The Mechanics of Mistletoe - Liz Isaacson Page 0,23

at her, glad when she softened a little bit. So much that a small smile curled the edges of her mouth.

He squeezed her hand and faced the house. “Roof, windows—what else?”

“Gutters,” she said. “I didn’t see any water damage or anything. But that’s just on the house. Come on.” She took him up the driveway and through the garage to the back yard. “They have an acre and a half, and it seems to be covered in debris.”

Bear surveyed the land, and sure enough, it felt like everything that had been outside in anyone’s yard had somehow blown into this one. “Okay,” he said, seeing his future right here in this yard, picking up everything imaginable. “So we need wheelbarrows or trailers, and we’ll pile all of this on the front sidewalk and street. Neighbors might come get it if it belongs to them.”

He reached up with his free hand and took off his cowboy hat. Using it to fan himself, he wasn’t sure what else to say. His phone rang, and it was the ringtone he’d assigned to Ranger, so his adrenaline leapt.

“That’s my cousin,” he said, releasing her hand and taking a step sideways. “I need to answer it.”

“Sure,” she said.

“Ranger,” he said after swiping on the call. “What’s up?”

“How are things with Sammy?” Ranger asked. “Because we’ve got a slight problem here.”

Ranger’s “slight problem” wouldn’t make Bear happy, he knew that. It also wouldn’t be slight. Ranger sometimes had a problem with his adjectives, and he always underestimated the severity of the problems the ranch faced.

He looked at Sammy. “I can probably wrap up here,” he said. “What’s the problem?”

“We’ve got a small fire issue.”

“Fire?” Bear’s panic reared, and he turned away from the yard he’d been looking at. “I’m on my way.”

Chapter Eight

Sammy hurried after Bear, determined to go with him. He continued to fire questions at his cousin, and she heard the growly, grizzly tone in his voice. It actually made her smile, and once he reached the cement, he moved fast.

She jogged to keep up with him, climbing into the passenger seat as he started the truck. He hung up and looked over at her, a touch of surprise in his expression. “I can drop you back at the shop.”

“I’m good to go help with your fire issue,” she said.

“Really?”

“I can’t do much here until we get materials,” she said. “If your cowboys are really going to come help me pick up the debris, I don’t need to start by myself.” She started gathering her hair into a ponytail. “What’s on fire?”

“Turns out Ranger is not the greatest at communicating,” Bear said darkly. “It’s not Shiloh Ridge on fire. But Wade Rhinehart has a small fire started at his place, and the last thing any of us needs is for that to spread.”

“Do we need to call it in?”

“Wade has,” Bear said, pulling away from the curb.

“What can you do to help?”

“I have fire retardant,” he said. “They drop it from planes usually, and Wade has a drone.”

Sammy’s eyebrows rose, as did her admiration of Bear. “Do you have a drone?”

“No, ma’m,” he said. “I don’t do anything like that at Shiloh Ridge. We do everything from horseback.”

“You don’t even use ATVs?”

“No, ma’am.”

“But you can fly a drone.”

“Sure,” he said. “Bishop can, at least. He’s on his way there. I’ll get our commercial hoses and follow them to the Rhinehart’s.”

“Commercial hoses?”

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m twenty-five minutes outside of town, right? If anything catches on fire, I need some way to fight it until the professionals show up. Most of us at the outlying ranches have commercial hoses. They attach to the fire hydrants on our ranches, and we can get things wet to prevent the spread of the fire or douse it, depending on where it is.”

“Fascinating,” she said, and that caused Bear to smile. He was utterly devastating when he smiled, and he likely didn’t even know it.

His phone chimed, and he glanced at it in the console between them. Sammy did too, and when he said, “Will you read it to me?” she picked it up.

“It’s from Jeremiah Walker,” she said, her eyes moving up the texting stream too. “He said he and Skyler and Micah are on their way.” She glanced at Bear. “I’m assuming to the Rhinehart’s, because the texts above that are about the fire.”

“Are they?” he asked. “I didn’t get those.” He looked at her and quickly back to the road, as they were literally driving through a