Beach Blondes

by Katherine Applegate; Michael Grant

  Suddenly, out of nowhere, a blizzard swirled around her, a tornado of tiny silver-and-black fish that sparkled like diamonds in the flickering shafts of sunlight and blocked her view of Seth. In her various practice dives, Summer had never seen more than a few distant fish and, once, a graceful stingray. Now it was if she had been invited to join the school of fish as it darted left and right, seemingly all of one mind, then shot forward, following some unknowable logic.

  Just as suddenly as it had come, the blizzard of fish blew away and there was Seth, wiggling his eyebrows, an expression that Summer translated as “wasn’t that cool?” She nodded.

  The wreck of the freighter was scarcely recognizable at first. It looked more like a natural phenomenon, a rusted, shell-encrusted, half-buried reef shaggily adorned with waving seaweed.

  But as they got closer, Summer could see the distinctive outlines of a large ship lying on its side, the superstructure mostly buried, the hull still rising from the sea bed.

  It was this strange, out-of-place work of man that made Summer feel most alien. She was flying far above it, hovering over it like an ungainly, slow-motion bird. She felt a passing moment of giddiness, a fear of heights, as if she might at any moment lose the buoyancy of the water and fall the twenty or thirty feet to the dead ship.

  Seth led the way down, gliding through the separate beams of milky sunlight, one moment dark, the next bright. Summer kept close to him, oppressed by the sense of distant tragedy. Had people died here, going down with this ship?

  Summer and Seth skimmed above the ship’s crusty flank, inches above the hull, like airplanes buzzing a landing field. She touched the ship, surprised at the sensation—it was hard and real and substantial. She glanced ahead and saw that Seth was standing upright, using his hands to keep his balance. He waved for her to come.

  He was standing beside a huge, jagged tear in the ship’s side. The death wound, Summer had no doubt. She looked down into the darkness of the ship. And then, from the dark gash a pop-eyed face appeared, a large fish that looked for all the world like a grumpy old man who’d been awakened from his nap. It floated out and past them, nearly three feet long and in no hurry at all.

  Summer gazed around more closely, looking less at the wreck of the ship and more at all the living things on or around or within it. Tiny shells clustered on the hull, each a living creature; the octopus that scuttled along, a liquid flurry of graceful motion; the amazing snail that crept toward her foot. There were small forests of soft, willowy plants that made a home for crabs and squid and rays. Fish, big and small, alone or in schools, darted in and out, up and down, crossing between her and the sun above like flights of birds.

  In a single moment of awareness she realized that the dead ship was no longer dead. The machine that had failed to protect its human cargo now protected an entire universe of colorful, indescribably strange, stunningly creative, incredible life.

  A moment ago she had been sad, seeing only a wreck. Now she smiled—as well as she could with a regulator in her mouth—and felt a surge of happiness. It was a new, unexpected sort of happiness, a satisfied feeling that had nothing directly to do with her own wants and desires. It was funny, really, Summer thought, the way she got caught up in her own minuscule fears and worries, her own tiny plans, as if she were the star in the big story of the universe.

  Just like the people on this ship who had probably seen nothing but tragedy when it sank, perhaps the confirmation of their own minuscule fears and the end of their own tiny plans. Those people had not been the whole story, either. A much bigger story was being told.

  Summer laughed an explosion of bubbles. And then, for some reason that she could not possibly have explained in words, she swam over to Seth. She caught his hands in hers and drew him into a swirling, giddy dance that went round and round and round, a slow tornado of bubbles and limbs caught in a shaft of sunlight.

  “So, aren’t you going to ask me about the trip?” Mallory Olan demanded. She was in the passenger seat of the Mercedes, having said she was just too exhausted to drive after the overnight flight in from the West Coast.

  Mallory looked almost nothing like her daughter. She was expensively, if loudly, dressed. Her hair was big and out of a bottle. It was flattened a little in back from leaning against the airline seat.

