Chapter 20
Chapter Twenty
brYNN
I’ve never run so fast in my life.
The village is a blur – cobblestones slick with rain, the streetlights haloed in mist, my boots pounding out a rhythm that matches my heartbeat. Too fast. Everything too fast.
Jude’s somewhere ahead of me. After his alarm sounded, he’d just stared at me.
For one long second that a first responder can’t afford, he’d just stared at me…
Then he didn’t even grab his jacket, just moved – and now I’m chasing him through the dark like I do this regularly.
Like if Jude Harding rushes off into the dark then I will follow him.
And I will. And that’s the terrifying part.
The boathouse lights are blazing when I round the corner onto the harbour. Cal’s already there, shouting instructions, his voice carrying over the wind. Tom’s pulling on his drysuit, face grim. Bill is checking equipment with the kind of focused efficiency that only comes from decades of practice.
And Jude. Jude’s at the kit locker, hauling out life jackets, and he looks up when I skid to a stop at the door.
One look. That’s all we get.
His eyes find mine across the chaos – just for a second, just long enough for a flicker, a moment, to pass between us, and then he’s moving again, all business, all focus.
Right. Okay. We’re doing this.
‘Trelawney!’ Cal’s voice cuts through. ‘You’re with us. Kit yourself out. Two minutes.’
I don’t hesitate. Can’t afford to.
The drysuit is cold, clammy, resistant in all the wrong places. My fingers feel thick and stupid as I yank at zips, adjust straps, fumble with the life jacket clips. Around me, the crew moves like a machine – everyone knowing their role, their position, their purpose.
‘What’ve we got?’ Tom asks, checking the radio.
‘Yacht,’ Cal replies, pulling up coordinates on the navigation system. ‘Thirty-two-footer, three souls aboard. Engine failure, taking on water. They’re about a mile off Pencarrow Point.’
‘Bloody hell.’ Tom shakes his head. ‘Spring tides.’
‘Spring tides,’ Cal confirms grimly. ‘Current’s running hard. Coastguard’s got a helicopter en route, but visibility’s shot. We’re their best chance.’
Spring tides. The words settle in my stomach like stones.
Grandad used to talk about spring tides with a kind of reverence. Twice a month, when the sun and moon align, the water moves with a force that can’t be reasoned with. The strongest currents. The most unpredictable swells. Beautiful, he said, if you respect them. Deadly if you don’t.
‘Everyone ready?’ Cal scans the crew. His eyes land on me last, assessing. ‘Brynn. You good?’
‘Good.’
It’s not a lie, exactly. More like a commitment. A promise to become good, right now, because there’s no other option.
‘Then let’s go. Tom, you’re deputy on this call. Jude, you’re foredeck. Bill, lines. Brynn, you’re on recovery assist. Stay sharp, stay together, and let’s bring everyone home.’
The boat launches into darkness.
The Atlantic in a spring tide is a living thing.
It doesn’t just move – it heaves, great rolling swells that lift the lifeboat like a toy and drop it into troughs deep enough to steal your breath. The engine screams against the current, fighting for every metre, and the spray hits my face like needles of ice.
I’m braced against the cabin rail, one hand locked on the grip bar, the other pressed flat against the hull. The vibration travels up my arm, into my chest, until I can’t tell where the boat ends and my body begins.
Focus. Breathe. Don’t think about the black water. Don’t think about what’s underneath.
Don’t think about Jude, somewhere ahead of me in the dark, preparing to risk his life.
Too late.
The radio crackles. Cal’s voice, steady despite the chaos: ‘Pencarrow Point, bearing zero-four-five. ETA six minutes. Coastguard confirms position – yacht is listing, approximately fifteen degrees. Casualties are on deck, wearing life jackets.’
‘Copy,’ Tom responds from beside me. His face is set, jaw tight. In the dim glow of the cabin lights, he looks older than his years. ‘Visibility?’
‘Shite,’ Cal says flatly. ‘Maybe fifty metres. We’ll be running on radar until we’re on top of them.’
Fifty metres. In conditions like this, that’s nothing. That’s a single wave between seeing them and missing them entirely.
‘There.’ Bill’s voice, sharp. ‘Two o’clock. I’ve got a light.’
I strain to see through the spray. Nothing. Nothing. And then – a flash. Weak, wavering, but unmistakable against the black.
‘Visual confirmed,’ Cal calls. ‘All hands, prepare for approach. This is going to be rough.’
Rough.
That’s one word for it.
The yacht appears out of the darkness like a ghost – white hull stark against the water, listing badly to port, waves breaking over the deck. Three figures are huddled near the mast, their emergency light swinging wildly with each swell.
‘Jesus,’ Tom breathes.
