Flint stepped back first.
My fingers tightened around the mustard bottle.
He carried his tray toward his station, and I watched the flex of his back under that dark shirt for one full second before I remembered I had a camera, a crew, a tied competition, and a final round to win.
Joelle appeared beside me with a roll of foil. “Leftover bison dogs go in the blue cooler. Winner or not, we still have food-safety rules.”
“I just won.”
“Yes, and congratulations. Please put everything in the blue cooler.”
I took the foil from her and started covering the remaining bison dogs. My hands were steady enough for foil.
Across the clearing, Flint glanced back, quick enough that no one else would have caught it.
I smiled at him before I could stop myself.
His hand tightened around the handle of his cast-iron pan.
The final round waited for tomorrow.
So did every rule Caprice hadn’t announced yet.
Tonight, though, the meadow was cooling, the cameras were packing up, and I was still thinking about the brief brush of Flint’s knuckles against my wrist.
I’d wanted to beat him.
I still did.
For one hot second, the scoreboard wasn’t where I was looking.
Chapter Four
FLINT
I buried the last ember with a shovel while the production van rattled down the access road.
Ed had packed his camera. Joelle had counted the bins twice. Caprice had climbed into the van with her headset still on. “Round Two momentum,” she’d said into it, which sounded like producer code for everyone had earned a migraine.
That left me with cooling coals, a red-orange sunset over Fire Mountain, and Sunny watching me from beside her camper like she’d decided patience was a condiment and she’d run out.
Her white apron was streaked with mustard near the hem. The red bandana in her coppery curls had slipped crooked sometime after the kids cleaned their plates and before Ed gave the dish the kind of grudging cameraman respect he usually reserved for a battery that died on schedule. Her glossy low wedges had dirt on the sides, which meant she’d adapted to the terrain just enough to annoy me.
She’d won clean.
I tamped sand over the last dark seam in the fire ring, set the shovel aside, and peeled off my gloves. The wind had gone soft,the kind that moved grass without laying smoke flat. We were done for the day, and nobody had set anything on fire except my concentration.
Sunny lifted the mustard bottle an inch. “Are you doing a dramatic silence, or is this a smokejumper mourning ritual?”
“Former smokejumper.”
“Former smokejumper dramatic silence, then.”
I crossed the clearing toward her. The closer I got, the harder it was to ignore the yellow streak on her apron, the stubborn lift of her chin, and the way she seemed ready to enjoy making me admit defeat.
“You won that round,” I said.
Her eyebrows climbed. “Say it again. I want to hear if the mountain echoes.”
