by Lena North
Shit. This wasn’t going to be easy.
“Can you wait a while with dinner?” he asked. “Let’s go out back and sit for a while.”
“Okay,” she agreed like he’d expected her to. “Has anything bad happened at work?”
He didn’t answer and wished he’d rehearsed what he would say to her because right then, his mind was uncomfortably blank.
“Is everything alright?” she asked when they were seated in her pretty deck-chairs, facing her small garden.
“Look, Mimi,” he murmured. “You told me the other day that I don’t have much free time, and I’ve given that a lot of thought.”
“Okay,” she said. “With another job, it would change. Working in an office would be different.”
He was momentarily stunned. She knew who he was, and what he did. How could she even think he was there to tell her he’d quit the police force and start working in a goddamned office?
“I love my job,” he stated. “I won’t ever quit.”
“Oh.”
“But I have very little personal time right now, and I…” he paused, and then he took the plunge. “I don’t think this is the right time for me to be involved with anyone.”
She blinked.
“What?” she breathed.
“I think you deserve to be with someone who can give you the time you clearly want, and I’m not that person, Mimi.”
“You’re breaking up with me?”
“I’m sorry,” he murmured.
Her soft brown eyes filled with tears and slowly, one rolled down her cheek.
“Did I do something wrong?”
“No,” he protested. “You’re a good woman. You did nothing wrong.”
“But, why? I thought what we had was good?”
“You deserve more.”
“I never asked for more, Joao.”
She actually had, and repeatedly, something he couldn’t blame her for. Being involved with the chief of police in a small town meant being stood up on dates and accepting changed plans with no notice. It meant spoiled dinners and constant interruptions.
“It’s not you, Mimi. This is about me. I just don’t think –”
“That’s bullshit, Joao,” she snapped. “If you don’t want me, just say so.”
He swallowed and decided she deserved honesty.
“I don’t want you,” he said.
She reared back as if he’d slapped her and he knew she hadn’t expected him to say that.
“I think you should leave,” she whispered.
“Yeah,” he said, and added, “I’m sorry, Mimi.”
“No, you’re not,” she hissed.
Joao thought about that on the drive home. She’d been right. He felt bad about how he’d handled it but wasn’t sorry he’d broken up with her.
Roark was waiting for him, and as he pulled off his clothes and walked over the beach, his cousins showed up. No one said a word as they slowly walked into the ocean and then he dove. The sun was touching the horizon, and the golden light made the world around him a soft, turquoise cocoon. He heard a pod of dolphins giggle further out, calling for them to come and play. With a few strong kicks, he joined them and let the water do what it always did to him.
It washed away everything and gave him a sense of peace.
He was sorry for Mimi and wished he hadn’t been such a fool. If he’d broken things off a lot sooner with her, she wouldn’t have been so hurt, and that was on him. But he’d done what was right, and he knew it without a doubt because as they sped along with the dolphins, he wasn’t just at ease with himself.
He felt free.
Chapter Six
Shark
Charlie
Everything felt completely unreal. It was as if I was living someone else’s life, doing things only other people got to do. I lived in a house with two of the genuinely nicest people I’d ever met, and they treated me as if I was their daughter. I spent time with people my age who was funny, kind and treated me as if I was their cousin. I’d learned how to swim, although not very well. I’d stopped locking my bedroom door.
Sebastian had known me as Lottie Norley, but on the Islands, they called me Charlie Torres, and unless Seb walked up and stared me straight in the face I didn’t think he would even recognize me. I had a tan for the first time in my life, and my caramel colored curls were starting to get seriously streaked by the sun. I’d gained some weight, and it looked good on me. I laughed more than I had in my entire life. There was only one thing bothering me, and it bothered me hugely.
My father.
We’d met several times, and we talked. It was stilted and uncomfortable, and everything was so easy with everyone else but ridiculously difficult with him.
Dupree Torres. Barman, beach bum, with an easy grin for everyone and laughter in his eyes. Except when he was with me. Then he closed up and kept his conversation to what could not be described as anything other than platitudes. We’d talked more about the weather than anything else, and since the sun seemed to be shining perpetually on the Islands, we were running out of things to discuss.
It made Pauline unhappy to see us so uncomfortable with each other, so I tried to be cheerful, but it was fake, and he knew it. It made him frown which promptly made me nervous, and we slid back into awkwardness again. And I had no clue how to move us along from how we were together, so I avoided Dupree Torres as much as I possibly could.
Instead, I hung out with my cousins.
I’d had friends as a child and had tried to reconnect with the ones who also had left our church, thinking we had something in common. It turned out we had nothing at all in common. A few of them told me flat-out that they didn’t want to be reminded of how they grew up, and I could tell that the others were very uncomfortable around me. They had been part of a cult. I had grown up in a place where there was a cult, which was hugely different, to me but also to them, so I stopped calling, and they did too.
When I started university, I slowly made a few friends, and I’d thought that, finally, life would begin for real. They started to call me Charlie, I’d been on dates, met my girlfriends at coffee shops between classes, and felt so blissfully normal. And then I met Sebastian.
