Chapter 4

This was not how he wanted to die, thank you. Buried alive at the bottom of the ocean, the air slowly turning to poison in the tomb-slash-cabin of the fishing boat Lady Luck.

Maybe not so much on the luck, although if Axel was honest, the fact that he’d gotten inside the lower compartment and latched the waterproof seal in time to create an air pocket did seem on the lucky—or even the divine providence—side of the equation.

He now sat on the ceiling, the contents of the entire cabin scattered around him—pots and pans, dishware, books, pillows, life jackets, blankets—anything that wasn’t latched down, and even then, cushions had broken loose, along with the contents of the freezer. Frozen fish, some coffee beans, and a bag of raspberries—that seemed like an interesting combination.

A few canned goods rolled across the ceiling with the below-surface current.

He couldn’t tell if he might be sinking—or maybe the air pocket of the cabin was keeping the boat afloat. And it might not be the only air pocket. It was possible that the captain’s cabin and even the flybridge contained air.

He didn’t want to chance it.

The windows peered out to murky water, but the barest of light suggested he might not be too far below the surface. Hopefully the keel still stuck out of the sea, something to catch the sunlight, tell the world he wasn’t on the bottom.

Yet.

The static of the mic buzzed through him, and he tried again. “Hello?” Axel held the mic to his forehead, breathed out.

Nothing. Okay. Think.

It had been a long shot anyway, hoping the ham radio he’d found tucked in the cabinet might work. Radio frequencies struggled underwater, but the ham operated at a 136 kHz band, so?—

“Axel?”

Her voice crackled through the line, igniting inside of him.

“Hello! I’m here! I’m here!”

A pretty voice, although he might be biased. He’d take any voice on the other end. Still, he wanted to imagine her as pretty, maybe a brunette, someone who wouldn’t give up on him.

Mostly that last part.

“I thought I lost you,” she said. “I’m trying to get ahold of someone over the radio, but she’s not answering. I’ll keep trying.”

“I’m still here.”

He wanted to suggest she turn the dial, find another channel—in fact, Moose possessed a ham radio, but the chances that his brother had parked the chopper and returned home to his warm bed came in at negative zero.

If his brother could get a bird in the air, he would search the ocean blue for him; Axel knew it in his bones. But the chopper’s fuel had been almost spent right before the boat went over, so chances were Moose had headed to Homer to drop off his crew.

And by the time he returned, Axel might be at the bottom of the sea.

Not to get too dark and gloomy, but the hope of his brother finding him in the swells . . .

The woman on the ham might be the last person on earth he spoke to.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt?” she said now.

“Maybe some bruised ribs, and my shoulder took a hit, but I’m fine.” For now. Gurgling from somewhere above suggested the boat gulped water somewhere. But so far his ears hadn’t popped, so no depth pressure yet.

Oh, so much to look forward to as he slowly asphyxiated. Or drowned.

“What happened?”

Maybe she was trying to keep him talking—probably not a terrible idea, given the fact that at least he’d know how far he’d sunk. When he lost transmission, well, he’d lose any chance of contacting Moose too.

“There’s a storm coming through the area, and my team went out to rescue some fishermen. The boat got swamped.”

“Are you alone?”

“Just me and Davy Jones.”

“Who?”

He laughed. “You know—the pirate? Dead pirate? Captain of the Flying Dutchman?”

“Oh.” Silence. “That’s . . . not very funny.”

“That’s all I’ve got.”

“That’s pitiful. Okay, listen. Can you swim out?”

He frowned. “Not in seas with thirty-foot waves, and fifty degrees. You saw Titanic, right?”

“Jack could have totally fit on that door.”

“Right?”

“But then Rose would have had to marry him, and maybe he was just the holiday-romance guy and not the real guy.”

“The holiday-romance guy?” He found a jug of water and uncapped it.

“You know, the guy who’s lots of fun but deep down can’t make a commitment.”

“Maybe she was the holiday-romance girl.” He took a drink, wiped his mouth.

“Rose was still trying to figure out who she was. At least Jack knew—he was a guy just trying to figure out how to survive.”

“So which one are you? Jack or Rose?” He put the cap back on.

“I don’t know. Rose, maybe.”

A sigh on the other end. Interesting. “So, who are you, Sparrow?”

“I’m a . . . researcher.”

“What are you researching?”

A pause. Outside the window, bubbles rose, which meant that air below him was escaping.

He pressed his ear to the ceiling boards. Sloshing. The more water that spilled in, the heavier the boat would get.

“Um, the migratory patterns of wolves?”

He leaned against a pole that connected to the bench seating above. “I have a friend who does that—her name is Peyton. She’s from my hometown.”

Another pause, this time so long that his voice held the smallest edge of panic when he keyed the mic. “Sparrow? Are you there?”

Another beat. Was the ocean getting darker outside his window?

