Luna pushed the paddleboard out, wading behind it, until she got to waist deep, then she dove under and came up with a splash. “Oh god, that is — oh my god that is amazing.”
Beckett had been spellbound watching her, now he returned to himself, tugged his sandals off and dropped his sweatpants, revealing some swim trunks.
Luna cocked her head to the side.
Beckett waded in two steps but stopped mid-step. One foot was up, one arm bent awkwardly. “What?”
“This is new for me, and super sexy.”
He waded a couple more steps, grimacing, jerking and uncoordinated. “You, madam, are too horny.”
It was true what he said. She was totally hormonal, but also, his muscles, and tattoos, and he was in the water, and oh! He dove in, swam under, and his hands grasped her ankles, tugging her under. He rose, his head popping up in front of her face, making her feel breathless and wiggly. She wrapped her arms around his wet head, nose to nose, treading water.
His arm was on the paddleboard, his other hand on her hip, holding, wriggles and flutter kicks.
A drip of wet down his nose, her cheek against his, wet breaths in between. “It's like the day you jumped off the boat, you found me, in the whole ocean, you found me.”
“And I'll keep finding you. Over and over.”
He adjusted his arm over the board and pulled her thigh up around his waist, wet slippery skin on skin.
She kissed him. She pressed up against him. Their legs gracefully kicking and wrapping, Their hands rubbing. Finally she pulled her panties off and with a splash flopped them onto the board. He chuckled and pulled his shorts off and splashed them onto the board. “Don't lose them, we'll be naked to the world.”
Luna wrapped her legs around his waist, Beckett ran his hands down her to her hips and pulled her close and they made love, splashing and twisting and holding on and floating and whispering sweetnesses into each other's ears, just the two of them, in the water, in a deserted part of the world, on the edge of a mountain, at sunrise.
Until done, Beckett yelled to the sky, “I love you Luna Stanford!”
“I love you too, Beckett Stanford.”
Still treading water, she pulled her panties on and he pulled up his shorts. “So how do you ride this thing?”
Luna opened her eyes wide. “Seriously? You have never been hotter than this morning. Is it because you're aware I'm writing something called wedding vows?”
“Yep, you need to be well-sexed so you'll be extra romantic in front of all the guests.”
“Wait, how many guests?”
“Not that many, and now I'm changing the subject again. How do I ride this?” He smiled with a full-dimpled smile.
“You climb up. Then you crouch in one movement, but pause, catch your balance, and then stand. All you have to do after that is keep your eyes on the horizon and paddle.”
Beckett splashed his top half onto the board and rocking and rolling got his whole body on top of it. He flipped over with a splash and a groan. “Don't worry I've got this.” He mounted it again and rose to a flailing crouch. His arms waved around and he rocked maniacally.
Luna was treading water with languid loops of her arms and small leg flutters. “You are so hot, eyes on the horizon, now stand.”
He wobbled up to a full stand.
“You forgot the paddle.” Luna swam forward, grabbed the paddle off the board, dove up, and placed it into his outstretched hand. “Now paddle.”
Very slowly, with jerks and spasms, he lowered the paddle into the water, pushed it back, and propelled the board forward.
Luna said, “That is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen.”
He called back over his shoulder, “You need to get out more.”
“Now turn back.”
“How? Oh crap, I'm heading out to sea, I'll be lost, crap!”
“Beckett, you're on a lake, and you're only fifteen feet away. I'll swim to you before you get to twenty-five feet, promise.”
“Okay then, but what do I do?” He wobbled recklessly but corrected himself. “I'm going farther — what do I do?”
“Push the paddle in and back and it will spin you, like that, perfect. Now paddle on the other side, twice. Okay, see? You're coming around.”
Beckett turned. “Thank you. I can see you again.”
“Now paddle toward me. Don't look down. Look at me, over here. Or the horizon actually.” Beckett pulled the board up close. “How did I do?” His board tipped, and he careened, arms spinning, and fell with a giant splash. He came up with a grin.
