First Light

by Isabel Jolie

  “Erik told me I hadn’t broken any US laws.”

  He shoved his hands into his pockets and nodded. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

  I followed him down the stairs and to the front door. The palm trees along the street bent in the wind. As he drove away, in an entourage of golf carts for his investigative team, Poppy approached, her long skirt blowing out in front of her like a sail, her hands planted to her front, holding it down in place over her underwear. She waved her arm, and I stepped down my porch steps to meet her in the yard.

  “We’re flying out in the morning. Up to New York. Gabe wants to get the plane far away. We just got back from taking our boat in for dry storage. To be safe. Do you want to fly up with us? Get away? I think we have room for your dog.”

  My dog! Nym. He’s at Logan’s.

  “Cali, are you okay?”

  “Yes, yes. Ah, thank you, but no, I’ll stay here. I’ll be fine.”

  “They’re saying it’s gonna hit as a three or a four. You don’t want to stay here. Head out with us.”

  “It’s okay. I’ll be fine. Really.”

  “Well, Gabe has a crew that’s boarding up our place, and they’re almost done. Do you want to have them put some plywood on your windows?”

  “No need. I have metal shutters on all the windows. I just need to click a button.”

  “Are you serious? Gabe is going to be installing those after this storm. I think he’s pissed he didn’t think about state-of-the-art storm protection already. But it’s not the wind that’s the worst. It’s the flooding. Why don’t you come with us? Even if you’re fine, you’re gonna be without electricity for days. That’s no fun. And Gabe said mandatory evacuations have started. You’re not going to have a choice.”

  “This is America. There’s always a choice.” The wind whipped strands of hair into my eyes, and I struggled to pull it back into a clasp.

  “Poppy, get away from her,” Gabe shouted from his porch. His alarmed expression stirred nausea. Bile rose in my throat.

  “Babe, what the fuck?” Poppy smiled, amused. Not understanding.

  “Gabe, I can explain.” But his stern expression warned me there would be no explaining. Another friend was about to be ripped from my life.

  “No need to explain. News around here travels fast. Come on, Poppy. We have to go.”

  “Will someone please explain what the bloody Nora is happening here?”

  Before I could say another word, Gabe pulled Poppy away, their bickering floating in the wind.

  I jogged to Logan’s house. The regular beats of my shoes on pavement kept my fraying insides intact. Other than the wind, there were no signs of an impending storm. The sky wasn’t bright blue, but no signs indicated a monster storm hurled our way.

  Nym greeted me at the unlocked door. “Poor buddy. I completely forgot about you. I’m so sorry. I’ve had the worst day.” I opened the door wide so he could relieve himself. The blanket I’d used this morning remained thrown haphazardly across the sofa. I folded the blanket and picked up my dirty coffee cup. This morning, it was a different world. I’d been sad, mourning my mother, and my family, but by evening, it felt like a month had passed in one day. As sad as I had been in the morning, I’d had Logan, and that had been enough.

  An intense, saturated pain pressurized my chest. “I love you, Logan.”

  Nym trotted up to my side, and I bent down and buried my face in his neck. When I rose, I could barely see through the tears, but I knew what I had to do.

  Chapter 27

  Logan

  * * *

  Tamara tapped lightly on my office door, interrupting my meeting with Chad, the mayor.

  “Last email’s gone out. Last ferry is at noon today,” Tamara informed us. We’d been in full preparation mode for three days. At this point, we’d battened down as much as possible, and few residents remained.

  “You’ll be on it? Or are you getting out earlier?” Chad asked her.

  “I’m planning on catching the ten. I’m going to stay at my sister’s in Raleigh. They’re saying it may hit as a four.”

  “Sounds good,” Chad told her. “Thanks for all your help. Get out of here and stay safe.”

  “When are you both leaving?” she asked.

  Chad leaned back in the guest chair, stretching, so relaxed you’d think he was talking about his golf game. “Me and the missus will head out shortly. I’m going to take my boat over to dry storage, and then we’re going out to visit my son in Chattanooga. I figure it’ll be a mess here for a while. Where are you going?” He directed his question pointedly at me.

