The other medic was already in the driver’s seat, ready to pull away. Alex slammed the doors shut and hesitated only for a few seconds as the ambulance made a U-turn and headed back toward the freeway. A few SWAT cars were in the area, and as Alex ran back to his Dodge, one of the officers shouted at him. “Where are you going?”
“There’s still a man up there — one of the suspects. Somebody has to get him.”
“Not you, Brady. You won’t have backup,” Joe said.
“I don’t care.” He was already back in his truck, refusing whatever Joe might be saying next. He wouldn’t disobey orders, but he had to hear them in order to follow them. And right now he wasn’t listening.
Alex felt a sense of purpose as he pushed the truck up the hill, bouncing and skidding around corners and narrow stretches of road. He’d vowed that no one would die at the hands of a fire set by the REA, and already one suspect was dead. But not another one, not when he and the entire headquarters knew this was coming. It wasn’t like 9/11, when the country was blindsided by the terrorist attacks. This time they had known, and maybe they hadn’t done enough to stop it. Either way, no one else was going to die — not tonight. He would see to it.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Holly braced herself against the back of the ambulance so she could keep one hand on Bo for the ride to the veterinarian hospital. But as she patted the sleeping dog’s side and his head, she was completely absorbed in the task of trying to process what had happened over the last hour. She’d done what she could do … she had no doubt about that. She’d made the call to 9-1-1 as soon as she had even the slightest clue that something bad was happening.
She leaned her head back and closed her eyes. The estates were gone. Completely gone. Dave Jacobs had insurance, and if he could afford the deductible maybe he’d build again, or maybe not. Either way, her job was no longer a certainty. She had called Ron after she called the police, but by the time he arrived on the scene no one was allowed up. Ron had called her just once to see how bad the situation was. “The houses, are they … how many are burning?”
“They’re gone, Ron. The whole neighborhood’s on fire.”
In the course of their conversation, she wished she were talking to Dave and not Ron. Someone who might be concerned with her safety. Because Ron definitely seemed more concerned with the buildings than with her, and she knew for sure that she and Ron were finished.
The ambulance bounced and jerked as the driver made his way to the freeway. Holly pictured herself waiting in the dark real estate office for someone to come help her. Early on after the first fires were started, she thought about sneaking out, maybe driving down the dirt road to the guard station and checking in with the officers who were there. But she didn’t know if she could make it to her car without attracting attention from the men setting the fires.
Then someone from the sheriff’s dispatch called her and ordered her to leave. “You’re in grave danger up there,” the woman told her.
“What about the arsonists?” Holly had been sitting low at her desk in total darkness, watching fires start at each end of the street.
The dispatcher explained that a SWAT officer was headed up, that he’d make the arrests, and that whether the suspects saw her or not she needed to leave. Holly agreed, but as she hung up, she watched in horror as the fire jumped from the corner house to the brush across the street, closing off the road and trapping her. Trapping all of them. Her next call to 9-1-1 was more urgent, filled with panic.
“What am I supposed to do? Everything’s burning up here.”
“Stay calm. Is the house you’re in on fire?”
“No.” Her heart slammed around inside her. “But the wind … it’s blowing the fire in every direction.”
“Stay put as long as you can. Call if anything changes. We’ll have someone come get you as soon as we can.”
The next fifteen minutes were the longest in her life. Holly opened her eyes and studied the dog again. The ambulance was getting off the freeway, heading down an off-ramp.
“It won’t be long,” the medic’s eyes looked deeply concerned.
“He’s not doing well, is he?” Her voice was thick with tears, and she could barely talk.
“No.” He frowned and patted the soft fur around Bo’s ears. “He’s hurt pretty bad.”
Holly sighed and let her forehead rest in her hand. In her wildest dreams, she hadn’t imagined the person who would rescue her would be Alex Brady. But seeing him only confirmed what she had wondered about before. She hadn’t stopped loving him, not even a little. She would always remember the way he looked on the doorstep of the model home, his eyes wide and worried, features drawn and tense. And then the change in his expression, the half a second when the walls came down and she could see clearly what she’d always believed.
That the Alex she loved was still inside him somewhere. The young man he’d once been had risen to the surface instantly in the shock of seeing her at the door. Just as quickly, the walls were up again, but that was understandable. They had been in the middle of an emergency, a disaster that could’ve wound up very differently. She patted Bo’s side, a couple of long, soft pats. Poor dog. The disaster was still playing out around them. And what about Alex? Holly’s heart fluttered about inside her, its rhythm nowhere near normal. Alex was crazy to go back up the hill. The winds could shift at any moment, and the fire would tear down the other side of the development, right across the fire road.
The ambulance turned onto a busy street and sped onto a straightaway.
“The staff knows we’re coming.” The medic was focused on Bo. “They’ll be ready for him.”
“Thanks.” She sniffed twice. Tears slipped onto her cheeks, and she pressed her finger beneath her nose. What was Alex thinking? He should’ve stayed with his dog and let another deputy get the suspect. The guy couldn’t go anywhere trapped in the fire, so why chase after him? She felt a series of sobs building inside her. The answer was as obvious as it was painful. He had to go for the same reason he’d pushed her out of his life. Because he was driven to save lives — even the life of a bad guy. Every life but his own.
