DARC Ops: The Complete Series

by Jamie Garrett

  She felt even shakier when he peeled up the bottom of her shirt, resting his face against her belly. He left her clothes on this time, pushing them out of the way instead, his lips caressing her skin as he held her in place. Kissing her there, sucking lower, one finger curling back her underwear, his tongue quickly moving in to fill the space. She held his head how, feeling the movements of his face, his jaw muscles moving along his scalp as he suckled her, lower . . . And then way lower, his mouth skipping over everything completely and landing along her upper thigh, higher while his fingers crept into her panties from the sides, teasing over her, and then opening her. He was taking his time this round.

  She wiggled and squirmed under the pressure, twisting in the sand onto the unbuttoned shirt beneath her. It was a good move, that shirt. Very considerate, almost as much as the delicate care he’d taken with each touch, each stroke of his fingers. Each move blasting a wave of ecstasy through her body and forcing her back down in the sand. An invisible force on her chest holding her down like a weight. A weight in her mind, dulling thought and blasting everything away. She lay there in the sand, heavy, his, still shaking as he rubbed her faster, her clit throbbing between his fingers.

  Her fingers dug into his hair, grasping on as if it were the only thing holding her to this world. Eyes shut. The sound of the ocean. The feel of his mouth on her skin. On her ocean. The warmth of his mouth now coming down on her, swallowing everything but the burning, radiant light that seared through her body. She trembled on the beach under him, finally achieving what they’d worked so hard for.

  Her eyes were still closed when the wall of foam—and then solid water—crashed into her body, and then over her until she tumbled across the sand, floating now, surging across the beach with an impossibly huge wave. Her eyes stung when she opened them, salted jets of water spraying into her eyes. But she could feel Cole with her, holding on to her legs, and then climbing up to her body as they tumbled together. His voice garbled something under the roar of water. It took them up the beach, thudding and sliding along the sand, her skin burning and scraping with it. When she finally got a glimpse of their latest emergency, it was clear even in the darkness that the whole coast was being swallowed in one giant wave. She still had Cole with her, his bear hug keeping her against his body. And at times he seemed to help her head above the water. He did so again, and she took another deep breath, staring in front of her at the darkness of the jungle. They were fast approaching it.

  Another garbled command from Cole. She could tell from his tone that it began as some helpful, rational instruction for what to do when this giant wave pushed them full speed into the thick jungle. Had he experienced this before? Was this just another part of Hawaiian living?

  Over the tops of low-lying shrubs now, through the areca and ti plants. No more soft perfumes. Salt only. The sound of the ocean roaring into land, into the dense jungle, she and Cole separating at the first palm tree. Their arm lock had broken apart around the base of its trunk and she was already at another, trying to hold on. Maybe that was Cole’s instructions. Hold on for dear life as the water surged around her.

  What the fuck was going on?

  This was nothing like the first wave that had interrupted them hours ago. Not even a “freak” wave. It was a mutant wave. The word slammed into her brain. Tsunami.

  Hanging onto the thin trunk of a palm tree, Annica remembered the shaking she’d just felt a few minutes ago. Shaking more than when she was underneath Cole, and more than the orgasm he had delivered. An earthquake, and now a tsunami. It must have happened just off the coast. A small one perhaps, since she was still alive.

  On the tree, she could keep her head above water, for now. She could breathe. She could scream. “Cole!”

  No answer in the mad rush of water.

  She was a good swimmer. On the high school swim team, and later a lifeguard. But back then, her harshest tests came in the controlled environments and mostly still water of indoor swimming pools. Nothing like the might of the Pacific Ocean swelling up into land, flowing in hard, and still flowing. It had been a continuous rush of water for maybe half a minute, pressing her against the tree. She had to keep climbing up in order to not be crushed. In order to stay breathing. The water and the rush wanted to squeeze the air out and press her ribs in and collapse her lungs. The water wanted to take her further through the trees and maybe grind her into the embankment leading up to the road. The soft mud there would be treacherous. She would get stuck and drown.

  The idea of Cole pinned in the mud surged another rush of adrenaline through her body. It was enough of a spark to get her half up and out of the water, climbing up further now, inching along with all four limbs wrapped and grappling with the wet and scratchy trunk. The water now was almost helping her stay upright and afloat, propping her up into the palm. She swiveled around the best she could to get a look around the tree, down to where the water had rushed to. It was too dark to see anything but the white tips of the waves, the whites of them breaking around trees and rocks. She hoped Cole was one of those objects sticking safely out of the water. And with his head up.

  “Cole!” she cried again, forcing her voice louder and higher, willing it to break through the wall of sound from the wall of water. “Cole! Where are you!?”

  The water suddenly slowed around her and she almost fell from her perch on the tree trunk. She grabbed tighter, shaking now, her biceps burning, loosening. She kept calling for Cole, but there was no answer. With the slowing water, he should have been able to hear. But the water didn’t just slow. It began to pull back, all of it moving in the opposite direction, sucking her back to sea. Annica’s legs dangled off now, her arms burning even worse.