“You did great.”
“Better than Dan?”
“Much better than Dan. Want me to take you for a spin?”
Beckett climbed on the board and kneeled with Luna standing behind him. She paddled them around some of the coast line, exploring inlets and small marshy places, until finally her stomach started growling. “I'm famished.”
“Me too, let's go see what we have left to eat.”
They hauled the board out of the water and slid it into the bed of the truck. In the front seat they popped open another bag of chips and ate them talking about the lovely morning and the beautiful lake and the weather. Luna said, “It's one of the first times I've ever spent this much time on land with no one else around.”
Beckett blinked a few times. “Yeah, it's weird. I wonder why?”
Luna took another big bite of chips. “Also no traffic, like no one is interested in coming here, but it's so pretty.”
Beckett grew pensive. “Yeah. Yeah. Right. You know, maybe we ought to go.”
He backed the truck up the small incline and pulled out onto the road. There wasn't any traffic. At all. It hadn't been a big deal at five a.m., but now, at ten a.m., it was notable. And causing Beckett's mind to whir. What was happening -- what had he missed?
Luna noticed his mood changing. “It's probably no big deal, maybe they have security now, like you plan to have on your mountain.”
Beckett looked over at Luna. She looked nervous because he was nervous. He had no real reason to be nervous, just a feeling, and those were usually stupid and unnecessarily punishing to his brain. He clapped a hand on her thigh. “How about this morning, huh? That was fun, right?”
“We should do it all the time, whenever we can.”
“Definitely. We will.”
Chapter 51
They drove for a bit longer. “Here's the store I stopped at earlier. We should get some more snacks, take them home to Chickadee. She'll adore us for it.”
Luna said, “Do you think she can adore you any more than she already does?”
“I doubt it, but we shall see.” He pulled the truck into a spot directly under an old sign that read: General Foods and Gas. The lot was still empty except for the same car from five hours ago. Luna jumped out. “Gotta go to the bathroom again! At least I know where it is.”
Beckett got out slower. He scanned the parking lot and the woods beyond before he walked across the pavement to the door and opened it. There was a bell that announced his entrance, but no sounds within. Beckett called, “Hello?”
At the coolers he grabbed a cola for Luna and a root beer for himself, then another lemon lime soda for Luna for later. He stacked them in his arms and headed for the chips and candy bars, glancing around again for any sign of life.
Then the back door opened and with a deep scary frightening rattling cough, someone walked into the shop. Beckett watched from behind the shelving. It was a woman, wrapped in a sweater, haggard and definitely sick. She wheezed for breath, then whooped, gasped, and wheezed again. Her chest rattled with phlegm. Coughs echoed through the tiny shop. Possibly following the flinging spittle, flying around the air, adhering to things. To people. To Beckett. She coughed again.
Beckett said, “Oh um, I was just—”
The cough started again, thick and bone-chilling.
Beckett walked toward the counter. He did not want to get closer, but he needed to see the person, c
heck her for the telltale sign.
She huddled over the counter holding a rag to her mouth, a rag tinged-pink, sopping.
Beckett looked through the window over her shoulder and saw Luna, smiling, trailing across the parking lot from the bathroom to the truck. She looked fresh, healthy, glowing.
The woman rasped, “Surprised the quarantine didn't keep you away, but probably you were already exposed, right?”
The color drained from Beckett's face.
She coughed, rattled, hacked, and spit into the rag. “Back fifteen years ago, wasn't it, the Deep Flu? Well, it's back with a vengeance.” She put both hands on the counter and gasped for breath. “Taking all of us it didn't get last time.”
The bags and drinks spilled from Beckett's arms to the counter.
“Yep, surprised you're here.” She wheezed and struggled for air.
“Never mind on the stuff, yeah, um...” Beckett backed to the door.
