Chapter 1

“Bobby!” Millie screamed. “Over HERE!”

“Okay,” Fox said. “I don’t think now is the time—”

“Keme! Keme! Look! Hi !”

“Millie,” Indira said, “they need to concentrate.”

Torn between distracting her friends and, well, the thrill of simultaneously cheering/screaming at them, Millie settled for hopping up and down silently, waving her arms.

It was a bright October day, the weekend before Halloween. The sky was blue. The sun was warm. And although it was cooler than the summer months in Hastings Rock, on a day like today, you couldn’t really tell.

Ketling Beach was a long, wave-smoothed crescent. To the north, Klikamuks Head jutted out into the sea. South, the shoreline curved inward, and across the bay rose the dollhouse profile of Hastings Rock. Where the light caught the wet sand of the beach at exactly the right angle, it looked sheeted in silver.

Banners hung everywhere, announcing the GREMLINS AND GROMMETS SURF CHALLENGE. In smaller type, the banners explained, Brought to you by Gremlins and Grommets Surf Camp. The event had brought out what looked like most of the town, and people lined the beach in folding chairs, many of them wrapped in blankets and carrying thermoses of coffee. Not exactly your Malibu beach scene, but I had learned—to my surprise—that not only did the Oregon Coast have some great surfing spots, the best time of year was late October. Which seemed like a wonderful recipe for death by hypothermia.

But if the cold water had deterred anyone, you couldn’t tell by the number of surfers waiting to compete. Beyond the barrier that marked the end of the spectator zone, they ran the gamut from children with foamboards (presumably the gremlins and grommets, although I wasn’t entirely sure of the lingo) to middle-aged men and women who looked scarily fit for their age. (This from a guy who prefers an elevator to stairs even when he’s going down.)

Deputy Bobby and Keme were down there too. They were both wearing wetsuits as they did some light cardio, warming up for the day’s events. If I had to make a list of terrible, awful, horrible ways to spend the day, watching Deputy Bobby jog and do jumping jacks and laugh at something Keme said probably wouldn’t rank high on the list. It might not even make the list at all.

Although, to be fair, sitting next to Deputy Bobby’s boyfriend, West, probably would make the list. In part, because I was doubly self-conscious every time I looked at Deputy Bobby. (Not that I was doing anything wrong. Not that I couldn’t look at him. Because we were friends, right? And friends looked at each other all the time. Even when friends were in wetsuits, and you could see all their muscles, and friends were bending and stretching and—we’re just friends!) And in part, because the juxtaposition wasn’t ideal. I mean, West was gorgeous. He had flaxen hair in a messy part, perfectly pink cheeks, kissably pouty lips (at least, I assumed Deputy Bobby thought they were kissable), and eyes the exact same color as the sky this morning. He was wearing a ring on his left hand these days, so I guess I needed to start thinking of him as Deputy Bobby’s fiancé. In keeping with the Halloween theme, he’d chosen to go as a very, very, very (need I go on?) sexy construction worker: hardhat rakishly cocked, hi-vis vest, jean shorts, steel-toed boots. And that, ladies and gentlemen, was all. If it were me, I would have been freezing, but since West also apparently had the metabolism of a hummingbird, he looked perfectly comfortable.

Everyone was dressed up, not just West, although nobody else, as far as I could see, had gone for the pouty-sexy-where’s-my-metal-clipboard look, which should have been ridiculous, but honestly? He was totally pulling it off. Indira, of course, had kept her costume tasteful. I’d asked if she was going to be a witch, and she’d asked me why I thought that, and I’d immediately regretted every life choice I’d ever made. (Answer: it’s because of that lock of white hair she has, which gives some seriously witchy vibes.) Instead, she’d gone for a tweed jacket over a rust-colored sweater and jeans, which looked like a normal outfit for her. She’d added big glasses and a crumpled deerstalker cap that sat cockeyed on her head, and when I’d finally had to ask who she was, she’d said Professor Trelawney. (Which, point for me because I had totally guessed witch.)

