by Lisa Hughey
I was back at my test beach. The one I liked to visit in the middle of the night to work on my fear of water. Like some surreal Groundhog Day where I kept returning to the same place to learn my lesson. But what if I’d changed my mind? What if I didn’t want to learn?
My palms were sweating. And a sick churning had taken up residence in my stomach. Which come to think of it, hadn’t been fed today. Somehow Zeke Hawthorne had convinced me to come with him. And suddenly I was confronting my biggest fears.
I awkwardly changed into the skimpy swimsuit, removing my underwear from beneath my clothes and then replacing them with the bikini. Fortunately he’d also bought an oversized sweatshirt, because the beach was going to be cold. Even with a mid-October Indian Summer, the sand and the water would be freezing. Not that I wanted to get anywhere near the water.
The need to check in with my mother was weighing heavily on me. My stepfather had found me yesterday, what if he’d found Mama too?
“I want to call the answering service.”
Zeke had pulled off his threadbare t-shirt. My mouth went dry at the rippling expanse of bare skin. “Go for it. But keep it short.”
I nodded mutely and turned on my phone. I called in to the service and pressed the security code to listen to the messages. There were two messages from my mother, which was odd. It hadn’t been that long since the last one.
“I forgot to tell you a second ago,” Mama’s voice rang in my ear. A melancholy hit me, so sharp it pierced my heart and made it difficult to breathe. “Your Uncle sent a friend. Pretty sure he’s with you now.”
Uncle Carson sent a friend? Mama thought Zeke was Uncle Carson’s friend. That’s why she’d been so willing to let me go with Zeke. Her instant trust made so much more sense now.
As the message center gave me the date and time the message was left, I realized that our messages must have crossed last night.
I deleted the message then pressed the button for the next one.
“He was there?!” The distress in Mama’s voice came through loud and clear. “Oh my God. Are you okay? How did you get away? Oh, I wish I could give you a hug. Leave me another message. Let me know you are okay. Be safe. And no sign of him here.” Wherever here was.
I punched in the numbers so I could leave her a message. “We’re fine.” Which wasn’t precisely true but at least she had escaped from her stepfather. No need to worry her mother with all the other craziness going on. “Let’s check in twice daily. Love you.”
I finally realized that this whole situation was nuts. The threat of John Stanley had to be eliminated once and for all. But I wasn’t sure how to go about making that happen.
“Ready?” Zeke asked.
I stared through the stand of eucalyptus trees at the rippling waves of the ocean. The fog still lingered, and the sun played peek a boo with the clouds, flickering in and out. A ray broke through the cloud and shone on the gentle waves of the protected cove.
So pretty. Like a postcard. But the effect was anything but calming. My stomach churned and my limbs filled with a paralyzing fear. Was I ready? No. “Yes.”
I squared my shoulders.
“You’re going to be okay.”
I sure hoped so.
We walked to the beach together. Zeke had his new phone in his palm, while I carried the thin blanket we’d purchased for inside the tent.
I shuddered. We better not be camping. It would remind me too much of those early days on the run from my stepfather.
Zeke grabbed my free hand and swung my arm back and forth like a little kid. “Cover.” His palm was warm, comforting, a lifeline as we neared the encroaching waves. The salty scent of brine spread through my senses. A brisk breeze whipped my hair around my face and I tugged the floppy hat low over my brow.
“What are the odds you’ll see someone you know here?” Zeke asked.
“Small.” My footsteps faltered and stuttered as I stepped closer to the ocean. “My friends are all shopkeepers.”
Except they weren’t really my friends. Our only connection was that we ran shops in town. They didn’t know that I loved math or science. They thought I worshipped the moon and concocted homeopathic scents and scrubs for tourists. Not that they weren’t lovely people but I had nothing in common with them.
That fact made me sad all over again.
I shook out the blanket with a sharp snap, then let the light Mylar square float to the ground. The shush of the waves was soothing. As long as we stayed away from the water.
Zeke plopped onto the blanket and began messing with his phone.
This was a smaller beach. No lifeguard tower, no lifeguard stand and mostly deserted at this time of year. The water was awfully cold unless you had a wetsuit—I gave Zeke a side eyed glance as I recalled his surfing adventure from the other night—Or you were crazy.
“We need a defensible position, multiple exits, safe from the sky, and unexpected,” he muttered as he thumbed through rental listings on his phone.
He did some more searching on his phone and I thought about my fears. About the fact that thirteen years later, my stepfather still had a stranglehold on my life and I was sick of it.
I shoved to standing.
“You okay?” Zeke glanced up from his intense concentration of the screen.
I squared my shoulders. “I will be.” I took one large, determined stride toward the surf.
Zeke considered that big step. “You need me, I’m here.”
Gratitude and another more subtle emotion flowed through me. I could do this. I would do this. I took another step. The sand was cool and wet, squishing between my toes and rubbing along the ball of my foot as I took another stride forward.
My heart banged against my ribcage as I drew nearer to the receding water. Fear tingled in the tips of my fingers and toes as I decided I had to meet the incoming tide not wait until it came to me.
