Sunset Bridge (37 page)

She could be wrong, of course. She could be somewhere else, perhaps on the wreckage of a seawall. She needed to rest and continue her exploration when she could.

Only Maggie knew that a brief rest wasn’t going to be enough to help her. She had used up every internal resource getting this far. She could no more climb higher and negotiate what would surely be a precarious path than she could sprout wings and fly to safety. One misstep and she would be in the water again, washing away to who knows where.

The fact that she was still alive was extraordinary. She had
gotten herself to this place using her own strength and determination. But the only way she would survive this night was to summon help. With her free hand she managed to unzip her windbreaker, then the inside pocket. With trembling fingers she fished out the GPS unit. The chances it would still work were small. It was supposed to be waterproof, but it had been submerged a long time, not briefly dunked or rained on. And even if it
was
working, she didn’t know if she could get a signal in this weather.

With her fingernail, she dislodged the casing over the SOS button and held it down. She thought a light was supposed to blink, but for five long seconds, nothing happened. Despair filled her, then the faintest tinge of green appeared.

For a moment she couldn’t believe it. Could this really mean that the signal had been sent? That her coordinates could be mapped? That rescue personnel might be dispatched to find her?

She examined the unit again, looking for the button that provided a direct link to Felo. If she pushed this one, her SOS would also be sent to him, along with her coordinates. She didn’t hesitate. If nothing else, if he received a message saying that she had tried to reach him, at least he would know she had thought of him. There was no hope of a personal message, not in this downpour, but at least she could let him know she had trusted him to try to help her.

She held the button down and raised the unit above her head for as long as she could, so the satellite would have a chance to find her coordinates.

And finally, waves still crashing against her legs, she cradled the GPS in her hands and murmured a prayer.

Awareness came slowly. She was lying on something hard and rough. Wind howled all around her, and water was
sloshing all the way to her waist now. Her arm seemed to be tethered, and at first she thought she was back at the fish camp, hands tied to a post, with Blake taunting her. She heard voices, but she was too exhausted to open her eyes.

“Maggie!”

She didn’t want to answer. She wouldn’t give Blake the satisfaction of a reply.

But this voice was not Blake’s.

Startled, she tried to sit up, but something was holding her down. Memory returned in bits and pieces. The boat. The water. The oarlock that had saved her life. Then…

“Maggie!”

She realized that somehow she had managed to slip her arm under the rod in the concrete, the rebar that had once been part of some collapsed structure.

The bridge.

She had passed out, but before she did, she had slipped her arm under the rod, effectively pinning herself in place. The GPS seemed to be gone. Or perhaps she had zipped it back in her pocket.

But someone was calling her name.

“Here,” she rasped. “Here.”

She could hardly hear herself over the roaring of the wind.

“Here!”

A light shone in the darkness, and she heard men’s voices.

“Here,” she said again, a little louder; then she began to cough.

In frustration, she saw that the light was too far to her left. Shouting was futile. She had almost no voice. She couldn’t stand so she could be seen more easily without risking everything. She could only wave her hand, then wave it again.

“Got her!”

She closed her eyes against the sudden brightness, wondering if this was a dream, or if she was dying and this was the white light people claimed to see. But she wasn’t floating above her body. She was tethered to concrete, and even if this was only a dream, it was better than her reality had been.

She heard scraping above her and managed to open her eyes. Something seemed to be dangling in front of her; then she realized the something was legs. A body materialized part by part out of the darkness as it was lowered toward her, strapped inside a harness.

“We’ve got you,” a man’s voice said. “We’re going to haul you up. Can you hang on to me while I get you into this?” He held up another harness.

“No.”

“You’ve got to try.”

“Can’t,” she said. “Want to…”

“Pull that thing up and let me get her. I’ll hold her,” said a voice from above. “Maggie, hang in there. You’re safe now.”

She knew that voice. Had she been able to, she would have smiled.

She tried to answer, and the man swung a little closer. “What’d you say?”

“I know,” she said.

“Know what?”

“Tell Felo. He’s here. I’m safe. I know.” And finally she let herself cry.