With Fox, it was hard to tell if it was a costume or daily wear, since Fox’s outfits seemed to straddle the delicate intersection of Victorian train conductor, circus impresario, mortician, and steampunk enthusiast. Today, for example, they were wearing a knee-length frock coat over a Led Zeppelin tee, plus a top hat. (Hats were apparently a thing this Halloween.) Like I said, it was hard to tell if this outfit had been plucked from Fox’s daily rotation or was a Halloween treat.

Millie, on the other hand, was definitely in costume. Millie’s usual attire (which consisted of cute sweaters and jeans) had been replaced by a full ’80s exercise getup: a neon pink leotard, turquoise tights, and electric yellow legwarmers and sweatbands. She’d done a full blowout on her hair and looked a little like Farrah Fawcett if she’d been struck by lightning. God bless her, she’d even found ankle weights. And the thing was…Millie looked amazing. I wasn’t sure she even knew how good she looked because, well, she was Millie. But I knew one thing: I was dying to see Keme’s face when the poor boy finally got a look at her.

As for me, I’d gone with something that I thought was clever. As usual, my friends had managed to blow up my expectations in a way that was both loving and devastating.

“I still don’t get it,” Fox said. “Are you a sex kitten?”

They chose the exact moment when I was drinking some of Indira’s hot chocolate, which meant all I could do for several minutes was choke.

West glanced over at me, gave me an appraising look, and said, “Dominatrix-cat.”

“Oh my God,” Fox said. “That’s exactly it.”

“It’s hot,” West told me. “You’re totally going home with someone tonight.”

“No,” I managed to wheeze through death-by-hot-chocolate.

“What is a dominatrix-cat?” Indira asked.

“I’ll look it up,” Millie announced.

“No!” Fox and I managed at the same time.

“Aren’t you just a black cat?” Millie asked. “I thought the keys just got stuck to you like that time you got wrapped up in all that tape in your office and you couldn’t get it off and you kept shouting for somebody to come help and Keme laughed and took all those pictures.”

“This is not like that!” I took a deep breath, which was hard since I was still recovering from my near-death experience. “And I would have been fine except Keme kept making it worse—”

“Well, what are you?” Indira asked. “Why don’t you just tell us?”

“Because this costume is clever and original and—and insightful.”

“Insightful?” Fox murmured.

“And I’m not going to demean myself and demean you and demean the whole human race—”

“He gets on that high horse quick,” West said, “doesn’t he?”

“You have no idea,” Fox said.

“—by explaining it,” I finished. “And why are you all so focused on me? This is about Deputy Bobby and Keme.” I fought with myself, lost, and added, “And nobody even asked Fox about their costume.”

“I’m a polymorphed dragon,” Fox said—a tad haughtily, in my opinion.

No one seemed to know what to say to that.

Indira recovered first. “West, I’ve got thermoses here with more hot chocolate and coffee, depending on what the boys want. I brought blankets. And I’ve got dry clothes. Is there anything else they need for when they get out of the water?”

Shaking his head, West said, “That’s perfect. What they really need is to go home, get in a hot shower, and eat something, but you need a crowbar to get Bobby away from his board, even at the end of the day.”

“Babe,” Deputy Bobby called from the barrier to the spectator zone. He had his wetsuit rolled down to his waist, and God help me, I looked. The world froze. Angels sang. Trumpets, uh, blew—it sounded better in my head. He made an impatient gesture, and for a disoriented heartbeat, I started to rise.

“Let me guess,” West said as he got to his feet. “Zipper’s stuck.”

“Keme tried, but he can’t get it.”

West slipped under the barrier and moved behind Deputy Bobby to inspect the wetsuit’s zipper. Meanwhile, Fox asked in a breathy whisper, “Good God, how much time does Deputy Delectable spend in the gym?”

“At least an hour every day,” I said automatically—because ninety-nine percent of my brain was trying to commit every inch of Deputy Bobby to memory and, at the same time, pretend like I wasn’t looking. “Usually before work, but some days he has to go after.”