  Diana hated to drive with her mother in the car. It wasn’t that her mother criticized her driving; she rarely did. Rather it was that Diana had to cope with morbid fantasies of running the car into a concrete abutment and killing her mother. It wasn’t exactly a wish, and it wasn’t exactly a fear. But it was distracting.

  “How was your trip?” Diana asked.

  Mallory began to tell her, in great detail, and after a few minutes Diana forgot her mother was talking. This day was not even supposed to come. At one point Diana had nearly decided that she would be dead on the day her mother returned. She’d played that scene so many times in her mind that it seemed unreal that her mother should now be here, right beside her, chattering away and complaining, and Diana, far from being dead, was being forced to interject semi-interested “uh-huhs” and “hmms.”

  Well, maybe that wasn’t so far from being dead.

  Diana popped in a CD. Saves the Day. She didn’t especially like them. She only had the CD in the car to annoy her mother.

  “I can’t wait to see Summer,” Mallory said, shouting over the anarchic music. “I feel bad that I haven’t even seen her for more than a minute since she’s been here. What is this music? They’re just screaming.”

  “It’s a tender love song,” Diana said, straight-faced.

  “Why didn’t Summer come with you to pick me up?”

  Diana enjoyed the moment. “Summer is off with a boy she met. I guess they’re going to spend the day scuba diving and nude sunbathing on an uninhabited island. Don’t worry, though. I made sure they packed plenty of sunblock.”

  Okay, so the part about nude sunbathing had been a slight embellishment. And who cared about the sunblock?

  Unfortunately, Mallory didn’t fall for it. “I’m glad she’s meeting people,” she said.

  They arrived at the house, and the housekeeper came out to help with the bags. The phone was ringing as they went inside.

  Her mother grabbed it in the hallway, assuming of course it was for her. And it almost certainly was, Diana thought. She was dragging one bag down the hall when she heard her mother say, “Adam! How nice to hear from you. It’s been a long time.”

  Diana dropped the bag.

  “Yes, I had a fine trip,” Mallory said. “Me, too. Yes, here’s Diana now.” She put her hand over the receiver and in a loud stage whisper called Diana over. “It’s Adam Merrick.” Then she wiggled her eyebrows suggestively.

  Diana took the receiver. Her heart rate had shot up as soon as she’d heard the name Adam.

  “Yes?”

  His voice was curt, cold, formal. “You wanted a meeting. My father is in town today. Four o’clock this afternoon, at the estate. That is, if you’re still sure you want this.”

  He sounded as if he expected her to argue or perhaps to have changed her mind.

  “You and Ross, too,” she said. She glanced at her mother, who was looking expectant, as if somehow Diana might be discussing marriage plans with Adam.

  “Oh, we’ll be there,” Adam sneered.

  Diana hung up the phone.

  “So? So, has something been happening while I was away?” Mallory asked.

  To Diana’s own amazement, she laughed. Well, it was funny. “All sorts of things have happened while you were away,” Diana said.

  15

  Seth Crosses the Line, and Adam Crosses Back Over It

  “If it wasn’t for that beer can, you would almost think no other person had ever been here before,” Summer said, gazing down the beach.

  The boat bobbed contentedly just offshore, pulling at its anchor rope. They had brought their blanket and picnic supplies ashore in a tiny inflatable dinghy, after exhalin
g themselves into a giddy high inflating it. The dinghy was just large enough for their things, with the two of them swimming alongside. Now it sat on the sand, limp and partly deflated.

  They had laid out their blanket under the shade of a stand of palms, enjoying their peanut butter and jelly and sliced turkey sandwiches while they watched pelicans dive-bombing the water.

  For the most part, they’d been silent. It didn’t bother Summer. She’d noticed that this easy silence often fell over them after they went for a dive. As if they were reluctant to reintegrate into the normal world of conversations that were carried on in words rather than gestures.

