Chasing Fire

spread it with soft, buttery cheese. Offered it. “I’m not especially rich, I don’t think.”
    She studied him as flavors danced on her tongue. Caught in a pretty breeze, his hair danced around his face in an appealing tangle of brown and sun-struck gold.
    “I want to know. But I don’t want bad memories to screw your picnic.”
    “That’s about it for the bad. I’m not sure I’d remember them, or more than vaguely, if it wasn’t for my aunt and uncle. My mother’s sister,” he explained. “My parents named them as my legal guardians in their wills. They came and got me, took me up north, raised me.”
    He took out plates, flatware as he spoke, while she gave him room for the story.
    “They talked about my parents all the time, showed me pictures. They were tight, the four of them, and my aunt and uncle wanted me to keep the good memories. I have them.”
    “You were lucky. After something horrible, you were lucky.”
    His gaze met hers. “Really lucky. They didn’t just take me in. I was theirs, and I always felt that.”
    “The difference between being an obligation, even a well-tended one, and belonging.”
    “I never had to learn how wide that difference is. My cousins—one’s a year older, one’s a year younger—never made me feel like an outsider.”
    That played a part in the balance of him, she decided, in the ease and confidence.
    “They sound like great people.”
    “They are. When I graduated from college, I had a trust fund, pretty big chunk. The money from my parents’ estate, the insurance, all that. They’d never used a penny, but invested it for me.”
    “And you bought an arcade.”
    He lifted his champagne. “I like arcades. The best ones are about families. Anyway, my younger cousin mostly runs it, and Jared—the older one—he’s a lawyer, and takes care of that sort of thing. My aunt supervises and helps plan events, and for the last couple years my uncle’s handled the PR.”
    “For families by family. It’s a good thing.”
    “It works for us.”
    “How do they feel about your summers?”
    “They’re okay with it. I guess they worry, but they don’t weigh me down with that. You grew up with a smoke jumper.” They added chicken and salad to plates. “How’d you handle it?”
    “By thinking he was invincible. Talk about superheroes. Mmm,” she added when she bit through crisp skin to tender meat. “God bless Marg. I really considered him immortal,” Rowan added. “I never worried about him. I was never afraid for him, or myself. He was . . . Iron Man.”
    Gull poured two more glasses. “I’ll definitely drink to Iron Man Tripp. He’s why we’re both here.”
    “Weird, but true.” She ate, relaxed in the moment and felt easier with him, she realized, than she’d expected to be. “I don’t know how much of the story you’ve heard. About my parents.”
    “Some.”
    “A lot of some’s glossed over. My father—you’ve probably seen pictures—he was, still is, pretty wow.”
    “He passed the wow down to you.”
    “In a Valkyrie kind of way.”
    “You’re not the sort who decides to die in the battle.”
    “You know your Norse mythology.”
    “I have many pockets of strange, inexplicable knowledge.”
    “So I’ve noticed. In any case, a man who looks like Iron Man, does what he does . . . women flock.”
    “I have the same problem. It’s a burden.”
    She snorted, ate some potato salad. “But he wasn’t one for coming off a fire, or out of the season, and looking for the handy bang.”
    She arched a brow as Gull merely grinned. “It’s not his way. Like me, he’s lived here all his life. If he’d had that kind of rep, it would’ve stuck. He met my mother when she came to Missoula, picked up work as a waitress. She was looking for adventure. She was beautiful, a little on the wild side. Anyway, they hooked up, and oops, she got knocked up. They got married. They met in early July, and by the middle of September they’re married. Stupid, from a rational point of view, but I have to be grateful seeing as I’m sitting here telling the tale.”
    He’d known he’d been wanted, all of his life. How much did it change the angles when you, as she did, considered yourself an oops?
    “We’ll both be grateful.”
    “I think it must’ve been exciting for her.” Rowan popped a fat blackberry into her mouth as she spoke. “Here’s this gorgeous man who wore a flight suit like some movie star, one of the elite, one at the top