One Final Breath

by Lynn H. Blackburn

  Anissa jerked it open and handed the spotlight to Gabe. She joined him in the front of the boat and he knew she was scanning the water for any sign of life.

  Adam was at the back of the boat, Anissa’s phone pressed to one ear, hand pressed to the other as he talked to the dispatcher. She must have handed it off when she ran for the boat. “Investigators Campbell, Bell, Chavez, and Parker responding to a distress call on Lake Porter. Shots fired. Someone, possible female, calling for help. We’re on the north side of the lake off Porter Trail, but we’re headed toward the south side.”

  Ryan cut the throttle and they bobbed in the water.

  Listening.

  Water lapped against the sides of the boat. Night bugs buzzed. Thunder rumbled. But nothing human spoke to them from the darkness. Were they too late?

  “I didn’t dream that voice.” Anissa spoke in a whisper.

  A splash.

  Could have been a turtle or a fish, but—

  “Help!”

  The voice was much weaker this time, but also much closer. “Keep talking to us!” Anissa called out over the water. “We’re with the sheriff’s office. We can help you.”

  “Please!” This time the voice had a distinct gurgly quality. “I don’t think I can hold him much longer.” A girl. Maybe a teenager. And she wasn’t alone. How could she have gotten to the middle of the lake?

  Ryan put the boat into a slow forward creep in the direction of the voice. But voices carried over the water in weird ways. A fat raindrop hit Gabe’s arm. Then another. Great. The storm was here. “Anything, Chavez?” Ryan asked.

  “I see a light! Hurry! I don’t want to drown!”

  They were getting close and now had to be careful not to run over her. “Hang on, sweetie. Keep kicking. Don’t try to swim toward us. Just keep kicking.” Anissa leaned over the side of the boat and called encouragement as Gabe swept the spotlight across the surface of the water, looking for—

  Another sound split the night.

  Gabe grabbed Anissa’s arm and pulled her with him until they both knelt on the floor of the boat, their arms resting on the seats. He checked behind him. Adam was in a similar position at the back of the boat. Ryan knelt behind the wheel.

  Was someone shooting at them or at the girl?

  Or taking advantage of the thunder to target practice. At midnight? Unlikely.

  “I think the shots are coming from the other side of the cove. We’re sitting ducks out here.” Ryan pointed to the shore opposite Leigh’s house. “Stay low. He could be reloading.”

  Anissa peeked her head above the rail. Gabe joined her with the spotlight. Both of them kept as low a profile as possible while still scanning the water.

  “There!” Gabe held the light steady on the place he’d seen a flash of white face. “She’s gone under. I think she may be holding another kid.”

  Ryan turned the boat in the direction of the light. Anissa slid out of her shoes, her shorts, and the cover-up she’d been wearing over her bathing suit. Adam continued to relay information to the dispatcher. The rain came harder. Faster. If they didn’t find them soon . . .

  Gabe prayed. “Ayúdanos por favor. Ayúdanos.”

  “Amen,” Anissa whispered.

  He hadn’t realized he’d said the words aloud. Or loud enough for anyone to hear them.

  A bolt of lightning split a tree on the other side of the lake and illuminated the night for a few critical seconds. Anissa grabbed his arm and pointed. A head. And another. They were close.

  Anissa dove in.

  She shouldn’t have jumped in without a life ring, but Gabe understood why she did. Anissa was an incredible swimmer and would be able to get to the girl much faster without it. And they were running out of time.

  He saw the girl’s head break the surface. “Stay on that path, Anissa. You’re almost there.”

  Ryan continued to move the boat toward them.

  “I can’t hold him!”

  The terror in the girl’s voice pierced Gabe’s heart. What should he tell her? Let the boy go? What if he was still alive and they could save him? But she shouldn’t drown trying to keep him from sinking.

  Adam joined him at the front with the ring.

  “Trade ya.” Gabe took the ring and handed the light to Adam. Then he dove in after Anissa.

  They had to get these kids out of the water.

  And all of them off the lake.

  “I’ve got you.” Anissa reached for the girl.

