White Heat Read online

  “Right.”

  She lifted a shoulder. “Hey, it works. So…” She sized him up from toe to forehead, somehow making him want to stand up taller. “You didn’t need a bag to toss your cookies after all.”

  “I’m stronger than I look,” he responded, mocking her own words to him.

  She smiled, apparently unapologetic for her bluntness, which was oddly both refreshing and a little startling. “You still look a little green, but strong enough,” she decided. “You’ll need that strength, with the job ahead of you.”

  As if his stomach wasn’t wobbly enough, it did another somersault. It’d been so long. A year.

  A lifetime.

  And it would have been longer if Brody hadn’t interfered.

  The thought of his brother, probably at this very moment lounging on the beach, grinning at bikini babes and chuckling over what he’d done, made Griffin grit his teeth. “Let’s just get this over with. Take me to the fire.”

  “Oh, no. My job was to get you here.” Turning to an old weathered guy in beat-up coveralls and a cap low over his eyes, she nodded when he pointed to the gas tanker. “Gracias,” she said, and handed him a brown bag that no doubt held the required booze.

  Julio, apparently.

  “Good luck, Ace,” she said to Griffin over her shoulder as she headed back to her plane.

  “Wait.” He stared at her, stunned. “You’re leaving?” He didn’t like her, mostly because she’d provided the means to get him here, but she was also his only tie down here.

  “Don’t worry. Tom Farrell will be here any minute to pick you up.”

  She’d told him not to worry a few times now. He hated those words. “Tom?”

  “The postmaster.” She cocked her head. “In fact, I hear him coming now.”

  “What? Where?”

  “Shh.” She listened some more. “Yep, that’s his Jeep. For your sake, I hope he got the brakes fixed.”

  Two seconds later, a Jeep roared right onto the “tarmac,” and skidded to a stop a few feet from the plane. There were no windows, no fenders, no top, and what might have once been a cherry red paint job had long ago faded and rusted down to the metal.

  “Hey, Tom.” Griffin’s pixie pilot smiled, transforming her face. “You washed this heap, I see.”

  “Nah.” Tom hopped out. Fiftyish, he had a tough, rangy body, long blond-gray hair pulled back in a leather strap, and deep brown eyes. “I drove through the rio yesterday. Just long enough to spruce it up some.” He stuffed his hands in his front jean pockets. His tanned Caucasian face crinkled into a welcoming smile.

  “Tom came from North Dakota,” Lyndie explained to Griffin. “In case you’re wondering why he’s as white as I am. He showed up here in the seventies to fish, fell in love with a local, and never left.”

  “True, true,” Tom said, thrusting his hand out to Griffin. “And you’re the help we need so desperately.”

  “Yes, and you’re…the postmaster.”

  Tom gave Lyndie a long, wry look. “You never get tired of messing with the guys’ heads, do you? I bet you took the long way in, too.”

  “Who, me?”

  Tom shook his head, still pumping Griffin’s hand. “I’m mostly the sheriff now, but also I deliver the mail. When we get it. Don’t worry, son. You’re not dreaming, you’re really here.”

  Not so much of a comfort, actually.

  “How bad is it really?” Lyndie asked Tom, who sighed.

  “Bad.”

  “Well, keep me posted.” His pilot, the little she-devil, gave them both a wave and started backing away. “Later.” She tossed a look Griffin’s way. “You go play hero, now. I’ll be back for you at the end of your shift. Sunday night.”

  That wasn’t a comfort either.

  “Yeah…uh, Lyndie?” Tom took off his hat and scratched his head. “Nina’s sort of in a mood again.”

  Lyndie stared at him, than laughed a little and shook her head. “Nope. I’m not translating for you all weekend. I haven’t had a day off all damn year. Sam gave me this weekend, and I’ve got a date with a long nap and a pleasure joyride wherever I feel like winging to.”

  “So who’s going to translate for your hotshot here?”

  “He’s not my hotshot, he’s yours.”

  “Now, Lyndie—”

  “No.” She pointed at him. “Don’t you ‘now Lyndie’ me. Sam pays Nina to do it, and you know it.”

  “Who’s Nina?”

  Both Tom and Lyndie looked at Griffin as if they’d forgotten he existed.

  “My daughter,” Tom finally answered. “She’s uh, rather headstrong.”

  “Code for stubborn and selfish.” Lyndie let out a sound of annoyance. “She’s a native with flawless English who translates for our volunteers in return for cash. When she’s in the mood, that is.”

  “Yes, she’s a hothead, that one.” Tom lifted his hands in the helpless gesture of someone who’d created a monster and now didn’t know what to do with her. “Stay, Lyndie. Please? You yourself said you had time off, and how better to spend it if not in a place you know and love, a place now in danger if the wind doesn’t cooperate and our men don’t get that fire under control?”

  “Yes, but—”

  “But you hate to be social, I know. I know—”

  “I don’t hate to be social,” Lyndie said through her teeth, which Griffin thought was interesting.

  She didn’t want to help any more than he did. After the plane had landed, she’d put her hand on him to soothe. The urge to return the favor shocked him.

  “Then you won’t mind helping us out,” Tom said smoothly.

  Lyndie put her hands on her hips and glared at Tom, who pretended not to notice.

  “Into the Jeep, now,” he said to no one in particular, putting a hand on Lyndie’s back and trying to push her toward the vehicle.

  “I can’t stay,” she insisted, notably less forcefully this time. “I have…”

  “Yes?” Tom smiled sweetly, his warm eyes guileless. “You have something more important?”

  Lyndie stared at him, then suddenly her shoulders sagged. “No. Damn it. Of course not.”

  “There you are,” Tom opened the beat-up door and patted her arm. “You know it’s okay to admit you have a home here,” he said gently.

  “I do not.”

  “You feel at home here,” Tom said.

  “My home is the sky—which I should be up in right now, thank you very much.”

  “Whatever you say, Lyn.”

  She let out a low, unintelligible reply that sounded like a growl.

  Griffin had never known a woman who could snarl so convincingly, as if she might launch herself at the source of her aggravation. He wondered if he touched her now if she’d snap at him. He put a hand on her shoulder.

  Whipping around to face him, she stared at him.

  Unbelievably, he nearly smiled.

  “It’s all settled then.” Tom nodded approvingly. “I’ll make sure your plane is properly tied down and cared for, and that Rosa knows you’ll be staying for the weekend. Get in now, darlin’.”

  And to Griffin’s amazement, the strong-headed, temperamental, free-spirited Lyndie merely sighed and climbed up into the waiting Jeep.

  In the front seat, naturally.

  Leaving the back to him.

  3

  Why had he touched her back there? Lyndie couldn’t figure it out so she stopped trying and looked around. They made their way toward the fire on a narrow, rutted road that wound around the hills in a meandering fashion. If they could get there as a crow flew, they’d have arrived in two minutes flat, but the roads here in the Barranca del Cobre were few and far between. Just outside the airport, they crossed a set of railroad tracks that nearly rattled the teeth out of Lyndie’s head.

  “That’s where the train comes through,” Tom explained to Griffin. “Which is the only way to travel this area. It’s not really safe any other way. Too many deep, dark canyons where one can fall