Hotshots Read Free Page B

have burned.”
    â€œWhy has it been such a bad season?” Kyle Johnson asked.
    â€œA number of reasons: a dry winter, a buildup of fuels, a fire-fighting force that’s overworked and stretched thin.” He stopped himself; he’d been revealing too much, forgetting for a moment that he was on camera.
    Kyle didn’t give him a chance to gather his wits. “What is the cost to taxpayers?”
    â€œEnormous.”
    â€œIs the urban/wildland interface part of the problem?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI understand four young women were killed at Thunder Mountain.”
    â€œThat’s true.”
    â€œIs it normal for so many members of a crew to be women?”
    The official blinked and looked around like he was waking from a bad dream. “When we call for a firefighter we don’t care whether we get a man or a woman. What matters is that the individual can do the job. The women firefighters are professionals. They’ve been challenged and they’ve proven they can do the work.”
    The tape ended. I rewound it and went back to the kitchen, where I made myself a cup of Red Zinger with honey. The guy in the freezer was still dropping ice in his bucket and the boxes had not been unpacked. I took my tea to the living room (the room with the least mess), sat down on the sofa, opened the interagency report, and was still reading when the Kid showed up at three. The investigators listed the causes of the fire: a lightning strike, a high fuel buildup, a dry spring, severe winds. They listed the things that had gone wrong: fires were burning all over the West and resources were stretched thin, the change in weather conditions had not been communicated to the hotshots, the lookout had not seen the blowup in time to warn the firefighters, the hotshots had not dropped their packs or deployed their fire shelters when threatened. At the end of the report the investigators interviewed the firefighters, who came up with their own conclusions. The Duke City Hotshots had chosen to be interviewed as a team, so neither Ramona Franklin nor Mike Marshall were quoted directly. That account lost some immediacy in the group telling, but the individual accounts of the other firefighters were vivid and angry. Between the firefighters’ statements and the investigators’ conclusions lay a gulch wide enough for a lawsuit to fill.
    I heard the Kid let himself in through the kitchen doorway. “Puta madre,” he swore as he collided with a box. It didn’t take him long to track me down in the living room. “You’re reading, Chiquita?” he asked.
    â€œIt’s the Forest Service report on the Thunder Mountain Fire. The firefighters came to one conclusion, the investigators came to another.”
    Without even asking he knew whose side I’d be on. “Are you going to do it?”
    â€œI don’t know. The parents are divided. She wants to sue, he doesn’t. There are a couple of firefighters I need to talk to before I decide.” But he and I both knew that I wanted this case so bad I was already feeling the warmth of the flames and listening for the crackle of the truth. My house was a mess, but my mind was focused.
    â€œThat’s good, Chiquita, but when are you going to move in?”
    â€œI’ll take you to dinner if you help me unload the boxes.”
    â€œI don’t know where to put things,” he protested.
    â€œI’ll tell you,” I said.
    ******
    On Monday morning I called Joni’s friend, Ramona Franklin, and told her I was Eric and Nancy Barker’s lawyer.
    â€œWhy do the Barkers need a lawyer?” she asked me. Her voice was soft and she had a way of putting equal emphasis on all the syllables that made me wonder how she got an Anglo surname.
    â€œThey want to sue the Forest Service for negligence in Joni’s death.”
    â€œThat won’t do any good,” Ramona said, weighing carefully every