Page 96 of Second Start: Family
He went. Fast and never looking back.
Vicky sucked in a sob along with a smoky breath.
“I love you too, Ned Otter.”
*
With her arms around Vicky — but feeling the other woman straightening herself out of the embrace — Kenzie looked over her shoulder to the opening door.
“Bodie. What are you doing here? How—?” She glanced toward Cully, then back to her brother.
“Cully heard about the fire on the way back to Bardville. Turned around to see how we can help. Cambria drove so we … so we’d get here faster.”
Vicky turned to the newcomers.
“Good.” She cleared her throat. “We need all the help we can get.”
“You have to help out family,” Lizzie said. She and Molly had followed her in. “That’s what Grandma said, especially helping out Daddy. And that’s what we’ve been doing. Plus, Miss Kenzie said it’s important for families to help each other.”
Bodie shot Kenzie a look, then back to the girls. “Did she?”
“Yes,” Lizzie assured him. “But she said something Grandma didn’t say. She said you need to talk to the person, so you know which part of the load they need help with.”
Bodie stiffened.
Cambria made a slight sound.
He looked around at his wife, and the stiffness evaporated.
“I’ll remember that,” he said to Lizzie.
Kenzie sucked in a breath.
“Thank you.” She wasn’t sure what all she was thanking them for — a lot — but what came first right now was for being here. “The man in the orange shirt is organizing volunteers.”
Bodie looked at her for a long moment before he jerked his head around and headed for the man. Cully laid a hand on her shoulder as he passed, then caught up with her brother.
*
They worked side by side.
Dan knew that.
At some level, he also knew others arrived. And the wind died down.
But it all seemed distant. The only clear reality was the fire in front of him and his father beside him.
They all had dug a defensive line in the uphill slope of the next ridgeline — the last one before the house.
They watched it now. It was holding. Helped by shovelfuls of smothering dirt, but holding.
His father was there, beside him, as he had been since…
“Go inside. Get some rest,” his father said.
Dan’s muscles cried at the thought of resting. His throat swallowed hard in the hope of breathing air that filtered out the soot and heat.
He drove the shovel deeper into the ground, pulling up dirt to toss on the embers. “I’m okay. I can keep working. I—”
