Ashore, Libby and Tony saw the splashing and cheered. Byron put down his rod and scrambled around the deck. “Those idiots on Long Island took my net!” He looked up at Reese, helplessly.
“Don’t worry about it,” Reese said over his shoulder. “Doesn’t feel like a big one...I think I got it.” Reese pulled in the fish—a medium Spanish Mackerel—easily enough, and managed to land it aboard Tiberia, where it flopped on the foredeck, its scales iridescent in the afternoon sun. He put his foot down on the body to keep it from flipping overboard and looked around for an implement to knock the fish out or kill it quickly.
“Here,” Byron said—he handed Reese a knife and stepped back.
“Got a live well?” Reese asked hopefully.
“Nope,” Byron said. “I got a stringer though—just put ‘im on and we’ll toss it over the side. I think it’s too shallow for sharks...should keep our catch fresh enough.”
Reese took the neon green line from Byron and threaded the needle-like tip through the mackerel’s gill and mouth. He looped the knotted end through the line and tied it off against the starboard railing.
“Okay, buddy...easy does it,” he said to the mackerel as he lowered it into the water, where it immediately tried to swim away, only to be restrained by the stringer through its mouth. “Okay, look’s good.”
“Let’s see what else we can catch,” Byron said as he cast out again.
As Reese fished, he watched Tony and Libby on the shoreline. Libby already had a decent pile of driftwood on the sandy beach. But Reese couldn’t fathom what Tony was doing—he waited for the water to recede after a wave, then dove into the sand, digging furiously with his hands. He stood up and shouted, holding a handful of sand, then dumped it into the yellow bailing bucket.
“Um...what are they doing over there?”
Byron looked up from his fishing rod. “Eh? Oh...Tony’s looking for sand fleas.”
“Oh, good thinking—we can use them for bait.”
Byron laughed while he adjusted his lure. “I suppose we could...but that’s one of his mother’s favorite beach eats—steamed sand fleas. They’re not bad.”
“What?” Reese asked. “I’ve eaten a lot of weird stuff,” he said as he cast out into the shallows again, “but I ain’t had sand fleas, steamed or otherwise.”
“Oh, with some Old Bay Seasoning and mixed in with some clams and veggies...they’re pretty tasty. I prefer them stir-fried myself, I like the crunch.”
Reese made a face. “I’m not that hungry. I’ll stick with fish.”
Byron laughed. “Well, if we’re lucky, Libby might find some mussels, too. We’ll see.”
Reese dreamed of a good old-fashioned clam bake as both men went back to fishing. Byron caught a fish next—another mackerel—a bit bigger than Reese’s. After a long dry spell, when Tony and Libby had a fire going on the shore, Reese added a flounder to the tally.
“I think that’s enough,” Byron said. “Those mackerel are fair-sized. Want to start cleaning?”
Reese nodded and pulled up his lure. “Sure, I’m starving, let’s get this going and get the meat on the fire.” As they began to gut the fish and prepare them for the evening’s meal, Byron continued their conversation.
“I want you to take Intrepid.” He held up a bloody knife and stopped Reese’s argument. “I know how bad you want to get to your family—there’s no easier way than sailing that boat down the coast right to Charleston. If you had to go ashore and find a car...who knows what you’d have to deal with through three states.” He shook his head as he cut down the fish’s spine and severed the two filets with an easy, practiced flick of his wrist. He sat back on his haunches and wiped the sweat from his brow with the back of his hand.
“Besides,” he continued, “it’s not like Libby and I can sail both boats. It takes all my wits just to keep Tiberia afloat, unbalanced and with a compromised hull. Tony’s not near capable enough to handle Intrepid on his own...so we’d have to tow one or the other.”
“That wouldn’t be good for either hull...thanks to those jokers on Long Island.”
Bryon grunted. “So, the only logical course of action is to give you Intrepid.”