The yacht is taking on water. I can see it in the way she sits, the sluggish resistance when the waves hit. She’s not going to last much longer.
‘Deploying Y-boat,’ Cal orders. ‘Jude, Tom – you’re in. Bill manage the tether. Brynn, you’re on deck recovery. The second they bring someone to the rail, you get them aboard. Clear?’
‘Clear,’ I say, and my voice doesn’t shake.
Small victories.
The next twenty minutes are chaos and precision in equal measure.
The Y-boat – the small inflatable we use for close-quarters rescue – launches into the swell with Jude and Tom aboard. I watch them disappear into the spray, my heart lodged somewhere in my throat, and force myself to focus on what I can control.
The rail. The recovery line. The space where casualties will appear, God willing, alive and whole.
The first one comes over the side gasping and crying – a woman, maybe fifty, her life jacket askew and her eyes wild with terror. I grab her under the arms, haul her onto the deck, and guide her toward the cabin where it’s marginally warmer.
‘You’re safe,’ I tell her. ‘You’re on the lifeboat. You’re safe now.’
She clutches my arm like I’m the only solid thing in the universe. Maybe, to her, I am.
The second casualty is a man – her husband, I think, from the way he keeps calling her name. He’s heavier, harder to manage, but Bill’s there to help, and together we get him aboard and settled.
‘One more,’ Cal shouts over the wind. ‘Jude’s going back for the last one.’
I look toward the yacht. The Y-boat is alongside, Jude leaning over the rail, reaching for a figure still clinging to the mast. The yacht’s listing worse now – twenty degrees, maybe more. The mast is almost touching the water.
‘She’s going over,’ Bill shouts. ‘Bloody hell, she’s going over—’
And that’s when I see it.
The Y-boat’s tether line. It’s fouled – tangled with debris from the yacht, a trailing rope that’s wrapped itself around the connection point. The current is pulling, tightening, and the line is going taut in a way that’s wrong, wrong, wrong—
‘JUDE!’ The scream tears out of me, raw and feral. ‘THE LINE—’
He looks up. Sees it. Reaches for his knife—
Too late.
The current surges. The fouled line snaps tight with a sound like a gunshot. The Y-boat jerks violently sideways, and Jude – Jude who was leaning over the rail, off-balance, reaching for the last casualty – goes over.
Into the black.
Into the water.
Into the spring tide current that’s been waiting all night to claim someone.
Time is strange.
It stretches. Thins. Becomes a substance I can move through, like wading through water, every second lasting an eternity.
I see Jude’s head break the surface – just for a moment, just long enough for me to fix his position. Twenty metres off the port bow. The current’s already dragging him toward the rocks.
I see Tom in the Y-boat, fighting to control it, shouting words I can’t hear.
I see Cal at the helm, already turning the lifeboat, but he’s too far, too slow, the current’s too strong—
I see the throw line, coiled at my feet.
And I move.
Later, I won’t remember making the decision. Won’t remember calculating the distance, the drift, the angle of throw. It’s just there – Grandad’s voice in my head, patient and sure, the way he was when he taught me to cast a line in the harbour when I was seven years old.
Lead the target. Account for the wind. Follow through.
The line sails out across the water.
It lands two metres ahead of Jude – exactly where the current will carry him in the next three seconds.
He grabs it.
‘I’VE GOT HIM!’ I’m hauling before I’ve finished shouting, the rope burning through my palms, my whole body braced against the rail. ‘BILL HELP ME—’
Bill’s there. Then Cal leaves the helm, adding his strength to mine. We pull together, fighting the current, fighting the weight of a man in waterlogged gear, fighting the Atlantic itself.
Jude’s face appears at the rail. White. Gasping. Alive.
We haul him over the side and he collapses on the deck, coughing up seawater, shaking so hard I can hear his teeth chatter.
‘The line,’ he manages between gasps. ‘The Y-boat—’
‘I know.’ I’m already moving. ‘I see it.’
The fouled tether is still a problem. Tom’s struggling to control the Y-boat, the debris wrapped tight around the connection point, and the third casualty is still on the sinking yacht.
But I can see how it’s tangled. Can see the point where one cut will release the tension, free the line, give Tom the slack he needs to manoeuvre.
‘Knife,’ I bark at Bill. He hands me one without question.
I lean over the rail – further than is safe, further than is smart – and I cut.
The line releases. The Y-boat surges forward. Tom gets control, gets to the yacht, gets the last casualty aboard.
And I sit back on the deck, knife still in my hand, lungs burning, heart pounding, and think: We did it. We actually did it.
Beside me, Jude is still shaking. Still coughing. Still alive.
His hand finds mine on the wet deck.
He doesn’t say anything.
Neither do I.
The journey back is quiet.