“Is that so?” Fox asked, and they turned a curious look on me.

The note in their voice made me flush, and I probably would have stammered something that made everything worse, but fortunately, Keme came to my rescue. He was jogging toward us, his dark hair up in a bun, and his face was alight with excitement.

“Keme!” Millie shouted and waved.

That poor, poor boy.

The word poleaxed comes to mind. I saw the instant he caught sight of Millie. And then it seemed like he couldn’t see anything else. His eyes were locked on her (Millie was still waving, obviously), and Keme began to veer off course.

“Uh, Keme,” I tried.

“Keme!” Indira shouted.

Fox stood and bellowed, “Hey!”

None of it helped, though. He couldn’t hear us. And so he jogged straight into a rack of surfboards.

Keme went down.

The surfboards went down.

Lots of people started yelling.

“Oh my God,” Millie said. “Keme, I’m coming!”

“You know what?” Fox said. “He might be embarrassed. Let him get himself together first.”

Millie didn’t look happy about that, but she stayed. Keme got himself upright, seemed to shake off the daze—although I noticed that he was careful not to look in our direction again, which was probably a mixture of caution and embarrassment. He got the rack upright and started returning the surfboards to their places. Other surfers joined him, but the initial shouting had died down, and it looked like everyone was in good enough spirits that the accident turned into something to laugh about, rather than cause for a genuine argument.

“There you go,” West said. “All set.”

Sure enough, Deputy Bobby had his wetsuit zipped up now. In case you’re wondering, it was actually kind of worse, somehow. I mean, it fit him like a glove, and that’s all I’m saying. He gave West a kiss, and West squirmed away, laughing, before he said, “You’re getting me wet!”

“What’s there to get wet?” Fox asked sotto voce . “He’s got about six inches of fabric on him total.”

I shushed Fox.

“Are you ready, Bobby?” Indira asked.

Deputy Bobby wore that huge, goofy grin. “Water’s perfect—do you see those swells coming in? Perfect breaks today.”

“I assume that means it’s all good.”

“The lineup is going to take forever.” But his tone made it clear this was a small objection. Then, in a different voice, he said, “Oh, come on.”

Farther up the beach, a group of guys had paused halfway through putting up another beach tent. Even with the tent only partially erected, it was easy to read the words spray-painted in red on the fabric: THIEVES and TRESPASSERS.

“What’s that about?” I asked.

“A protester,” Millie said.

We all looked at her.

“Keme told me,” she said.

“Her name is Ali Rivas,” Deputy Bobby said, “and she claims every inch of this coast is sacred land for various Native American tribes. She’s been raising a ruckus for weeks. Vandalism, destruction of property, threats. Jen calls in something new almost every day, but nobody can prove this woman, Ali, is doing it.”

“She strikes again,” Fox said, eyeing the graffitied tent that the men were now in the process of taking down.

“Is this really sacred land?” I asked.

Millie shook her head. “Some of the tribes used to fish here, of course, but the only nearby ceremonial sites and burial grounds are on the headland.”

We all looked at her. Again.

“Keme told me,” she repeated, this time with a laugh. “And anyway, the Confederated Tribes are sponsoring the competition—they’ve got a tent down that way.”

“That doesn’t make any difference to her,” Deputy Bobby said. “She said the leaders of the Confederated Tribes were sellouts.”

“Yikes,” Fox said.

Another man, accompanied by deputies, walked over to the vandalized tent. He was average height, heavyset, dressed in a polo and pleated khakis, and his hair and goatee were black as coal. It was hard to tell at a distance, but I thought maybe he was older—something about the way he moved. He said something to the deputies, who in turn said something to the men, who let the tent fall. The deputies spread the tent flat on the sand, clearly preparing to take pictures of the damage.

“Who’s that?” Indira asked.

West dropped into his seat again. “Gerry Webb.”

