She turned her back on the valley, and observed the burned area around her. There was so much to keep an eye on, too much. Budgeting and financial cutbacks kept them perpetually understaffed, resulting in too many hours on-site and too few hours off for recuperation, not to mention too few people working at any one time.
When she found herself actually weaving, practically asleep where she stood, she backed up to a tree, slowly sliding down until she sat on the ground, her head resting against the trunk.
She lowered her hand from her face and then couldn’t keep her eyes open in the bright glare. So she closed them, just for a moment.
And never saw the new, dark-black plume of smoke rising from a hot spot, only five yards away…
1
LILY LAY FLAT on her back, her physical therapist pushing her leg up over her head as though she were a pretzel, telling her to “work it, Lily, stop whining and work it,” while pain seared a fiery line from her ass to the very tip of her hair.
Lily would like to work him, all right-right into a bloody pulp.
Instead she gritted her teeth and told herself that this was the price she paid for stupidity.
No self-pity, she decided as she began to sweat like a stuck pig, her tank top sticking to her skin, her leg quivering wildly as she stretched her abused, injured muscles…Damn, she hurt.
Maybe retiring wasn’t so bad. It wasn’t as if it was the first time. From high school, she’d gone into expedition guiding, which she’d retired from to become a paramedic. And when she’d burned out scooping stab victims off the streets of Los Angeles, she’d retired again to become a wildland firefighter.
And she’d loved it. Thrived on it, actually, moving from fire to fire, exploring Montana, the Dakotas, Idaho, Wyoming…a perfect fit for her restless spirit.
Until she’d screwed up and nearly gotten herself killed.