D is for Drunk (2 page)

Chapter 40

Chapter 41

Chapter 42

Other Books in the Series

Also by Rebecca Cantrell

Also by Sean Black

Copyright © 2016 by Rebecca Cantrell & Sean Black

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

Created with
Vellum

CHAPTER 1

S
ofia coughed out seawater and made a mental note never to follow through on a crazy middle of the night scheme again. Last night she’d watched a documentary about surfing, and as she snuggled into her warm bed she’d decided to become a better swimmer by running down to the beach and practicing every morning before work. After a few weeks, she’d be swimming like a dolphin or paddling like a surfer. What could be easier?

But dolphins had blubber and surfers had wetsuits, and now she knew why. The cold water of the Pacific Ocean slapped her breath away, and she treaded water to try to get it back. She should have come in slowly, gotten used to the temperature, given herself time to decide to get a coffee instead. She’d convinced herself it was like taking off a Band-Aid—best to rip it off all at once and not draw it out. So, she dove in and swam as hard as she could for the horizon. Not the smartest move, she could see that now.

She counted three surfers—red board, white board, and blue board. They all wore black wetsuits, and none of them looked cold. Maybe she should do her swimming in a heated pool, one where she could reach and out and touch the side, one with a coffee shop.

The ocean fell away under her, and a giant wave loomed over her head. ‘Turtle through it!’ said a voice in her head. Some character from last night’s movie. Deciding he probably knew what he was walking about, she dove underneath the wave and swam, pulling with her arms and kicking hard with her legs until she made it through. She swam another body length before surfacing.

No big waves coming in after that one, so she turned to watch the surfers ride the wave she’d passed through. Red Board knew what he was doing. He caught a good piece of the wave and rode it toward shore, balanced on his board with his arms extended. Blue Board must have decided to miss it, because he sat on his board behind the wave, looking out toward the blue-green horizon for the next one. Where was White Board?

She followed the wave back toward shore. She wanted a hot shower. She wanted an even hotter coffee. She wanted to be wearing warm, dry clothes. All three options lay in the same direction.

The wave ahead broke with a boom, and Red Board wiped out into the churning soup in a tangle of arms and legs. Another wave lifted her up, but she was far enough away from shore that the wave wasn’t ready to break yet. Blue Board caught the wave and rode it in, as graceful as her sorta pet seagull, Fred, in flight. Red Board caught the end of the wave and took it in, too, but White Board was still nowhere to be seen.

She stopped swimming and looked for him. His board had been pulled out by the previous wave, and it bobbed along on top of the water not too far from her like an ice floe. She had a funny feeling in her stomach that didn’t come from the cold, and she swam quickly toward the scrap of white.

With one hand still paddling, she grabbed the board and checked the back. A white line hung down from the end—the surfboard’s leash. Surfers used the leash to attach the surfboard to their ankle. Maybe the leash had slipped off his ankle. Or maybe not.

Gulping in a deep breath, she dove, following the leash down. A few feet under she discovered the leash was attached to a foot. The foot’s owner was still, eyes closed, skin a watery green.

She hooked one arm through his armpit and pulled him toward the surface. A long ago class at the YMCA bubbled up into her mind, and she remembered you were never supposed to rescue someone in the water by grabbing them, because they could start thrashing and drown you. Use a pool ring, use a shepherd’s crook. Use any one of a bunch of devices she didn’t have.

His weight dragged her down, but she kept kicking. Her lungs told her she didn’t have much more time to screw around underwater, and she kicked harder. She couldn’t let him drop down to the end of his leash and drown.

Her face broke the surface, and she sucked in a deep breath, holding the man’s chin up out of the water, in case he decided to start breathing, too.

He didn’t.

She wrestled him half onto his board, turned him onto his side, and started waving for help. The beach had a lifeguard, so she just had to get his attention and he’d know what to do. She had no idea what came next. The useful details of the class at the Y were gone.

Waving for help didn’t seem to be working. Maybe she should take off her bikini top and wave it around her head like a flag. Maybe that would attract some paparazzi in kayaks who could make themselves useful. She yelled, but no one could hear it over the surf, no matter how much she projected.

Finally, something seemed to work. The lifeguard ran from his station carrying a long red surfboard. He looked faraway and small, but he was heading toward them. Help was on its way, and hopefully it would come soon enough.

Another wave lifted them and dropped them again. She needed to get the guy to shore, but didn’t know how to maneuver through a breaking wave with a surfboard without wiping out. The last thing this guy needed was another dunking. She held him steady on the board and thumped him on his back. The guy had been underwater for maybe a minute, out of it for about the same amount of time. He had to start breathing soon.

As if he read her thoughts, he spat out a mouthful of water and took in a deep breath.

