"Why in the world would he bring a kid here?" He seemed angrier than he should be. If Tabitha stayed quiet, she wouldn't affect their mission in the least.
Gail turned to Tom and put her hands on her hips. "Because she's dying, lugnut. This is her last chance to see something special."
Tom didn't seem fazed by Gail's shock factor. He climbed a tree a few feet away and brought out another camera. "When the moment comes, just make sure she doesn't get in the way."
Gail froze as an uncomfortable shiver crept up her spine. What did he think was going to happen?
"Aw duin." Blarney's voice brought her back to reality. "Want tae join the lad and his li'l sis and hae a cup of hot cocoa?"
Gail glanced back at Tom. Either that or stay outside with him. The twilight brought a cool breeze to the forest, rustling the leaves and poking through her sweater. She'd packed all her warm clothes. At least the tarp would block the breeze.
Besides, she had a lot of catching up to do if she was considering a relationship with Flynn. Getting to know Tabitha was important to her. "I'd like that very much."
****
"Listen, Blarney. Lady Gaga is only one of the most famous pop singers in the world." Tabitha threw up her arms. "He's hopeless."
Flynn sighed and sipped the froth off his mug of hot chocolate. Putting Blarney and his sister together was like trying to mix toothpaste and orange juice. "Give the man a break. He's been living in the woods for the last twenty years."
"But everyone knows who Lady Gaga is."
Blarney waved his hand. "That Hollywood shizazzle niver intrested me. Gie me the trees blowin' in the wind any day over the soond of a radio."
Tabitha rolled her eyes and shook her earphones. "It's an MP3 player."
Gail smiled. Flynn had been nervous about her meeting Tabitha. She wasn't the most polite teenager on the face of the planet and she didn't like nerdy teacher types. Tabitha's personality seemed to amuse Gail more than anything.
"What about you, Gail?" Tabitha gazed at her from across the tent. "You know who Lady Gaga is, don't you?"
Flynn held his breath. Oh no. Tabitha would draw her whole impression of Gail from her knowledge of Lady Gaga. Gail didn't strike him as a pop-star-adoring kind of scientist. Teens could be so judgmental. Especially Tabitha.
"Actually, I dressed up as her for Halloween once." Gail laughed. "Not very warm or comfy for October weather in New England, but you never think about that part when choosing a costume, do you?"
"No, you don't." Tabitha grinned.
"I'd like to have seen that." Flynn imagined Gail in skimpy tights and an outlandish wig. He bet Tabitha's estimation of Gail had just risen by ninety percent. Gail wasn't as nerdy as he'd thought.
Gail blushed. "Still have the outfit back in Boston."
"Ewww, gross-a-rama, guys. Save it for later." Tabitha pretended to hurl.
Gail smoothed her hair, and Flynn's neck grew hot. Somehow Tabitha had managed to embarrass both of them, and they were the grown-ups.
"Shhh!" Blarney held up a finger and peered out the opening cut into the length of the tent. "Somethin's oot thare." He whispered softer than the wind.
Silence fell as everyone crawled to the peephole. Flynn's heart raced as he scanned the shadows. Leaves crunched by the water's edge. A dark form moved from one stand of trees to another, picking berries off branches.
"You don't think that's Tom, do you?" Gail whispered.
"Naw. He's not that stupid." Flynn squinted in the darkness, hoping he was right.
Tabitha rubbed her hands together and blew on them as if cold. "Is it Nessie?" Her voice shook.
The dark form turned toward them as if it felt their gazes on its back. Two glossy eyes stared back at them. Flynn's stomach sank. The eyes were too small to possibly mirror the yellow orb they'd photographed that night. The animal shot into the woods without another sound.
"Deer." Blarney let out a long sigh, as if he'd held his breath. "Juist a deer."
"Great. That's freaking marvelous." Tabitha breathed heavily as if she was going to cry.
Flynn crouched beside her in the small space. "Are you okay, hon?"
She rubbed her forehead. "Meh. I'm just not feeling all that hot."
Guilt trickled through him. He'd smuggled her from the hospital for a deer. "Lay down. Use my backpack as a pillow. I'll wake you if we see anything."