“I would have thought the quarantine would keep everyone away, but this morning I had a pregnant girl in here.” She raised her chin and exposed her neck, dark, purple. The way Beckett's mother's neck had looked just before — “I didn't want to scare her, but this place is a death sentence—”
Beckett slammed his back into the door, pushed out, and spun into the parking lot. He had lost all feeling in his hands — shaking — the blood rushing all over inside him except where it needed to go, his extremities. He yanked his keys from his pocket and his mutinously shaking appendages dropped them in the dirt. His breath was gasping, crap — he was going to panic. Nope, he was full panicked. This was — he bent for his keys and tried to catch — he was going to pass — he glanced up.
Luna was in the passenger seat watching him through the truck's back window. He tried to get the keys into his right hand, but his fingers wouldn't listen to his brain. He tried to pull the door open, but also slammed against it, and then yank pulled, but couldn't — he had to get Luna out of here, now, right now—
Luna opened his door from the inside. “Beckett, what's wrong?”
“Can't — breathe—”
She grasped his wrists and pulled him into the seat.
He collapsed down and wriggled his hands from her grasp. “Don't touch me. God it's everywhere—” He grasped at his collar and tugged, trying to get air into his lungs.
“Beckett what happened? Beckett, put your head back.” She pushed him back in the seat and rubbed his chest and shoulders, made to climb on his lap. “What's happening?”
“No, don't — she was sick. Luna, don't touch me, I'm—”
Luna sat on his lap and rubbed her hands down his cheeks.
“Don't Luna you'll get — God I can't breathe.”
“Shhhhhh, Beckett, shhhhhh.” She put her forehead on the headrest beside his ear. “Tell me.”
“She was sick. Was she in there — when you went there? The bathroom. Luna, oh god, the bathroom. You bought chips, you ate — if something happens to you, the baby. I have to get you out of here.” He brought the keys to the ignition but his shaking hands couldn't aim. He dropped his hand with the key to the seat beside him. “I can't do anything right, I brought you to a fucking quarantined town.”
“Shhhh, Beckett, shhhhh. Try to breathe, please, breathe.”
“Do you know if you've been exposed to it? The Deep Flu, have you had it?”
“I don't know.”
“It was fifteen years ago, you can't remember?”
“I was four. I don't remember being sick.”
“How about your family, did you lose anyone, fifteen years ago, maybe they would have talked about losing relatives to it?”
Luna said, “I'm sorry Beckett, I just don't know.”
Beckett sat for a moment staring around wildly, anywhere but her eyes. He needed to wash. She needed to wash. He had to get her home. Luna was on his lap, her rounded belly pressed into his stomach, her body folded on his chest, her head beside his ear. He couldn't touch her but she was everywhere all around.
He began to recite what he knew. “It's called the Deep Flu. Fifteen years ago it killed seven out of ten people. My parents. Those that had it and survived are considered immune, like me. But if you haven't had it, or if it's mutated, or — the incubation is six days. After that it can kill in a day.”
Luna said into his ear, “Oh.”
“Without knowing if you've ever had it, we'll have to put you in quarantine, and just—”
Luna pulled a hair's breadth away to look at the side of his face.
“I don't know what I'll do if something happens to you.”
Luna closed her eyes tight and nestled into the side of his neck and spoke just above his heartbeat. “This can’t be how it ends. Just breathe okay?”
“Yeah, of course, yes. I need to drive now, sitting in this parking lot is freaking me out.”
Luna climbed off his lap to the passenger seat and Beckett reversed the truck from the space and onto the empty road.
_____________________
Part III
Home
Chapter 52
Beckett banged into the house. “Chickadee! Dilly!”
Chickadee bustled in from the kitchen. “What, dear boy?”
He stood in the middle of the living room, hands on his head. “I took Luna to Highland Glen, to the lake.”
Dilly froze in the doorway.
“I didn’t know it was under quarantine. She’s been exposed—”
Chickadee interrupted, “Now why would you go there? Aren’t you listening to the news?”
