wrath of the Sea Queen (139 page)

C
a
eli made up her mind.  The only way she could protect Max from this stranger would be to draw the
man
away.  She leaned close and whispered to Max.

"
Max, I
a
m going to lift you up into the cabinet
and cover you
with the blankets. 
Once
I
hide
you
from that man
,
I am going to l
ead him away
. 
I need you to be very quiet. 
Don't make a sound, no matter what you hear.  I don't want you to come out of that cabinet for anybody except your Papa, ok? 
When your Papa opens the door,
if you
happen to
see the bad
man
anywhere at all
, don't come out.  Stay hidden.  Wait for the bad man to leave.  Can you do th
at
, Max?
"

Max
started
crying
, but bit his trembling bottom lip
.
  He tr
ied
not to make noise as tears rolled down his
frightened
cheeks.
  C
a
eli
had
scare
d
him
after all
, but it could
n
o
t be helped.  She reached over and hugged him
tightly
.

"
Please, Max.  I need you to be strong
and be
safe.  Will you do that
for me, Max?
"

"
Yes, pretty C
a
eli,
"
he whispered
between sobs
and nodded his head.  He reached out a small hand and placed it on her cheek.

"
Will you be strong, too?  My mama was not strong when the man in black visited her.  I don't want you to be sad, pretty C
a
eli.
"

C
a
eli
looked at
Max
with a puzzled expression.  Something unusual
ly bad
must have happened to Max's mother
, and he
most
certainly
witnessed at least part of it
. 
C
a
eli already
suspected that
Max's mother must have been a gifted woman, though C
a
eli did not know if she was descendant of one of the bloodlines or
had acquired her skill
. 
She definitely wanted to sit down and talk to
Apela
about it. 
Maybe he could shed some light on
Max's keen insight
, but that would have to wait.  Right now, she needed to focus on the situation at hand.  C
a
eli
's goal was
to get this man out of the hotel and away from Max.
  She wasn't sure why, but
C
a
eli
had the distinct impression
that the man was after Max.

"
I will
be strong
, Max
.  We
wi
ll both be strong, won't we?
 
Ready?  U
p you go.
"

C
a
eli lifted him into the cabinet and adjusted the blankets to cover him. 
As sh
e shut the door
, she
prayed
that he would be safe. 
Next, s
he moved the chair over to the door and tilted it so that it propped
tightly
beneath the doorknob.  She wanted to buy herself some time.  C
a
eli
was aware that
her efforts to dislodge a few of the planks
covering the former opening
would li
kely alert the man to her location
.  The barricade would slow him down and, hopefully, give her a chance to escape through the wall
.

C
a
eli
kicked at
one of
the
thin
boards
, trying to
nudge
it loose
.  After several
attempts
,
the first
board
cracked and broke
free
.  She ignored the pounding that began on the door behind her.  Finally
,
another
board broke loose and, after
a total of
five
long
minutes, she
had
a large enough hole to climb through.  When she emerged from the little room
and came unsteadily to her feet
on the opposite side of the wall
,
C
a
eli
turned and stumbled directly up against the man in black.
  He
was
waiting for her in Ben and Salma's room, which
happened to be
opposite the laundry room wall.  C
a
eli
regretted
not thinking of th
e
possibility
that, i
n hindsight, seemed rather obvious.

C
a
eli tried to reverse
direction, but her momentum carried her forward
, directly into his outstretched
palms
.  H
is clammy touch
seeped
through the thin material of her blouse
as h
e caught hold of her below her ribs.  Time seemed to stand still and their eyes locked.  C
a
eli
looked into the
blackness
in those
orbs
that reflected nothing
. 
That gaze
scared her to her core. 
C
a
eli
looked down when a pulli
ng near the bottom of her shirt,
that
coincided with
a
ripping sound
heard
as if from a distance
, begged her attention
.  The
long and pointed
fingernails on one of the man's hands ripped through the fabric at the bottom of her blouse and slashed against the bare skin of her stomach.
  Her mind slowly registered the fact that he struck her. 
C
a
eli instinctively
realized that
the strike had been delib
erately placed, aimed with
specific
intent. 
Then the pain of
i
t jolt
ed
her back to
full
awareness.

She
reacted impulsively to
pull away from
the man
, but was not quick enough to completely avoid the strike.  Three red lines,
each
a
pproximately
four inches long, could be seen where his fingers
had
raked across the left side of her
abdomen
.  As he
made a
move to hit her again, C
a
eli managed to break free of
the man's
grasp, knocking him aside in the process.  She ran
by
him, out of
her aunt's
room, through the lounge, and down the beach.  She only looked back once to make sure he was following her
rather than
going after Max. 
The man
g
ave
chase
, and he was quick.

By the time
C
a
eli
crossed the sand and
reached the edge of the water,
t
he
man
had
nearly caught up with her. 
His bone-like fingers
reach
ed
for her as the cool water rushed over her feet and lower legs.  C
a
eli turned to make a stand and try to fight him off
, hoping to make use of her gift
against him
.  To her astonishment, he
vanished
.  Not running away, but nowhere in sight.  She scanned the water around her, but he had not gone under. 
Alarmingly
, there were no footprints in the sand other than her own as she loo
ked back the way she had come.

C
a
eli put her hand down on her stomach and felt the
wetness of the
blood he
drew
a
long with
the
pain
of the injury. 
She saw the red smear on her hand. 
At least there was some trace of him, and
C
a
eli
knew she was not losing her mind. 
Fighting her directly
apparently
was
n
'
t part of
the man's
plan. 
But where
did he go
? 
H
ow did he disappear so quickly?  In her panic,
did
C
a
eli
merely
imagine that he was so close to her?  No. 
She
was certain that he
had been
right behind her.