Chapter 31
Chapter Thirty-One
Scarlett
I run toward the lights. Toward Dean. The rain drives sideways, stinging my face, soaking my sweater until it clings to my skin like something alive.
Abel shouts behind me—words I can’t catch, lost in the wind and the hammer of rain on the dock boards.
I don’t stop. Don’t slow. The cluster of figures at the far end of the main dock grows clearer through the gray.
Someone kneeling. Someone standing. Someone holding a flashlight that swings wildly in the wind.
Abel’s hand closes around my arm. Hard. He yanks me sideways off the main dock onto a narrower finger that juts into the harbor. My boots slip on wet wood. I catch the rail. The harbor churns below, black water heaving against the pilings.
“This way,” he shouts. The wind tears his voice apart. “Hurry.”
“The main dock—Dean’s there—”
“He’s not.” Abel pulls me forward. His grip is iron. “The clinic truck left ten minutes ago. Bodhi drove him.”
Relief floods me. Dean’s at the clinic. He’s being treated. The journal sits in my bag. Evangeline’s words. The truth. Everything we’ve fought for. I can breathe.
Then why is Abel’s hand shaking?
We reach the end of the finger dock. A small boat rocks in its slip—not one of Dean’s tour vessels. Something private. A runabout, maybe twenty feet, cabin forward, open stern. The hull is white with a blue stripe. No name I can see through the rain.
Abel jumps aboard. Holds out his hand. “Come on.”
“I need to get to the clinic.”
“It’s faster this way. Trust me.”
I don’t trust him. Something in his face is wrong—too pale, too tight, his eyes darting between me and the harbor mouth and the storm building overhead. But Dean is hurt. Dean asked for me. I take his hand and step down into the boat.
The deck pitches under my feet. I grab the gunwale.
Abel is already at the console, key in the ignition.
The engine turns over. Catches. A deep rumble beneath the boards.
He casts off the lines with quick, practiced movements.
The boat drifts backward from the dock. Abel shoves the throttle forward. We’re moving.
Rain hammers the windshield. The wipers struggle. Abel stands at the wheel, his body braced against the pitch and roll, his knuckles white on the controls. The harbor mouth opens ahead of us—a gap between the breakwater and the shore, water churning white where the harbor meets the sound.
I look back. The marina lights are swinging. The cluster of figures on the main dock—they’re not tending to an injured man. They’re securing boats. Hauling lines. Moving with the urgent rhythm of people battening down before a storm. No ambulance. No Bodhi. No Dean.
The island shrinks behind us. The harbor falls away. The boat points into open water. Away from Port Haven. Away from the clinic.
“Abel.” My voice comes out steadier than I expect. “Turn around.”
He doesn’t answer. The throttle pushes forward. The engine growls. We’re picking up speed.
“Abel. Now.”
“I can’t.”
“Dean’s not at the clinic.” It’s not a question.
He shakes his head. Once. Sharp.
The lie lands. Actually lands, like something physical hitting my chest. Dean was never hurt. There was never blood. Never a fallen mast. Abel looked me in the eye in Shea’s kitchen and told me Dean was dying, and I believed him because the alternative was unthinkable.
I cross the cockpit in two steps and grab the wheel. My hand closes over his. The boat veers. Water slaps the hull. Abel shoves my hand off. Hard. The boat corrects. I stumble backward, catch myself on the cabin door.
“Don’t.” His voice cracks. “Please. Just listen.”
“Turn this boat around.”
“I can’t go back.” Rain streams down his face. His light hair is plastered to his skull. He looks younger suddenly. Frightened. “He’ll kill him.”
“Who?”
“My father.”
The boat pitches. A wave hits the starboard side. Spray arcs over the gunwale, cold salt water that soaks me to the skin. I brace against the cabin wall. My bag—the journal—is somewhere at my feet, wedged against a bench. Safe. For now.
“Jasper threatened him.” Abel’s hands shake on the wheel. “Three days ago. I heard it. Dad doesn’t know I heard.”
Another wave. The boat rolls. I grab the rail. My stomach lurches.
“The journal.” Abel’s voice breaks. “It was my father’s.
Not Gus’s. Dad found it years ago in the attic of the old marina office.
He’s been feeding Gus pieces of the real history for—Christ, I don’t know.
A decade? More? Little things. Hints. Enough that Gus could hold the truth without having to say it. ”
The storm builds. Wind howls through the rigging. The boat takes another wave broadside. Water sloshes in the bottom. Ankle-deep now. Cold. My boots are full of it.
“Jasper overheard them.” Abel’s knuckles are bone-white on the wheel.
“Dad and Gus. Talking in the hardware store. I don’t know what they said.
I wasn’t there. But Jasper was. He cornered Dad the next day.
I heard it from the sailboat. Dad’s voice.
Jasper’s voice. Jasper said—” Abel stops.
Swallows. “He said anyone who dismantles the Merrick legacy disappears. Those were the words. Disappears. And he meant it. I’ve known my uncle my whole life. I know when he means it.”