I shivered in the chilly mid-morning air. The fog parted and occasionally the sun glimmered through the gray. A few hearty tourists lay on beach towels and a pair of small children, a boy and a girl, frolicked in the shallow surf.
Kids could do this.
I could do this. I took another step, the fear was dizzying. Then I realized my chest hurt because I needed to breathe. “Inhale deeply,” I muttered.
The squawking seagulls was nearly drowned out by the rush of terror in my ears. Frigid water seared my toes as I took my first voluntary step into the ocean in thirteen years. I forced myself to stand in several inches of water, hypnotically watching the roll of the tide and the sparkle of the sun on the waves. My heart still thundered in my chest and the tingling in my body didn’t abate, but I forced myself to endure.
I was going to beat this fear if it killed me. The sharp cold burned and I danced backwards a few feet. But I did it!
I whirled around to tell Zeke.
And there was my second greatest nemesis. My stepfather.
I fell a step back into the surf. My vocal chords were so tight, I couldn’t even utter a squeak. I hadn’t been this close to him in years.
Years that had not been kind to him.
My heart beat so hard I was afraid I might pass out. My entire body shook on the inside as fear shot through me.
John Stanley loomed in front of me. Oddly not as large as I remembered. His chest was still broad but he had a belly, that old muscle had gone to fat. His lined face was marred by spider veins and the red cheeks of a man who drank too much. His nose looked as if he’d broken it and his hair, what was left of it, was more salt than pepper. Unlike the devil black it used to be.
“Hello, Claire.”
“That’s not my name anymore,” I said evenly, refusing to show him fear. I’d been forced to forget my name, forget my identity when I was seven years old.
“How did you find us?” My voice cracked. From fear. From frustration. From sheer rage.
“It wasn’t a stretch,” he said derisively. “You’ve loved the water since you were a baby.”
But as his words registered, I jerked away from him.
“Not since that night, you bastard.” My thoughts caught in an emotional vortex. “I hate the water.”
I wouldn’t give him the knowledge that I was terrified.
The tide rolled in, hitting my heels. Damn him.
He had taken that away from me. I had loved the water. Any kind of water and I would usually kick my feet through it or paddle around in it. I’d forgotten how much I loved the water when I was a kid.
Since I was a baby, he’d said. Did that mean that he’d known of me before he met my mother when I was five? Which implied that he’d been watching us for far longer than I’d, or Mama had, ever realized.
The thought cramped my stomach. Reflexively I clutched my hands over my belly and felt the hard outline of my cell phone in the front pocket of the sweatshirt.
My new cell.
That had to be it. Somehow he’d been tracking me through my cell.
I’d activated that cell immediately after dumping my old one. Could he have a way to check for new activations? I would have to ask Zeke.
“Where’s your mother, Claire?”
Claire was dead. Then I realized what his question implied. He hadn’t found Mama. Thank Goddess.
He hadn’t found her and he wouldn’t. Not through me anyway. “I don’t know.” I smirked. He could do whatever he wanted to me but the reality was…“I have absolutely no idea.”
A particular mean-spirited pleasure bubbled through me and I laughed with spite. Hard.
His dark eyebrows lowered over his rage-filled gaze. He clenched his fists, and his body bulked, his shoulders seemed bigger. But as I stood there I realized that John Stanley wasn’t that much larger than me now.
I stood about five foot nine in my bare feet. Stanley was maybe five ten or five eleven.
“It’s time for you to go away, John.” I used his name derisively. “We’re done with you.”
He took a menacing step toward me but I refused to back away. “But I’m not done with you.”
My tunnel focus widened as I took in the beach around me. I could hear the kids still splashing in the surf a few yards behind me. I saw the other adults with their wide eyed stares as he bunched his fists and advanced on me.
I was trapped between my stepfather and the water, the two driving fears in my life. And then a larger wave rolled in and splashed high on my calves.
I yelped and jumped. I couldn’t help it.
“What the hell?”
He jerked as if shot. Beyond him I saw Zeke. Zeke who was coming to save me. I’d been so wrapped up in the confrontation that I completely forgot about Zeke. But Stanley must not have realized I was with someone or he never would have turned his back on Zeke.
John whirled around at Zeke’s tap on his shoulder, fists clenched and up near his face like a boxer.
I heard the sirens in the background.
We were out of time. I pressed my thumb into a spot between Stanley’s neck and shoulder, in a move I’d practiced in self-defense class over and over again but never actually completely executed. Stanley dropped onto the sand with a thud. “It worked.”
“Nice move.” Zeke said, “But it’s time to go.”
I looked at Stanley unconscious on the sand. Nothing had really be resolved. This was not how I wanted this confrontation to end. But we couldn’t afford to stick around.
“Cops will be here soon.”
Twenty-Nine
Time to get the hell out of Dodge.
Zeke had managed to get into the local real estate website and look up available rental properties. Then he’d picked the best one for both location and defensible position.
Sunshine seemed to be reeling from the confrontation with her stepfather. Zeke cursed the fact that he hadn’t had a chance to ask John Stanley any questions. But Sunshine had definitely been in danger. And right now they had no options.
