“That I’m giving you a crap promotion because it’s easier work for a woman of your advancing years.”
Jazz had to smile. She liked Will. Most days. “It’s as if you’re psychic.”
“Not psychic, but I know you.” He scrubbed a hand over the stubble on his head, which he shaved to hide the beginnings of male-pattern baldness. He was forty-one years old and a smokejumper veteran. He’d been her boss for four years. “I recommended you because you’re young and could use more management experience before you try and go after McCall. The competition will be fierce. This position in Grand is the perfect opportunity for you to show what you can do. I might know you’re more than just one of the prettiest faces on my team, but now you get to prove it to the higher-ups.”
She let that sink in. Will wasn’t trying to edge her out in favor of one of the boys. He was doing her a favor. Some of the disappointment curdling her stomach disappeared. “What do you mean,oneof the prettiest?”
“Please, Tinkerbell. You’re cute, sure. But Wayne and Jay can both give you a run for your money.”
Her smile loosened into a laugh. They could, indeed. Wayne looked like a Viking. He’d done some modeling in college and the other team members like to remind him of it. Jay was into bodybuilding. His face wasn’t quite as handsome as Wayne’s, and he was a lot stockier, but his picture had appeared in a number of sports magazines. In certain circles, he was quite famous.
Jazz, on the other hand…
The guys called her Tinkerbell, not because she was tiny—in fact, she was five ten—but because of her blond, pixie-cut hair, blue eyes, and baby face. She still got IDed in bars.
“Look at this another way,” Will went on. “You’ll be in charge. You won’t have to put up with the new guys hitting on you, anymore.”
“They don’t hit on me.” Not for long, anyway. A few new recruits sometimes tried to impress her at first, but lost interest when they found out she could keep up—and that she was ten years older than they thought.
She paid more attention as Will filled her in. The base in Grand, Montana, was brand new. So new in fact, it was a surprise the Forest Service had gotten it operational so quickly.
“Word has it a local guy with a crap ton of money to write off as a tax deduction footed the bill,” he said when she asked how the miraculous feat was accomplished. “What do you say, Jazz? Do you want the position?”
She could only imagine the mess she’d be walking into. A whole crew would have to be hired, including a materials handler to look after the firefighting gear. But it would be a step toward her real goal, which was McCall.
“I do want it. Thank you for the recommendation. It means a lot.”
She grabbed dinner with the rest of the team before settling into her bunk with the most entertaining of the three books she had on the go. A few pages in, just when the story was getting good, her phone, set to silent, vibrated. The screen lit up.
She checked the number and sighed as she answered. “Hey, Mom. What’s up?”
“Hi, Jasmine.” Only her mother ever called her by her full name. Her voice, soft and anxious, filled Jazz with dread. “Have you heard from Todd lately?”
Jazz closed her eyes. She was eight years older than her brother. When he was a little boy, she’d been more of a mother to him than a sister. She was tired of bailing him out of trouble. She was equally tired of their mother expecting her to. Old habits, however, died hard.
“What’s he done this time?”
“I didn’t ask,” her mother admitted. “He called from the police station and asked me to come post his bail. What do I do?”
You call your daughter and ask her for the money. Same as always.
Jazz longed to say it, but didn’t. Her mother was an aging former showgirl who couldn’t name her children’s fathers. That they were three different men, Jazz didn’t doubt. Her mother had been irresponsible for as long as she could remember.
“Do you know how much the bail is?” she asked.
There was a brief silence on the other end of the connection. She could almost see her mother doing the calculations in her head. “Two thousand.”
Which meant bail was really only a thousand, because her mother couldn’t resist skimming some off the top for herself. Still, the amount was large enough to suggest Todd had violated the restraining order his ex-girlfriend had taken out against him. He needed to grow up and move on.
She was tempted to tell her mother to approach a bail bonds company for the cash, but if Todd skipped out on his court date, which was a distinct possibility, Jazz would have to repay it. Either way, this phone call was going to cost her money she’d never see again. “I’ll send you an e-transfer.”
Her mother made a pretense of being grateful, but the call lasted only a few minutes after that. She never asked Jazz how she was doing, or even where she was.
Jazz tossed the now-silent phone aside. She’d once watched a few reruns of the TV seriesShameless, but quit because it reminded her too much of her childhood. The biggest differences were that she’d had two brothers to care for and she’d grown up in Las Vegas. She left home when she was eighteen and never looked back, so her sense of family wasn’t strong, either. She did, however, send grocery money.
And, occasionally, bail money for Todd. Thankfully her youngest brother, Leo, had managed to stay out of trouble so far. She called both of her brothers for birthdays and Christmas, trying to lessen the guilt she felt over abandoning them, but figured she’d inherited her mother and unknown father’s stellar parenting DNA, because the biggest emotion she’d felt when she left them behind was relief.
She tried to go back to her book, but thanks to the call from her mother, the story had lost much of its charm. Sleep was out, too. She could switch to a less riveting book on world economies, but if it did put her out, she’d have to reread it on principle. She’d barely finished high school, and she hated sounding ignorant when the team got together, so she read a lot to compensate.
She slid from her bunk, and with her boots in her hand, tiptoed from the room. A few lights were still on but most of the others were sleeping. She wore sweats to bed when staying on base, but she stopped at her locker for her jacket, leather pants, and helmet. Then, she made her way to the parking lot. It was quiet outside. Except for the occasional plane, traffic was light around the airport at night.
Her bike was an aging Harley-Davidson Sportster 883L. She’d bought it used a few years ago after a months-long search and she loved it beyond belief. The racing green fuel tank and low mileage were what finalized the deal.
She tucked her fringe of blond bangs under the lip of her helmet so her hair wouldn’t get in her eyes, then dropped the visor over her face. Within minutes she was on the I-90 with the wind tugging at the sleeves of her jacket.
A long bike ride was second only to those few brief heartbeats of freefall for putting her world back to rights.