“Sorry. I tried the radio again. No answer. How are you doing?”

“I’ve been better.” He grimaced, hating the desperation in his voice. Blew out a breath. He wasn’t dead yet. “So, Sparrow, are you from Alaska?”

“No. I . . . I came out here because of a friend.”

“Where’re you from?” The boat was turning, starting to roll to its side. He braced himself on the cabinet.

“Minnesota.”

“I have family there. My great-uncle and some second cousins. They live on a lake.”

“Everybody lives on a lake. There’s ten thousand to pick from.”

He liked her. She was no-nonsense, had a bit of wit to her. “Have you always been a wolf researcher?”

Silence. Another beat. For a second he feared?—

“No. I was . . . a detective.”

“Like Sherlock Holmes?”

“Maybe. I hunted serial killers.”

“Sort of a dark hobby.”

“It paid the bills.”

“So does river-monster hunting, but nobody is signing up for that.”

“What is river-monster hunting?”

“You know, that show where some guy shoves his arm in an underwater cave or log and pulls out a catfish with teeth the size of my hand clamped on to his bloody arm.”

“And now that’s an image I’ll have to sleep with.”

“Not if you never go river-monster hunting.” The boat continued to turn in the water.

“I’ll cross that off my bucket list.”

“What else is on your bucket list?”

Another pause, and he found himself smiling.

“Okay, in truth I don’t have a bucket list.”

“Yes you do. Everybody has a bucket list.” Canned goods rolled across the ceiling, fell onto the bench.

“Fine, what’s on yours?”

He blew out a breath. “Besides living through this?” He caught a can of peaches before it beaned him. Set it on the bench.

“That’s a given.”

“Fine. Bungee jumping.”

“You aren’t serious.”

“I think I am. I’d like to just . . . fall. And know that I’m going to be caught.”

“And if you’re not?”

“Maybe I won’t know?”

A laugh on the other side as she toggled her mic, and something warmed him to his bones. “Okay, fine. If you started a bucket list right now, what would be on yours?”

She sighed. “I think I might be willing to skydive.”

“So very Rose of you.”

“What?”

“Standing on the bow of the ship, believing she could fly?”

“Only because Jack was holding on to her,” she said.

“And we’re back to Jack.”

The boat had righted itself. At least he wasn’t upside down. But he might be going straight to the bottom.

“We’re always back to Jack. He believed in . . . everything. Hope. Tomorrow. That he could be anything, do anything.”

Something about her voice . . .

“You don’t believe that?”

Quietly, “I think I used to. Or maybe a missing part of me does.”

He hated how much he could agree with her. “Once upon a time, I think I used to believe that too.”

Oh, he wasn’t sure why that came out.

“So, who are you, Axel? Jack or Rose?”

“Neither. I’m the captain—going down with the ship.”

“More dark humor?”

Maybe just truth. He shook his head. “I should have dove into the sea when we were hit by the wave. Then my brother could have picked me up.”

He knew that made no sense to her, but he just had to voice it to someone.

“We all have would’ve and should’ve, but this is what is. So, how are you going to stay alive?”

Huh. “You sound like my Coast Guard instructor.”

“You’re with the Coast Guard?”

“I was. Rescue swimmer. Top of the class—” He wasn’t sure why he’d added that. “Got my pick of stations and came up to Kodiak. I could swim farther, last longer than anyone . . . Thought I was really something.”

Silence. Finally, “And then? Because it sounds like there’s an ‘and then’ at the end of that.”

She was dangerously easy to talk to. “And then I went out on a rescue. It was in October and the seas were high—like today. A fishing boat was taking on water, seven souls on board, all a family. By the time we got there, four were in a lifeboat, three in the water—a mom, dad, and one of their sons. Twenty-five-foot swells, water breaking over their heads. Thirty-two-degree water. I went into the water and got the mom—direct deployment with a sling. I put it around her and took her up, and by the time she was onboard, I couldn’t feel my hands, and ice blinded my face mask. But I went back into the water after the next two. I got my hands on the dad, but the waves kept washing over us and my hands wouldn’t work. He got away from me.”

Pressure started to build in his ears. Aw, yeah, he was going down, albeit slowly. The air pockets probably acting like buoys. Still, he was definitely sinking. He held his nose and blew out, popped them.

“Then what happened?”

“The son grabbed me and climbed into the sling. Put his legs around me, and the chopper lifted us out. By the time I got on deck, my hands were frozen, the radio on my helmet frozen. Another rescue boat radioed in that they were picking up the guys in the lifeboat. But there was still that guy in the water, right?”

Wait—was that water near the edges of the ceiling board, coming out of the toilet?

Shoot. Not watertight.

“So what happened?”

“My crew chief wasn’t going to let me go out again, but I pushed out and refused to come back in, so they lowered me down. I searched the sea for twenty minutes until they reached bingo and had to haul me up. By then I had hypothermia and was nearly a casualty.”

