The Complete Firebirds

Chapter 4

4

Curt didn’t know what to say to that. There was pain there. And love. He could hear it and it humbled him. He loved his sister, he supposed. Yeah, sure he did. Because brothers loved their sisters, even if they made you batshit crazy half the time just by being alive and drawing breath. But he’d never found anything that would sound like that simple “thank you” did in Stacy Richardson’s soft voice.

In silence, he’d helped her roll the helo off the trailer.

They had three of the five rotor blades rigged before the silence built to the point where he couldn’t stand it any more. He started babbling about his business plans. He, Jasper, and Jana had worked them out together.

“There’s that big outfit up in northern Oregon, Mount Hood Aviation. They fly all these big aircraft, Firehawks and even an Erickson Aircrane. I can loft all six of these 520s for the cost of one of their Firehawks. I could launch ten for the price of their Aircrane. I figure that with the pickup trucks for transport, we can be almost anywhere in the West within a day. And the 520s let us tackle fires in a way that matters to the insurance companies even more than the Forest Service.”

“Saving structures.”

“Bingo.” He liked that Stacy saw it right away. “With a line of six of these little babies, we can get up close and personal with spot fires before they can kill off a structure. We’re set up at a discount with the Forest Service so that we get early call to fires and an insurance bonus for every structure we save. Hence the cameras,” he pointed underneath. Everything would be videoed and then submitted to insurers as proof for each time they saved a million-dollar home, or a hundred-dollar shed. As far as he knew, it was a first-ever business set up this way and he could only hope that it worked, because he and his sister had gambled everything on it.

They were hocked up to their eyeballs. He hated to do so, but he prayed for a busy fire season. Because if it was a slow one, the Oregon Firebirds weren’t likely to see another.

Stacy nodded as if it all made sense to her. More than the financial scheme. As if she could see the dreams and sweat of the last three years putting together the right deals, the right gear, and the right people.

Now why was her approval so important to him? It was like a sigh of relief went through him that it would all somehow work even if smart money said otherwise.

They swung the last blade into place as the fuel truck finished topping up the tank.

She took a moment to glance around the field.

He followed her gaze. Everyone looked ready.

Then she turned to him and smiled. It lit her up. She was already beautiful, but damn that smile was electric.

“So, shall we see who gets to keep their pants on?”

Suddenly Curt wasn’t so sure that he wanted to compete against her in a flight.

Ten hours later, sitting down around the firepit with the other fliers, he knew he’d never risk underestimating her again. After a day of working on shakedowns and team coordination, there was no longer any question about who was the hotshot pilot of the outfit. There wasn’t a single guy here who shouldn’t be down to his skivvies.