Zeke couldn’t be anywhere near the authorities, so they couldn’t afford to wait for the cops to arrive. Currently, John Stanley had only asked about Stella Smith. Which was not a crime. Even if Sunshine could file a restraining order against him, since he technically hadn’t done anything, it was doubtful the police could or would be able to do anything.
“We’re going to have to hide the car.” Zeke talked aloud as he turned over the engine.
“Why?”
“With the way he’s tracking you he’s got some training. He likely memorized every make, model, and license plate in this parking lot.” Not to mention if any of the tourists were watching them leave the parking lot and reported the plate to the cops. One of them must have called the police.
She was shaking. Delayed reaction.
“So he can track us?” She was grabbing the front of her sweatshirt. “Track. Track. Dammit. Somehow, that’s how he did it.”
She pressed the button to roll down the window. The cool air rushed into the car and swirled the junk in the backseat. Sunshine held a cell phone in her fist, looked around to make sure no one was following them, and no one could see her, then she threw it out the car window as they cruised down Highway One.
“I think he had my new cell number.” Sunshine said fiercely, “That’s how the bastard found me in San Luis and again on the beach. He came to both places where I used my phone. I hadn’t used it since yesterday at the café until I turned it on this morning to call the answering service.”
“It’s new?” he asked.
“Yeah. How could he have figured it out?”
“He may have monitored any new activations within a certain radius.”
“What about Mama?”
“She could be using Blue’s phone.” In which case Stanley would have no idea and no way to track him.
That made the most logical sense. But if they caught up with Stanley again they could ask him. Zeke mulled that over while he drove them toward their new digs. He kept watch in the rearview mirror to make sure they weren’t being followed while Sunshine tugged her skirt back on.
Zeke parked two houses down, also available as a weekly rental. “Stay here.”
“A house?”
“I told you.” Zeke grinned. “We’re going to play tourist.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Need to tinker with the garage door so we can park inside.”
She didn’t even blink at his proclamation that they were going to break in. She moved right on to the next concern. “So we really didn’t need that camping gear.”
“Backup plan.” Zeke said, “It served a dual purpose. Misdirection and backup. Always need a backup plan. Act casual.”
“Let me be clear, I’m not very comfortable with squatting,” she called out as he slammed the car door.
“Noted.” Zeke cautioned her. “If you see Stanley, take off.”
Zeke easily broke in to the two car garage. There was an old Toyota stored in one of the bays. Excellent. New wheels when it was time to leave since the Honda was likely compromised.
It only took him a few minutes, then he gestured to Sunshine. “Start ‘er up and pull right in to the garage.”
After Sunshine drove the Honda into the garage, they secured the garage door. Zeke popped the trunk. They unloaded only the bags they needed, the perishable groceries, the extra cell phones, and the hair products. Everything else stayed in the trunk. “Let’s get these inside.”
They walked inside. As an example of architecture the house was stunning. Floor to ceiling windows in a wall across the entire front of the house showcased unrestricted views of the ocean and Moonstone Beach. Knotted wood paneling graced the interior walls of the two story cathedral ceiling living room, complete with exposed wood beams and tile flooring. The other walls were decorated with beach-themed paintings.
This section of Moonstone Beach was still mostly deserted, similar to the beach they’d just left. The win
d blew across the sand, the beach unprotected by any vegetation. The temp of the ocean, a frigid fifty degrees this time of year, would keep most people away even with the sun out. Which worked well for his EPA.
Sunshine paused, her gaze mesmerized by the wall of windows and the view. Zeke noticed that she was staring at the beach. Her longing was an almost physical presence in the room as she observed the tide roll up the sand and then draw back out to sea.
Her yearning was painful to witness.
While he’d been looking for a place to hole up, he’d kept one eye on her as she tested her fear of the water and one on his phone as he searched for a place for them to hide. He’d been damn proud of her for boldly walking into that water. Damn John Stanley for interrupting her forward progress.
Zeke wished they could go out to the beach so she could try again.
But they needed to stay hidden.
As a place to stay out of sight, the house left quite a bit to be desired, but he’d chosen a property that also had empty houses on each side.
“We’ll have to stay out of view of the windows,” he said carefully. “But we can see the ocean from the loft.” Zeke gestured to a set of stairs tucked into the back corner. At the top was a small loft with a bed and a spectacular view.
The house was split in to several sections. The downstairs garage served as the foundation, with a back stairway that lead to the second floor of the structure, but the first floor of the interior. On one side was the kitchen and a bathroom. Fortunately it was older construction so there was only a small doorway that lead to the exposed open living room. They might be able to spend time in the living room at night once the sun went down, with lights off so no one could see them.
But they couldn’t afford for anyone to catch sight of them inside the house, so during the day, they had to avoid the living room at all costs. Off the kitchen was an extension of the stairway from the garage that lead up to the third story and featured two bedrooms and one Jack and Jill bath.
They were going to have to share a bedroom. Zeke didn’t want to presume, but he also needed to be as close to Sunshine as possible in case there was any trouble.
But he’d bring that up later.