Fight the Tide (17 page)

He looked out to sea, clearly drained and shell-shocked. “I’m walking and talking. So I guess I’m okay. Whatever that means. ‘Okay.’”

“I’m so sorry.”

“I keep thinking that if I’d been here, maybe…”

Adam choked down his own surge of guilt, because it wasn’t about him. “I understand.”

“Woulda, coulda, shoulda, right?” Craig shook his head. “I want to scream, but the kids… Have to keep it together.”

Adam had no idea what to say. He nodded.

“So here I am. Walking and talking. And she’s gone.” He squeezed his eyes shut before opening them with a loud exhalation. “You looked deep in thought when I came up.”

“Just listening.” Adam put his hands into the pockets of his leather jacket. It was surprisingly humid for November, even on the water, but the worn leather was a comfort somehow. The camera was in there, the metal smooth under his fingers. He pulled it out.

“I took some video of Abby the other day. Do you want to see it?”

Staring at the camera, Craig’s eyes welled. “I woke up with her this morning. How is she gone? How?” He swiped at his eyes. “There’s no answer, I know.” Looking at the camera, he said, “I do want to watch, but not today. Thank you.”

Nodding, Adam tucked the camera away.

After a minute of silence as they stared into the night, Craig asked, “And what do you hear? When you listen?”

Parker playing the world’s most depressing game of go fish with Lilly in the saloon. Jacob holed up in the spare cabin with Mariah, the door closed, sobbing quietly so no one will hear. Ocean currents beneath them, fish and sea creatures. An animal sniffing around Abby’s grave—a squirrel, perhaps.

“Not much,” he answered. It had been too late to think about sailing on, so they were still anchored,
Saltwater
bobbing nearby like a ghost ship. The wind had picked up, turning them to face the endless sea.

“Seems so empty,” Craig said. “I know it can’t be. Hear other people like us on the radio. See them sometimes. Still doesn’t feel real. Some days, I wake up expecting to be in my bed, my sweet old dog licking at me with her bad breath.” He smiled so sadly before glancing at Adam. “I couldn’t go back for her. Got Lilly from her play date, and we went to Abby’s for Jacob. Thought it would all be over by morning, whatever it was, but I didn’t want to leave Abby and Jacob alone. Just in case.”

His gaze was distant, and Adam waited, letting him say what he needed to.

“Police were closing roads. People were panicking, seeing video of the carnage happening in the big cities. The mayor told everyone to stay inside and wait. So we went back to hole up at Abby’s. Never thought it would actually touch us. The authorities would get it under control long before it came our way. Then morning came.”

“Yeah.” He thought of that first night in the woods with Parker, the snotty freshman he didn’t even like. It seemed like another life.

“I can see her so clearly.” Craig’s gaze went distant. “Old Lola, waiting by the door, eager for kisses and scratches. Waiting and waiting, getting hungry. Wondering where I was, where Lilly was. Waiting forever. But we couldn’t get back. Had to get out of the city, and I couldn’t risk my child, or Abby and Jacob, not even for that sweet animal. If it had just been me, I’d have tried. But with them, I couldn’t risk it. You understand, don’t you?” he asked desperately, clutching Adam’s arm.

“Of course.” Adam patted him awkwardly. “You did the right thing.”

Craig looked down at his own hand, as if he wasn’t sure how it had come to be gripping Adam. He let go. “Sorry.” Playing with his hoodie zipper, he said, “Lola wouldn’t have understood why we never came home. If she’s still alive somehow, she’ll still be waiting.” He wiped his eyes. “Haven’t let myself think about it. Hell.” Then he looked around guiltily, as if Lilly might hear him.

“I’m sorry.” It wasn’t enough, but Adam couldn’t think of anything else to say.

“When my wife died, it took a year and a half. Cancer. I don’t think Lilly really remembers her. But I watched her go, bit by bit, day by day. Couldn’t do anything to stop it, to keep her here. Not a thing.” He shivered, zipping up his hoodie tighter. “Now Abby’s just…
gone.
How is it possible? If I’d known it would be the last time… I should have told her I loved her when I kissed her goodbye. Should have told her.”