W
anda wasn’t sure what the mattress in Marsh’s guest room felt like, hard, soft or Goldilocks in-between. It didn’t matter to her, because she hadn’t once stretched out on it. She hadn’t even changed out of her clothes. She had made a spot for herself and the emergency radio in the den, and that where she was now.

She wasn’t sure how much sleep her housemates got, either. Flashlights flickered through the night as people made trips to the bathroom or got up to peer outside the few windows too small or otherwise protected to rate hurricane shutters. She hadn’t tried to talk to them, because what could she say? She had listened to the storm slowly dying, and by the time dawn fought its way through the clouds and rain and waved from the horizon, she was almost certain the worst of the hurricane had missed them. No eye had passed overhead, and she’d been awake all night to confirm that. There had been no silent lull, not five minutes, not twenty-five. The storm had peaked
before midnight, and since then, everything had been over but the shouting.

Phyllis had done her share of damage, though. Maybe she hadn’t hit the key full force, but at about eleven the winds had sounded like a jet plane coming in for a landing. The house had rattled as if a toddler giant had picked it up and shaken it to see what fell out. A minute later Wanda had heard a crash nearby, and she’d been afraid one of the red cedar trees in a thicket up near the road had succumbed to the wind. Either that or the massive bay oak in the middle of the yard that Marsh was particularly fond of because of its name. Tracy had told her he called it Bay’s oak, and there was a tree house nestled in the branches.

If Marsh’s house had belonged to
her
, the tree would have been long gone, on account of it being within striking distance of the house. But Marsh had been willing to take chances. If it had toppled last night, at least it had toppled in the right direction.

She heard footsteps and turned to see Tracy, in a terry-cloth robe that was too big for her, approaching with a cup of coffee, which she held out. “Strong and black and sweet. The way you like it.”

Wanda took it, although she wasn’t sure her stomach would cooperate. “How long you been up?”

Tracy crossed her arms over her belly. “About as long as you. Who could sleep? At least the worst of it seems to be over.”

“No, the worst of it comes today, when we find out what happened…to everybody else.”

Tracy moved closer and put her hand on Wanda’s shoulder. She didn’t say anything.

Wanda did. “I keep telling myself Maggie’s strong and
smart. When she was a kid, nobody could ever get the jump on her. She always seemed to know what was going to happen next. Once Kenny and I decided to take the kids to a beach motel for the weekend right before school was going to start. Summer’s last hurrah. A surprise, if you know what I mean.”

“I do.”

“I went in to tell Maggie what we were doing, and she was already packed and waiting.”

Tracy nodded, but she didn’t smile. “Maggie also knows how to be careful.”

“Yeah, she had to learn, that’s for sure. Those are the good things about her, the things that might keep her safe. Then there’s the bad part. The part where she doesn’t listen to advice. The part where she’s sure she’s right and just plows in when she shouldn’t.”

“I wonder where she learned that?”

Wanda had thought about that a lot. She’d had all night. Everybody said that Maggie was just like her father, while Junior was like Wanda. But Wanda knew Maggie wasn’t a hundred percent Ken. Her stubbornness, her commitment to doing whatever she thought best? Wanda could take credit for that, too, something she would surely do every day of her life if the news today was as bad as she feared it might be.

“You know how else she’s like me?” she said. “Kenny would come home at night, and if I could get him to talk about what he’d done, I’d feel this stab of envy. Right here.” She put her fist to her chest. “See, there I was, waiting tables and changing diapers and making supper. Not that Kenny didn’t do his part, but let’s face it, he’s a cop. He never worked anything as normal as a forty-hour week in his life. More like a forty-hour shift and then another, one on top of the other. He was gone too much, and there I was, holding us together,
helping with homework and making Halloween costumes. You know how many times I wished I was the one out there trying to figure out what some bad guy had done and why?”

“So you understood why Maggie became a police officer?”

“Understood, but I never approved. You worry, you know.” She cleared her throat. “And now, maybe I’ve lost them both. Right before the bridge collapsed, Kenny said he was coming over to look for Maggie. I don’t know where he was when he told me that. Maybe on the bridge…”

“No, he wasn’t behind me in either lane,” Tracy said. “Not that I saw, and I’d have noticed him. I looked behind me a couple of times. And if he wasn’t behind me, then he’s okay.”

