3. Caleb
THREE
Caleb
The water didn’t get much flatter than this. I wiped the sweat from the back of my neck. It also didn’t get much hotter when the sun was directly overhead. There were days when I patrolled Marshoak Island that I believed we were in one big stew pot. Today was one of those days.
Turtles lazed on logs fallen in the creeks. The seagulls seemed too hot to fly. It was miserable in July. Yet, I knew summer had a chokehold on the island for one last season before fall blew in gave it a makeover. She was not letting go.
I slowed the engine. Gabe sat on the bow, tying knots. He was trying a new technique Brady had taught him.
“What about this one?” He held up the pretzeled loop.
“You want me to give you a gold star or something?” I joked.
“Yeah, it’s at least a five-star knot.”
I shook my head. “You would want a prize for tying a knot. We get paid to tie knots, you dumbass. We’re in the Coast Guard.”
“I can show you how.”
The radio crackled. I picked up the receiver. “Hold on.” I motioned to Gabe that we had a call coming in. I turned the volume up.
“Coast Guard Cutter 21, this is base.”
“Base, this is Coast Guard Cutter 21. Go ahead.” I waited for the call.
“Coast Guard Cutter 21, we have a distress call.” My posture changed. I waved at Gabe to be ready. He approached the cabin.
“Copy that, base. Do you have the coordinates and call number?”
I waited while the details came over the radio.
Gabe joined me by the wheel. “What’s going on?” he asked. “What’s the call?”
“Distress signal for swimmer overboard and stalled engine,” I explained. “Get ready we need to haul ass.” I shifted us into high gear and sped out toward the ocean. Gabe braced himself, holding on to the bridge.
The adrenaline pumped through my veins. It had been a while since we had an emergency call. That was a good thing with the summer coming to a close.
An uneventful summer was good news for a rescue swimmer. Although, Gabe sometimes mentioned how he thought we might be getting rusty. Our annual certification swim was approaching in a few months. We had plenty of time to train for another year as rescue swimmers. It wasn’t as if we were going to suddenly stop being able to swim incredibly fast or maneuver in the water with difficult weights. We had always been built for this. Trained. Disciplined.
I couldn’t say I was disciplined the entire summer. Margot had a way of tilting my world sideways enough to make me feel like I’d lost my sea legs. I smirked, cutting through the inlet.
Gabe held on to the canopy overhead.
I’d always stayed away from summer romances. I’d been the one to warn guys from hooking up with tourists who would never stay. I knew it was rooted in my own shit. A heart that had been broken seven years ago by the same Margot who had mended and patched it back together.
I could finally breathe now. I could hold her. Love her. Because she was going to stay on Marshoak Island.
That fear that she would pack up one night and be gone the next morning was gone. She’d done that to me once before, but that was when we were still kids. She’d never do it again. I knew it. I felt it. Everything was different this time.
“What’s our ETA?” Gabe shouted over the roar of the engine.
“Five minutes.” I tapped the GPS coordinates on the screen.
“I’ll get the gear ready.” He disappeared behind me, unhooking the rig with the rescue equipment.
I called into base to let them know we were five minutes out from the boat. They didn’t have any more contact with the boat since the distress call came in. I hoped that wasn’t a bad sign.
Gabe and I had been a team since we were stationed at the Coast Guard base on Marshoak. Through all the rescues this summer. The girls he had cycled through. The fucking mess with Carrie. Gabe had been there. The money from Carrie gnawed at me.
I knew I had done the right thing by using it for good. I had to hope that Margot would see it that way. But if it worked out the way I wanted it to, she’d never know I was behind the LLC that had offered to help restore the Blue Heron Marina. Her uncle’s place needed a lot of work. The money wasn’t enough to make all the repairs, but it was enough to get her to a place where she could make the marina a working marina like it used to be.
She was smart. Creative. Driven. She would turn a profit at the Blue Heron, and what I had to do would be worth it. If she didn’t know it by now, I’d sacrifice almost anything for her.
Margot didn’t have anyone else. The kid I was when we met would have freaked out at that thought. It’s a hell of a heavy commitment. But now, being with her has made me want that kind of commitment. It’s not the burden she thinks it is. Loving her was like breathing.
“Hey! Up there!” Gabe hollered. He had spotted the twenty-foot fishing boat. I began to slow the cutter toward the vessel bobbing on the ocean.
“Is there anyone out there?” I asked. I didn’t see a person on the deck or in the water. I lifted the receiver to let base know we had reached the distress signal.
“Doesn’t look like it. Shit.” Gabe began to suit up. We were going to have to search the perimeter of the boat.
“Who called it in if there’s no one onboard?” I grabbed the binoculars from the console as we drifted closer, in case I could see anyone on the floor. Maybe they had passed out.
“Hell if I know.” He zipped up the top of the suit.
We floated against the fishing boat. It appeared to be abandoned. It didn’t make any sense.
“I’ll check the hull,” Gabe volunteered. He stepped one foot on the railing and hopped over. “Coast Guard!” he hollered. “Anyone onboard? We’re here to help. Hello?”
I continued to communicate with base. Something was off. It didn’t feel right that we had reached the emergency call, but no one was here.
Gabe shook his head at me once he emerged from the hull. “No one here.”
“Fuck,” I grumbled. I started to suit up to start a dive and search status.
“Maybe another boat called it in?” he suggested. “Maybe they just thought someone had gone overboard.”
I shook my head. “Not according to base. The call came from a passenger on the boat.” I attached a deflated inflatable life jacket to the hook on my suit. Next, I positioned goggles on my head. If we needed, we’d return and get the tanks for a full dive. To start, we needed to assess what we were dealing with.
“They probably went in the water to help, and now they’re both under.”
“Someone tripped a signal from this boat,” Gabe reported. He surveyed the dash controls. A red light blinked every few seconds.
“We can hope that maybe they were picked up by another boat nearby?” It was the best-case scenario. Otherwise, we were dealing with multiple drowning victims.
“Hold on. Before we go in, let me call in again.” I checked with base. “Base, this is Cutter 21. That distress call from the fishing boat… anyone call back an all-safe report? Another boat? Over.”
“Coast Guard Cutter 21. It’s still a distress call. It has not been canceled. Over.”
I shook my head and cut the engine. “Base, we’re going to do a swim search. Over.”
“This is base. Copy that, Cutter 21. Over.”
I dropped the anchor to the cutter while Gabe tied the two boats together. The water made a hollow sound as it sloshed up against one hull and then the other. I unlocked the gun safe beneath the wheel hatch. We disarmed and mounted our pistols in the cargo holsters. As soon as I punched in the code to lock the guns, I turned around.
“Ready?” I motioned to Gabe.
He nodded and moved to the stern of the abandoned boat. He peered into the water. The sun was too bright for us to see below the surface. I knew my best friend was thinking the same thing I was—we didn’t want the passengers to be dead.
“See you back up top, O’Connor.”
“See you up top, Axton,” I replied.
We gave each other a thumbs up, counted to three, and jumped.