She wanted to call out a thank you to the sky. “Are you all right?”

“I’m OK.” His voice sounded like a long-time smoker’s. He coughed again, then put a shaky hand up to the back of his head.

“The lifeguard’s on his way.” She kept her hand on his back, holding him on the board.

He showed her a palm wet with blood, then dipped his hand in the ocean to clean it off. A trip to the zoo with her niece and nephew had taught her some fun facts.

1. A shark can smell a drop of blood in a million drops of water.
   
2. A shark can smell blood a quarter mile away.
   
3. The Pacific Ocean had lots of sharks, including great whites that could eat them surfboard and all.
   

What was she going to do, tell the guy not to bleed? It wasn’t as if he was doing it on purpose. It wasn’t a lot of blood, but it was definitely more than a drop. She looked around for a gray fin, cutting through the water like in
Jaws
. So far, so good.

He pulled himself all the way up onto the board. Even in a wetsuit, she could tell he was pretty well built—long muscular arms and legs, a mop of shoulder-length black hair, a sexy three-day beard, and green-brown eyes the color of kelp.

“Your head OK?” she asked.

“Just a bump.” He still looked pretty pale, but he sat fairly easily on the board, so that was a good sign.

“Let’s wait for the lifeguard to tow us in.” She suddenly felt tired and cold. Adrenalin was mean that way. She got a stronger grip on the board.

“Would you be more comfortable up here?” he asked.

Unsure how to answer, she nodded.

He reached down and pulled her up next to him. He was a lot stronger than she’d expected. If she were the one drowning, he’d have had no trouble pulling her to the surface.

She wrapped her arms around herself and shivered. “Thanks.”

“I should be thanking you, for saving my life.” He had the most amazing smile. It was wide as the sky and made his brown eyes shine.

She glanced down at his tanned hands. No wedding ring there, nor a tan line to indicate he might have taken one off.

“I was just at the right place at the right time.” And how.

Blue Board came up from the left. With his dark hair slicked back, he looked like a seal. “Jaxon!”

So, Brown Eyes was named Jaxon. It suited him, masculine and a little exotic.

“I’m OK, man,” Jaxon called.

“What happened? You were right next to me.” Blue Board paddled closer.

“My board clocked me on the head, and I went under. I’d be fish food if this pretty lady hadn’t rescued me.” Jaxon pulled out another one of those smiles, and she grinned right back, feeling pretty darn happy he was alive and cute, and she was alive, too, and no sharks were visible.

Blue Board looked at her and his mouth dropped open.

Not this again.

“You’re Sofia Salgado!” he said. “Jaxon, you got saved by Sofia Salgado.”

Jaxon looked at her with the same goofy expression as his buddy. “The half-pint detective?”

Blue Board was an enthusiastic guy. “It’s like being saved by Pamela Anderson Lee from
Baywatch
. Wow!”

Technically, Sofia felt, she’d had to work harder than Pamela Anderson Lee would have, since she didn’t have surgically implanted double D flotation devices in her chest.

“The most important thing is that you’re all right,” she said.

“I’m...umm...” Jaxon sputtered out into speechlessness. He looked bashful. Cute, but not what she’d been hoping for.

“Is everything OK?” The lifeguard drew up next to them. She recognized him.

“Hi, Tony,” she said. “Jaxon here got hit by his board and dragged under, but he seems OK now. Except a bump on the head. And he’s bleeding.”

“Miss Salgado pulled me up and saved my life,” Jaxon said.

“Let’s get you back to shore, see if you need an ambulance,” Tony said.

“I’m fine.” Jaxon shifted on the board. “Just a knock on the noggin. I can paddle back.”

“My board’s motorized. Not a problem. ” Tony clipped his red board onto the end of Jaxon’s board, and they headed toward the beach. Being towed was sure a lot easier than swimming. Blue Board was having to work to keep pace.

“I sure appreciate you coming along when you did, Miss Salgado,” Jaxon said.

“Sofia,” she said. “Just Sofia.”

“My name’s Jaxon Ford.” He pulled one hand off the board and held it out to her. “You can call me Jaxon.”

She shook his hand. He had a strong grip, and his hand felt surprisingly warm.

CHAPTER 2

A 
little wave hit them broadside, and the board tipped. She grabbed it with both hands again, but Jaxon didn’t. He shifted his weight to match the water.

“You must be a good surfer,” she said, not letting go of her death grip on the fiberglass. She didn’t want to go back into the cold water by herself.

“It’s my first time,” he said. “And I practically got myself killed.”

He still seemed a lot more confident on the board than she was.

“Freak accident,” she said. “Could have happened to anyone.”

“Do you rescue all of them?”

“You’re the first one I’ve rescued,” she said.

“Really?”