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Back Lost Hills Save as PDF
Chapters (49)
  1. TITLE PAGE
  2. COPYRIGHT PAGE
  3. DEDICATION
  4. Contents
  5. CHAPTER ONE
  6. CHAPTER TWO
  7. CHAPTER THREE
  8. CHAPTER FOUR
  9. CHAPTER FIVE
  10. CHAPTER SIX
  11. CHAPTER SEVEN
  12. CHAPTER EIGHT
  13. CHAPTER NINE
  14. CHAPTER TEN
  15. CHAPTER ELEVEN
  16. CHAPTER TWELVE
  17. CHAPTER THIRTEEN
  18. CHAPTER FOURTEEN
  19. CHAPTER FIFTEEN
  20. CHAPTER SIXTEEN
  21. CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
  22. CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
  23. CHAPTER NINETEEN
  24. CHAPTER TWENTY
  25. CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
  26. CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
  27. CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
  28. CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
  29. CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
  30. CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
  31. CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
  32. CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
  33. CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
  34. CHAPTER THIRTY
  35. CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
  36. CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
  37. CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
  38. CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
  39. CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
  40. CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX
  41. CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
  42. CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
  43. CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
  44. CHAPTER FORTY
  45. CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
  46. CHAPTER FORTY-TWO
  47. CHAPTER FORTY-THREE
  48. Author’s Note and Acknowledgments
  49. About the Author

“It would be worse to let her die,” Eve said and stormed out of the captain’s office, slamming the door behind her.

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

CHAPTER FORTY-ONE

Eve ran out of the station, jumped into the plain-wrap Explorer, and sped to her condo, double-parked at the curb, and dashed inside to grab her list of Coyle’s service calls and get another look at the pushpins in her map. She couldn’t sit back and let Caitlin die, not if there was still a chance of saving her.

Malibu Creek State Park was bordered by Mulholland Highway to the north; Crags Road, Lake Vista Drive, and its offshoots to the west; and Las Virgenes Road to the east. The only homes that directly bordered the park were on Lake Vista, Crags Road, and the neighborhoods that rimmed the eastern edge of Malibu Lake.

She checked the map, and then the list, quickly identified six homes that Coyle visited adjacent to the park, and wrote the addresses on a slip of paper that she stuffed in her pocket. Now she just had to get to the houses, which wasn’t going to be easy, and then deal with smoke and possibly fire when she got there to search for Caitlin.

She opened the closet under her stairs, grabbed the fire extinguisher and her earthquake kit, which was a duffel bag full of supplies that included goggles, leather gloves, dust masks, a first aid kit, and a crowbar, and rushed out of the house.

As soon as she got into the Explorer, she tossed her bag and the extinguisher on the passenger seat and tuned in to the LASD patrol frequency to hear the latest news about the fire, evacuations, and road closures.

She learned that the sheriff wasn’t exaggerating about the voracious ferocity of the blaze. The fire was devouring acres by the minute, driven by single-digit humidity and blistering fifty-mile-per-hour winds. The tsunami of flames had already crossed Topanga Canyon and raged west across ten miles of mostly uninhabited wilds, eating up the parched plants for fuel and building in intensity as it jumped across Las Virgenes into Malibu Creek State Park. Officials were terrified that the Stevenson Ranch blaze, now moving through Ahmanson Ranch, could connect with the Topanga blaze to create a megafire if they weren’t stopped.

Eve made a sharp U-turn on Las Virgenes, hit the siren and grille flashers, and took the 101 four miles west to the Kanan Dume Road exit. Along the way, she stole glances to her left at the thick, churning cloud of smoke that filled the sky behind the Santa Monica Mountains.

She got off at Kanan, turned left, crossed through the northbound stream of ash-covered vehicles packed with people, pets, and possessions escaping from the fire, and sped south on the overpass.