“She knew.”

“You think so? Lord, I hope. Because I did. I loved that woman. I was so grateful we’d found each other just before the world changed. That we’d been together that night. I always thought it was the one good thing that came from this. And now she’s just gone.” He turned to the dark peninsula. “I know her body’s only a shell. That her soul’s in heaven. But I hate to leave her alone. We’ll never see her grave again. The forest will grow over it. I suppose that’s right in its own way.” He shuddered. “Unless it all burns.”

The briny wind had cleared the distant smoke from Adam’s nose for the night, at least. For the moment, he could believe that the world in the darkness was peaceful.

Craig turned back to the sea, fresh tears gleaming in his eyes, the stars and moon reflecting there. His chin trembled, his voice thick. “I hate to think of it, how scared she must have been. Because I know what she was thinking. I know it like I know my own name. She was thinking of Jacob. That she was leaving him, and there wasn’t a thing she could do about it. It was Tanya’s biggest fear when she was diagnosed—that she would have to leave her baby behind.”

The fear of leaving Parker alone was a visceral thing squeezing Adam’s gut, and he could only imagine how much worse it was for a parent. He had no comforting words, so he stayed silent.

“I know Abby must have felt the same, and it’s so much worse now. Leaving her son to
this
world?” Craig blew out a long breath. “Could be me tomorrow. And then what? What happens to my little girl? To that poor boy? I can’t leave them.” His heart was rabbiting, and Adam could hear the panic rising. “I can’t leave my baby!”

Adam took Craig’s shoulder. “You won’t. You won’t leave them.”

“You don’t know that! Who’s going to take care of my little girl?”

“We will. I promise.” He kept his hand secure on Craig’s shoulder.

“You’re kids! You’re what, twenty-five? And Parker’s a teenager!”

He didn’t point out that he was only twenty-three since he felt a decade older most of the time. “I know, we’re young. But we’ll take care of your daughter if anything happens to you. Jacob too. We’re in this together.” As he said the words, the truth of them filled him with peace and purpose. “I promise we won’t let anything happen to those children.” And maybe it was a crazy promise to make. One he couldn’t keep. But he and Parker would never leave the kids to fend for themselves. Never.

“You can’t promise that.” Craig shook his head, his breath hitching. “No one can. We could all buy it tomorrow.”

“We always could have, even before all this. My family died in an instant. One minute we were driving along. I was fighting with my sisters, and my parents were fed up. Then it was over. They were dead, and I was the only one left. It could always happen. And the world has changed, but we’ll do our best. We’ll do our best for those kids.”

Craig stared at him, his throat working as he tried to catch his breath, his shoulder rigid beneath Adam’s palm. In increments, he unclenched, his pulse slowing. He blinked hard a few times. “Yes, we will. Okay.”

Adam squeezed gently before letting go. “It’s all anyone can do.”

“I’m so sorry about your family. That must have been…unbearable. But I guess that’s what we do. Bear the unbearable. We keep going.” He rubbed a hand over his shorn head. “Abby and I talked about it once. That if either of us got it, we’d take care of the kids. Somehow I never thought it would be me left behind.”

“You’re not alone. We’re in this together.”

Craig looked at him again, a watery smile on his face. “I guess we are. Thank you. Thank you both.”

They sat in silence, the boat rocking on swells. Adam listened, tuning in to the cabin below. Parker and Lilly were still playing cards, but Jacob seemed to have cried himself to sleep. That was good, at least.

After a few minutes, Craig laughed hollowly. “Now we need to find a place to go. Need to find…something. Don’t you think?”

He thought of Salvation Island’s calls, the woman’s voice echoing in his head often. “I do.”

“We can’t just keep floating around. Surviving. There has to be more. Somewhere, there has to be more. Lilly and Jacob need a home. A community. Stability.”

A pack.
They had each other now, but Craig was right that they needed somewhere to put down roots. Their own territory. “We’ll find a place.”

“I know Parker’s dead set against it, but what about this Salvation Island? Is there a way to get close? Check it out without sailing right up and walking on shore?”