Tabitha pulled the backpack toward her. She set the back of her head on it, tied the strings of her hood tighter, and closed her eyes. "You'd better."
She fell asleep. Her head jerked with small movements as if she suffered in her dreams. He placed a hand on her forehead. Her skin was burning up. A slick sheen of sweat covered her face.
Had bringing her here been a mistake?
Chapter Twenty-Three
Predator and Prey
Gail's eyes watered from staring at the moonlit waves without blinking in fear she'd miss the one time the waves would change. Blarney sat beside her with a fathomless expression crinkling the wrinkles in his age-old face. He was part of this forest now, and he could blend with the terrain as if they were one entity. If anyone could spot Nessie, it had to be him. Gail was just backup.
She took off her glasses, wiped the lenses on her sweater, and rubbed her burning eyes.
Tabitha slept soundly beside Flynn as he held his hand to her forehead, gauging her temperature every few minutes. It was his turn to take watch next, but she didn't have the heart to tear him away from his ailing sister.
I can keep watch longer. I just have to remember to blink.
Gail put her glasses back on and focused her attention back on the black crests that formed on the surface in tiny mountains, then disappeared just as quickly, ever-changing yet always the same.
So much rested on this one night.
She had to believe.
Blarney moved beside her. "Keep gaird, lass. I'm gaun for a snack."
As he dug in his backpack, Gail stared across the water at the reflection of the shimmery moon. A loon bobbed on the waves, dipping its head under the surface and coming back out again. She'd watched the loon for hours, tracing the black bird's journey across the lake.
The loon flapped its wings and took flight, disappearing into the shadowy forest on the opposite shore. The emptiness and isolation started to get to Gail. What am I going to look at now?
The image of the silvery moon broke as a bubble popped, disturbing the surface. Gail blinked, making sure she wasn't imaging it.
A fish jumped from the water toward shore. Gail straightened, pressing her face against the tarp. Well, that's odd. Too bad the loon had decided to leave.
Another fish followed, leaping from the water and diving back in two feet closer. Soon, a school of minnows, salmon, and even some smaller pike hurled themselves toward the rocks in the shallows, creating a pitter-patter of commotion like falling rain.
Gail froze. Open your mouth and say something. Turn around and let them know.
She couldn't tear her eyes from the mass exodus of fish bubbling up against the shore as if the water temperature had risen too high. The urgency, the utter desperation clutched her throat like thick fingers, tightening. "G-guys…"
"Gail, are you okay?" Flynn's voice broke through the haze. "Blarney, check on her. Something's wrong."
Blarney moved to the slit he'd cut in the tent. "Well, I'll be a mither of a goat."
"What is it?" Flynn joined them.
"Guid ol' Nessie. That's whit it is."
"No way." Even though Gail had been waiting for this moment ever since she'd started to believe, the reality of Nessie being real was too much to swallow. Could the migration of fish be something else? Could Blarney be wrong?
Gail's hair stood on end, spreading around her. She gazed at Flynn, and his hair spiked as well. Blarney's beard seemed to rise a quarter of an inch.
"What's going on?" Gail tried not to panic.
"Electromagnetic waves," Blarney said as if he was the sc
ientist and she a homeless wild woman. "Ayeweys happens whan Nessie's aboot." When he smoothed his beard down, the air crackled around his fingers.
Fish of all sizes threw their bodies against the rocks, some of them landing on shore to writhe on the leaves in apparent suicide. As a marine biologist, Gail had never seen anything like it.
A long snout with impossibly long, spindly teeth snapped through the surface, catching a mouthful of fish and gulping them down in one smooth jerk. The fish traveled down a long, scaly, bluish-gray neck that rose twenty feet above the water, towering over the trees on the banks. Small, webbed dorsal fins spiked from the back of the neck all the way down on ridges. The fins grew larger at the base, each one stringing along strands of peat moss that dripped over the surface.
Holy moley. Gail couldn't breathe. Was she dreaming? She bit her lower lip until it bled onto her tongue and she tasted metal. The night air was too biting, the smell of rotten leaves too thick, and the fear all too real.
The reptile turned its head and a large, golden orb scanned the rocks while two nostrils puffed a fog of hot air around its yellow-toothed mouth. Each breath sounded like the exhaust on a steam engine. Out of instinct, Gail, Blarney, and Flynn ducked farther into the tent.