Now I had my cousins, and I might use them as an excuse for not spending more time with Dupree, but they were also such a treat. They acted as if I belonged, and always would.
I still didn’t swim well, so I didn’t dare to go into the ocean, but sometimes at night, I climbed out on the rocks by Silver beach and sat there with my legs in the water, talking to the dolphins. I wasn’t sure if they lived there, or if they were waiting for me, but as soon as I dipped my feet, someone called out to me. It felt strange at first, and if I’d ever before heard about someone talking to animals, I would have found it earth-shattering and dramatic. Instead, it was oddly ordinary. The dolphins simply treated me as a friend, and we chatted about nothing at all or giggled about what we’d done during the day. I told them about the curry Pauline had cooked and how happy Nicholas had been when he saw it. They shared that they preferred smaller fish because they tasted more and were easier to digest. Dolphins could break wind too, apparently, a fact which made me laugh until I thought I’d fall off the rock I was perched upon. They were complex creatures but simple to be with, and in a way, they taught me how to interact with my cousins. Pauline had told me to go with the flow, and I started to understand what she meant.
I’d talked to Nicholas and Pauline about looking for a job, and they’d told me to wait until I’d been on the Island for at least a month. I’d protested, but they’d been very persuasive, and I’d given in eventually. Then Nicholas had handed me some money, and I’d protested again, and given in, again. After some discussion, they agreed to consider it a loan and that I could pay them back as soon as I dared to access the money I had in my bank account in Prosper.
The cousins all knew how to sail, and everyone seemed to own some kind of
boat. Some had bigger fishing vessels or smaller dinghies, but a few had small catamarans which I really loved. Tina had taken me out on Joao’s cat, and the feeling had been amazing. It felt like I was flying over the water. Roark had a bigger boat which he mostly used to take tourists out around the main island. He seemed to work only when he felt like it and didn’t seem to feel like it a lot, so it wasn’t a surprise when he asked a bunch of us to come with him on a day trip.
It was a surprise, however, to see Joao ambling down the dock with a towel slung over his shoulder and sunglasses covering his eyes. His dreads were shorter than most of the others’, and he’d tied them back for once, which showed off his lean face in a way that was way too attractive, so I looked away. Pauline had told me he had a girlfriend and she hadn’t seemed to like the girl, but the relationship had sounded serious, so I wasn’t going to ogle him. Much.
It was a fantastic day, and we went to one of the smaller islands where no one lived to have a picnic on the beach. On our way back, Roark took us far out on the ocean, and I stood there, watching the endless stretch of water.
“You like,” Tina asked, and she didn’t put it as a question because there wasn’t any need.
“Yeah,” I answered anyway. “Whose bathing suit am I wearing?” I asked then.
She’d just waved her hand dismissively when I tried to give it back to her and told me to keep it. I figured it was one of her own old ones that didn’t fit anymore, but when I saw her in a bikini, I wondered if it ever had.
“Thea’s,” she said.
“Thea?”
“My girlfriend.”
I had vaguely remembered her saying something about being a lesbian that first night but hadn’t wanted to ask because, well, it really wasn’t any of my business.
“Tell her, thanks?” I asked.
“Come to dinner and tell her yourself.”
“I’d love that,” I said. “Is she a nurse too?”
She started laughing and shook her head.
“God, no. She works dispatch at the emergency number. Started out as a firefighter in Prosper but didn’t like it. Went on vacation, met me and just stayed.”
I felt how my face softened because her story was short and to the point, but I heard the affection in her voice.
“Lucky her,” I said.
“Lucky me,” Tina countered.
I was about to agree with her when the boat suddenly turned abruptly. I hadn’t been prepared, so I lost my footing and stretched both my hands out to grab the railing. I missed it and toppled right over the edge and straight into the water.
It was cold, and I got some of it down my throat, but I wasn’t afraid. Since I wasn’t a good swimmer, Roark had put a small life vest on me, so I knew I’d float easily, and they’d turn around and pull me out. Loud cheers echoed from the boat, and I was laughing back at them when the happy sounds turned to shouts of warning. I turned, and my blood froze when I saw the fin moving my way. The dolphins were very proud of their curved fins and were forever bragging about them, but this one was straight, so I knew what was approaching.
The shark wasn’t moving fast, but it was aiming for me and just kept coming.
“Move away from it, Charlie, we’re coming!”
My friends were calling out from all around me, and I tried to turn to move out of its path. It hit me on the side, and it hurt, but it hadn’t clamped its jaws around me as I thought it would. The fin disappeared, and I took a deep breath and went under the surface, trying to find it. The huge gray shape was circling around and started moving toward me again, and this time, it opened its mouth.
If I hadn’t been under water, I would have screamed. Fear sent tingles down the sides of my legs, and my whole body seemed to lock in place as I prepared for the attack to happen.
