Page 16 of The Final Storm
“No, but I don’t want to be separate from them,” he admits.
“Gemma might make Milo ship them to us, you know.” I joke. “I heard them complaining the moment we shut their door about being housebound at night.”
Sam cracks a smile he can’t keep away. “I told them no more nighttime worm hunting days ago,” he says. “There are people moving about the island. I can feel it. Someone’s there… watching.”
Milo turns his head at Sam’s words. “I’ve seen them too,” he adds, then turns back to look at the Galene. We are making an already tense situation worse.
“Gemma won’t let anything happen to them,” I assure Sam. “She’s protected, and they are the safest there with her. We don’t know what we’re getting into here.”
Sam reaches for me, kissing me on my forehead. He nuzzles his face into my neck and kisses the sensitive spot that sends goosebumps across my skin. The cool night air chills it when he pulls away. “In this together,” he says.
“Forever,” I reply.
The Galene grows closer, and I see the tall steel sides rise from the ocean in the darkness. Milo brings our boat to its side, and an entryway comes into view. This ship is smaller than the Thalassa, but its enormity still takes my breath away. My chest constricts when we slow, churning water while we creep up to the entrance, unsure how they’ll greet us.
Sam pulls me next to him as the hull opens upward and sends a gush of water slapping the sides of our small boat. Morgan cries out, and I wrap her up and hold her against my chest.
I had faked my assuredness about boarding the Galene for a while now, but my exterior walls crumble to the ground as we dock inside an eerily familiar room of boats. Dread fills my gut, but I fake my confidence. We made the right decision with the boys. They don’t need to be here, but I’m questioning if we should either.
Lori, Luke, and Sam bark out codes and names, and after a few tense minutes, the guns pointed at our heads lower. The tenders for these boats are all the same, so we made it inside before they realized we didn’t belong. It seems we are okay to stay, and I can’t decide if that’s a good thing or not.
I break the silence and my nagging thoughts. “Everything is going to be just fine,” I whisper. Milo turns to me and cocks an eyebrow. He can feel the foreboding as much as we all do.
Sam wraps his arm around my shoulders, careful not to disturb the baby. She’s fitful, trying to fall asleep without enough food in her stomach.
Memories of our time on the Thalassa fill my thoughts, and I fight my desire to push them away. A memory could trigger a vision, and as much as I want to forget about Dean and the horrible events on that ship, doing so would be cowardly. I need my sight more than ever now.
“Did you see that, or are you trying to comfort yourself?” Sam asks.
“I’m trying to will it. Things will be fine.”
“We have a lot to lose,” Sam admits. “More than we ever had when the world was normal.”
I struggled to remember what that felt like.
Normal.
It seems like a past life. As if another woman lived and died, and I was reborn in this insanity. I thought about telling Sam about the woman dressed in white, the one who screamed at me to leave. She had only come to me one night, and I was desperate to believe it was a fever dream in childbirth. But I know better.
“Everythingwillbe fine,“ I lie. He knows I don’t see it that way, but he takes my words for what they are.
“I’ll go back as soon as you all are settled,” Lori says. “I don’t plan on being here long.” She’s lying. She won’t leave Luke’s side, and he’s not getting out of a medical bay soon.
Luke lets out a violent spell of coughs, interrupting my thoughts and worries. Lori covers his mouth with a cloth that’s spattered with blood. Sam looks back and gives me a nod while Milo ties us off to the side. It’s a silent agreement that we’re here and it’s the right thing, given what we know.
I close my eyes for a moment too long, and more memories from the Thalassa come to the surface. They aren’t visions, just things pushed away with time. The grading of the walkways that curve around the boats in the same pattern where Dean pointed his gun at Sam not so long ago. The doorway that leads into rooms has the same large handle and hangs open with two men on either side. Boats line the storage bay, identical to the one we’re standing upon now that took us to safety. It’s a mirror image of our escape.
These men that stand around us, however, are heavily armed, whereas I never saw so many weapons on the Thalassa. I stiffen in response and remind myself we are strangers to them, not residents on the vessel. They may have heard about the riot in the Thalassa - the fires. Precautions don’t mean danger.
A handsome man, maybe forty years old, weaves in and out of military personnel at a fast pace. He has a wide smile on his face and raises a salute to Sam. I feel Sam’s body shift next to mine as he salutes back.
“Nico,” the man shouts. He throws buoys over the side of the slip, and our boat gently bounces against them.
“Caleb,” Sam yells back over the rushing water. “What the hell, man? What are you doing here?”
“Why aren’tyouhere? Did ya get lost?“ Caleb jumps down and begins securing our boat. “When I heard your name over the radio, I had to run down and greet you, brother.”
Sam tightens his grip around me and draws his mouth to my ear. “I’ve known Caleb for a decade. This is good, Rowan.” He kisses me on the cheek and takes my hand, leading me to the side of the boat. “Caleb, help my wife up.”