Another wave of tears filled her eyes. Watching him tonight, she realized for the first time that he was right. She couldn’t have been in a relationship with someone that driven, that focused on solving crime and saving lives. The terrorist attacks had changed him, and this was the result: Alex’s crazy determination to keep other people from going through what he went through, so that no one else would have to be the victim of the attacks of another.
A victim like Alex still was.
He found the suspect trying to get away, stumbling down the hill at the top of the fire road, a wet rag pressed to his mouth. The sight of him assured Alex he’d done the right thing by coming back up. The guy could be killed trying to escape the fire on foot, and if he did make it out, he’d probably be back at his acts of ecoterrorism by next week.
Alex flipped his bright lights on the guy and drew his gun. The suspect froze and raised his hands over his head. Alex ran out, grabbed him, read him his rights, and shoved him into the bed of his Dodge. He didn’t have handcuffs, but he wasn’t worried about the guy fleeing. Not with his life on the line. Wasting no time, Alex slid back into the driver’s seat and hurried up the hill to turn around.
At the same time, he realized what was happening with the firestorm. The wind had shifted, and a towering wave of fire was coming their direction. Alex whipped the truck around as soon as it was physically possible. From the back, the bald guy must’ve seen the fire coming toward them because he shouted, “Faster!”
Alex tried not to look, tried to stay focused on the road ahead of him because he had to make it down the hill, had to turn the last suspect over to SWAT, and get to the vet hospital. Had to make it back to Bo, back to tell Holly he was grateful for the way she had been there for Bo.
Still he couldn’t help but see what was happening.
The fire was spilling down
the back side of the canyon at a wicked speed, consuming the brush like a voracious monster and creating an inferno that was now just twenty yards ahead of Alex’s truck, pressing its way downhill and edging in on the fire road ahead. He would have to hurry if he was going to make it. Once the fire crossed the road, it would be a sea of flames impossible to drive through.
He gave the truck a little more gas, but as he did, his rear left wheel nearly slid off the narrow road. Alex had to let up on the pedal until he could steer the truck back onto the gravel, and those few seconds were all it took. Ahead, the fire roared across the road and back up the hill on the other side. Before Alex could think of a plan or put his truck in reverse, the flames crossed the road a dozen yards behind him.
“We’re surrounded!” The suspect shrieked.
Alex was breathing hard, looking first over his right shoulder, then his left. There had to be an escape. He could drive off the fire road if he had to — at least they’d have some sort of chance that way. But the inferno raged on all fronts, every side, and Alex wondered for an instant if this was what hell felt like, trapped by a mountain of fire with no escape. They were going to die, so maybe he was about to find out, and it occurred to him that Clay was right about the Bible verse. There was a way that seemed right to him, and he’d done that very thing. But in the end it really was going to lead to death.
He hit the brakes and tried to imagine running through the flames or maybe crawling under them. But there wasn’t a single space surrounding him that wasn’t on fire. He gripped the steering wheel, his heart pounding, his breathing fast and panicky as he reached for the radio. “Brady, here. I’m trapped on the fire road. Flames all around us. I need some help here, guys. Send a helicopter, and hurry.”
The flames were closing in, so that they were stuck in a circle maybe thirty yards in diameter and getting smaller with every second, every gust of wind. This was really the end. He could still do one thing, so Alex opened the door and shouted at the suspect. “Get inside the truck. Hurry!”
The tall thin suspect vaulted out of the bed and slid into the backseat, brushing tiny fiery embers from his hair. Gone was the cocky attitude, the larger-than-life bad guy who had shot a bullet through Alex’s dog. The suspect was a quivering mass of terror. “Listen … you gotta get us out of here!”
“We’re stuck.” Alex didn’t look back at him, didn’t bother to raise his voice. He shut his door and stared at the flames.
In the backseat the suspect was going ballistic now, shouting for him to do something, to drive through the flames, or let him out of the truck. Screaming how they needed to say their prayers, and how he was going to run down the mountainside if Alex didn’t do something.
“Go … you won’t get far.” Alex leaned his forehead on the steering wheel and tuned him out. They were both going to die, and that meant he’d never know about Bo, never see Holly Brooks again. Never have the chance to thank her and tell her what he knew for sure now.
That his love for her had never died, no matter how he’d tried to suffocate it.
He opened his eyes and felt a burst of the fight that was so familiar to him. Maybe he could drive through the flames and make it out on the other side. He’d done that once tonight already, so why not at least try? But the fire ahead wasn’t a thin wall this time; it was an ocean of flames, an inferno. They’d get a few feet in, his truck would explode, and that would be that.
He never should have come back up the hill after the suspect. If the guy had been killed in the fire, it would’ve been his own fault. Alex wasn’t responsible, and eventually the guy would’ve been caught — by fire or by the SWAT team when he came down — just like Joe had said. Joe had warned him not to come up here again. So Alex would die because of his own stubbornness, his determination to do things his way. That’s what would kill him in the end — just like the Bible verse had said. Alex looked over his shoulder again and saw what he already knew. The flames were closer now, the circle shrinking.