Yep, water. It ran across the boards of his cabin. Shoot.

“The Coast Guard censured me and put me on leave. But I was a little messed up in the head, all that time in the water, the frustration sort of . . . I don’t know. Sometimes I still hear the mom screaming, the kid crying. It got inside me and . . . anyway, the Coast Guard decided I should take more time off. Like, permanently.”

He was going to have to ditch. He’d already stood up and now searched for a flare or a buoy.

“I’m sorry.”

“Yeah. Well, I’d wanted to be a rescue swimmer all my life, since I was a kid and I saved another kid from drowning—at the time, I thought I was some kind of hero or something.” He found a flare. Blew out a breath. “Maybe I am Jack after all.”

“Desperately trying to survive?”

“Something like that. Listen. Um. So, I’m taking on water here. And . . . I think I’m going to have to swim out. Any luck on the radio?”

“I’ll try again, but . . . are you sure? It sounds like you’d have a better shot inside the boat.”

He stood in water to his ankles. “Pretty sure.” Although he thought he would have sunk faster. “Maybe there’s more air in the captain’s cabin.”

“The longer you can wait to get in the water, the better, probably, right?”

She had a point.

Silence hung on the other end while he ripped one of the cushions from the bench. Supposedly flotation devices, but he wasn’t holding out hope.

“Axel?”

“I’m here.”

“I tried again. Sorry—still no signal.”

“What time is it?”

“Nearly midnight.”

He found a waterproof bag amidst the pillows and picked up the ham. Shoved it into the bag. Maybe if the next compartment wasn’t flooded . . .

“Axel?”

“Yeah?”

“Just checking. You were quiet there.”

“I’m trying to figure out how soon I abandon ship.”

“Oh. Okay, listen. Look around you. There’s got to be something you can use to self-rescue.”

“I have a flotation cushion and a flare.”

“How about a life raft?”

“It’s hung up on the bow of the ship.”

“What?”

“The lifeboat. It’s hung up?—”

“But isn’t there a redundancy on the ship? A lot of boats have lifeboats and a life-raft suitcase. It’s usually at the back, near the rail.”

“Who are you, Captain Ron?”

“Ten thousand lakes. Go check.”

“I can’t, not without leaving the boat.” But maybe it was time. The water had risen to his knees, his feet turning frigid. “I think it’s time to ditch.” Especially since the pressure had hit his ears again. Every ten feet, which meant he might be under by twenty feet. Any deeper and he wouldn’t have enough breath to reach the surface.

“Sparrow?”

“I’m here.”

“Thanks.”

“I’m not going anywhere—I’ll keep trying. Stay alive.”

No promises, but he didn’t say that. “Yep.” Then he shoved the mic into the bag and zipped it, securing the bag across his body.

The water had sloshed up to his thighs, and he popped his ears, then stood at the hatch to the captain’s cabin. Five deep, fast breaths, then another, to fill his body. He shoved on his helmet and reached for the door.

It swung up more easily than he’d expected, and while water gushed in, it didn’t fill the cabin. He scrambled out, up the stairs, into the cabin.

Not filled full, but water seeped in.

Through the windows, the sea gulped the last rays of light. The air had buoyed him, but the ocean would win. And given the froth and current above him, the sea still raged.

Life-raft suitcase. Near the back rail.

He slogged through the water toward the door. Still had breath left, but let it out and took five more quick breaths, then another, deep, then more.

Then he fought open the door.

The ocean blasted into the room, and he held on to the frame as the pressure equalized.

The boat would sink fast now, so he pushed out and grabbed the rail.

Yes—there, the orange life raft, in a suitcase.

Pressure built behind his ears—C’mon?—

He reached for the latch. No frozen hands today, but it slid under his grip. He held the rail, the pressure burning through his brain—and hit the latch again.

The suitcase popped open, and like a balloon, the raft deployed. He grabbed it as it inflated and rode it to the surface as the boat dropped away into the depths.

Then held on with everything inside him as he surfaced into the raging sea.

* * *

She couldn’t just stand here and let him drown.

But thirty minutes since his last transmission said . . .

No, Flynn wasn’t going to jump to conclusions. Except jumping to conclusions was sort of her job—jumping, then sorting through, then jumping again, rinse and repeat until finally she landed on the right conclusion.

Please let it not be that Axel had drowned.

She picked up her radio again. “Axel, are you there? Axel?”

Nothing, and she set the mic down and got up, running her hands behind her shoulders, kneading them, then moving to her neck.

She stepped outside for a breath of air despite the nip, knowing she should go to bed. But how, exactly, was she supposed to sleep with him out there, maybe—hopefully—fighting for his life?

But in all likelihood, the ham radio had gone down with the ship. So even if he was alive . . .

He was alone.