Wanda thought about that; then she nodded, a little pressure lifting from her heart. “Maybe you’re right.”

“Oh, I am. Count on that. And since he knew about Maggie and her interest in Blake, then you can bet he’s spent the night checking everywhere Blake might have gone if he evacuated. That’s what he’s been doing since the bridge fell. He’s been looking for Maggie, checking all the options over in Palmetto Grove. For all we know, she’s with him right now.”

Marsh came in, coffeepot in hand. “Ready to warm that cup?”

Wanda shook her head. “How’d you make coffee with no electricity?”

“Camp stove. I could make eggs and bacon, but I’m guessing nobody’s that hungry.”

“Sun comes up a little more, I’m going out to see what I can discover.”

“Power lines will be down all over the key. It’s going to be touch-and-go out there.”

“I’ll take my chances. You haven’t been out to check anything?”

“It’s still pretty dark, and I couldn’t see anything from the porch. I thought I’d have coffee first.”

“We ought to go see how much damage we got at Happiness Key,” Tracy said.

“Palmetto Grove didn’t get a direct hit,” Marsh said, confirming Wanda’s guess “Phyllis probably went up the coast and came in north of us somewhere.”

Janya descended the stairs, a smiling Lily in her arms. Wanda was glad one of their little group could smile.

“Vijay is still sleeping. We slept together on one mattress, but at least the children slept.”

“Those kids landed in the right place, that’s for sure. You’re good to them,” Wanda said.

Good or not, Janya still looked beat. “No news?”

Marsh started to answer, but he was interrupted by a loud pounding at the front door. Everyone froze; then he set the coffeepot on the closest table and took off to answer. Tracy followed, then Wanda and Janya with Lily.

Marsh threw the door open wide enough that Wanda immediately got a good look at a grizzled man sporting a beard that probably hadn’t been trimmed since the day he’d decided not shaving was some kind of good idea. The beard was snow white and fanned out over his collarbone.

“Earl,” Marsh said, sticking out his hand. The two men shook.

Rain was still falling, but the wind had diminished to a weak imitation of itself, and in an hour it would probably be down to a strong breeze. Patches of lighter sky were visible between dark clouds, and Wanda could see the shadow of Bay’s oak, still standing tall.

Earl followed Marsh inside. He wore a dress shirt as wrinkled as his face, and knit workout pants that had been hacked off midcalf. He’d solved the problem of shoes by wearing flip-flops, which he kicked off at the door.

“Got your note last night,” he said. “Friend got his car stuck on the way over to stay at my place. Had to tow him half the way back.”

Marsh bypassed pleasantries. “Have you got news?”

“Which do you want first?” Earl paused. “I guess you’ll want to hear about the woman before the rest of it. You don’t need to worry about anybody finding her anymore. She’s in the hospital in town. They rescued her last night. Got dumped in the water by some maniac, but she made it as far as that damn bridge. Boyfriend and father rescued her.”

He looked at Wanda when she cried out.

“I’m not making this up,” the old man said, narrowing his eyes. “You don’t believe me?”

Tracy and Janya closed in on Wanda, putting their arms around her as if they knew she needed to be held up.

“She will be okay?” Janya asked Earl, but she was looking at Wanda. “The woman? Maggie?”

Like all men, Earl wasn’t immune to Janya’s considerable charms. He forgot Wanda entirely. “She will, though the guy who dumped her in the water probably wasn’t as lucky. They think he drowned.”

Wanda couldn’t think of a thing to say, which was, she figured, the first time in her whole life. Everyone else was asking questions, but her friends’ arms tightened around her, as if they knew what she must be feeling.

“A lot of damage,” Earl said, “but most of it minor. They say the hurricane spawned a few tornadoes here and there. They’re still looking into that. Power’s off in town, just like
here. I hope you have a generator, because it’ll be a while before any of us can get across the bay for supplies. They’ll have their hands full over there for a while, so we’ll be fending for ourselves. They asked me to get a group together to go house to house to see if anybody’s injured or in serious need of assistance. We’ll see what we can set up here until the authorities can take over.”

“I’ll help,” Marsh said.

“Looks like you have your hands full here. But as soon as it’s light, I’ll get some people together, then we’ll figure out what you can do.”