“How do you know that?” Deputy Bobby asked.

“Because he tried to pick me up last night,” West answered. He adjusted the hardhat and gave a rakish grin. “While you were in the restroom.”

Deputy Bobby looked like he might be thinking a few words you wouldn’t find in most dictionaries.

“He’s a real estate developer,” West continued. “And he must be a good one, because the watch he was wearing cost over a hundred thousand dollars.”

“He’s the one that’s building the planned community on the other side of Klikamuks,” Millie said. “Do you know how much he’s going to charge? A million dollars for a house. And that’s not even one of the houses on the waterfront. And they’re going to have a marina and a bunch of new restaurants and—”

“Wait, a marina?” Fox squinted. “Isn’t the surf camp on the other side of Klikamuks? Gremlins and Gruntlings, or whatever it’s called?”

“Gremlins and Grommets,” Deputy Bobby said drily. “And yes, that’s where it is. I don’t know the details, but Jen said she worked something out with him.”

“Who’s Jen?” I asked.

Before Deputy Bobby could answer, Keme trotted up.

“Oh my God, Keme, are you all right?” Millie scrambled over to inspect him. She stood close to him. She touched him. She was wearing perfume. And God help that poor boy, he was wearing a wetsuit.

I gave Deputy Bobby a telepathic nudge and a meaningful look.

He almost laughed. “He’s fine, Millie. We’ve got to get in the lineup, or we’re going to miss the best sets.” With a slap to Keme’s shoulder, he added, “Come on,” and then he headed down toward the water.

Keme detached himself from Millie as gracefully as a seventeen-year-old boy can.

We settled into our seats, enjoying coffee and hot chocolate and cake (cranberry upside-down) and cookies (pumpkin cheesecake, which yes, can be turned into a cookie). The wind picked up again, stiff with the brine and carrying a hint of surf wax and what I thought might have been recreational, uh, substances. A fair portion of that seemed to be coming from Fox. Once Deputy Bobby and Keme had their boots and hoods on, they collected their boards. Keme’s gear looked piecemeal—probably assembled from castoffs or whatever he’d been able to score cheap. Deputy Bobby’s on the other hand, looked expensive. It made me think of the rotation of expensive sneakers he liked to wear—another layer in the enigma that was Deputy Bobby.

True to Deputy Bobby’s prediction, there were a lot of surfers waiting in the lineup. But it was a beautiful day, and the waves were plentiful, and we watched (and Millie cheered) as Deputy Bobby and Keme slowly worked their way forward.

“I’m kind of sad we’ll miss it,” West said.

I glanced over.

“The new development,” he said. “It sounds like exactly what Hastings Rock needs—a breath of fresh air, new money, new people.”

Because Deputy Bobby and West were moving; that’s what he didn’t have to say. West had told me they were moving. It had been one of the first things he’d said after he and Deputy Bobby had gotten engaged. They were moving to Portland. They were moving away.

“Are you sure you can help load the truck next week?” West’s question broke through my thoughts. “Bobby said you don’t mind, but I know it’s a pain—”

“No. I mean, yes. I mean, I’ll be happy to help. Do you need help packing?”

“We’re almost done, actually. Thank God I was able to talk Bobby into using his leave—can you believe he wanted to work right up until we left?”

I could, in fact. Because not only was Deputy Bobby very good at his job, but he also loved his job. It was part of who he was. Or maybe just who I thought he was. I had a hard time picturing him away from Hastings Rock. What would he do in Portland? Who would he be?

West’s silence jarred a response out of me: “Fox said they’d help too—”

“Absolutely not,” Fox said without looking up from their phone.

“I’ll help,” Millie said. “Dash, we could make it a RACE! And we could see how many boxes we can carry at one time. AND we could see who can pick up the heaviest box! West, are you sad you’re moving? Are your parents sad? Are you going to miss Hastings Rock? We’re going to miss you SO much! I’m probably going to cry when you and Bobby drive away. Oh my God, I think I’m going to cry right NOW!”