I'm not seeing this. Gail clutched the branch holding the tent in place. It would be a bad time to have their only form of protection come down on their heads. "She's not going to come up here, is she?"
Blarney's eyes never left the shore. "I pit this tent here for a reason, lass. Nessie feeds off the banks. I hae niver seen her haik too faur from water."
The neck swung forward and a webbed flipper landed on the rocks, shaking the ground underneath them. The clawed edges clutched stone, clicking against a rock as the beast pulled itself to shore. An oily, scaled hump like a small mountain rose from the surface, covered in patches of algae. Massive muscles bunched under the bluish-gray scaly skin as the beast reached for a clump of trees and bit off a mouthful of leaves. Its flippers spread like massive wet pancakes over the land.
"Where's Tabitha?" Flynn's panicked voice cut through Gail's stupor.
Gail whirled around. The patch of ground where Tabitha had slept was empty.
Had she left to go to the bathroom? Gail's heart sank to her stomach. Poor, sick Tabitha was out there with the monster! If she had any sense, she'd hide behind a tree and wait for the beast to pass.
"There!" Blarney pointed to the shore's edge.
Gail whirled back to the opening. Tabitha crawled in the undergrowth three feet away from the back flipper. She reached out with her hand, trying to touch the beast.
"No, no, no!" Flynn's voice rose.
Blarney held Flynn down and put his hand over his mouth. "Ye'll turn this shore into a killin' hoose, lad. If Nessie muives, the lassie is deid."
Gail slapped her hand over her mouth. Blarney was right. If they drew attention to themselves, the beast would turn and the flipper would come down on Tabitha's head. There was no telling how much Nessie weighed, but it had to be tons.
Flynn squiggled out of Blarney's grasp. "What are we going to do?" he whispered. "Leave her there alone?"
Blarney ran his hands through his beard and shook his head as if trying to find the right answer to a no-win situation. "Let her be. Wait for Nessie to gae back under."
Tabitha had pulled herself forward enough to touch the flipper. A growing puddle of water dripping from the beast had soaked her sweatshirt. Her hand dangled in the air as her thin, pale fingers twitched above the sleek surface.
Flynn's eyes were as wide as eggs. "Tabitha, don't do it, honey," he whispered.
Her hand came down gently. As she touched the wet surface, a spark of light traveled from the beast's fin and up Tabitha's arm. Tabitha jerked back, but if the beast noticed, it was too busy feeding off the trees to care.
Gail blinked. "What was that?"
"Electromagnetic energy." Blarney rubbed his beard. "A've seen it happen to trees, but niver to a person."
Gail grabbed Blarney's arm. "Is she going to be all right?"
Blarney shrugged. "Leuks fine ta me."
"Wait!" Flynn scurried to the other end of the tent and peered out. "Something's moving on the hill."
Gail followed him and pressed her face up against the slit in the tarp. She knew that rounded belly anywhere. "It's Tom."
"What's he doing? Is he crazy?" Flynn's voice rose dangerously loud.
"He must be trying to save Tabitha." Gail could only hope.
"No." Blarney was behind them. "He's oot to git Nessie."
Flynn shook his head as if he didn't believe it. "Why is he holding the tripod sideways?"
"That's no tripod." Gail stiffened as reality hit and all the pieces of Tom's identity fit into place: the toupee to hide his bald head; his leathery, sun-dried skin; the way he forgot to turn the video camera on; how he knew exactly how to read a fish scale; the fish and hooks on his boxers; the ASA patch on his bag, which must stand for the American Sportsfishing Association; and how he'd talked to Blarney about mounting Nessie on the wall.
"Tom" was the infamous Charlie Fayette, the man who'd traveled down the Nile and speared the legendary albino catfish the local Abuguru tribe had worshipped as a deity. That had been after he'd killed three endangered manatees, the last known living Hawaiian Monk seal, and a Galapagos tortoise. He was wanted in several countries for violating the Endangered Species Act, among other shady ventures. She'd only seen him on television, but Gail knew it was he deep down in the pit of her gut. She swallowed bile.
"That's a harpoon."