Reese was quiet for a long moment while he worked on cleaning his mackerel. “Thank you, Byron. I know this boat means a lot to you...”
Byron scoffed. “Intrepid meant a lot more to Saul and Mary. Besides,” he said, nodding his head at the canvas-covered M2 on Intrepid’s foredeck, “I don’t want to sail into Baltimore and have to explain that to whoever’s in charge.”
They shared a laugh and finished cleaning the fish. “I’ll take good care of her,” Reese said after a long moment of contemplation.
Byron looked up and grinned. “I know you will. You’re a fine sailor, Reese.” The smile faded from his face and he pointed his knife at Reese. “You just be careful. A Cat 4 is nothing to sneeze at.”
Reese nodded. “I’m not looking forward to this next passage, that’s for sure. But if we time it right...I think we can make Charleston before the worst of it hits. Assuming the landfall predictions we’ve heard are anywhere near accurate.”
“Or it doesn’t speed up...” Byron added.
Reese nodded. “I’d kinda like to leave tonight...” He sighed and shook his head. “But we can’t. Jo can’t stand watch on her own during the night—“
“I can hear you, you know...” she called from Intrepid’s cockpit.
Reese glanced over his shoulder. “Well, she can, but she’d just wake me up every thirty minutes so I wouldn’t get any sleep, anyway...”
“That’s true,” Jo added with a grin.
Byron nodded. “Probably for the best then that you two get a full night’s sleep and start in the morning. It’ll be motivation for us to leave at dawn, too.”
Tony waded back to Tiberia and picked up the prepared fish, then sloshed back ashore with an armful of cooking utensils for Libby. Reese and Byron leaned over Tiberia’s transom and cleaned up, then pitched the offal overboard for the crabs.
“Oooh, some blue crabs would be awesome right about now...did you say you had some Old Bay?”
Byron grinned as he washed his hands. “Sure do...though I can’t say where it’s at right now...it’s an awful mess down below since we took on all that water. Libby’s still trying to clean it up, but it’s down there somewhere.”
They moved back to Tiberia’s pulpit, at the bow, and relaxed while Tony tended the fire on the beach and Libby cooked. Reese looked back and smiled. Jo lay sprawled out on Intrepid’s port side cockpit bench, snoring, her campaign hat down over her face.
Reese sighed and leaned back on the cabin roof aboard Tiberia and basked in the late afternoon sun. “I never in a million years thought I’d be anchored right next to the Bay Bridge, fishing without a license, cooking on a wildlife refuge island.”
Byron laughed, a hearty, jolly sound. “And here I was just wondering how much ammo you had left for that beast on Intrepid’s foredeck.”’
Reese joined in the laughter and clutched his sides. “Not much!” he hooted. “Jo’s got an itchy trigger finger!”
Byron wiped at his face and laughed even harder when Jo snortled and woke up.
“What’s so funny?” she demanded with all the grace of a wet skunk.
“Nothing,” Reese said as he waved off her question. “We’re just discussing the ammo situation.”
“Oh, you’re laughing because I used a lot of it up, huh?” Jo demanded. “Well, I was in what my uncle woulda called a target rich environment.”
Reese flopped back on the cabin roof, laughing so hard he thought he might cry. “You’re a park ranger, not an army ranger!”
Beside him, Byron roared and slapped at the deck with an open hand.
“Hey, you guys too busy laughing or can you help me get this fish aboard without dropping it?” Tony called from the water over the starboard railing. Reese sobered up and helped haul the delicious smelling food aboard, then assisted
Tony and Libby as they climbed up. They all settled in their respective cockpits to enjoy the meal in good company.
Reese could feel the undercurrent of anxiety run through the group like an ocean current. Everyone was nervous—they were nervous about splitting up, about going their separate ways, and what each group might find at the end of their journeys.
He caught Jo’s eye more than once, and though she smiled and laughed with the rest of them as Tony recounted Reese’s swim with the great white shark, the smile never reached her eyes.
