Burn Season novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: The Vote

Kasey didn't argue.

She nodded, squeezed my arm once, and went to help Moss load the litter into the helicopter.

Walker looked back at me from the open door.

He didn't say anything, because I had told him not to.

The helicopter lifted over the meadow, and the downdraft pushed my braid across my face.

I stood there until it was a speck over the south ridge.

"Well," Verna said behind me. "That was a lot of people on my porch."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't be. I haven't had that much to look at in years." She sipped her coffee. "You want my advice, MacLaren?"

"No."

"Good. I wasn't going to give it."

Two days later Bea and Moss came up the trail at noon.

They had a case of beer, a sack of onions, and a whole frozen elk roast.

Moss carried the roast.

"I'm told I'm the mule," he said, and put it on Verna's porch rail.

"You're too tall to be a mule," Verna said.

"Yes, ma'am."

"Come in. Don't touch anything."

By three o'clock the cabin smelled of onions, and Verna had put Moss on the stove with a wooden spoon.

Bea stretched out on my cot with her boots on.

I sat on the floor with my back against the wall.

"Okay," Bea said. "Tell me the real report."

"There's nothing to report."

"Rory."

"He came to the cairn the first night. He left my boots. I wrapped his ankle."

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