Barrett, Julia Rachel - Pushing Her Boundaries (Siren Publishing Classic)

by Julia Rachel Barrett

  “Matches?” asked Mace, thumbing through the contents of the kit.

  Robert fished through the pockets of his waterproof vest. “Here.”

  Maggie watched Mace complete his search of the first aid kit. He looked up at her. “There’s nothing in here I can use. The tweezers are too large.”

  Maggie had a sudden revelation. “My pack,” she said. “Get my pack. If I’m lucky, my Swiss Army knife is still in one of the pockets. I don’t think I took it out after my last backpacking trip. There’s got to be something on that you can use.” She cringed when Mace lowered her foot to the sand. Fuck, this hurts.

  Mace returned, holding her knife. “Got it.” He pulled out the hardware. “I’m going to have to use the reamer; it has the smallest diameter. Maggie,” he stopped and reached for her hand, “this will be agony, but it’ll be brief.”

  “I know.” She took a deep breath and blew it out. “Just do it.” She watched Mace heat up the reamer. He’d need to get it scorching hot to burn through the nail.

  “You want Robert or Patty to hold your foot steady?”

  “Hell no.” She gritted her teeth. “Go.”

  Mace placed her foot between his thighs. “All right, keep very still.”

  Maggie stared out over the water, nostrils wrinkling as she smelled the burning nail before she felt the heat bite into the injured flesh. “Oh…God…” She closed her eyes and tried not to scream. Gradually, the pain subsided to a manageable level. Opening her eyes, she looked down to see a hole in her big toe and bright red blood all over Mace’s hand.

  “Are you all right? You look pale.”

  Maggie nodded her head. She was feeling nauseated, but between the pain, little food, and even less sleep, it didn’t surprise her. “I’m okay, Mace. Thanks. It feels better, but I think I should pour some alcohol or peroxide over it. Did I see some alcohol wipes in the first aid kit?”

  “I’ll take care of it.” He poured some bottled water over his hands, washing off the blood, before he ripped open a couple of packages and pressed the alcohol pads to her toe.

  Maggie sucked in a breath and tried to ignore the stinging sensation. Talk about adding insult to injury. Geez!

  “I wish I could wrap this, but your feet are going to be wet for the next five days, so a dressing would be pointless. I’m sorry, Maggie, it really was my fault.” He looked very contrite.

  “Shut up, Mace. It wasn’t your fault.” Maggie gave him a weak smile.

  “Hey,” called Robert, “if you two are finished over there, we need to get going. I want to be past Windy Point before the worst of the storm hits.”

  “Windy Point,” Mace muttered, as he helped her put her sandal on. “Sounds inviting.”

  Maggie laughed. “Yeah, Windy Point. I saw it on the map. We have about four miles to go. Think you can manage to keep this canoe headed in the right direction if I paddle my ass off?”

  Mace pulled her to her feet. He held tight to her hands and their eyes met. For a moment she thought he might kiss her. She wished he would kiss her. His mouth opened as if he wanted to say something, but then he closed it and shook his head.

  “What?” Maggie asked.

  “Nothing. We better get our gear stowed. Looks like our guides are leaving without us.”

  * * * *

  It’s a nice ass. I wish I had that ass in my hands right now. That’s what he’d wanted to say, but he couldn’t say it. She’d withdraw from him again. He couldn’t believe she didn’t slug him after he dropped a hundred-pound aluminum canoe on her toe. Mace had slammed his fingers in the car door often enough to know how much pain she was in, but Maggie was a trooper. She’d looked as if she might throw up when he’d punctured her nail…Christ, he felt like he might throw up, but all she did was close her eyes and breathe. It was one thing to do that to a patient in an exam room with sterile equipment and maybe some lidocaine gel. It was an entirely different feeling to deliberately inflict pain upon someone you cared about.

  I hope she doesn’t get an infection. I won’t forgive myself if she gets an infection, and we don’t have a fucking satellite phone, do we? Jackass Robert.

  He wondered if they should turn around right now and try to make their way back to the portage; maybe canoe in the direction of the cabin, see if they could flag down a fishing boat. He glanced up at the sky. The weather was getting so damn foul it might not be any safer to turn back than it would be to get to a campsite. Mace glanced over Maggie’s shoulder at Robert and Patty’s canoe. They were a good half-mile ahead of them, and Mace and Maggie were losing ground with each stroke. The Grumman wallowed like a pig in the trough of every wave.