  The water began slowly, leaves and branches and bits of plastic garbage floating past. And a human body. Faced-down and limp and floating by like driftwood. The flow was still slow, and Annica could reach for it, for him, and pull him close to her and her tree. It was Cole. Shirtless. Unconscious. She yelled at his body but nothing moved. She felt no muscle strength in him. No will to survive. She would have to will it for him.

  She held with her feet, too. Body wrapped around Cole and the tree trunk as the rest of the water sloped back down to the beach and to the great black open of the sea whence it came. The sound was almost as loud as its initial rush into the jungle. There was also something else now, a distant siren. It sounded like it could have been from Hilo, an emergency siren about the tsunami. But she had no time to wonder about the implications of a natural disaster. She didn’t even think about “the story” of it all.

  Cole’s head dipped under the water again.

  She lifted her arm up his back, snug behind his head. She lifted more until his face appeared again. A loose, sleeping face. Lifeless.

  She waited for the water, still so much of it needing to be pulled back to sea. She waited with Cole, with her body holding both of them, barely. It was a great relief when the water went low enough for ground footing. She was standing now, the rest of the water coursing through her legs, then her ankles. She walked with Cole, dragging him, panicking, and then dropping him on a random clump of palm fronds. A panicked brain made it hard to remember lifeguard lessons.

  She crouched by his face. His skin was shiny but dull, gray. She put her ear to his mouth and heard nothing.

  Ear to his heart.

  Nothing.

  He looked dead, and, finally, peaceful.

  21

  Cole

  He was somewhere deep underwater. Under the waves, miles under, where it was colder and blacker. Miles beneath the cargo ship. Miles under his old life now, where he could only hear its faint murmurs. Muffled sounds from a past existence. There was a light, too. Equally dim and distant, but a light nonetheless. It was moving closer, warming him.

  There was a pull of something, a sense of motion through the blackness. His body was light and drifting, floating upward toward the light. The warmth and the light became a face staring down at him. Th
e sounds, too, all coming from this beautiful, angelic face.

  Annica stared down at him, still from miles away. But it was her face. Still quiet, but it was her voice. Growing louder. The light from her face grew warmer and pulled him closer, opening Cole’s eyelids until he could clearly see her—until he lurched to the side and coughed out a stream of saltwater from his lungs. And then there was something that felt like vomiting, more liquid splashing down on the mud he’d been lying on. He was facing down, holding himself up on his palms, water draining out from his mouth and nose as he panted hard to fight his breath back. It felt like the water had been draining from his mind, too. The distant blurriness had left and it was the raw imagery again of their jungle and of her face. Annica.

  “Annica,” he said, coughing out more water.

  Two hands on his shoulders, rubbing his back. Annica saying something . . .

  He finished the coughing and spun around, lying back down. But Annica tried lifting him again. “Keep going,” she said. “Cough it all out.”

  His throat ached.

  “Come on,” she said.

  “It’s out,” Cole said, coughing again, and then looking around. Looking for the ocean. It felt like he had just been lost in its depths. He had drowned. But where was the water now?

  Had she pulled him all this way up the shore?

  “Can you breathe?” she asked.

  “What happened?” he said, breathing quickly but effectively. The air retuning brought more alertness, like a gust of wind blowing away the fog. “Where are we?”

  When he looked back at her face, it seemed like she was having a tough time coming up with the words to explain it. Maybe she drowned, too. Maybe she was still in the fog. “Are you okay?” he asked, reaching for her and pulling her into him for a hug.

  Annica nodded against his chest. “There was a tsunami.”

  “From the earthquake,” he said. God, it all seemed so surreal. The entire fucking day.

  She kept nodding.

  He was aware now that he was shirtless and without pants. He had on his boxers, but everything else had been swept away either by their passion or the wave that ended it. Annica, too, looked out of sorts, wearing nothing but her shirt and panties and a dull anxiety across her face.

  “We need to move,” Cole said. “Tsunamis are never just one wave.”

  They broke apart and he got to his feet first, eager to get to action. Eager to regain his role as protector and to help Annica. “Let’s get to higher ground,” he said, before pausing to look at her again.

  She noticed. “What?”

  Cole leaned in and kissed her. Quick and soft. “Thank you,” he said. “I’m assuming you just saved my life.”

  “I’m assuming so, too,” she said, not smiling. “You were unconscious. I gave you mouth-to-mouth.”

  Cole wanted to say something witty about it. But the urge to move and get to higher ground trumped even the best of jokes about her mouth-to-mouth. Maybe later they would have time for another take on it. It was a goal to strive for. Something to live for. What else could there be?

  “Let’s go,” he said, wanting to rush off with Annica through the jungle. But she stood in place.

  She said, “Wait.”

  “For what?”

  “We should go to the beach first and then run along the jungle to find the start of the path.”

  He remembered the path. And his bike. Then he remembered the car that had been looking for them.

  “You really think we can bushwhack through all that?” she asked.