“Derek Forbes,” Wanda said. “And the bridge. We thought we heard—”

Earl looked happy to tell that story and cut her off. “He and somebody on the camera crew got two women out of a car that went into the water when the bridge collapsed. Not too many people would have done something like that. They risked their lives for real, not just for entertainment.”

“They’re okay?” Marsh asked.

“Yeah, everybody made it, but the press is going to descend on Palmetto Grove like barnacles on a shipwreck. They thought another car went in, too, but it looks like that wasn’t true. Lucky for everybody the bridge wasn’t crowded at the time. Not right where it split open, anyway.”

Marsh clapped him on the shoulder. “Can you get messages out for us, telling people we’re okay? My son’s in town worrying. Janya’s husband, too.” He nodded in her direction.

“That’s all I’ll be doing the next few days, I figure. Seems like nobody much understands that all them cell towers and phone wires can go down in a storm. But some of us, we stay prepared.”

Marsh wrote down names, phone numbers and messages,
and Earl promised to make sure all the information got to the right people. Then he left, cautioning them to drive carefully when they went out, because there were trees and wires down all over.

Marsh closed the door behind him just at the moment when Wanda began to sob.

“If there’s a lot of damage, I don’t know how I’ll pay to fix it all,” Tracy told Marsh as they waited on the porch for Janya and Wanda to get the children ready for a trip across the key. “My deductible’s sky high, and you know all the insurance caveats about hurricanes and how many different companies get involved. This one won’t pay for this, that one won’t pay for that. By the time they’re done ‘won’t paying,’ I’ll get a twenty-dollar bill and a pat on the back for my time and effort.”

“Don’t borrow trouble.” Marsh put his arm around her. “So far our luck’s been good.”

Tracy gazed at the cedar tree blocking a portion of Marsh’s driveway out by the road. Fortunately none of their cars had been in its path, and the rest of Marsh’s yard looked okay, though some branches were down, the door of Bay’s tree house was half off, and shingles from the tree-house roof were scattered nearby. A piece of tin from Marsh’s roof hung over one side of his porch, but once the tree was sawed up and hauled away, the rest could be repaired with a short day’s work.

“We
have
been lucky,” she said. “Me and Maggie most of all. I’m alive to wrangle with the insurance company, and she’s alive to figure out the rest of her life.”

“You have yours all figured out?”

“I have part of it figured out.”

“Which part is that?”

“The part about who to spend it with.”

He kissed her. “Funny thing. I have that part figured out, too.”

“We ought to get together sometime and compare notes.”

The door opened, and Wanda came out with Lily. “We’re leaving Chase and the cat here to guard the house. Hope that’s okay.”

“Good idea.” Marsh went down the steps to pull his car up to the porch. His hybrid had all-wheel drive, and they had agreed to go in one car. With little or no traffic on the roads, it seemed silly to take two just to accommodate the kids’ car seats, and also more risky.

“If everything’s okay, we’ll move back into our houses this afternoon,” Wanda told Tracy. “Leave you lovebirds alone.”

Tracy gave a shake of her head. “No, I think we ought to stay together until things are at least a bit more normal. Ferry to the mainland, electricity. No sense in everybody fending for themselves when we can work together here and make it easier.”

“Will you be staying here from now on? You moving in with Marsh?”

Tracy wondered the same thing. She knew that was what Marsh wanted, and she loved the old Cracker house,
and
the man and boy in residence. Living there made complete sense. Yet she was torn. If she lived with Marsh, she would no longer be part of life on Happiness Key.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do,” she said.

“Sure you do. This is where you belong now. You and the baby.”

Janya came out with Vijay. “We are ready. Vijay says this is
a new adventure. He has started a story about a big wind that takes a little boy to a brand-new land.”

“Better read him the
Wizard of Oz
before he gets too far along,” Wanda said.

Tracy wondered if Vijay and Lily would soon be transported to a brand-new land of their own, one with the grandparents who had never acknowledged them. If Janya and Rishi were allowed to keep the children, they would all travel back to India whenever they could to see Janya’s family, perhaps even the children’s relatives if fences were mended. Staying here with the Kapurs would not be a rejection of the past, but a new chapter. She hoped the families and authorities on both sides of the ocean would realize that.