Page 52 of Some Like It Hot

“Yeah. He’s actually FBI. What happened with Pope?”

FBI. Huh. Riley turned back to Tucker. “This Pope guy was waiting for Darryl—who apparently was also one of the prisoners—please tell me you got him.”

“Oh yeah. That was Rio’s doing.”

Who looked a little edgy, wearing the soot from the fire, reddened eyes, and not a little fierceness in the way he ran up to Riley. “You—were you the one who killed Pope?”

Riley lifted a hand. “Step back there, bro. No—it was this other guy, Orion. Pope was going to kill us, thank you, and Orion just—well, anyway, he was there. It was an accident.”

Rio raised an eyebrow.

“Later, guys,” Tucker said. “We need to get out of here—the planes are coming in with slurry drop.”

As if on cue, the low drone of a bomber plane hummed in the distance, and Riley turned to make out a tanker headed along the horizon.

And just in time because the fire lipped the foothill, torching across the treetops, hurtling toward the ranch. Cinders streamed out like advance fighters, dropping into the meadow and lighting the grasses.

Tucker lifted his radio as they turned and jogged toward the house, directing the bombers to lay down the wet along the dozer line, into the green.

In the far distance, the heartbeat of the chopper thumped the air. Riley reached the porch of the lodge and from the safety of the overhang, turned, watching the slurry drop. Mud splashed down, a waterfall of red made up of water, ammonia sulfate, and clay.

“Hopefully it’ll slow the fire down,” Tucker said.

Rio stood beside him, watching. “I don’t want your job, ever.”

Tucker grinned at him.

“Riley!” Skye had come around the side of the house. Bedraggled and dirty, her eyes lit with a sort of relief when she grabbed him around the neck. “We were really worried about you.”

Really? “I was worried aboutyou.”

She let him go. “I’m okay. Rio was there, so…” She looked past him to the former, um, prisoner, like he might be her knight in shining armor.

Huh.

The dark-haired female marshal—Stevie?—came up behind her. “Riley, right?”

He nodded and met her hand. “You caught them? Darryl and that March guy?”

She blew out a breath. “Yeah. March is dead, but we still have one more fugitive. A Logan Thorne—or at least that’s his current alias. When we ran his prints, we found them connected to a soldier by that name killed in Afghanistan three years ago. His prints alerted to an Interpol watch list—the guy is wanted in connection to an international assassination.”

Riley raised an eyebrow, what he deemed was an appropriate reaction to the news. Kept his voice neutral.

She, however, eyed him. “You didn’t happen to come across him?”

“You mean aside from fighting a fire with him?”

She stared at him. Gave a nod.

“He was pretty quiet. Stayed to himself.”

“He’s dangerous, Riley. If you know anything—”

The chopper had landed on the far side of the house, and now a couple of the guys—Seth and Romeo—rounded the porch. Blackened faces, their yellow shirts nearly black, they appeared strung tight, bone weary.

“Riley,” Seth said and met his hand. “Sorry.”

The fire was blowing toward them, a massive line of flame that anyone smart would run from. Riley shook his head. “You’re alive. That’s what matters.”