"No!" Flynn shouted as Tom lifted the harpoon and aimed at Nessie. At the same time, Tabitha jumped to her feet and threw herself in front of the beast's heart. She spread her arms. "Don't you dare!"
Behind Tabitha, Nessie opened her mouth and her neck undulated. A loud and deep, crooning call echoed over the lake. Nessie dove backward into the water, and Tom fired. Tabitha stood her ground, closing her eyes. She blocked Nessie's escape with her body.
The harpoon flew through the air in a tragic arc, catching the light of the silvery moon. Gail held her breath, her heart pounding in her ears. The harpoon hit Tabitha straight on, the tip driving through her right side. Tabitha fell backward into the water as Nessie disappeared under the surface.
"No!" Flynn broke through the tent and slid down the hill. Gail pushed through the entrance. A thousand worries flew in her mind. What if Nessie ate Tabitha? What if she'd already been dead when she'd hit the water? What if Flynn jumped in after her and the beast ate him, too?
Before Gail could stop him, Flynn jumped into the water and disappeared underneath the inky blackness. Gail reached the rocks and teetered on the edge, flailing her arms for balance. She bounced from foot to foot, gathering courage to jump in after him and took a deep breath.
"Hold it, lass. Give him a chance." Blarney caught up and pulled her back.
"I'm not letting him die." Gail fought him, but the old man was strong.
Just as Gail broke away from Blarney's grip, Flynn resurfaced with Tabitha. He swam to shore with her in his arms. Her eyes were closed and the harpoon protruded from both sides. Blood streaked her pink pajama pants.
"You bastard!" Flynn shouted at Tom as he reached the canoes Blarney had stashed under the branches. "I trusted you!"
Tom didn't answer. He jumped in a canoe and paddled away with a tracking device blinking under one arm, its light illuminating more ammunition for the harpoon gun strapped to his back.
Flynn placed Tabitha on the forest floor in a bed of leaves. Gail reached down and felt her wrist. "She still has a pulse." She checked the girl's mouth. "She isn't breathing."
Flynn grabbed his phone. "I'm calling an ambulance. Do you know how to do CPR?"
"I do." She'd been required to learn for an undergraduate survival class. She'd never actually tried it on a drowning human being before, but she wasn't about to tell Flynn that now.
I can do this. I can bring her back.
/>
She put her mouth to Tabitha's and breathed in. The girl's lips were as cold as death and Gail couldn't help but think of her father freezing in the Alps.
Nothing.
Gail blew a puff of air into Tabitha's mouth.
Come on.
Tabitha's chest rose, and she coughed up water into Gail's mouth. Gail pulled back, hope rising, and spit out the water.
Flynn knelt beside his sister. "Tabitha, can you hear me?"
She threw up, then clutched her side, shivering. "W-what happened?"
"Don't move, honey." Flynn wiped tears from his eyes. "Just rest right here. The ambulance is on its way."
A plaintive call echoed over the lake, bringing everyone back to the scene behind them. Tom must have fired a tracker. A blinking red light shone beneath the depths.
Blarney took his raccoon hat off and stomped on it, cursing. "He's gaun ta kill her!"
Gail gave Flynn a stern look as she ripped pieces from her coat to wrap around Tabitha's wound and staunch the flow of blood. "We can't let Tom get away with this, and we can't let him kill Nessie."
"I'll stop him." Flynn reached down and stroked Tabitha's cheek. "Just make sure she gets to the hospital."
"I will." Gail grabbed his arm, stopping him from turning away. "Be safe."
Flynn nodded. "Raigmore Hospital emergency room. I'll meet you there."
As much as Gail wanted to stay and help Flynn, she knew every minute counted and the paramedics would have a hard time finding them in the middle of the woods. It wasn't good to move someone with such an injury, but what if Nessie surfaced again?
Gail positioned herself behind Tabitha and stuck her arms under the girl's shoulder.
"Blarney, help me carry her to the road."
"Aye, lass." Blarney grabbed Tabitha's feet as Flynn reached the second canoe and jumped in.
They started up the hill with Gail walking backward. Her eyes darted from Tabitha's shocked expression to Flynn paddling to the middle of the lake where they'd last seen Tom. A cloud covered the moon, and all went black.
Love on Loch Ness Page 14