  “Not me. Jeremy! Take him. I can swim.”

  Anissa didn’t argue with her. “Okay. I’ve got him.”

  Gabe swam up beside them with the ring. “Give it to her,” Anissa said. “I can pull him in.” Gabe pushed back the desire to stay with Anissa. The boy was limp in her arms. She could handle it.

  Another crack—not thunder. They needed to get out of the water. Now.

  Ryan idled the boat beside them. Adam lowered the ladder. “Come on. Right here.” Gabe stayed with the girl—she couldn’t be more than sixteen—as she swam to the ladder. She’d refused the life ring, but she’d been right. She could swim. Quite well. She reached for the ladder but paused before pulling herself out of the water. “Does she have him?” she asked through chattering teeth.

  “She does,” Gabe said without even looking. “She’ll get him on board. Let’s get you up so I can help her with your friend. What’s your name?”

  “Brooke.” Her entire body trembled as she pulled herself up the ladder. Gabe stayed behind her. The way she was shaking, she could lose her grip and fall back into the water. “Brooke Ashcroft.”

  Ashcroft? Was she related to—? Gabe stopped the thought in its tracks. It didn’t matter.

  Adam reached for Brooke’s hand and helped her into the boat and Ryan wrapped a towel around her shoulders. The rain would soak it through soon, but maybe it would provide a little warmth.

  No one brought up how her bathing suit was covered in blood.

  Gabe could hear Adam as he settled Brooke on the floor at the front of the boat. Anissa reached the ladder with the boy and didn’t appear to be out of breath. Probably wasn’t. Sometimes he thought she might be part fish. She definitely had all of them beat when it came to cardiovascular endurance.

  Both Adam and Ryan joined them and the four of them maneuvered the young man onto the back of the boat. As soon as he was on board, Anissa and Gabe scrambled up the ladder while Adam and Ryan laid the young man on the floor between the seats. Gabe knelt over Jeremy. No pulse. No breaths. He swiped the boy’s mouth and opened up his jaw enough to drain the water from his throat.

  Adam pulled the ladder out of the water and Ryan gunned the engine.

  Gabe blew into Jeremy’s mouth twice.

  No response.

  Gabe started compressions.

  One . . . two . . . three . . . four . . .

  “Leigh’s dock?” Ryan shouted the question.

  Adam shook his head. “The ramp at the end of Porter Trail. The ambulance is almost there.”

  Anissa wrapped her arms around Brooke. The poor thing was shaking so violently it looked like Anissa was holding on to an out-of-control washing machine.

  Adam joined Gabe on the floor of the boat.

  “He shot Jeremy.” Brooke yelled the words over the roar of the engine. “Why would anyone shoot Jeremy?”

  The bullet had entered the upper left half of Jeremy’s torso, but Gabe couldn’t think about that right now.

  “Brooke.” Anissa’s voice carried over the storm and the engine. “Have you been drinking? Doing drugs? Anything like that? We need to know so we can help Jeremy.”

  “No! Nothing! We don’t do that stuff. It was a race. To see who could swim across the fastest.”

  Twenty-seven . . . twenty-eight . . . twenty-nine . . . thirty.

  Adam did two more breaths.

  Gabe continued compressions. Adam continued breaths.

  The boat slowed, shouts and lights trickled through Gabe’s consciousness, bu
t he kept going. He might not be able to save this boy, but he was sure going to try. He didn’t look at his face. He focused on doing the one thing he could do. Arms straight. Steady rhythm.

  Nine . . . ten . . . eleven . . . twelve . . .

  The boat bumped against the dock.

  Paramedics jumped onto the boat. Anissa filled them in.

  Gabe didn’t stop.

  Twenty-two . . . twenty-three . . . twenty-four . . .

  2

  Anissa brought up the rear of their somber crew as they each nodded at Bill, the security guard in the Carrington Memorial Hospital emergency department.

  He gave them a sad nod in turn and reached his hand toward Anissa as she approached. “You okay, hon?”

  All she could do was shrug.

  No, she wasn’t okay. She’d dragged a dead boy out of the lake tonight and then watched Gabe try to force life back into him, even though he had to have known the boy—Jeremy—was already gone.

