Hawke

“My bathing suit?”

“Here, I’ll help you.”

She took the bow of little white strings that held up his navy blue bathing suit in her teeth and pulled them apart.

“There you go,” she said. “Now, will you please pull it down?”

“Why should I do that?”

“Because you’re my lunch and you’re covering up my favorite part. The piece de rйsistance.”

He pulled both knees to his chest, lifted himself off the towel, and removed the bathing suit in one motion.

“Well done,” she said.

“Happy now?” he said.

“Oh my, that does look good,” Vicky whispered in his ear, and then her lips were everywhere, causing him to arch his back upwards involuntarily as he felt her mouth close around him.

They made love there on the beach with the blind pig swimming to and fro in the blue sea, chasing the apples and oranges. Vicky was astride him, riding, rocking, her hair matted to her forehead with the heat of both sun and passion, her eyes locked on his right up until the instant when she cried out and arched her back, raising her arms to the sky with both hands outstretched, reaching for something she’d never quite touched until this very moment.

She lay in his arms for a time, her head on his chest, listening to his heart pumping, feeling him fall slowly away from inside her and drift down into what she hoped was the bliss of a peaceful dream.

He began to snore softly. She got up and put on her bikini, looking down at him, smiling. Then she dropped to her knees once more and stroked the damp black ringlets of hair on his chest.

“Alex Hawke,” she whispered to him, “you can’t hear me, but you know what I wish more than anything? I wish I’d become a surgeon instead of what I am. I wish I could take a little scalpel inside that brain of yours and find the exact little furrow of gray matter where whatever hurts you is hiding. Snip, snip, snip, I would cut it out. And you’d never have those terrible dreams, ever again.”

She sat up and brushed the hair back from her eyes. She sucked deep gulps of tangy air deep into her lungs, feeling totally invigorated, bristling with sharp, kinetic energy. She got to her feet and stood there, shielding her eyes with her hand, sca

Pine Cay, Alex had called it. It couldn’t be more than a mile from where she stood. She was a strong swimmer. A competitive swimmer; She could swim across and explore the pine forest while Alex slept. She could probably be over and back before he woke up, he was sleeping so soundly. The water was such a lovely shade of light blue it seemed to be begging her to plunge in.

She swam out toward the delicious river of dark blue that ran between the two islands.

Alex had no idea how long he’d been asleep.

He sat up with a start, realizing Vicky was no longer beside him. He looked around, but didn’t see her swimming or anywhere along the deserted beach.

He called out her name. No answer.

He leapt to his feet and ran along the line of scrub palms. Maybe she went exploring. He called her name repeatedly, thinking, she’s barefoot. Why would she go back among the rough and prickly palms?

His heart started pounding. That’s when he heard something that sent an arrow of fear through his heart.

Alex … Alex … Alex!

Faint. And coming from the sea.

He ran to the water’s edge, desperately sca

He made a ru

He stopped swimming and raised his head. He could barely make out the dim shape that had to be her.

No … no … no …

Her voice was weaker now, a faint no repeated over and over. She was telling him to stop. Telling him the current would only take him as well. He plowed ahead another fifty yards, feeling the swift pull of the ru

He swam harder. He was strong. Stronger than this bloody current that was stealing Vicky away from him. He swam until the muscles in his legs and arms were burning and then he swam harder still.

Another look. There. She was much farther away now. He saw her go under. Then surface again. He swam toward her, heedless of the wicked pull of the water. Raised his head, gasping for air. A sick, hollow feeling began to steal its way inside him. For every ten yards of progress he gained, she was being swept away another thirty.

He plowed forward, refusing to acknowledge it was hopeless now, unwilling to give up. He swam another thirty yards, feeling himself right on the periphery of where the rip was strongest. He raised his eyes, stinging with a mixture of tears and salt, and looked again.

“I love you!” he cried out, praying she might yet be able to hear him.

He saw her just that one last time, briefly, being pulled past Pine Cay now, and then he saw her go under. Waited. Fought the tide. Waited for that dear little head to surface, please, just once more and maybe he could get to—somehow get to—God—just to see her again …

He knew then that she was gone. Simply. Irrevocably. Gone.

He lifted his face to the heavens and screamed mercilessly at God.

Alex Hawke turned and swam as hard as he could for Kestrel . The edges of the rip had him, fought him, but not hard enough to overcome his rage. In minutes, he was climbing aboard the sloop. He ducked down through the companionway to the small navigation station.

There was a satellite phone hanging above the notebook computer with the GPS system.

Ambrose was on the sat phone speed dial.

He picked up on the first ring.

“I need immediate help,” Alex said, gasping for breath. “Immediate! I need our main launch in the water headed out the cut between Hog Island and Pine Cay. At least two divers aboard. I need you to call the Bahamas Air-Sea Rescue Command at Harbor Island. Tell them we need search-and-rescue choppers out here now.”

“Alex. Calm down. What’s going on?”

“It’s Vicky, goddammit.”

“What’s wrong, Alex?”

“She’s gone. Swept out in the riptide. I don’t know! Maybe we can save her! Christ, just get some bloody help out here, all right?”

“We’re coming,” Ambrose said, and hung up.

Alex scrambled back up on deck and hoisted the main and the jib. He weighed his anchor and headed the sloop out into the cut, his eyes fixed on the area where time and speed of current might have put her since he last saw her.

His eyes were burning. He was praying for that little brown smudge he’d last seen drifting away from him.

Praying to see it again. Simply praying for it to still exist.