  Summer stood up, brushing sand off the seat of her bathing suit, and walked up the beach to pry the can out of the wet sand. When she looked back she saw that Seth was bent over, collecting the debris of their picnic and putting it all in a plastic bag. She started back, then paused for a moment, unnoticed by Seth, enjoying the scene. Seth had the gift of seeming perfectly at home in every environment—when he was hammering and sawing and covered with sweat and sawdust; when he was sitting down to a dinner in a nice restaurant wearing the infrequent shirt; when he was underwater in a wet suit or just a bathing suit. She supposed it was something that came from inside him, this easiness in his own skin, the understated confidence. Not showy or charismatic like Adam, just centered and calm and sure of himself.

  Even when he was holding her in his arms, looking solemn and serious, even as he…

  Especially then, Summer realized with a pleasurable twinge. She walked back to him, and he held the bag open for her can. She bent to pick up a sandy crust of peanut butter and jelly sandwich that had fallen.

  Summer wiped her sticky fingers on Seth’s bare, smooth chest.

  “Hey,” he protested.

  “Sorry, I forgot to bring paper towels,” she said.

  “And that’s all I am to you—a paper towel.” He grabbed her and swung her to the ground. In contrast to the roughness with which he’d grabbed her, he kissed her with supreme gentleness, on her forehead, on her closed eyelids, on her throat, on her left ear…on her lips.

  His lips were salty, as Summer supposed she was, herself. Salty and no longer so gentle. He kissed her deeply. Summer wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him closer still, suddenly possessed by a hunger that the peanut butter and jelly sandwiches hadn’t exactly addressed. Summer smoothed her own hands down his sun-warmed back, savoring the heat of his skin. Seth pulled his lips away, but only to kiss her neck, and then to move in slow, ever-so-slow increments toward the first swell of her breast.

  “Um, wait,” Summer said, quite suddenly.

  Seth raised his head and smiled. “Did I cross the ‘line of death’?”

  Summer laughed and kissed him again, but in a way that signaled that they were done—for now. “I don’t know if it’s exactly a ‘line of death.’”

  “But there is a line,” he said.

  “Um, yes. I don’t exactly know where it’s located,” she said, “but I’ll know when you’ve reached it.”

  “Is it”—he touched the swell of her breast where it met the edge of her bathing suit—“there?”

  “Mmm, could be,” she said. “But it’s more like in my head.”

  “Oh, that line,” he said thoughtfully. “You mean the line where you suddenly realize you aren’t exactly thinking clearly anymore and something else is taking over?”

  “So you know that line?” Summer said, trying to make a joke out of it.

  He nodded. “I go there every time I’m with you,” he said seriously. “I’ve been living right on that line since the first time I kissed you in the airport.”

  Summer unintentionally made a little whimpering noise deep in her throat. “Sure. Right. You probably went to the line with lots of girls. Like you never did with Lianne?”

  “Did you with Adam?”

  Yes, she had, Summer realized. On a night that had a certain similarity with this day. There had been a beach. There had been a picnic. It had seemed a perfect day up to that point. And then…

  “I think we should go back in the water,” Summer said, pushing him back, but not urgently.

  “She says, avoiding the question.”

  “I just think we both might cool off a little in the water,” Summer said. She got to her feet and helped drag a reluctant Seth to his.

  “The water’s warm. We’d have to go deep to cool off,” he said. “And you are trying so hard to stay shallow.” He paused for a beat, then grinned unexpectedly.

  Summer began to giggle.

  “Okay, that did sound a little pretentious and serious, even for me,” Seth said. “Come on, let’s get wet.”

  Diana dressed carefully, almost as if she were performing a ritual. She combed her hair. She brushed her teeth. She checked the tape recorder batteries and the tape itself. She slipped the tape recorder into the waistband of her loose-fitting silk slacks and carefully fluffed the tail of her blouse, checking the result in her mirror.

  She had checked it all a dozen times, hundreds, if you counted just running the plan over and over in her mind. The small tape recorder could not be seen or heard. She had taped over the little red indicator light after an early experiment had revealed that it shined through.

  Diana picked up the bag she’d bought. It was a hideous thing. Fortunately, neither Adam nor Ross had ever had much fashion sense when it came to female styles.