  “Haven’t decided.”

  “But you’re getting out, right?”

  I chugged on a bottle of water. I’d been up all night and hadn’t made it home yet. I craved a toothbrush and a splash of water on my face. The damn beard itched like hell. When I got home, I couldn’t wait to shave the thing off. I’d only been keeping the aggravating thing because a certain someone said she liked the way it felt on her thigh.

  “Logan? You’re not signing one of those waivers, are you?” Chad’s question sounded more like a command.

  “No.” His question reminded me, though, of the form I needed to deliver to two residents who right now were refusing to leave the island. Butch Buchanan, an old, retired realtor, claimed he’d never evacuated and never would. Called mandatory evacuations bullshit. Then there was Alice Santera, an older woman on the island who fed all the stray cats. I had more concern for the elderly woman than I did for Butch. “But you just reminded me I need to take these forms around. After I make it home.”

  “Did the Coast Guard finish packing sandbags?”

  “They finished about five a.m. We’re in a good place. I need to make rounds one last time. Do you think you’d be able to convince Butch or Alice?”

  “Those are our last two?”

  “They both said they’d sign away rights.” Under orders of mandatory evacuation, if one stayed, they had to waive all rights to emergency assistance and essentially say they knew their lives were in danger. If they received emergency help, they would have to pay for it.

  “Did you ask them for their social security numbers so you can ID the bodies? That worked in Virginia.”

  “No.” I scratched my beard. My dry eyes ached. The last couple of days had been filled with boarding up windows, moving deck furniture, and even shoveling sand and building sandbag walls.

  “You like you’re about dead on your feet.” Chad stood and pointed his index finger at Tamara, taking charge. “You, missy, you get out of here. We’ll be in touch after it hits.” She flashed a smile, waved, and exited the building. “And you,” he swung the finger at my chest, “get home. Shower. I’ll swing by and talk with Alice and Butch. I’ll text you and let you know how it goes. Then you can do whatever you need to do, but I want you on that noon ferry. You got it?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Your buddies are already out of here, right?” Chad hung back, watching me close my office. For whatever reason, I locked the door.

  “Gabe and Poppy flew out two days ago. Tate and Luna sailed north. I think he plans on docking in Annapolis.”

  “He’s banking on the storm not heading up the coast, huh?”

  “Well, aren’t they saying it’s going to head inland?”

  “You’re new here. If you’d been around long enough, you’d know those weather people don’t know shit.”

  “Yeah.” I’d been hearing that for days, but it certainly seemed to me the monster storm on the radar screen was headed this way.

  “You hear from your girlfriend?”

  Robert and Samuel entered the building, and I used the opportunity to duck Chad’s question.

  “Hey, guys. Last ferry at noon.”

  “We’re aware.” Of course they were.

  “We stopped by your place and boarded up the windows. But now we need to get back on the mainland. We’ve got our own homes to get prepped.”

  “You b
oth go. Stay safe. And thanks for everything.” They’d worked through the night.

  “Did you decide where you’re going to hunker down?” Samuel asked me.

  “Not yet. I’ll probably get in my car and drive west. I want to be close enough that I can come back over after she hits.”

  Samuel nodded, and I got a whiff of his pungent body odor as he stepped closer.

  “Well, don’t push it. Traffic reports are bad right now.” He held his hand out to shake, and it felt wrong. Final. I wanted to push his hand away but sucked it up and gave his hand a vigorous shake then patted him on his back.

  “Any more from the FBI?” Samuel asked. He’d been smart enough to know he walked on tender territory, but he couldn’t help but lodge a question every few hours. International crime. Right here. The sort of shit cops lived for. But not me. I felt sick.

  “No news.” And I didn’t want to talk about it. “Let’s get out of here. Good work, team. I think we’re about as locked down as we can be. Chad, I’ll be looking for your text.”