“No, I’m not, and this isn’t helping. Dilly, help?”
Dilly recovered herself. “Yes, yes, of course.” She rushed forward and grabbed Luna around the shoulders. “First thing we should—”
Beckett said, “She needs to shower. I need to shower. You just touched her, so you should probably shower too.”
Dilly asked, “How exposed do you think you were?”
Beckett said, “Luna used a bathroom. Twice. I stood not two feet away from someone with a blood cough.”
Chickadee said, “Out to the porch with you both, strip down, oh dear, dear, and we’ll burn the clothes.”
Luna was terrified.
She couldn’t tell if she was more scared of the what ifs of the sickness or that Beckett and Dilly and Chickadee were so freaked out that they were thoughtlessly ordering each other around and no one was talking directly to her or explaining anything to her or —
Chickadee said, “Dilly you’ll need to gather your tinctures and remedies. I’ll call Roscoe and tell him we’re not going to make the appoint—”
Dilly asked, “Should we go to the hospital?”
Chickadee waved her away. “We can’t, the hospital is full of people dying from this flu. If Luna wasn’t exposed, she would be — and the baby.” She glanced around at everyone. “Is no one watching the news?”
Beckett said, “All we watch around here are comedies. So forgive me for not paying attention to the state of the world.”
“Comedies are for escape, but you still have to know!”
They all stopped short, noticing Luna, a woeful expression, a tremble on her bottom lip.
Beckett said, “I’m sorry, love. I know this is overwhelming. You just need to take a shower now, okay?”
Luna nodded, a tear rolling down her cheek.
He strode to the front porch and stripped from his clothes, pulling his shirt over his head, dropping his shorts to the floor, kicking out of his sandals last, because he couldn’t think straight. Luna stripped off her clothes too, kicking them into the same pile. Then she followed Beckett naked through the house to the steaming shower.
Chickadee called from the kitchen, “Dilly and I will bring in towels for you.”
The shower was not luxurious, or relaxing, or sexy, it was busy. They wordlessly soaped and scrubbed every bit of their bodies. Beckett covered his hair with soapy suds and scrubbed around and around. He poured out a dollop of shampoo an
d lathered it into Luna’s hair and scrubbed vigorously, and then they rinsed each other of all the soap. And even with the proximity, their naked bodies, it wasn’t enough to distract them from the mood — desperate, sad, terrified.
A few minutes later they emerged from the shower to fresh towels, a couple of t-shirts, and clean underwear. Beckett’s pale skin was pink from the heat and scrubbing, Luna’s darker skin glowed, her black hair glistened.
Steam drifted around the bathroom as they dressed, sticky and thoughtful. Luna caught a glimpse of Beckett shaking his head as he pulled his underwear on. “What?”
He leaned on the sink. “I can’t believe I did that. I’m so sorry Luna, please be okay, I’m so sorry that I did that.”
She threw her arms around him and he clutched her to his chest, kissing her hair. “I’m sorry.”
After a moment she pulled away and wiped her eyes. “I should go out and see what Dilly wants me to do next.”
_____________________
Beckett and Luna were seated at the table, side by side, plates of dinner in front of them, heads drooping, barely able to eat. Tea steeped in mugs drifting steamy fragrance around the room. The combination of fear and too much garlic in the food and wafting peppermint caused Luna’s head to spin. They all ate in silence.
After Luna pushed her plate away, full enough, Dilly pulled a box from the top shelf of a cabinet. “I have tinctures and remedies next.” She dug out wooden box holding an assortment of small vials. “A few oils.”
She twisted a lid. “A couple of drops in your tea.”
Luna said, “Just as long as it’s safe for the baby.”
Dilly stopped in mid-drop, holding the vial over the tea mug, her hand shaking. “I don’t know. Oh god, I don’t know.” She looked around at their faces, then burst into tears, and began digging through the box. “I don’t know if they are. I don’t know. What am I going to do?”
Deep (Luna's Story Book 3) Page 14