  He looked in the direction of the road. It was too dark and thick. In comparison, he could at least see the beach.

  “How long until the next wave?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, “but it’s better than getting stuck in there again.”

  At this point, he just wanted to run anywhere, though he was glad to see her follow his stride toward the beach. Running there involved jumping over flattened vegetation and piles of water-strewn palm fronds. Trip obstacles left and right. It was like basic training for the army, high-stepping through the squares of a cargo rope. Only this time he had someone a little more attractive next to him. That’s where he liked Annica—especially in times like this. Not behind or in front, but right by his side, keeping pace as they both dodged over downed branches all the way to the clearing. On the beach now, he could see how the water had pulled back, far out to sea. It was a dangerous omen.

  They followed the battered tree line to where their trailhead should have been. Everything looked different now after the tsunami, but he was sure where it was by the distance covered. He still had good senses for that, at least.

  “Is that it?” Annica asked, both of them staring at the faintest trail of sand through the dark cover of jungle.

  “That’s it.”

  They started up the trail, moving in the same way as before, high-kneed and leaping, with eyes constantly scanning the ground. It occurred to Cole that he might be better off looking up more often, that there might be something more dangerous at eye level. Something worse than branches, or a wild boar, or another tidal wave. He kept this in mind when the path zig-zagged uphill, when the corners were close and blind. He checked back to Annica one last time, who was doing better on the path going uphill than down. He was glad for that. But up ahead, behind the next tight bend, he wasn’t glad to see the path blocked by more than downed foliage. It was two human shapes in low light.

  Cole stopped immediately, absorbing Annica’s collision without taking his eyes off the people. Both of them were half-naked and darkened by the earth as if they’d also been swept up in the tsunami. He heard another wave crashing in from the sea, the next round blasting through the forest below them. Up here on the path they were safe. Safe from water. He wasn’t sure about the people.

  He felt worse about it when he saw moonlight glint off the barrel of a gun. The black shine of a semiautomatic.

  “Just hold it,” came a high voice. It was a woman, short and slender. And pointing a gun at his head.

  He slid his hand over to his holster. To where the holster should have been.

  “Hey!” the woman cried.

  “I’ve got nothing,” Cole said, feeling more naked now than ever. Unarmed and vulnerable and at the mercy of whoever this person was.

  “Who are you?” he asked.

  “Just hold it,” she said again. “Both of you.” She had pointed the gun at Annica.

  “Don’t do that,” Cole said. “Keep it on me.”

  “Then keep her from moving.”

  Cole told Annica not to move, while his eyes were trained on this armed woman. He could see now that she wore a pair of athletic shorts and a sports bra. Her chest was heaving.

  “Just calm down,” Cole told her.

  “I am calm.” Her eyes stared at him, unblinking. Asian eyes, almond shaped.

  He finally had time to look at the ground below her, to where the other figure lay. A larger figure, a man. He wasn’t moving.

  “What’s wrong with him?” he asked.

  “I found him like this.”

  “Like what? What’s wrong with him?”

  “Come on,” Annica said, “Can you please put the gun down? We’re not going to do anything.”

  “Then stop moving.”

  “I’m not moving.”

  “Hey,” Cole said, “What’s wrong with him?”

  The woman kept her eyes trained on Cole as she said, “I found him down below in the lava rocks, all cut up. He’s bleeding bad, so I tried to carry him up to the road. But then I heard you guys running up.”

  “Okay, so we ran up,” Cole said. “Why do you have a gun pointed at us?”

  “I can lower it,” she said, “if you stay away.”

  The gun must have been submerged under water for some time. He remembered how long it took for the water to rush before his memory went foggy. Long enough for him to lose consciousness. Then he began wondering about the quality of amm
o she’d been using. There was a slight chance the gun wouldn’t fire, water-soaked as it was. Staring at her now, the way her gun hand shook, it was a risk he wasn’t too excited about taking.

  Annica was looking at the man on the ground. He still hadn’t moved. She said, “Can we see him?”

  “See him?”

  “To see if he’s alright.”

  “He’s not,” the woman said, backing away slowly. “But yeah, see what you can do. My objective was to just watch him. Not kill him.”

  “Your objective?” Cole said. He was creeping up to the wounded man, making sure his movements were slow and steady and obvious. He tried to be as small and nonthreatening as possible, in case the gun could still fire. “What’s your mission?” he asked her in a calm voice.

  “I’m running security,” she said. “It’s another reason why I’ve got my gun on you guys.”

  “Security for what?” Cole crouched next to the body. He could see the man’s chest moving slowly, a laboring breath. A pause. And then another. There was a low groaning wheeze of wind passing through his face. Cole looked at that next, getting a good look at someone who looked astonishingly similar to his old friend, his house-mate, Tommy. Longish blond hair that looked mostly darkened with mud and blood. Tommy’s crooked nose. Full face made even fuller with bruising and swollen lacerations. Cole thought about the lava rocks. He said, “Who is this?”

  “I’ve got my boss coming here,” she said. “Maybe you can save your questions for him?”