  Back at my house, my windows were indeed boarded up with plywood. I opened the back door, and the emptiness hit me first. The blanket Cali had been using was folded neatly. The kitchen counter gleamed white. The coffee pot sat unused.

  In my bedroom, I physically flinched at the row of empty hangers on the portion of the closet she’d been using. She’d moved everything out. The empty dog bed mocked me.

  I brushed my face. Pulled out my shaving kit, took scissors to my beard. Then I foamed up and shaved off the dark bush. In the mirror, the clean skin shone whiter. I ran the shower hot until the steam fogged the mirror. The scalding water pounded my back, my face, my scalp. Exhaustion helped to mask the deep ache, but even in my sleep-deprived state, I recognized it for what it was—a mask.

  When the water lost its heat, I ended the shower. A low-level throbbing emanated from behind my eyes, and my stomach churned, reminding me I’d had nothing but water and coffee. After getting dressed, I opened the refrigerator.

  In stacked plastic containers, our leftover meals from the night before I discovered the truth about her rested next to a round wrapped tray of cinnamon buns. A note attached, in her handwriting, included cooking instructions. On the second shelf, a new oversized jar of grape jelly bore a yellow Post-it note. I lifted it.

  “Don’t forget to eat. Fresh bread and peanut butter are in the cabinet. Stay safe. I never meant to hurt you. I assume you know everything from Matt, but if you have any additional questions, please ask. I love you, always. Cali.”

  I balled up the note and tossed it in the trash.

  Then I picked up the phone. No text from Chad yet. I hoped he could convince that stubborn old woman to get off the island. But if he couldn’t, I planned on staying. I’d check on her before the storm hit and after. Same with Butch. Funny how all the people staying on the island and risking their necks were singles.

  I pressed Matt’s name and held the phone to my ear.

  “Hey. Was wondering when I’d hear from you. You all evacuated?”

  “Haven Island is cleared.”

  “You’re staying?” I noted the tinge of disapproval.

  “Yep.”

  “Is that safe?”

  “We’ve got a lighthouse that’s been here for almost two hundred years. I can hunker down. I’ll be fine.”

  “Okay. Well, call me when it’s over. Let me know you survived.”

  “Will do.” Out of habit, I dragged my fingers across my now smooth skin. “So, did you end up pressing charges?” I had no need to ask, but curiosity prevailed.

  “No. She’s been assisting us.”

  “Did she ask for immunity?”

  “No. Hasn’t even asked for a lawyer.”

  “What?”

  “She handed over her phone, computers, servers. Everything. I know you’re pissed at her, but from what I can tell, she hasn’t done anything wrong. At least, from a legal perspective. And, yeah, she knew some of what her brother was up to, but I think he kept her mostly in the dark. Probably for her own safety. She looked pretty broken when I last saw her. You may want to check up on her.”

  “She’s probably on her way back to Seattle.”

  “No. She told me she’d be on Haven Island if I needed her.”

  “Are you tracking her?”

  “No. NSA doesn’t have authority to monitor US citizens on US soil. You know that. Besides, she gave me her phones.”

  “Oh, man. She’s probably out of the country by now.” How’d they screw this one up so bad?

  “Maybe. But I don’t think so.”

  “You screwed up. You should’ve filed charges. Kept her in custody.”

  “For what? We have nothing to charge her with.”

  My addled brain didn’t fully process his statement. Exhaustion smothered logical thought processes. Maybe she had broken no specific outdated US laws, but she’d lied to me.

  For the hell of it, I jumped on the department’s ATV and roamed the beaches one last time. The waves had grown, and whitecaps dotted the deep blue across the horizon. The wind had stalled, and the horizon held a foreboding dark hue. However, if you looked to the mainland, the sky shone blue. The dichotomy struck me as eerie. There were no birds, seagulls, pelicans, anything, as far as the eye could see. Silence and suffocating humidity prevailed. Under the blanket of heavy, still heat, I found it hard to breathe.