The shark was less than four feet away when a strong arm curved around my waist, and I was yanked out of the way. In the corner of my eye, I saw the side of Joao’s face, but we were moving so fast the water made my sight blurry. I turned my head to look where the shark was and saw a big group of dolphins circling it. One of them swam straight into the shark’s side, hitting it with his nose, and the shark turned away from me. Then another dolphin came at if from the other side and hit it lower, almost in the belly. I saw another dolphin rush toward the bigger animal but then we breached the surface, and I coughed and spluttered while Joao moved us toward the approaching boat.
Before I knew it, I was hauled out of the water and deposited on the deck. I pushed wet hair out of my face and tried to catch my breath.
“Are you okay?” Joao said next to me. “Tina, come and check her out!”
I looked at him and pushed out a startled, “Eek!” He froze, and I focused on keeping my eyes on his face. “Why are you naked?” I squealed.
Someone threw him a towel, and he wrapped it over his lap.
“I had to get in quickly,” he muttered.
Had he been naked before I fell overboard? I was pretty sure I would have noticed, so I didn’t understand. Adrenaline was also rushing through me, my head spun, and weak laughter pushed its way up my throat.
“Okay,” I said, trying not to blush.
“Okay,” he echoed.
“How do you feel,” Tina asked, and I felt her hands twisting me around, so she could look at my side where the shark had hit me.
“I’m good,” I said, and when no one said anything, I added, “That was one big shark, though.”
“That’s all you have to say?”
“What else is there to say?” I asked back.
Then my eyes slid downward, and I closed them immediately.
“Charlie, what’s wrong?” Joao asked, and I could hear the worry in his voice.
I still did not open my eyes again.
“You have to get dressed or move the towel,” I whispered. “I can still see your –”
He walked away abruptly, so I opened my eyes again, and they met Roark’s. He was grinning widely as he shook water out of his dreads and all over me. Then I realized his shorts were dry.
“Were you naked too?” His grin faded away, and I moved to get up, but a firm hand held me back.
“Calm down, Charlie,” Tina murmured in my ear.
“What the hell?” I squealed.
Joao crouched down next to me again, now dressed in his shorts and a loose tee.
“We’ll get you back to Uncle Nico’s house. You have a scrape on your side I want him to look at. We have a few things to explain too, but we’ll do that back at the house, okay?”
He put that as a question but in reality, it wasn’t one, so I nodded mutely.
“You saved me,” I said. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome,” he said quietly.
“The dolphins saved me too. Can I say thank you to them before we go?”
The lines around his eyes deepened, and the look on his face was so sweet I had to look away for a second. A few of his dreadlocks had fallen out of the leather strap he’d used to tie them back, and before I could stop myself, I stretched a hand up and moved them away from his face.
“They’ll like that,” he said.
I leaned over the railing and put my hand in the water, cupping it so I could splash some on my face. Then I kissed my fingertips and touched the surface.
“Thank you,” I called out.
There was an echo of sounds all around the boat suddenly, and it sounded a little like soft laughter. As we started to move, I laughed with them. The shark attack had been scary, and maybe I should be more shook up from it than I was, but I’d been protected. Joao and Roark had been there and the dolphins too. In a strange way, it felt as if I knew that whatever happened, I would have managed to get away. I didn’t know how but I would have.
***
Nicholas checked my side and hip, and I had some shallow scrapes and a bruise, but since the shark had only bumped me and not dug his teeth into my flesh, I was surprisin
gly unharmed.
“So,” I said when I limped out on the courtyard in a loose dress to find Tina, Roark, and Joao waiting for me. “Got bruised again, but lucky me, he didn’t bite.”
“That type of shark will bump their prey a few times first,” Joao said. “Tenderize the meat or stun you into not moving or both. Once it’s good and ready, it’ll grab you and pull you down for a bit. When you’re bleeding enough, it’ll let go and let you bleed out before he starts eating.”
Yikes. That was a bit more detail than I actually wanted.
“He might have bit you some, but they want fatty meat. Seals or turtles is what they want. I don’t think he would have actually eaten you.”
I blinked.
“It was a he?” I asked, and added sarcastically, “Of course it was.”
“Yup,” he said. “You could have gotten hurt a lot worse, but very few actually die from shark attacks.”
I stared at him, wondering if he was joking, but he seemed earnest and calmly held my gaze.
“Oh, okay,” I snapped. “Guess I was lucky.” Then I remembered that I hadn’t actually been lucky. He’d come to my rescue. Naked. “Or, um…” I mumbled.
“Right,” he sighed. “There are some things you should know.”
“Probably,” I said when he made a pause which was uncomfortably long.
Then he pulled his hands over his head to push the dreadlocks back and leaned forward.
“So, yeah. We told you how the d’Izias have the sight. And I know it’s hard to grasp, but I also shared how the Jamieson’s and the Torres’ interact with the dolphins.”
He’d narrowed his eyes and was watching me in a weird way. It was as if he expected me to say something or do something.
“And?” I prompted after a while.
“And what?”
“I’m not a genius in any way, but that was actually not very difficult to understand. I talk to the dolphins, remember?”
“You weren’t clear enough, Joao,” Roark snorted.
“The Jamieson’s can talk to the dolphins, and the Torres’ interact with the ocean a different way,” Joao said.
