Alaskan Fire Read Online Free PDF Page B

Blaze blurted, “Are you trying to piss me off?”
    “Nope,” Jack said, “Trying to
figure out what sort of critter landed on my doorstep, that’s all.”
    Blaze choked.  “ Your doorstep.”  She waved a hand at the lodge around them.  “I’m sorry, did you
just spend six hundred thousand of your hard-earned dollars on this
place?”
    “From what I hear,” Jack said,
still working with the fire, “It was an inheritance.”  He pulled back and got a
little cut-open pop-can full of clear liquid and sloshed it on the wood
inside.  Then he yanked a book of matches from his back pocket and struck a flame,
then touched it to the kindling.  The fire spread fast—not as fast as gasoline,
Blaze realized—but he had definitely used some sort of accelerant.
    An inheritance.  Blaze
found herself so infuriated that it was all she could do not to tell him to get
his tight, Greek-godly ass packed up and out of her lodge.  Now .
    “And when I say my doorstep,”
Jack said, turning to her, “I mean my neck of woods.  I’ve claimed this place. 
Everything for about ten square miles.  Tied myself to the land, keep it nice. 
Kind of makes me anxious to see just what sort of critter is holing up right
smack in the middle of it.”  He peered up at her expectantly, then, like he was
waiting for her to tell him she was a Martian, and oh, by the way, here’s my
raygun and the keys to my spaceship.
    Blaze sighed, looking at the dusty
drywall of the ceiling.  “Damn it.  Are there any other people that can
turn a wrench around here, or are you it?”
    “You haven’t answered my
question, missy,” Jack said.  “I woulda said you got some snake in you, but
smell’s not right.  Kinda bitter.  Like burned metal.  Kinda like those
flame-throwing gorillas in Africa.”
    “Get out,” Blaze said.
    Jack stood up, but he leaned
against the wall and crossed his arms over his big chest.  Over the crackle of
the fire, he gave her a flat stare and said, “Are we gonna have to tussle,
then?”
    Blaze stared at him, completely
unbelieving that he was not listening to instructions.  “I told you to get out
of my house.”
    “‘Your’ house,” he growled, “Is
on my land.  I’ve kept it free of all sorts of nuisances and vermin for
over a hundred years, and I’d hate to let it down now.”
    Blaze’s mouth fell open.  “You’re
insane.”
    “Maybe,” he growled.  “And you’re
trespassing, tootz.”  And his growl sounded almost feral, animalistic, like a
warning rattle that was coming from deep in his chest.
    Impossible, Blaze thought,
listening to the odd sound.
    “So, sweetie,” Jack said, still
leaning stubbornly against the wall, “Dispense with the bullshit.  Who are you,
and why the fuck didn’t you pay attention to the warning signs I posted all
over the place?”
    He’s completely off his
rocker, Blaze thought, staring at him.  She began to think of the gun she
had stashed in her duffel, in case of bears.  She glanced behind her.
    “Wouldn’t try it, if I were you,”
Jack said.  “I’ve been shot about fifteen-hundred times in my life, and stabbed
a time or two before that.”  He flexed a bicep, then looked at her.  “Ain’t
seein’ much effect…  You?”  He grinned, and in the firelight, Blaze could have sworn she saw long, sharp canines.
    “Uh, look,” Blaze said, deciding
that she really didn’t want to get into a brawl with a coke-snorting Bushrat
dopehead.  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.  I was told the deed was
for thirty acres.  If you think some of that belongs to you, I’m sure we can
work it out in the courts.”
    His mouth fell open and he
frowned at her.  “Are you smoking crack?”
    “I could say the same for you!”
Blaze cried.  “I’ve told you twice, now, to get out of my house, and you’re
still standing there.  You know, people go to jail for trespassing.”
    That got his hackles up. 
She could feel the energy in the room