Chapter 1 #2
Settled in the boat, Malloy turned on the motor. With his deep frown, he looked nothing like the smiling fifty-something man who’d been only too happy to take her money. Once at the pier, he tied off the small boat. “I’ll walk you to the dock. This is where I dropped your father,” he said.
“Any last words that he said to you?” She had to give it one last try.
His only response was the familiar grunt as he assisted her off the boat and onto the pier then handed off her things.
Next to her, he lumbered across the rickety boards, passing between a few other fishing vessels and a couple of older cruisers.
The wooden slats clanked as she and Malloy walked side by side up what looked like a recently rebuilt dock.
Off to the right, she took in the Bayfront Chandlery, which looked like it also offered groceries, and next to that was a dilapidated warehouse.
Weirdly, no town had built up around the marina like one would expect.
On the other side of the chandlery stood a partially collapsed dock and a burned-out structure.
The fog had caught up with them and hovered around the older dock, wrapping around the building destroyed by fire and turning it into an eerie setting worthy of a chilling horror flick.
Foreboding goose bumps crept over her skin.
This was her last stop on her research trip.
She wouldn’t be chased away by today’s earlier scare or tales of a ghost ship and its missing crew.
At the end of the pier, she stopped and faced Malloy. “How do I contact Diggins when he lives out on the water?”
“Mavis at the chandlery can help you.” He leaned in. “I wasn’t joking when I said it’s not safe.”
Before Cressida could process his words or ask him a question that he probably wouldn’t answer, he turned and walked away. Still, he called over his shoulder, “Watch your back.”
Creepy much? She watched him hurry back to his boat, then head out to the bigger trawler anchored in the bay. Good riddance. Adjusting her duffel, laptop case, and sling bag, she glanced at her surroundings.
So this is Hidden Bay.
About a hundred yards of sand-pebbled beach met high cliffs that spread a few miles in either direction, carving out a crescent-shaped bay of several miles.
She made her way to the Bayfront Chandlery, concerned it wouldn’t be open yet.
It was just before seven in the morning.
Cressida’s cell got no bars, and she wasn’t even sure if a rideshare was available here.
She entered the chandlery, and a young female clerk named Kit assisted her.
Mavis wasn’t there. Kit called for a ride to pick Cressida up and take her to the Cedar Trails Lodge, where she wasn’t due until tomorrow night.
She could sleep in the lobby if she had to.
Cressida asked the clerk to store her duffel and computer case so she could walk the beach while she waited for her ride.
She kept her shoulder bag containing her wallet with her.
On the beach in the early morning hours, she took in what promised to be an indescribable setting, but with the fog growing thick and suffocating, she couldn’t see much—only a few people strolling the beach.
While the bay water was relatively calm, beyond the crescent edges the ocean violently bashed the rocks on the shore.
She didn’t want to get too far from the marina, so she perched on a rock to relax and listen to the waves. Maybe she couldn’t see everything, but the sounds were calming.
It was too quiet.
Her father’s voice echoed once again in her head. “It’s not the storms that sink sailors, it’s the calm before them.” A reminder that she shouldn’t let her guard down.
Footfalls sounded behind her, approaching too fast and close. She jerked around. “What are you—”
A man gripped her wrist and twisted her arm behind her.
He covered her mouth before she could scream.
She tried the maneuvers she’d learned, techniques to free herself if she was ever attacked, but against the thick, ropy muscles on this man twice her size and weight, her defensive skills did nothing.
Pain ignited in her head when he grabbed her hair and dragged her out into the ocean, then dunked her. Could no one on the beach see what was happening? Had the fog interfered?
Her heart pounded violently, consuming what little oxygen she’d gulped into her lungs before going into the salty, cold ocean. She tried to punch his vulnerable parts, but his arms were so long, he prevented her from reaching.
Play dead.
Just . . . be dead. She fought until she thought she might actually suck in seawater. Her lungs burned, then she gave up as if dead.
And floated.
Letting the ocean take her, she drifted along with the waves washing in, then back out, then in again. Salt burned her eyes as she peered underwater, searching . . .
His boots kicked up sand. He was still there. A few more heartbeats and she would die if she didn’t breathe.
She had no choice.
And he finally disappeared, so she lifted her head to the side, sucked in oxygen, then once again let the ocean carry her. Her body drifted with the current, back and forth, slowly toward the shore, until she washed up onto the beach.
Like a lifeless body.
Play dead. Let him think she’d drowned. Had this ever worked before? If he wanted her dead, he could have shot her, but why do that when she could just drown and that would be the end of her story? No investigation required.
Limbs numb with cold, pebbles cutting into her palms and arms, she crawled forward on the wet sand. Gut and lungs heaving, Cressida coughed up brackish seawater, then she let herself remain in the sand, unmoving.
Tears leaked from her eyes to mingle with the grit and salt water clinging to her face. Grateful that the ocean had spit her onto the beach, she couldn’t fight back the pure terror still racing through her.
Let him believe she was gone. Let the danger be gone.