But to sit here and wait for certain death went against everything Alex knew. Suddenly, he remembered what the suspect had said a few seconds ago. How they needed to say their prayers … Whether the guy meant it or not didn’t matter. If Alex was going to die in the next few minutes, he had no choice but to talk to God — the God he’d walked away from seven years ago.
Whether it was the fire closing in on him or some divine act of the Holy Spirit, Alex wasn’t sure, but in that moment he could finally see with clarity that his father hadn’t died because of God’s callousness. He died because it was his time, and in a heartbeat he went from the horror of 9/11 to the hallways of heaven. His father never would’ve blamed God, and now Alex couldn’t blame Him either. Not for one more minute.
He opened the truck door, adrenaline flooding his veins, making it almost impossible to breathe or think or feel anything but overwhelming panic. The wind and burning embers gusted overhead, igniting bushes in the shrinking circle that surrounded his truck. The bad guy was still in the back screaming at him, begging him to do something, but there was nothing he could do.
It hit him then that this must be similar to how his father had felt in the moments before his death, trapped by a wall of flames with no way out, knowing that the fire had been set by terrorists. The difference was that his father had gone out with God at his side. Alex had no doubt about that.
So why couldn’t he cry out to God even here, minutes before his death? His father had wanted Alex to be a man of faith more than anything else, but all these years he’d refused to think about that. Alex clenched his fists and tried to focus above the roar of the inferno around him. He could almost hear his dad calling to him, telling him to reach out to God — before it was too late.
Alex crouched down beneath the swirling fog of smoke and for a few seconds — like the suspect — he thought about running. But there was nowhere to go. Then, without giving the act another thought, he dropped to his knees. The small gravel and rocks dug into his knees through his jeans, but he didn’t care.
“God!” The cry was desperate as it rose above the sound of the firestorm. “I’m sorry!” He shouted the words, but the fire and wind were so loud even he could barely hear them. He had blamed God and in the process he’d lost the life his father had wanted for him. He’d shut out everyone who loved him, and he’d tried to be God, the sort of Almighty he thought God should be. But he could see it all now, the fact that Clay was right. With Christ’s strength, the only evil that could ever be conquered was the evil within him.
He lifted his hands and face to the fiery sky. “Help me, God! I’m not ready to die! Please … forgive me.”
A release exploded in his heart and soul, and like a scene from long ago he recognized the feelings, because they were the ones that had defined him before 9/11. Feelings of love and hope and longing, a desire for the kind of life his parents had shared. A favorite Bible verse from long ago came rushing back — For I can do everything through Christ, who gives me strength. He’d shared it with Holly one day when the world was his and summer lasted all year long. And suddenly in the midst of the gravest danger he’d ever faced, it was all there again, flooding over him. Thank You, God … I feel You here with me.
He could do this, because with every breath Christ was giving him a strength he hadn’t known these past seven years. Alex remembered something his father had told him. That there was a party in heaven whenever one sinner turned back to God. Alex smiled despite the terror around him. Let my dad be part of the celebration, God … I see it so clearly. Thank You …
He could almost hear the band.
But even as he prayed, the fire moved in closer, sucking the air from the small pocket and making it hard to breathe. Alex wasn’t afraid, wasn’t panicked anymore. He didn’t want to die, but there was no way out. The end could be any moment now, the next gust of wind and the raging inferno would close in on top of them. Alex stayed on his knees and thought again of Bo and Holly and his mom. At least he’d had the
chance to tell his mother he was sorry. The heat of the flames was suffocating now, and Alex had a final thought — something good would come from him dying this way.
In a matter of minutes, he would see his dad again.
TWENTY-EIGHT
Jamie was listening to radio updates of the fire as Eric drove her to the hospital. It was still dark outside, and the smoke was thick across the freeway, the orange glow eerie in the western sky, especially since the sun was still hours from rising. Jamie replayed the events of the last half hour. She’d been awake, sitting up in bed when Joe made the initial update. He told her what had happened and how violent the guys from the REA had been. And he told her about Clay.
“You need to get to the hospital, Jamie. As soon as you can.”
Jamie’s first call was to Eric and Laura, and they had come immediately. Laura was at her house now with the still-sleeping CJ and Sierra, and Eric drove her to the hospital. After Joe’s call, Jamie had heard from the doctor. Clay was in critical condition, and she should hurry. But with all the terrible news, Jamie clung to one single hope, something else the doctor had told her.
They expected Clay to pull through.
That alone kept her sane as they sped along the Ventura Freeway to the Los Robles Medical Center; it was the only reason she could listen to the radio for updates. The fire was raging out of control, ripping through the hillsides at incredible speeds and spreading in all directions. The most recent news stated that an entire neighborhood at the base of the mountain had been evacuated. In addition, firefighters were evacuating other neighborhoods — well in advance of the blaze reaching them.
The news reporter kept stating what anyone listening already knew. That the fire was set by members of the REA, and that one of them had been shot and killed by a K9 deputy. The reports didn’t say the name of the officer, but Jamie already knew it was Alex. What other K9 officer would’ve been at the scene of the fire, working to apprehend the suspects?