Freeuse Summer: The Complete Collection by Hannah Monroe

Author:Hannah Monroe [Monroe, Hannah]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Hannah Monroe
Published: 2024-05-14T00:00:00+00:00

Hotshots

One

I woke with a start. Daylight filtered through the tent’s thin fabric and the sun lay high in the sky.

Was it midday already? I must have overslept.

I let out a long yawn and glanced at my watch.

02:46

What the hell?

God, it felt even hotter than yesterday, and that had been unbearable.

Why was it so smokey?

My heart lurched. I hadn’t made a campfire.

Fear snapped me awake. The crack crackle of dry wood aflame sounded like gunshots, and the heat pressed from all sides.

I grabbed the tent’s zipper without thinking, cursing, and recoiling as it singed my fingertips.

I wrapped my singed hand in my shirt and yanked it open.

The heat sent me reeling backward, and I stared out into hell.

The tranquil forest I’d drifted off to was gone. So were the hooting owls and the babbling of the brook. Now only flame remained, licking in all directions, the only sound the crackling of the wood.

I needed to go. Now!

A terrible groan sounded from above me. I glanced out the tent’s entrance just in time to catch the trunk of a great pine shearing, weakened by the flame that licked at its base.

A whoosh fell behind me as I threw myself clear from the doorway. The ground shook as the tree flattened my tent, sending it up like a match.

My bare feet stumbled as they danced in hot ash, sending me sprawling onto my back. The flames of the pine licked against my legs as I scrambled away.

I was practically naked, with only the t-shirt I’d been sleeping in to keep me protected.

My fingers scrabbled around the remains of the tent doorway, searching for something, anything, that could help me.

They closed around a strap, and I yanked in triumph.

The waterproof camera case exploded from a bed of ash.

“Oh great, just what I need.” I said to myself sarcastically.

I dropped low, scrabbling through the ash for the path down to the stream, but it was impossible to get my bearings. Smoke stung my eyes so bad I could barely see my hand in front of my face. Half the trees that had been there when I went to bed had toppled and burned.

I forced my feet forward, moving on all fours like a blind animal trying to escape the heat.

My fingers dug through the ash and dirt and groped into space. I somersaulted, head over heels down over the rocks of the bank, and smacked the water hard.

My head spun, my vision blurred. The tumble had knocked the wind out of me and I panicked, flailing and thrashing until I felt the strap of my camera bag tugging me toward the rippling orange glow.

Salvation.

My chest heaved as I broke the surface, taking long sobbing breaths.

The air was a little cleaner here; the stream sunken by its banks as the smoke rose above.

“So this is it.” I thought to myself.

“This is how I die.”

I wept as I scrambled onto the rocks. There was still so much I’d wanted to do. This entire trip had been a mistake.

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