  The lake patrol unit had joined them at the Porter Trail boat ramp and once the paramedics left with Brooke and Jeremy, the dive team members had taken the lake patrol unit back to the scene. Not that there was much anyone could do in a thunderstorm in the middle of the night.

  Or anytime.

  No one could bring Jeremy back. He was currently on life support, but it was only a matter of time. The family was waiting on his sister to arrive from Georgia in order to give her a moment to say goodbye before they would allow the machines to be disconnected.

  And the girl—Brooke—had been checked out and cleared by the emergency department staff but had categorically refused to leave the hospital. When the Littlefield family arrived they had allowed her to say goodbye to Jeremy. She was now waiting in the private room set aside for the family during this difficult time.

  That poor girl would need a lot of help coping with his death. She would be convinced it was all her fault. She would beat herself up over this one stupid mistake—and the consequences that she would live with for the rest of her life. She would wish—a million times a day—that she’d died instead.

  Anissa wasn’t speculating. She knew. She’d lived it.

  She pulled in a couple of quick breaths. Blinked back the sudden moisture in her eyes. She could not fall apart. Not now.

  She was a professional.

  But it would be a lot easier to be a professional back at the sheriff’s office.

  “You okay, Bell?”

  Anissa caught Ryan’s concerned remark. Ryan didn’t mind being there. Since he’d married Leigh, a nurse practitioner in the emergency department, the hospital had practically been his second home.

  He was following behind Gabe and Adam and didn’t look in her direction as he slowed his pace to match hers. He spoke in a soft murmur and Anissa knew he was trying not to call attention to the way she lagged behind the others. They all knew she didn’t like hospitals, but the way Ryan had asked her if she was okay sparked a question of her own. “Did Leigh tell you?”

  “Are you kidding? Leigh believes you are bound by some sort of confidentiality agreement and doesn’t seem to think anything you say to her is any of my business. But she did text me a minute ago and ask me to make sure you didn’t pass out.”

  Awesome. She was going to strangle Leigh.

  Ryan caught her eye and winked.

  Anissa punched his arm. “You’re messing with me? Now?”

  “Just trying to defuse the tension.”

  “Keep it up, Parker. I’ll make you dive with Stu.” Kelly Stuart was the newest member of the dive team. She was . . . eager.

  Ryan shuddered. “Sorry, boss.” His grin faded. “You’ve got this.”

  He picked up his pace and came even with Adam, leaving her to bring up the rear.

  She studied the square tiles, not registering anything around her. They wound through the wide hallways, often alone, sometimes stepping to the side as groups of nurses or physicians passed.

  Anissa knew Ryan thought her anxiety was due to her deep-seated distaste for hospitals—growing up in a culture where people went to the hospital not to get better but to die would do that to you. And none of them were happy that they were coming to check on Brooke Ashcroft and talk to the family of Jeremy Littlefield.

  No one ever wanted to meet grieving parents. The Littlefields had been out of town and had only arrived at the hospital a few hours earlier. Jeremy’s father, George Littlefield, had been on the same basketball team as the sheriff when they were eighteen-year-old boys, and the sheriff had requested that the dive team make themselves available to the Littlefields.

  She understood. This wasn’t her first experience with heartbroken parents.

  The difference was that the first time, she’d been the friend who survived.

  The image of her friend—four days dead—forced its way into her mind. She couldn’t stop the shudder that dominoed from her shoulders to her knees.

  A strong hand closed over her elbow.

  She didn’t need to look to know it was Gabe. When had he gone from the front of the group to the rear? And why did he have to make his move at the same moment her body betrayed her stress? And why did her stomach do that weird floppy thing it only did around him?

  Even as her mind scrambled for answers, it recognized the gesture and the next few breaths came a little easier.

  That same hand, in that same place, had gotten her through the early days after the shooting last winter. But until the events of tonight, it had been a while since he’d touched her in any way other than a professional manner on a dive.