“We have binoculars. We could watch from a distance. I…” His heart skipped. He should tell Craig everything. Adam would need all his abilities to keep them safe, and there was no sense in hiding anymore.

“You what?” Craig prompted.

I’m a werewolf. Please don’t be afraid of me.
But the words caught in his throat, rubbing painfully until he choked them down. “I could scout in the dinghy.”
Could watch through the binoculars from even farther away, hear sounds across the water you never could.
“I think it’s worth a try.”

Craig nodded, sitting up straighter, suddenly invigorated. “Yes. Yes, that’s what we’ll do. We’ll be careful, but we’ll find a new home. If not this island, then somewhere else. We can do this.” Breathing hard, he slumped again, his face creasing, voice shaky. “We have to.”

Adam said a silent prayer to the universe that they could.

*

It wasn’t quite
dawn when he heard it.

The soft sound was some kind of…scraping? Rubbing. He reached for Parker, bolting up when his hand closed over cold sheets. Adam had stayed awake for hours keeping watch, and had finally let himself hide in dreams, the urge to close his eyes just for a little while too much to resist. Parker had been nestled close to him, breathing steadily.

Now he was gone, and Adam reached out desperately, focusing on the heartbeats and breathing nearby. The sliding door to the cabin was half open, and beyond, he could see Lilly and Craig fast asleep on the fold-out bed in the saloon. In his T-shirt and boxer briefs, Adam tiptoed past them. By the stern, the other cabin door was still closed, and he could hear Jacob sleeping fitfully inside.

The scraping was coming from outside, and Adam crept up the steps to the deck. It was empty, and for a moment he could only blink in surprise. Fear dripped down his spine in icy rivulets, guilt that he’d slept too soundly like lead in his limbs, the urge to scream Parker’s name clawing at his throat.

The next moment, it all locked into place—the strange sound and Parker’s heartbeat, muffled across the waves.

His damp head bent, Parker was on
Saltwater
’s deck, scrubbing. Both dinghies were hitched, so he must have swum over. Adam did the same now, slipping into the cold water, shivering as he sliced through it. At the ladder, he said, “Parker.”

Swallowing a gasp, Parker whipped his head around, still on his knees. “Jesus fucking Christ. Stealth wolf mode again.”

Adam pulled himself up, dripping onto the deck. “I could say the same about you.”

He smiled faintly. “You were really out for the count. You haven’t slept enough.”

“I still should have heard you. I thought—” Frustration, fear, and guilt still tugging at him, Adam shook his head.

“Hey, it’s okay. I’m sorry.”

He focused on the deck. “What are you—” Swallowing thickly, he whispered, “Oh.”

“I didn’t want them to see this.” Parker turned back to the remains of the dark stain on the deck, the jagged edges almost black in the fading moonlight, and picked up a scrub brush. “I can’t get it all out. Even with bleach. You can still see it.”

For a few moments, Adam couldn’t speak past the rush of affection for him—for this challenging, wonderful man who would sneak out in the middle of the night to try and scrub away death.

Parker frowned. “What?”

In answer, Adam sank to his knees and took Parker’s face in his hands, kissing him softly. He rubbed their noses together. Finally, he got out, “I love you.”

Trembling and kissing him back, Parker murmured, “I love you too. Don’t die, okay? Let’s not die.”

“Deal.” Adam wrapped him in a tight hug, and they knelt there for a little while, just breathing, the boat rocking on the early morning tide.

When Parker pulled back, he eyed the deck again. “I don’t think we can do it. I don’t think we can get it out. There was so much blood, Adam. Didn’t think there could be that much.”

“Let me try.” He took the brush and bent to scrubbing, but Parker was right. Abby’s blood had sealed itself into the grain of the wood, and it wasn’t letting go.

“Jacob can’t see this every day.” Parker shook his head. “He can’t. Damn it!” He sucked in a breath and blew it out. “I didn’t… I didn’t want to care. I was afraid to trust them, but it was more than that. It was
this
.” He jerked his hand toward the dark stain. “I didn’t want to feel this way. I don’t want to! I don’t want to care, Adam! Because we’ll just end up losing it all. The world is fucked.” He choked back a sob. “We’re fucked.”