Indira patted her on the shoulder. “I already told Bobby I’ll bring sandwiches and sweet tea. It’s going to be a long day. And I’ll pack you something for the road, too.”

“It’s only a couple of hours,” West said with a smile, but he patted Millie’s shoulder as she wiped her eyes. “Hey, don’t cry. We’ll come back to visit all the time.”

Millie sniffled and nodded and said, “And we’ll come visit YOU!”

Maybe it was the sudden ear-blast, but West didn’t look quite so happy about that prospect.

I almost said, You don’t have to move, and then nobody will have to visit anybody , but my phone buzzed (and my better judgment got hold of me). My dad’s name appeared on the screen. (Jonny Dane, the Talon Maverick series.) A call from my dad was—well, unusual was putting it politely. My dad’s focus was on my mom’s books, on his books, and on his guns, and not necessarily in that order. I answered.

“Hey Dad.”

“Hey, Dashiell. How’s it going?”

“Uh, good. How are you?”

“Good, good. Listen, I’ve got a great opportunity. St. Martin’s asked me to edit an anthology—crime fiction geared toward men, you know? And I thought it’d be perfect for you.”

“For me?”

“How’s that story going, the one with the PI?”

He meant Will Gower, a character who had lived in my head for as long as I could remember. (That sounded better than calling him my imaginary friend.) In various incarnations, Will Gower had been a hard-nosed police officer, a hard-nosed FBI profiler, and a hard-nosed private investigator. He’d also been a Victorian bobby, a social worker, and a deckhand on an Alaskan shrimping boat—you get the idea.

“Uh, good?”

“Great, great. Send it over. We’ve got to get moving on this.”

“Well, it’s not quite, um, ready. A hundred percent, I mean.”

Dad was silent.

“It’s almost done,” I said. “It’s so close.”

Millie patted my shoulder. Fox snorted offensively. Indira started unpacking one of the slices of cake.

“I can finish it up?” It was a miserable-sounding question. “Next week?”

“Dashiell,” he finally said—and it held an unbearable amount of parental long-suffering.

Fortunately, at that moment Deputy Bobby and Keme started paddling out to catch the next set.

“Dad, I’ve got to go. I’ll get you the story next week.”

As I disconnected, Millie screamed, “GO BOBBY! GO KEME!” And then, without missing a beat, “Dash, that’s so exciting you’re almost done with your story!”

Fox snorted again. For someone who was, themself, an artist (and one who—I’d like to point out—spent a high proportion of their artistic time lying on the floor, moaning about how they were a fraud and a grifter and an untalented hack), Fox gave surprisingly little leeway when it came to things like, uh, purposefully postponing the day-to-day instances of artistic production. (That sounded better than procrastinating by goofing off with Keme.)

“Here you are, dear,” Indira said as she passed me the cake she’d been preparing.

It was a surprise cake (meaning I didn’t even know she’d made it—the best kind), some sort of gingerbread confection. It was amazing, of course, and it went a long way toward taking the sting out of that conversation. My dad’s silence. The way he’d said, Dashiell .

What helped more was that I got to watch Deputy Bobby catch his first wave. He made it look surprisingly easy when he popped up on his board, and even at that distance, I could see how natural he looked when he settled into his stance. He was actually kind of amazing—carving turns, slicing the water, his body leaning into each move until I was sure he’d fall. He didn’t, though; he looked like he was glued to the board. I didn’t know anything about surfing, but as far as I was concerned, it was incredible. And then, somehow, it got even better. Deputy Bobby launched himself off the lip of the wave. He went airborne, and as he flew above the water, he grabbed the back rail of the surfboard.

Millie screamed.

Fox shouted.

Indira shot to her feet, clapping.

West was jumping and waving his arms.

I was on my feet (I didn’t remember that), bellowing Deputy Bobby’s name.

It seemed like everybody else was cheering too, but I barely noticed. All my attention was on Deputy Bobby as he landed and rode the last of the wave toward shore.