  Diana went downstairs, sidling past the kitchen where her mother was talking to the housekeeper.

  She went down to the stilt house and let herself in. It felt odd being there when Summer was away—sneaky, dishonest, like she’d have a hard time explaining herself if anyone discovered her. But Summer was far away, and Diana was confident that Diver would not be around. Summer said he only appeared late at night and early in the morning.

  She got what she needed and left, feeling the weight of the bag on her shoulder.

  She took her own car and drove to the Merrick estate, all the while going over and over what she had to say, how she had to act, the things she had to be careful not to say.

  The Merrick mansion loomed huge and intimidating as she parked her tiny Jetta between a silver-and-black Rolls Royce and a mean, low-slung red Viper.

  I should be afraid, Diana realized. I should be shaking, trembling, the way I was the last time I was here. But as she took internal inventory, she knew she wasn’t afraid. Or if fear was present, it had been transformed somehow, had assumed a new and utterly different shape.

  She took a deep, calming breath and got out. At the door she pressed the buzzer. Then she slipped her hand under the tail of her blouse. And, finally, she squeezed her bag.

  “Do it, Diana,” she muttered under her breath. “Do it.”

  The door opened. She’d expected Manolo, the butler. It was Ross. He leered cockily at her, and she took a step back, shocked.

  Of course. They had deliberately sent Ross, thinking it would unsettle her. She reminded herself of what she had told herself a thousand times already—these were the Merricks. They were experts at using power and intimidation.

  “Hello, Ross,” she said.

  “Why, it’s Diana,” he said. “What a surprise.” He leaned close, to whispering distance. “Come back to get more of what I started to give you?”

  “I’m here to see your father,” Diana said, fighting down the feeling of loathing. The burning anger deep inside her flared. Good. Anger was her friend.

  She followed Ross down the hall, past the gloomy portraits of Merricks past. He led her to a room she’d never been in before, a huge, dark, walnut-paneled library with stacks of leather-bound books. More clever intimidation, she noted, another attempt to make her feel ill at ease.

  She felt like laughing. The Merricks didn’t realize that they were not dealing with the same Diana they’d known. Not anymore.

  Ross pointed to a single chair positioned before a massive desk. Diana sat stiffly, legs crossed. She rested her bag o
n her leg, holding it tight.

  Adam entered the room, dressed in well-weathered but still spotless jeans, and a pale yellow shirt. She recognized the shirt. She had given it to him, part of an attempt to broaden his preppy clothing choices.

  “Hi, Diana,” he said quietly. “It’s good to see you again.”

  For a split second Diana almost believed the warmth in his voice. Almost.

  “I’m sure you’re thrilled that I’m here,” Diana said dryly.

  Then the senator came in. He was a big, impressive man, wearing an expensively tailored suit that did not conceal his beefy shoulders or his spreading waistline. But the good looks he’d passed on to his sons were still in evidence.

  He took a long look at her as he stood behind his desk, surveying her with open disdain.

  It would have worked, Diana realized. Even two weeks ago, a week ago, she would have collapsed. His look, loaded with contempt, would have found resonance in her own mind. Even now she could feel that dark, twisted part of her endorsing his contempt, knowing, as he knew, that she was unworthy to be sitting here.

  But Diana reached out for the new feeling she had allowed to grow. Anger. She let it flare and grow hot, and felt the power of it.

  The senator sat down. His sons arranged themselves on either side of him. He waved a hand toward her. “You had something to say?”

  “Yes, I did,” Diana said.

  “Well, let’s hear it,” the senator said. He glanced at his watch. “What’s this about?”

  “This is about rape.”

  “Attempted rape,” Ross broke in. His father silenced him with a cold glare. The look surprised Diana. She’d thought the senator had treated her with contempt. But the frozen look he’d sent his son showed he was capable of much greater scorn.

  Diana reminded herself to stay steady. She had a game plan worked out. So far it was still on track.

  “Maybe it was just attempted rape,” Diana said. “But maybe it would make a much more interesting story if I left out the word attempted.”