  “How far do we have to go after we hit Windy Point?” he called up to Maggie.

  She turned her head slightly so the wind wouldn’t carry her voice away from him. “Another three to four miles, I guess. The campsite Robert wants to reach is somewhere on the western shore. We have to head in that direction,” she pointed to the left, “and then turn north. That’s as much as I know.”

  Mace muttered under his breath. Neither he nor Maggie had paddled a canoe in at least ten years, never a craft as unwieldy as this Grumman, and the weather and waves weren’t helping. Maggie gamely did her job without complaint, moving them forward. He tried to keep the canoe stabilized and headed in the direction they wanted to go, but it was becoming increasingly difficult. The thing was like a sail on a sailboat, and it was pretty damn tough to paddle a sail through choppy water.

  “Robert and Patty just rounded Windy Point,” Maggie called back. “I wish they’d wait up. There’s no way this bathtub we’re in can gain any ground.”

  “It’s a bad idea to get so far ahead of us,” Mace yelled to her.

  “What did you say?” She glanced over her shoulder.

  “I said it’s a bad idea to separate.”

  “Yeah, no shit.” She said it under her breath, but Mace caught the words. He agreed, no shit.

  Twenty minutes later, Maggie yelled, “Windy Point,” and those were the last words she spoke for an hour. As soon as they passed the headland, all hell broke loose.

  Mace estimated the winds to be at least twenty-five knots, gusting up to thirty or thirty-five every couple of minutes. Before they could even head up into the wind, they were slammed on the port side and rolled into a deep trough. Sideways to the waves now, he saw Maggie try to steady the craft and dig her paddle in as deep as she could, trying to point into the wind, but the troughs were so deep, her paddle bit into nothing but air. They were surrounded by whitecaps, tossed in waves cresting four to five feet. A sailboat could handle these conditions, no problem, even a kayak, but a Grumman?

  No fucking way. He looked ahead, hoping to spot Robert’s canoe. He bit back another curse as he saw Robert and Peggy, only their bobbing heads visible, a good nautical mile in front of them. Their sleek canoe rode low in the water, pointing toward a far shore that looked to be at least three miles away across open water. Their own Grumman crested a wave and crashed down into the trough, soaking Maggie. He watched her shoulders shake, water dripped from her hair, but she never stopped paddling.

  Donning their life vests, the two fought the weather and the waves, their progress agonizingly slow. Both tried to keep the canoe headed into the wind, but as the force of the storm increased, Mace began measuring their progress in feet. He felt like he was sailing in San Francisco Bay, bucking the winds and the tides. Under these conditions, it might take them three hours to canoe a quarter mile.

  They approached a small island, their last land mass until they reached the far shore. If we reach the far shore. No matter how hard they paddled, they couldn’t seem to get past the point of the island. The wind gusts blew them closer and closer to the rocky headland. Doing his best to keep the Grumman headed directly into the wind, Mace tried to ignore the waves crashing against the steep, granite surface fifty yards to his right.

  Gripping the sides of the canoe, Maggie balanced herself and turned partway ar
ound. Without her paddle, the canoe began to wallow in the trough of a wave. “Mace,” she yelled, “we need to bail. This island is our last chance. If we keep going we’re going to capsize or be swamped.” She gestured at the rocky headland, her arm jerking up and down as the canoe dropped into another deep trough. “Or we’ll wash up against those rocks and capsize there. I don’t want to lose all our gear.” She blinked at him just once. “And frankly, I really don’t want to die today.”

  Mace glanced to the right and noticed the wind had already pushed them ten yards closer to the rough surf breaking along the twenty-foot-high cliffs. She’s right. Even if I was partnered with a world-class kayaker, we couldn’t make any headway in these conditions in this piece of shit canoe.

  “Okay,” he yelled back. “We’ll run with the wind to the lee side of the island. I’ll rudder and you paddle on the port side. After we’ve turned, we can surf the waves for a while. Once we get beyond these rocks, when I tell you to pull, give it everything you’ve got.” She nodded and turned back, dipping her paddle into the waves on the port side as he’d instructed.