And then it was Keme’s turn. I recognized the look of furious concentration on Keme’s face; every once in a while, I caught a glimpse of it when we were doing something else, when Keme forgot that he was supposed to be an unimpressed seventeen-year-old. His pop-up was a little less smooth than Deputy Bobby’s, and it looked like he struggled, in the first few seconds, to keep himself upright. Then he caught his balance, and he seemed to change. The boy who vacillated between detached and surly (and occasionally outright combative) was gone, and in his place was a boy who looked…alive. That was the only word for it. It was like Keme was a house, and someone had turned on all the lights, and they were spilling out of him. He didn’t have Deputy Bobby’s finesse, not yet, but I thought, as I watched him carve the wave, that he might be more of a natural—if he kept surfing, he’d be better than Deputy Bobby one day; there was no doubt about that. But what made me grin until my face hurt was how happy Keme looked. How unselfconsciously at peace he seemed to be.

Like Deputy Bobby, he launched himself from the lip of the wave and caught air. Instead of reaching for the back rail of the board, though, Keme spun. He almost pulled it off, but as he was coming back around, he smacked face-first into the water.

“OH NO!” (Guess who that was?)

Fox winced.

“Oh my,” Indira said.

“God.” West held finger and thumb an inch apart. “He was so close.”

I went for supportive (mostly because I knew it would both gratify and annoy Keme): “Great job, Keme! Good try!”

Keme surfaced and shook his head. He paddled back toward shore. Deputy Bobby was waiting for him at the halfway point, and when Keme came up beside him, Deputy Bobby said something. Keme shook his head again. Deputy Bobby stretched over to give Keme a one-armed hug. When they separated, they paddled the rest of the way together.

“Aww,” Millie said.

Indira patted West’s arm. “That’s a very nice young man you found for yourself.”

“Yeah,” West said with a smile. “He really is.”

“Hugs are boring,” Fox said. “I want to see them fight!”

A voice came over the speaker system, announcing that they needed the surfers to leave the water for the under eighteen division. In ones and twos, the surfers started making their way back to shore.

“Wait,” I said. “Keme isn’t eighteen. Was he competing in the adult division?”

“Obviously,” Fox said.

“How?”

“He lied about his age,” Millie said. “He does it all the time. When we go to the theater in Seaside, he pretends to be twelve.”

“Hold on. One time—once!—I asked him if he had his driver’s license, and he wouldn’t talk to me for a week. I mean, he never talks to me, but this was…icier.”

“Movie tickets are expensive,” Fox said with a shrug.

I looked at Indira.

“I’ve told him I don’t like it,” Indira said. “But when you add a drink and popcorn, sometimes it costs us fifty dollars.”

“I don’t care about the movie ticket! I care about the injustice of him getting mad at me—”

“Babe!” West screamed. He ducked under the barrier to sprint the remaining distance to Deputy Bobby, who was making his way up the beach with Keme. “You were amazing!”

Kissing ensued. Lots of kissing. And while Deputy Bobby was looking particularly, um, estimable, what with the wetsuit and the salt-stiff hair and the general, uh, effect, I decided to look elsewhere. Out of politeness.

“I guess West isn’t worried about getting wet anymore,” Fox said with unnecessary smugness. “You know, I think it’s a little unfair that Deputy Delicious looks even better somehow after being in the water.”

“Fox,” Indira said in a warning voice.

“Dash looks handsome after he gets out of the water,” Millie said—with dubious accuracy but heartwarming loyalty.

“Remember after we went swimming, when we went to get something to eat, and the waitress thought he was a drifter and said he could earn some money washing dishes?” Fox said and began to laugh.

Indira said a little more loudly this time: “Fox.”

“That was not my fault!” I said. “You stole my towel, and—no! I’m not getting into this again!”

By that point, fortunately, Deputy Bobby and West and Keme had joined us. Indira was pouring cups of hot coffee, and Deputy Bobby and Keme were shivering as they took theirs.