  All the ocean homes had either been boarded up or had metal shutters pulled down. Many of the homes had sandbags around the basement level, but they had built the vast majority of these homes with hurricanes in mind. It was why many of these homes were built on pilings and living areas were almost always on the second floor. Some homes had nothing but parking and a stairwell on the ground floor. They prepared these homes for the incoming tide.

  My thumb slipped on the accelerator as I passed Cali’s home. All the pots of plants that decorated the stairs were gone. They had pulled metal shutters down on all the windows and doors. The place looked secure. Matt had mentioned she had a safe room hidden behind a bookshelf. I stared at the house, searching for signs of life. She’d still have Nym with her, and he’d need to go for a walk, so the fact even the doors were locked up meant she had evacuated. Like I told Matt, he’d probably screwed up by letting her roam free.

  My phone rang, and I answered it as I pressed the accelerator.

  “We got Butch to come with us. No luck with Alice. She’s worried about those cats.”

  “I’ll see what I can do.”

  “Try the social security number trick on her.”

  “Will do.”

  “If you can get her to the marina by eleven, she can ride over with us.”

  “And then where is she gonna stay? I’m not sure she even has a car on the mainland side.”

  “That’s the problem, isn’t it? Butch is riding with us now to Tennessee. Turns out he has a cousin near Chattanooga. And I had to promise him we wouldn’t stay more than a week.”

  “I don’t think the prospect of hanging out in the Wilmington Y is going to appeal to Alice.”

  “It’s more appealing than death.”

  “Maybe to some,” I mumbled.

  When I arrived at Alice’s, I parked in front and scouted her yard. Her home was against the marsh and would be protected by the low-lying trees. But the tide was rising. Chances were her first floor would take in water. Her house was up off the ground, but not a full story up. I pounded on her dark green door. The plantation shutters had been pulled closed, and I couldn’t see inside at all.

  I called Chad and reported back.

  “Really? Well, maybe we talked some sense into her.”

  I doubted it. My gut told me she was upstairs, settled in with all her felines, and she just didn’t feel like fighting with one more person about her decision to stay.

  From the seat of the department’s ATV, I watched the last ferry leave. The only people on board were the crew, and a handful of realtor management
personnel who’d been busy until the last minute taking care of rental properties. I drove away without speaking to anyone, not wanting to deal with the hassle of answering questions about my choosing to stay.

  I locked my doors, kicked off my boots, and crashed face first onto my mattress.

  Hours later, a loud crash woke me. The pitch-black room unsettled me. I rubbed my face rapidly while listening to the howling wind outside. I made myself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and ate it in the dark, listening. None of the digital clocks showed the time. We’d lost electricity.

  The wind had grown strong, but I didn’t hear rain yet. Alice probably sat in her home alone, too. If she and I were the only two on the island, it made sense we should weather the storm together. I pulled on a windbreaker and my boots, grabbed a flashlight and my phone, and headed out the door, back to the ATV.

  I cut down the south side of the island, then through the middle. Pitch black enveloped the whole place. Not a star in the sky. The only light source came from my single headlight. The wind had grown to an almost deafening level.

  As I cut across the middle of the island, for no reason in particular, it occurred to me I hadn’t been down business row. The back alley held the sewage entrance for the island and the trash department. Plus, a few random businesses. I drove down the street, searching for any loose item, any forgotten chair or potted plant that would cause havoc tossed by the wind.

  A narrow strip of light emanated from the bottom of a garage door. Curious, I drove to the light. The island lost electricity, so the light meant someone had a generator. The small metal building didn’t have a business sign I could see.

  I knocked on the door. The wind whipped around the corner of the building. Chances were someone just left a light on. But why would this area of the island still have electricity? The high winds blew sticks and dried leaves around. The crickets and frogs had gone silent. The door with the ray of light bothered me. My gut said something wasn’t right.

  I pounded on the door. I shone the flashlight over it. Three deadbolts. There would be no breaking this door down. I tugged on the garage door handle. I strained, lifting from my lower core. Light rain struck my face and back. The outer bands of the storm had arrived.