  Mace stopped steering and let the wind slap them around. For just an instant, they were broadside to the waves and he worried they’d capsize, but Maggie dug her paddle in deep and swung the bow around. Within a few seconds they were paddling with the wind instead of against it and all they had to do was maintain their course. Mace tried to keep them as close to the shore as he could without getting caught in the breakers because he didn’t want to be broadside to the waves for long once they turned to make a run for the sheltered side of the island.

  “Maggie,” he yelled forward, “I’m changing course. I want you to paddle on the starboard side.” He saw her switch sides. “Paddle hard!” Both paddles bit into the water and together the two of them pulled for the lee shore, trying to reach the wind shadow before the waves capsized the canoe.

  * * * *

  Maggie searched the rugged shoreline for a good spot to beach the canoe. She was thankful the island was heavily wooded; the thick forest kept the winds down to a light breeze as long as they paddled within ten yards of the island.

  I can’t believe Mace listened to me. Most guys would have tried to muscle their way across that open expanse of water and we could have died. She heard the dip of his paddle into the relatively quiet water and she felt grateful for his presence. If I’d been with a complete stranger, who knows what might have happened?

  “Mace, there.” Maggie pointed to a small sandy beach dead center in the middle of the island.

  Without a word, Mace turned the canoe and they paddled straight for it. Maggie jumped out into the shallows and pulled the canoe halfway up the beach. Mace climbed out and pulled the Grumman the rest of the way.

  “Do we have any rope?” he asked.

  Maggie shook her head. “We’ll have to drag it up farther, so if the wind changes direction it won’t be blown away.”

  Mace stood up and stretched his back. Maggie copied him. Her back had cramped from sitting and paddling for so many hours.

  “We might as well unload it and turn it over,” he said. “If another storm blows in, I’d just as soon keep the inside dry.”

  Maggie nodded her silent agreement. She noted that neither of them was ready to discuss the potential seriousness of their situation. She clambered up the bank and scouted for a dry place to unload the gear. The trees grew thick and close and she could barely make her way through the forest. There were no game trails on this particular island, at least not where they’d beached the canoe. Glancing back at Mace, she saw him watching her every move. He looked like a predator ready to spring into action, but he wasn’t hunting her—he was making sure she didn’t get into any trouble. His attentiveness slowed the pounding of her heart.

  At last she noticed a large fallen tree. The underside had rotted and formed a sort of shelter. The ground beneath was carpeted with pine needles. Maggie pressed her hands to the soil. It felt dry. This would be a good place to store the gear. She had a plastic cover for her backpack and she could probably use it to cover both her pack and Mace’s. She returned to the beach. When she reached Mace, his features seemed to relax.

  “There’s a place up there for the gear, and maybe we can make a rudimentary shelter. We’ll have to take stock of what we have.” She reached for her backpack and the waterproof pack containing a sleeping bag, a sleeping pad, and a blue tarp.

  “Give me one of those,” Mace ordered. “The bank is too slick. I don’t want to risk another injury.”

  “But I can carry…”

  “Maggie, don’t argue. Just give me one of the packs. We’ll make a couple trips and then we’ll drag the canoe up the bank.” His voice was even, but Maggie noticed that his face looked grim. She handed him the waterproof pack and followed him up the bank. In silence, they unloaded the remainder of the gear and stowed it beneath the hollow tree trunk.

  When they returned for the canoe, Maggie glanced at Mace. His face might be blank, but somehow she knew he’d put on a mask for her benefit. If he was even half as angry at Robert and Patty as she was, then he must be furious. “Mace, I can’t lift the front of the canoe up this slope. I’ll have to drag it.”

  “Don’t sweat it,” he replied. “I got it.” Placing his hands on her shoulders, he moved her out of the way and hauled the canoe right past her up the bank. She scrambled up behind him, ready to help turn it over, but he’d already flipped it and wedged it between two pine trees. The two stood side by side, looking at the gray sky.

  “I gotta pee.”

  Mace glanced down at her. “Don’t go too far. We don’t know what lives on this island yet.”