“You were amazing,” I told Deputy Bobby. And then I heard what I’d said, and I rushed to add, “You too, Keme.”

Keme glowered at me over the rim of his cup.

“I could have done it better, though,” I said.

For a heartbeat, the glower cracked, and a hint of a smile showed through. Then he went back to that flat stare.

“I definitely wouldn’t have fallen. Remember that part? At the end?”

His glare slipped again, but only for a moment, and then he made a very rude gesture.

“God, that was so good,” Deputy Bobby said. “It’s perfect out there.”

“One day,” West said, “when I’m a famous designer, we’re going to buy a beach house. You’ll be able to surf whenever you want.”

He already can, I thought. Right now. Right here.

“You both need to eat something,” Indira said. “Do you want to get out of those suits first—”

Before she could finish, a shout up the beach interrupted her. We all turned.

“You lying, cheating, thieving son of a—”

I recognized the speaker from around town. His name was Nate Hampton, and he was a used-car salesman and member of Hastings Rock’s city council. He was a lanky redhead who had chosen, for some reason known only to God, to wear a suit to the beach. And in that moment, he was charging at another man—the real estate developer, the one West had called Gerry. The redhead crashed into Gerry, and the men went down. They rolled across the sand, throwing wild punches that had neither force nor accuracy. It looked like a couple of pre-teens brawling rather than two grown men.

Deputy Bobby sprinted up the beach, and in a matter of moments, he separated the men. I jogged after him in case he needed help, but since he was Deputy Bobby, he didn’t. The redhead was on his knees, wiping a smear of blood at the corner of his mouth. Gerry sat on the sand. He looked older up close, his face lined. Maybe he thought dyeing his goatee and hair made him look younger. In my opinion, it made him look like he’d fallen into the shoe polish.

“Mr. Hampton,” Deputy Bobby said to the redhead. “What’s going on here?”

“Nothing.” The redhead got to his feet. He spat blood on the sand, leveled a furious look at Gerry, and shook his head. Then he took off toward the parking lot.

“Are you all right, sir?” Deputy Bobby asked as he helped Gerry to his feet.

“Fine, fine.” But Gerry winced as he pressed a hand to his side.

“Let me get an on-duty deputy over here—”

“No need.” Gerry detached himself from Deputy Bobby. People were still staring, and Gerry gave a weak wave. “We’re all right here.” He patted Deputy Bobby’s arm. “Thank you, young man. Now, if you’ll excuse me…”

“You should wait for a paramedic to have a look at you. We’ve got some chairs right over there.”

“No, no, no. I’m fine.” And with another of those limp waves, Gerry shuffled off toward the cluster of tents that marked the operations center for the surfing challenge.

“I’m going to make sure he’s okay,” Deputy Bobby said to me.

“Bobby!” West’s voice had an unexpected edge as he joined us. “What are you doing?”

Deputy Bobby’s face shut down. His gaze settled on something in the middle distance, not quite looking at West.

“The fight—” I began.

“Excuse us,” West said to me.

I blinked and opened my mouth, but the only thing I could come up with was “Oh. Yeah. Sorry.”

Deputy Bobby was still staring into the middle distance as I retreated.

“We talked about this,” West said, his voice sharp and carrying over the crash of the waves. “You’re not a deputy anymore. This isn’t your responsibility. Your responsibility is your family.”

Deputy Bobby said something too low for me to hear.

“What about somebody who’s actually on duty?” West said. “Dairek was right there!”

Deputy Bobby spoke again.

When West answered, his voice softened. “What if you’d gotten hurt?”

Then I moved beyond the reach of their voices.

Back at the chairs, the Last Picks were waiting for me with universally miserable expressions. Millie looked like she was about to cry. Keme glared at me as though this were somehow my fault. Indira sighed and started unwrapping a sandwich. And Fox watched Deputy Bobby and West without the slightest attempt to hide their interest.

“That,” they said, “is not good.”