  Valentine’s Day. That had been the last time. They’d both worked late even as others tried to get away for a romantic evening with their dates. As they’d walked to their cars well after 9:00 p.m., he’d squeezed her arm, just like he was doing now, and said, “Maybe next year we’ll leave early too.”

  They’d both laughed at the ridiculousness of the idea.

  She didn’t bother to process why she remembered that. It wasn’t like it mattered if he touched her.

  Or didn’t.

  “Can you do me a favor?” Gabe’s question drew her attention to his face. His eyes were glued straight ahead, his mouth set in a tight line.

  It was the most un-Gabe-ish expression she’d ever seen. “What’s wrong?”

  “Nothing. But I may have to take myself off this case and I need to know if you want it.”

  “Why don’t you want this case?”

  He met her eyes for a brief second. “I didn’t say I didn’t want it. I may not have a choice. But I don’t want to throw you under the bus by handing it off to you if you don’t want it.”

  Gabe wasn’t making any sense, but the tension in his voice, the set of his jaw, gave Anissa pause. Almost everything was a joke to Gabe, and over the past few years she’d learned to pay attention when he took things seriously.

  And clearly this was no joking matter.

  Did she want this case?

  Honestly? No.

  Would she take it? Yes.

  But only if she had to.

  “I’m next on the rotation, and yes, I’ll take it if I have to. But I think you’d be the best person for it.” She thought this for reasons she didn’t want to get into right now.

  Gabe quirked one eyebrow. “I guess we’ll see.”

  They entered the private waiting area. A tall man, gray at the temples, in track pants and a T-shirt, rose to greet them. “George Littlefield.” He shook each of their hands. When he reached Anissa, the tears that he’d been blinking back spilled over. “Thank you”—he drew a tortured breath—“for not letting my boy sink to the bottom of the lake.”

  Sobs rocked through him and Anissa did the only thing she could do. She put her arms around him and he clung to her like a drowning man.

  Anissa had no idea how long they stood there, but Mr. Littlefield eventually stepped back. “Thank you,” he said again. “If you’ll give me a moment, my wife wants to speak to you as well.” He waved an
arm in the direction of the door and he looked so lost. So broken. “She didn’t want to leave Jeremy.”

  He rubbed his hand across his face and exited the room.

  When the door closed behind him, Anissa scanned the room. A much older couple, probably the grandparents, spoke in soft murmurs to a youngish man who she’d guess was their pastor. The only other person in the room was Brooke Ashcroft, huddled in a chair, staring unblinking at nothing.

  The door opened, sooner than Anissa had been expecting, and she braced herself for the emotions sure to come from Jeremy’s mom.

  But it wasn’t Jeremy’s mom who entered the room.

  It was Paisley Wilson or, as she was better known, “This is Paisley Wilson, reporting live from Sky9.”

  What was she doing here? Surely the families wouldn’t want a nosy reporter—

  Paisley didn’t look around the room as she scurried to Brooke’s side. “Was that fast enough?” The words were spoken with kindness and compassion and Brooke leaned against Paisley with the kind of ease that only came from an established relationship.

  Paisley draped her arms around Brooke and kissed the top of her head. Only then did her gaze bounce around the room and an uncomfortable awareness filled her expression as she made eye contact with Anissa.

  Then her eyes widened, her face paled. She swallowed hard and fast.

  Anissa turned to see what had caused such an obvious reaction in the typically cool-as-a-cucumber reporter.

  Paisley Wilson was looking straight at Gabe.

  Paisley Ashcroft Wilson.

  The resemblance between her and her younger sister was slight, but when they were sitting side by side it was unmistakable.

  Gabe refused to be the first one to break eye contact.

  He’d done nothing wrong. But he’d paid for her mistakes.

  Paisley Wilson had nearly gotten him killed.

  Her desire for the big story had resulted in the death of a young man who’d been trying to get out of the gang life. She’d blown Gabe’s cover so thoroughly he would never be able to go undercover again—at least not in Carrington.

  And Paisley knew it. It was there. In the way her breathing hitched. The way her face had gone so white that he’d had a split second of concern that she might pass out. But now her face burned with the heat of spewing lava.