  Maggie pushed a few strands of damp hair out of her eyes. “I don’t think we need to worry. When I was looking for a place to stick our gear, I didn’t find any game trails. I think the island is too small to support much in the way of large wildlife.”

  “Bears can swim. So can moose. Be careful.”

  Maggie tossed him a halfhearted smile. “Yeah, I’ll be careful not to pee on my feet.” She went into the woods to relieve herself, keeping an eye on Mace’s barely visible baseball cap. When she finished, she tried to pick her way across the center of the island, hoping she could spot Robert and Patty if they’d decided to turn around, but the forest was impassible.

  “Maggie!” Mace’s voice stopped her in her tracks. Maybe they’ve come back for us. She crashed through the underbrush, hurrying back to the shore. “What? Are they here? Did they turn around?”

  “Where the hell did you go?” he yelled. “I lost track of your head.”

  “I was just…You were watching me?”

  “Of course I was watching you. The last thing we want to do is separate. We need to stay together. Where’d you go?”

  “I tried to get across the island, to see if maybe they’d turned around.”

  Mace crossed his arms, his mouth set in a grim line. “Did they ever look back? Did you see them look back at us, to check if we were following or if we were all right?”

  “No.”

  “Son of a bitch. Of all the stupid, brainless, idiotic things to do. You pay attention. You don’t take off without a word, without a look, in your new, sleek canoe, and leave your companions behind, to wallow in an ancient piece of aluminum that’s made for paddling on a quiet pond, not crossing Lake Michigan.” Mace stalked to a big, flat boulder on the shoreline and plopped down on it.

  Maggie followed him. She climbed up beside him. “We can stay here one night, if we have to.”

  “Bullshit. We stay here two hours and then we head back. Can you get us back? I have no idea where we came from and this shoreline all looks the same.”

  “Yeah.” Maggie pointed south. “That’s Windy Point, that big headland. We paddled out of the channel to the left of Windy Point. Can you see where the water is flat and kind of dark?” Mace nodded. “We came from there. I can get us there and I think I can get us back to the portage, but there were q
uite a few twists and turns along the channel. I’m not one hundred percent certain where the portage is and I’m not sure I’ll recognize it when I see it. I was kind of focused on my toe.”

  Mace winced. “Sorry.” He leaned over and grabbed her foot, pulling it up so he could take a look at her big toe. “How’s it feeling?”

  “So far so good.” She put a hand on Mace’s arm. “I’m going to walk around the island to the north and see if I can make my way to the other side…”

  “Over my dead body,” Mace interrupted.

  “Mace, listen to me. I’ll be careful. I’ll stay in the shallows and if the footing gets bad or if the water gets too deep, I swear I’ll turn back. We need to know if they’re coming back, and I can’t get through the woods. You wait here and look south—that way you’ll see them if they come around the tip of the island.”

  “I don’t like it. What if you fall or sprain something or break something? It’s a bad idea, Maggie. I say we stay together. I’ll come with you.”

  “No, that won’t work. What if they come around the southern tip of the island? They won’t have any idea we’re here.” She tried to make her smile reassuring. “Mace, I’ll be fine. I’m not afraid and I’m not going very far.” She jumped off the rock and slid down the bank into the shallows before he could stop her.

  “I don’t like it,” he called after her. “You’re doing this against my better judgment.”

  Maggie laughed. “It’s not a matter of life and death,” she called back.

  “Yet.” Mace pointed at his wristwatch. “The day is still young.”

  “If I’m not back in an hour, you can search for me.” Maggie rolled her pants up to her thighs and stepped into the water. Not bad, pretty shallow, a little slick but doable. After fifty yards, she glanced back at Mace. Instead of looking south, he stared at her, the concern on his face visible even at this distance. She waved and continued along the shoreline, taking great care to place her sandal-covered feet on flat rocks in water no higher than her knees, not an easy task. Her progress was slow. At least there’s no wind on this side and if I stay close to shore, I don’t have to fight the waves. I can’t believe those jackasses left us to fend for ourselves. We have…what? Two quarts of water, a single-burner stove but no pots, one sleeping bag, one sleeping pad, a tarp, and our clothes. That’s it. Not a single scrap of food. Yeah, we can stay here one night, but we have to get the hell out of here tomorrow morning or we’re screwed. We are so screwed.