Killer Swell

by Jeff Shelby

  I nodded, and we both stood. She looked back at Carter.

  “I’m glad you are okay, Carter,” she said. “And I’m glad you realized that your jackass of a friend was going to need some help.”

  “He is a jackass,” Carter concurred, pulling at the sling on his newly broken arm.

  Liz and I walked out into the hallway. She leaned back against the door to Carter’s room, her eyes hard and sharp. She started to say something, then stopped.

  “What?” I asked.

  She pinched the bridge of her nose and shut her eyes. “Nothing. Just a lot to think about.”

  “I know,” I said. “I can’t believe she killed her sister. And Randall and Charlotte.”

  “That,” she said, opening her eyes, “I can believe.”

  I looked at her, not understanding.

  “What I can’t believe is that you almost died last night.” The corners of her eyes twitched. “You didn’t listen to me. Again. You went to see Randall. You didn’t wait for help. You nearly screwed up the whole thing.” She paused. “Same old, same old.”

  I knew that my anger had gotten the better of me, but I wasn’t sure how rehashing my mistakes was going to improve the situation.

  I shook my head. “I don’t know what you want me to say, Liz.”

  She stared at me for a moment, chewing carefully on her bottom lip. Her eyes were looking for something and apparently weren’t finding it.

  “I don’t know either,” she said finally.

  She walked down the hall and disappeared around a corner.

  I watched her go, unsure of what to do. I knew that I’d disappointed her. Maybe she thought that what had happened between us in the last couple of days was going to change me. I knew that it wouldn’t, and yet I wasn’t sure I was comfortable with that.

  I walked back into the room.

  “Is she really gonna tell them I fell?” Carter asked, frowning.

  “What does it matter?” I asked, walking over to the window.

  “My reputation will be shattered,” he said, sounding like a child who lost his favorite toy. “All that work to establish myself as a badass. Gone.”

  “You’ll recover.”

  I felt his eyes on my back. “How are you?”

  I stared out the window. The view was to the north, and I could see both Torrey Pines State Beach and the condos up on the hill where Emily had lived in the distance. “Fine.”

  “Really?”

  “No. But I will be.”

  I knew that I would be, eventually. But death has a way of screwing you up. And not just the deaths of those around you, but the possibility of your own. I wasn’t sure how long it would take me to find that sense of normalcy again.

  “We should go do something,” Carter said.

  I turned back to him and looked at his cast and sling. “I don’t know that you’re in any kind of shape to be doing anything.”

  “They’re gonna let me outta here tonight,” he said. “But I mean doing something like getting out of town. Away from all this crap.”

  I liked that idea. “Okay. Where?”

  He grinned. “I was thinking Cabo.”

  I nodded, again liking the idea. “Good choice.”

  “No Ice Queen,” he said, raising an eyebrow. “Just me and you.”

  “No problem,” I told him, thinking about what had happened out in the hallway with Liz. “Just me and you. And the trip’s on me.”

  “As it should be,” he said, the grin returning. “A little food, a lot of alcohol, and a lot of surfing.”

  “Your arm gonna be up for getting in the water?”

  He made a face at the cast. “It’ll be fine.” He looked back at me. “Yeah. Cabo. Food, booze, and we’ll surf until we’re dead in the water.”

  I hadn’t been to Cabo San Lucas in a couple of years. There was a strong right break known as Zippers just up the road from the resorts, on the Sea of Cortez side of the point, that produced solid waves and took a lot out of you on a good afternoon. I pictured the azure colors of the water, paddling out to the lineup, and leaving a lot of things out on those waves.

  I was already looking forward to it.

  Acknowledgments

  This book may have my name on the cover, but it belongs to many others, and many thanks are owed. Mario Acevedo, Jim Cole, Heidi Kuhn, Margie Lawson, Tom Lawson, Sandy Meckstroth, Jeanne Stein, and Bob Stricker all read the book in its infancy and took the time to offer numerous suggestions that made it infinitely better. Victoria Sanders took me on as a client and made all of this happen—I will forever be grateful. The hardworking folks at Dutton—particularly Brian Tart, who was willing to take a chance on an unknown, and Martha Bushko, who in her wit and wisdom found the book I didn’t know I’d written—have made the entire process more enjoyable and more enlightening than I ever could’ve hoped for. And to my wife, Stephanie, who endured countless hours of whining, moaning, and mood swings and still managed to provide plenty of encouragement, support, and kicks in the ass when they were required—you are simply the best person I know.