I didn’t expect to have a single grandchild for a long time,Mom told me when she first met them.If you think I’m going to miss out on having four, you’ve got another thing coming.
I lift a hand to greet my sister, and Nathalie leans on the gate with a smile on her face as I approach. “Made it through another day intact?”
“Just about.” I laugh as I step out of the gate, making sure it’s locked behind me.
For a moment, something seems off, though I can’t put my finger on what it is—something in the air, a strange haziness that doesn’t seem right.
I brush it off, assuming it’s nothing more than my tiredness after a particularly long day at school, and hook my arm through Nathalie’s as we head in the direction of the grocery store to stock up for the week. It’s our little ritual, picking up everything we need together, and then she’ll help me bring it home and unpack as my parents keep the kids entertained.
A glow of warmth spreads in my chest—sometimes, I have to remind myself just how damn lucky I am to have my family so close to me like this, so willing to do everything they can to make sure I’m cared for and supported.
“How was your day?” I ask her, as we take the turn at the end of the road that leads up toward the high street. Devin Ridge is a small town, no room for anything more than a scattering of stores, but that’s the way I like it. When I went to college,I had access to way more than I did here, and I just found it overwhelming. I like things to be easy, and that doesn’t include spending ten minutes trying to choose the right flavor of juice from the two dozen on the superstore shelves.
“Ugh, long,” she replies with a groan. Nathalie works at the same café I used to when I was a teenager, and I guess she finds it just as challenging as I did. Like me, she’s putting aside some money to go to college, though she’s still a while away from actually pulling it off. I wish I could help her, but it’s not like I have a cent to spare, with the quads to think of.
“We had this delivery of new coffee beans, and Tanya wanted to test them out right then and there,” she explains. We reach the corner of the high street and follow the slightly cracked pavement up toward the store. “But the grinder had broken, so I had to do it by hand, and?—”
All of a sudden, a sound rips through the air, making us both jump out of our skin. It takes me a moment to realize where it’s coming from—it’s so loud, it pushes everything else out of my mind entirely, my heart pounding in my chest at the sudden shock of it.
“What the hell!” yells Nathalie, but she’s interrupted by another siren bursting out of a speaker attached to one of the streetlights above us. She clamps her hands over her ears and shoots me a panicked look, but I have no idea how to respond.
What the hell is going on?
“Prepare to evacuate,” a voice announces over the speakers. “A forest fire has been detected approaching Devin Ridge. All residents are advised to leave. Any residents on the East side of town are advised to go directly to the muster point…”
“The East side?” I mutter. That’s where my house is. My stomach twists—that’s where my parents and the quadruplets are! No wonder I felt something off in the air earlier; it was probably the first hint of smoke reaching the town. Forest fires aren’t unheard of around here, especially at the height of summer like this, but that doesn’t mean this is a common occurrence. For the town to be evacuated, things must be really, really freaking bad—and my kids are right in the line of fire. Literally.
Nathalie stands there for a moment, frozen. In fact, the entire town seems to be holding its breath, waiting for someone, anyone, to break the quiet that beats between us in that instant. A few people on the street just stand still, clearly too shocked to move. The sirens ring through the air, the smell of smoke becoming more pronounced with every passing second.
And then, the door to the grocery store flies open. Margaret, the owner, is running out with a bag over her shoulder, sprinting toward the muster point like her life depends on it.
Maybe it does. Maybe it does for each and every one of us…
It seems like I’m not the only one coming to that conclusion, as her sudden movement sends chaos exploding around me. People are rushing out of buildings, sprinting past us, knocking into one another as they hurry to close the distance between themselves and the evacuation point. My head spins, half-aware of people yelling to each other, yelling at me, telling me to get out of the damn way so they can get to the muster point and get out of here.
I grab Nathalie’s arm, tight enough that it seems to snap her out of her frozen state. Her eyes are wide as they find mine, like she knows exactly what’s on my mind.
“We have to get to the house,” I tell her. “The announcement—Mom and Dad might not have heard it from there, and if the fire’s approaching from the east…”
“They said that anyone staying there should just go straight to the muster point,” she reminds me.
“I’m not leaving them in the middle of this,” I reply, leaving no room for argument.
Turning, I glance around, looking for a break in the rush of people that I can exploit to get back home. And, before Nathalie can say another word, I take off in the direction of my house. The smoke is already starting to sting my eyes, but I can hardly pay attention to it, my mind caught on nothing more than how important it is for me to get my family out of there.
No matter what it takes.
2
CALLUM
“Is that everyone?”Dylan calls to me over the rush of noise and confusion that fills the town square. I look down at the papers in my hand, flipping through them quickly to see if every name has been ticked off.
“Nearly,” I reply. “Tell the transport to get these people out of here. Anyone else, we’re going to have to find them ourselves.”
Dylan grimaces, but ducks back behind the bus to tell the driver to get going. I can smell the smoke in the air, and in the distance, the flicker of flames against the late afternoon sky threatens to close in at any moment.
When I chose this profession, I never imagined that it would be my own hometown we were tending to. So high up in the mountains, Devin Ridge is usually safe from the worst of the fires. The winds blow them away from the highly populated areas if they even get close at all. But now? I know the town is in serious trouble. And without a decent firefighting force close at hand, it’s on us to do what needs to be done.
