Thank God.
Silver got to his feet and reached toward the sky, holding up four fingers.
Four survivors.
The pilot gave them a thumbs up.
Eric must have drifted off again because the next thing he knew, Silver was pouring water over his lips.
“Drink. Just a little.”
It felt so good, like life itself. “More.”
“Sorry. No more than a sip. We’ll get you hydrated.” A paramedic Eric didn’t know, a woman with auburn hair, finished putting an IV in his arm. “I’m opening your fluids wide. It should help with the thirst.”
Eric had said that very thing to people before, people with burns and blood loss. “What took you … so long?”
“They had to call us out of Denver. We had to assemble the crew, run a safety check, get airborne, and then fly here.”
A stab to the thigh.
More morphine.
Even with a full load of narcotics, getting him onto the litter was no picnic.
He gritted his teeth. “The others. They’re hurt, too.”
“We’re on top of it.”
“My wife. Call her. Tell her … I’m not dead.”
The paramedic put an oxygen canula beneath his nose. “We’ve radioed in already. She’ll get the word.”
Eric floated as they carried him to the helicopter and slid him into the bird, its rotors still running. The paramedic climbed in behind him, Silver, Ramirez, and Wright buckling into seats beside him, each carrying their own IV bag.
“I hope we don’t run into any drones this time,” Ramirez said.
The doors closed, and the bird lifted off, swinging in a wide arc around the forest and heading eastward.
Eric tilted his head back, caught sight of a wall of flame surging toward the new backburn, and beyond that, Scarlet Springs.
His home. The town he loved.
“It was my job to keep everyone safe. It was my job.”
Then his eyes drifted shut, and he was aware of nothing.
Heart thudding,Vicki looked to Megs to make sure she’d heard right. “Foursurvivors?”
Libby repeated her words. “Did they say four?”
“They surely did.”
“Oh, thank God!” Vicki turned to Libby, hugged her. “They’re alive.”
As far as Vicki was concerned, it was a miracle.
“Hawke knows what he’s doing, man,” Creed said. “He’s not going to take risks.”