“The fires have crossed the road. Chief O’Rourke and any other resident beyond the junction of Juniper and River Drive are cut off.”

3

Tess turned away from the flames, heart pounding. She gripped the steering wheel and looked up as the gate slowly swung open. As soon as the opening was large enough, she pressed the accelerator and shot up the gravel driveway, smoke swirling in the air like a murky, flowing curtain. Powerful sprinklers engaged on either side of her, sputtering at first and then shooting out strong jets of water. Livie Harp was prepared.

Noting cameras every several feet, Tess drove, elevation increasing, for about three-quarters of a mile before Harp’s house came into view. Fear of the fire fled as an overwhelming curiosity about this mysterious woman took over.

She knew that preppers were not uncommon around the area, even extreme preppers like Harp. Though all the other properties she knew as belonging to preppers were occupied by groups, families, not single recluses. Large properties with good wells seemed to attract people who feared some disastrous worldwide catastrophe on the horizon. She’d been told that many people in the area drove old cars, vehicles that operated with carburetors, not computers, in the event of an electromagnetic pulse attack that would destroy the electrical grid and render computers and the cars they controlled useless.

Was that Harp’s story?

At the end of the drive stood an impressive two-story log home, shrouded in smoke and surrounded by another security fence, with a large wraparound porch and the mountain behind. The word defensible popped into Tess’s head. Solar panels, a water tank behind some trees, and what Tess believed was a greenhouse were visible. There was also a huge barn and corral, set up with a circular walker for horses, with Harp’s Land Rover and a horse trailer parked in front. More gossip came to mind, about Harp patrolling the perimeter of her property on horseback, shotgun at the ready. Everything but the old Rover looked state-of-the-art, and Tess couldn’t help but wonder how on earth Harp supported herself.

A second gate swung open and she drove through. A woman Tess pegged as Harp stood on the porch, holding a shotgun.

Tess’s radio crackled. It wasn’t dispatch; she recognized Oliver’s voice and she heard the panic there.

“Tess! The fire has crossed Juniper. Where are you?”

She picked up the mike and took a moment to calm her own voice. “I’m fine,” she said, hoping to defuse his panic. “I’m at the Harp property. Looks like we’ll both ride this out here. I think the Coopers’ propane tank just exploded.”

“We heard it all the way down at the church. The wind finally seems to be letting up, and a C-130 is on the way. They hope to knock a lot of the fire down. Stay safe.”