Page 177 of The Ampersand Effect

The smoke invaded the cabin, acrid and burning in her lungs. Heat pressed through the fuselage as if the fire had already found them. Sweat dripped from Tobin’s brow, blurring her vision, but the clearing lay ahead—and all she could think of was Grier. She had to be there.

They reached the clearing just as the largest blaze breached the northeast tree line. Tobin scanned the open space, Eddie snapping on the searchlight. Dropping altitude for a better view only drove them into punishing heat; climbing for relief pitched them into turbulence that jolted the chopper and stole back the height.

“Do you see her?” Eddie shouted, wiping sweat from her eyes.

“Not yet!” Tobin’s voice was tight, her heart pounding. Her palms slicked on the controls as heat and anxiety rose in tandem.

Where is Grier? She has to be here!

“Pull up, Tobin!” Eddie shouted over the roar of the fire. “We’re fanning the flames and thickening the smoke. We’ll never spot her like this!”

“I can’t, Eddie. She’s close—I can feel her!” Tobin’s voice broke. She could feel her proximity to Grier, even if she hadn’t laid eyes on her. She felt it in her bones, her soul—in the very DNA that threaded between them and marked their hearts for each other.

The helicopter slammed into another air pocket, plummeting fifty yards toward the earth.

“Pull up, Tobin!” Eddie yelled again.

Reluctantly, Tobin eased them higher. The wall of flames was closing in, devouring the tree line. Sparks and debris spit from the crownfire, carried toward the prairie grass. It was only a matter of time before it caught—and the rotor drafts would only fan the flames, fueling the fire like Eddie had warned.

Tobin spun the chopper around its center as Eddie worked the searchlight. “Go back! What was that?”

Eddie swung the beam backward over the area they had just passed. There, prone in the grass, singed and sooted, lay a body. Tobin and Eddie leaned forward in the box office, straining for a better view. A collective exhale escaped them as Tobin yelled, “It’s her! I’m taking us down.”

“There,” Eddie said, pointing to the widest portion of the clearing still unscathed by flame. Tobin guided the bird toward it, her throat tight as she swallowed the scream tearing at her chest. They dropped another hundred feet in an uncontrolled fall due the thin, scorching updrafts so close to the ground. The danger of their descent became terrifyingly evident when adesiccated tree on the clearing’s perimeter toppled, landing with a crash. The grass around it licked violently into life.

“You have two minutes, Blur. You grab her and then you run. Two minutes.”

Tobin turned to face Eddie. What she saw stilled her heart. Eddie—usually brazen and resolute—was crying. Fear and concern radiated from her eyes. The shock of her friend’s vulnerability made Tobin’s hands tremble. She reached one across the controls, touching her best friend’s shoulder in a gesture she hoped felt comforting— and not like a farewell. She squeezed once, then leapt toward the ground, sprinting toward Grier.

Tobin’s feet were on fire. Not literally—yet—but the earth beneath her was molten in solidarity with the flames around them. She ducked low, coughing as smoke stung her eyes. She couldn’t see; the smoke was thick and choking. She screamed Grier’s name, wishing with the last dregs of hope at her disposal that Grier was conscious, that she could hear, that she would answer.

She tripped. Coughing, sputtering and crying on the ground, she forced herself up. She forced herself to shout again, inhaling hot, putrid smoke as she bellowed Grier’s name into the inferno. The fire was deafening, consuming the world around her and suffocating her words as they left her mouth.

Hope spurred her on—but reality slammed down with every breath. Her head spun, her lungs burned, and panic clawed at her chest. How could she do this? How could she find Grier and get them both back to the chopper? She wasn’t a hero—just a lovesick reject with a broken body and a shattered soul.

“Help…”

It was faint. “Grier!”

Where was she? She was so close. And she was alive!

Tobin dropped to the ground, frantically sweeping through the grass, following instinct alone.

“Tobin…” Fainter now, to her left. She shifted, patting the ground and moving toward the disembodied voice.

“To…” Grier’s voice faltered and died on Tobin’s name.

But it was enough. Tobin lunged forward with a final effort and connected with something hot and leathery—a woman’s ballet flat. And it was attached to a foot—Grier’s foot. Heart hammering, Tobin sprang toward Grier’s head and pulled her limp form into her arms, hugging her to her chest.

She rocked them, sobbing into Grier’s hair, frantically whispering her name on repeat—uncertain if she was trying to rouse her or convince herself that she’d actually found her. But Grier was truly in her arms. Tobin squeezed her slack form into her chest and howled an incomprehensible garble of emotion full of gratitude and fear and love into the abyss.

But they were still inside a wall of fire. They had to move. Ignoring the searing pain in her low back, Tobin hoisted Grier’s unconscious body over her shoulder. She pivoted on the balls of her feet and ran…

Only there was no helicopter. A giant wall of black plumage encircled them, obliterating her sense of direction. She had lost track of where she’d come from—and now she had no idea where to go.

Tobin spun in place, trying to triangulate herself against the flames, the choking smoke, and the heavy, pliant body of Grier on her shoulders. Where was the helicopter? Where was she? The inferno was encroaching, leaving no room for error—she had one chance to choose the correct direction, or… well, she didn’t want to think aboutor.

Tobin took a step forward and stumbled, eliciting a pained groan from Grier atop her shoulders. She coughed and faltered,nearly dropping her as she sank to one knee. Her back screamed, hot with pain and the proximity of the flames.