“Bring all the shovels you can find,” he called back.
Tory and Olivia scrambled to locate them, climbed awkwardly on the ATV they sometimes used for ranch chores, Olivia driving, Tory clinging to her and juggling the unwieldy tools, and took off after Lance toward the Ridley property.
The fire loomed larger the closer they got.
“Those volunteers better hurry up,” Olivia called over her shoulder.
Tory wondered if it was already too late.
Chapter Thirteen
Someone had set fire to the Coopers’ crop, Liam realized. Had they done it themselves?
That didn’t make sense.
“What are you gawking at? Pick up the pace,” Jed hollered as Liam hung up from his call to the fire department. Liam gritted his teeth, wanting nothing more than to sprint back to the house, but he feared Jed’s hip would give out if they went any faster.
As they neared the front door, Liam’s mother pulled in with Enid and Leslie in the truck with her.
“There’s a fire on the Ridley property,” he called out. “You need to head back to town until it’s under control.”
“Did you call the fire department?” Mary shaded her eyes. From here all you could see was smoke high above the house. He hoped that was enough to convince her of the danger in the situation.
“Of course. Someone already phoned it in. The volunteers should be on their way, but it’s going to get big fast in this heat. I need to get going. Go to town, okay? Take Jed!”
“I’m not leaving—”
Noah and Stella spilled out of the house behind him. “There’s a fire,” Noah called.
“Saw it,” Liam told him. “Called it in.”
Enid took stock of the situation. “Jed, can you drive Leslie back to town?” she asked. “We’ll help fight the fire.” Jed preferred someone else to chauffer him around these days, but he could get to town and back in a pinch.
“But—” Liam said.
“I’ll help with the fire, too,” Jed said.
“You need to help Leslie,” Mary told him.
Liam could see Jed was going to argue. He needed to speed this up. “Where’s Virginia?” he asked Enid.
“In town with a friend. She’ll be coming home soon.”
“Jed, if you drive Leslie home, you can intercept Virginia before she gets to Thorn Hill, sees that fire and decides it’s up to her to put it out. You know she will!” He held his breath. Would his gambit work? Every moment they spent here talking, the fire was growing bigger.
Jed nodded. “I can do that. You’re right—she’ll drive straight into the fire if she sees it, the batty old hen.” He was already hurrying toward Mary’s truck. “Keys,” he barked.
Mary tossed them to him. “See you soon, Leslie,” she called.
Enid was already hurrying for the barn. “We need shovels,” she called back. “Come on.”
“We need more than that.” As soon as he saw Jed get in the truck, Liam lit out past his mother and Enid. Noah raced after him. It took far too long for them to wrestle the disk harrow into place and attach it to the tractor, but a few minutes later, Liam was driving the tractor toward the Ridley property. Cutting a fire break around the blaze was the only way he could see stopping it. The disk harrow was the fastest way to get it done.
Behind him, Noah yelled to the others to load into the back of his truck. Liam put the pedal to the floor; Noah would catch up to him in no time.
When he neared the property line that bounded the Flying W, he saw he wasn’t the only one who’d had the idea. Someone was in a tractor scraping the vegetation off the land on the other side of the creek. The fire had already jumped the paltry flow, and both banks were burning.
It looked like the pot crop was ablaze on the far side. Soon the ramshackle outbuildings near it would be, too. The house, on his side of the creek, was intact so far. That’s where he’d start, Liam decided.
He heard a shout behind him and looked back to see Noah’s truck hurtling his way. It pulled to a stop nearby. Noah killed the engine, and Enid, Mary, Stella and Maya spilled out of the back. “Do you think we can stop it?” he thought he heard his mother shout.
“I don’t know,” Noah called back, already racing toward the fire.
It didn’t look good, Liam thought. He floored the accelerator again and got to work.
The heat stopped them well before they reached the blaze itself.
“How the hell are we supposed to fight that?” Olivia cried.
Tory knew what she meant. No one had tended the Ridley property for a long time. The dried-out hedgerow around the pot crop was burning uncontrollably. All around it, overgrown grass and weeds offered fuel for the fire.
Ahead of them, Lance had driven the tractor over near the creek, lowered the disk harrow and was beginning to plow a long line between the Ridley property and Thorn Hill. Tory could see he meant to wrap around behind the fire to try to contain it to the area that was already burning. He must have judged it too late to save any of the outbuildings. As they watched, the tractor passed them and kept going to make a wide arc.
“Watch out!” Noah cried as flames shot high and the breeze caught a mass of sparks, wafting them over the line of plowed ground toward them.
“That’s our job—stamp out those sparks,” Tory called. She raced for one, lugging her shovel along, and used it to put out the flames that were just catching hold in the dry pasture. Olivia raced for another as the wind gusted again and more sparks flew their way.
Tory lunged for another spark, banged the shovel down on it to smother the tiny flames, then had to resort to digging beneath it and pouring dirt on top of it before she could put them out. This was going to be