Libby looked glad, but sad—like she had reached the end of her own personal run and anticipated a well-deserved rest. He hoped she’d be able to reach Baltimore and her sister’s place before she ran out of medicine.
Reese ate another bite of the succulent mackerel, coated with Old Bay Seasoning that Libby had discovered under a cushion in Tiberia’s galley. The meat still steamed from the cook pot. The pale, flaky flesh was creamy and still carried a light seafood taste, but Reese imagined it was the best he’d get without some fresh squeezed lemon juice and a bowl of cilantro rice.
He chewed the fish gratefully, and smiled at Byron, who regaled the group with a story of his time in the navy. Reese recognized the tactic—talk about trying times in the past to steel yourself for an upcoming ordeal.
Once Libby passed out the remaining crackers and orange slices—the last of their precious fruit—everyone leaned back and relaxed with full bellies as the sun crept toward the horizon and a calm breeze off the Atlantic kept the bugs at bay.
Byron rolled down the Bimini shade on the port side and brought everyone relief from the setting sun. “What I wouldn’t give for an ice-cold beer right about now...”
Reese laughed. “Or a margarita.”
“Now you’re talking,” Libby chimed from Tiberia’s cockpit.
Jo laughed. “Gimme a whisky any day.”
“Spoken like a true Texan,” Reese said with a grin as he pointed at Jo.
“I’d settle for an ice-cold coke,” Tony added wistfully.
Everyone grew quiet. “When do you think we’ll ever have any of that stuff again?” asked Reese softly.
Byron exhaled. “Might be a good long while...”
“About tomorrow,” Libby said abruptly. “I’ll be praying for you two, heading toward that hurricane. You must promise me you’ll be safe.”
Reese grinned. “Madam, I can make no promise.” He turned and looked south, toward the growing bank of clouds on the horizon. He stood and gripped the backstay, then stepped up onto the transom railing aboard Intrepid and narrowed his eyes. “We’re gonna push hard south, and ‘I wish to have no connection to any ship that cannot sail fast; for I intend to go in harm’s way.’”
“Here, here!” Byron cried out. “John Paul Jones—truer words were never spoken.”
Libby, Jo, and Tony clapped as Reese took a bow, then sat back down in his seat. “Seriously, though—we’re raising the anchor at dawn and we’ll head south with all the sail she’ll handle.” He slapped Intrepid’s hull affectionately. “I think we’ve been holding her back the last few days—she wants to fly.”
“Oh, my word...here we go again...” Jo complained to a new round of laughter.
“You just make sure she gets there in one piece,” Libby admonished.
“She’ll hold together—though we don’t have a football sticking out of the hull like you guys...”
“I was talking about Jo, you galoot.”
The laughter died down in time with the sun as it dropped toward the western horizon, they cleared away the dishes and prepared the boats for one final night together.
Reese lay on Intrepid’s foredeck where the still-warm teak decking planks soothed the aching muscles of his back and shoulders. He groaned softly with the feeling of a full stomach and skin warmed by the sun and cooled by the salt breeze. He locked his hands behind his head and stretched out to watch the dazzling stars appear in the velvety black sky. As Jo and Libby murmured from the cockpit and Byron and Tony quietly made plans for the next day, Reese reveled in his solitude and the night sky.
“One more night, baby,” he whispered to the heavens, hoping that Cami might hear him, wherever she was. “Nothing is going to stop me now.” He listened to the waves lap at the beach some twenty yards away, a soft, soothing sound. The world was at peace, healing after the trauma of the tsunami—but a greater danger lurked over the horizon. Reese would gladly sail straight into the heart of the hurricane if it brought him home faster.
He stared up at the stars and rocked with Intrepid as she rested at anchor. “For I intend to go in harm’s way...”
BROKEN TIDE Book 5
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Broken Tide | Book 4 | Backflow Page 22