Later that night, Nicole woke from a restless sleep because a light was flashing outside her window. At first she thought it was lightning, because the rain was still pouring down in relentless sheets. But it came from below, not above. Someone was loading gear into a four-wheeler, running in and out of the old fire station outpost.
She pulled on jeans, added a sweater over her pajama top and a hooded rain slicker, then ran downstairs. No one else was awake, the lounge dark except for the flicker of the last ashes of last night’s fire in the hearth. She ran outside, her face instantly feeling the sting of raindrops.
Kai was in the midst of heaving a duffel bag onto the back of the four-wheeler. He wore a yellow firefighters’ rain jacket with white reflective stripes. For a wild moment, s
