were better placed on NIFC. “Do you think NIFC will change their minds about this fire?”

“And give us more support?” Sirus shook his head. “Most additional resources are going to that huge fire in Washington. Fires are burning all across the western states, most are closer to the urban interface, threatening homes and small towns. There’s nothing here but a national forest in one of the least populous states in the union. What do you think our chances are of getting more support?”

“Pretty slim.” Becca’s belly seemed weighted down by the news. “It’s depressing. Even though it’s only been a few days, it’s at the end of the season on a tough fire. You can feel the hopelessness in everyone, from the firefighters to the support staff here in camp.”

Sirus frowned. Glancing around, Becca was relieved to find they were alone, despite the fact that crews strode with purpose past them in both directions. It was probably the best opportunity she’d get to speak to Sirus about more personal matters. He was on the hiring committee for the Boise job, which was one of the reasons she’d accepted the Flathead fire assignment.

“Speaking of chances,” Becca began, “what do you think my chances are for that Fire Behavior management position in Boise?” She barely made it out of the way of a rowdy crew carrying shovels and Pulaskis, striding toward the parking lot and their transport to the DP.

At the door to the Fire Behavior tent, Becca looked up at Sirus, who still hadn’t answered her question. His expression wasn’t encouraging. Her hopes suddenly sank to her toes.

“They’re not going to give it to me, are they?” Becca managed to say.

“I’m sorry,” Sirus said, looking steadily into her eyes. She admired his directness, even as she dreaded his take on the situation. “You have everything they’re looking for—education, experience, and years with NIFC. And you’ve earned a lot of respect for your creative, if sometimes conservative, fire strategies.”

Ignoring the label that she was too conservative—who could be too conservative when lives were at stake?— Becca waited for the but.

She glanced down at her belly. It had to be because she was pregnant. Some good old boy who had a friend on the interviewing committee and who let the simulation program do his work for him was going to get the job. It really was a man’s world.

Still, she had to ask, “Why?”

He didn’t hesitate. “It’s your management skills.”

“My…my what?” Becca couldn’t believe her ears. “How could they say that? Every one of my direct reports has gone on to do well.”

The expression on Sirus’s face was solemn. “Many of your direct reports have gone on to do well in other fields.”

Becca’s equilibrium shifted, although her instability had nothing to do with the baby. What did you say in a situation like this? Defend yourself? Or crawl in some hole and lick your wounds?

“They weren’t suited to the work.” Becca lifted her chin, hugging her clipboard so tightly that the baby tried to elbow it aside. She loosened her grip while she tried to make Sirus see things from her perspective. “Most of these people—let’s face it, they send kids out here most of the time—don’t know what they want to be when they grow up.” Julia came to mind, bright, but with a mindset closed to less high-tech methods of information gathering.

Becca glanced around, but her assistant was nowhere in sight. “Too many see it as a step up in pay grade rather than a calling. They seem surprised when they realize the day doesn’t begin at eight and end at five, or that they can’t just bring a printout to a meeting and read from it.”

Sirus regarded her silently for a moment before looking away. “You know how things are around here. We have to deal with body count and open slots. If NIFC gets someone in the position, they’d rather not have them looking to move or quit after their first season.”

“You’re saying that I scare these people out of the job?” She refused to believe that. She tried so hard to help her direct reports improve on their weaknesses, to weed out the ones she felt weren’t suited to the work, and this was the thanks she got?