The boat pitches. I slide across the wet deck, catch the rail again. My fingers are numb. The cold has worked its way into my bones.
“Jasper searched your room.” Abel doesn’t look at me.
His eyes are fixed on the water ahead, on the storm, on whatever hell he’s steering us into.
“Weeks ago. He knew the journal had surfaced. He thought you’d found it through research.
The famous reporter digging into Merrick history.
He was wrong about who took it. Right about everything else. ”
My room. The balcony. The figure in the dark. Jasper standing over me while I slept, his hands going through my things, looking for the one document that could destroy his family’s narrative.
“The journal was never Gus’s.” I say it to make sure I understand. “Theodore found it. Gave it to Gus. Gus held it until I arrived, then passed it to me.”
Abel nods. A jerky, desperate motion. “Dad couldn’t stand it anymore.
The lies. Watching another generation raised on the myth.
Watching me get bullied for not being Merrick enough.
Watching Corey and Bodhi—” He stops. Swallows.
“He wanted the truth to outlive the lie. That’s all. Just wanted someone to know.”
Water sloshes around my ankles. The boat lists to port. Abel corrects. The engine strains. We’re pushing into wind that feels like a wall.
“I didn’t know what else to do.” Abel’s voice cracks.
He’s crying now. Hard, messy sobs that hitch his breath.
“Jasper will kill him. I heard it in his voice. He’ll do it.
And if the journal traces back to Dad—if Jasper figures out it was his own brother who handed the truth to a reporter—” He can’t finish. Doesn’t need to.
The wrongness of it settles over me. Not anger. Something colder. Clearer. Abel Merrick, twenty-three years old, standing at the wheel of a boat in a storm, crying for his father, because he believes the only way to save Theodore’s life is to get me off the island.
“You’re making it worse.” I have to shout over the wind.
“Running solves nothing. Jasper’s threat doesn’t vanish because I do.
If anything, my disappearance confirms the journal’s importance.
Makes it worse. Theodore is still here. The journal is still real.
The truth doesn’t change because I’m gone. ”
Abel shakes his head. “If you’re gone, the pressure lifts. Jasper stops hunting. Dad lives. That’s all I care about.”
“That’s not how it works.” I cross the cockpit.
Grab the wheel beside his hands. Our fingers brush.
His are ice. “Turn around, Abel. Right now. We go back. We tell your father what you heard. We get him somewhere safe. Then we use the journal. Properly. With authentication. Documentation. The whole thing. Jasper doesn’t get to bury this. Not anymore.”
Another wave. Bigger. The boat rocks. The deck tilts. I lose my footing. Slam into the gunwale. My hip takes the impact. Pain flares. Abel reaches for me. Misses. The wheel spins. The boat veers sharply to starboard. The engine coughs. Dies.
Silence. The sudden absence of the engine’s growl is louder than the storm. The boat wallows. Water sloshes knee-deep now. The bilge pump whines. It’s not enough.
Abel fumbles for the radio. His hands are shaking so badly he drops the handset. Catches it. Raises it to his mouth.
“Mayday. Mayday. Mayday.” His voice is thin. Breaking. “This is sailing vessel—this is Abel Merrick. Vessel in distress. Position approximately two miles northwest of Port Haven breakwater. Taking on water. Engine failure. Two souls on board. Mayday.”
Static. More static. The handset crackles.
“Abel Merrick, this is Coast Guard Station Port Haven. Copy your Mayday. Stand by for position confirmation.”
A voice. Human. Real. Coming through the storm.
Abel sobs. Once. Hard. “Copy. Standing by.”
The boat lists. Water pours over the gunwale. The deck tilts. I grab the rail. The surface is fifteen feet away and getting farther. The boat is going.
“Scarlett.” Abel’s voice is small. “I’m sorry. About Dean. I didn’t—”
The wave hits.
The deck vanishes under my feet. The world tilts. The rail tears from my grip. Cold. Black. Water everywhere. The shock of it stops my heart. My lungs seize. Salt fills my mouth. My nose. My eyes.
I kick. Arms burning. My body remembers what my brain has forgotten—swimming lessons at eight, a pool in Bel Air, my father watching from a lounge chair with his phone. One arm forward. Then the other. Kick from the hips. Don’t panic. Panic drowns you.
I break the surface. Rain hammers my face. The wind screams. I can’t see the boat. Can’t see Abel. The water is black. Churning. Waves roll through me. I taste diesel. Salt. My own fear, metallic and sharp.
“Abel!” The wind takes my voice. “ABEL!”
Another wave. It takes me under. The cold is absolute. My clothes drag. My boots are anchors. I kick harder. My lungs burn. The surface is somewhere above me. I can’t tell which way is up.
My hand breaks water. Air. I gasp. Another wave hits. I go under again. Deeper this time. The darkness closes. My arms are lead. My legs are lead. The cold has worked its way into my marrow.
I kick. One more time. Hard as I can.
The surface doesn’t come.