She picked up the radio again. “Peyton, come in.” Nothing. “This is Flynn. For the love, come. In!”

Nothing. Shoot.

The sun had set—or the closest it came to that in Alaska at the height of June. Really, it simply hung just below the horizon, turning the sky to blood red, dotted with deep magenta clouds, scarred by the jagged thrust of the faraway Alaska Range. The rays glistened on the river, turning the water into a molten lava flow. In the east, the moon also hung, pale and ghostly, muted by the light of the sun.

It felt like twilight, shadows climbing out of the forest. The makings of a horror movie. How had she ever thought this might be a good idea?

Except, if she hadn’t been here, then Axel would have been completely lost. Now . . .

Now what?

If he’d made it into the sea, and if it hadn’t already gobbled him, maybe . . . Well, he had said he was the top of his class.

C’mon, Axel. Don’t die on me.

She went inside. Picked up the mic, tried to call him again.

Nothing.

Then she picked up the bear gun and went outside. Peyton had said she would only be a couple miles away. Maybe . . .

She pointed at the sky and pulled the trigger. Aw, the stupid gun made a silly pop. And with the river . . . but she shot again. And a third time, just in case someone thought it might have been a mistake.

Then she stood in the yard, listening to their conversation about hope.

“You don’t believe that?”

“I think I used to. Or maybe a missing part of me does.”

Maybe she needed to channel the part of her that was Kennedy.

Or, rather, Sparrow.

She went back inside, paced. Okay, maybe she could walk out. Or . . . follow the trail of the four-wheeler to Peyton’s camp?—

“Hello? CQ, CQ?—”

What—She swept up the mic. “Axel! Is that you?”

“Just hanging out in the tub.”

She closed her eyes, holding the mic to her chest. Breathed. Then, “Where have you been?”

Crackling, then, “Fighting the high seas, Sparrow. Good call on the life raft.”

She sank into the chair, fighting the crazy urge to weep. She barely knew this guy, and yet . . .

Maybe it was the desperation of his situation. Or maybe . . .

Maybe she just longed for someone to have a happy ending. To be found and not lost. She found her voice. “You escaped the ship.”

“It went down like a rock. I rode the raft up and it inflated right there in the ocean. Managed to get inside it and zip the covering shut. I might hurl, though. I strapped myself in, but . . . oh, yep, I’m going to . . . Hold please.”

She scowled. Waited. Her own appetite had vanished over the past few hours.

He came back. “That’s better. But gross. The ocean is wicked out there. Please tell me you got ahold of someone.”

“No. Sorry. I . . . maybe I should try to scan the channels?”

“Yeah. Maybe. But I don’t know if anyone is up—what time is it?”

She checked her watch. “Two a.m.”

“It’ll get light soon. Maybe . . .”

“I’ll keep trying, Axel.”

“Good, because I can’t feel my legs. There’s water on the bottom of the life raft, and I think I have a hole in my dry suit.”

Which meant he was slowly freezing to death.

“Don’t go to sleep.”

“Yeah. I get that.”

“No, seriously—you have to stay awake.”

“I’m throwing up. I don’t think I’m going to sleep.”

She ran her hand across her face. “Okay, tell me—tell me about your brother. What’s his name?”

“Moose. Except that’s not his real name. His real name is Arlo, and he hates it. For a while, people called him Arlie, but he’s always been a big guy, so around fifth grade someone dubbed him Moose and he grabbed hold of that.”

“No nickname for you?”

“Oh, I had a few, but . . .”

“C’mon.”

“Moose used to call me Lugnut.”

She laughed. “Really?”

“He thought it was funny. I didn’t. I tried to get people to call me Phoenix.”

“Really? Like, you rise from the ashes?”

“Naw. There’s a guy named Phoenix from Alaska who plays in the NHL. I wanted to be him for a while. Actually, I just wanted to be like Moose.”

“And then he called you Lugnut.”

“The jerk.”

“So, have you risen from the dead?”

“Huh?”

“Like a phoenix.”

“Absolutely. I have at least five lives left.”

“That’s a cat, not a phoenix.”

“Still. At least five.”

She imagined him as handsome, to go along with the smile she could feel through the ham.

“Do you have any siblings?” he asked.

The question caught her like a hit to the boards. “Um. Yeah. Yes.”

“You sound unsure.”

“No, I’m sure. A sister. She’s a lot like me.”

“Smart, brave, and faithful?”

Oh. Wow.

“Too much?”

“I—”

“I’m freezing to death here. It might have shut down my brain a little, but . . . I’d like to meet you, Sparrow.”

Um. “Let’s just keep you alive there, Phoenix. Then we’ll talk.”

Laughter. It swept into her, through her, and found her bones. Heated them.

“So how’d you get into the serial killer hunting business?”

“I failed out of river-monster school.”

“Aw, I like you, Sparrow.”

She smiled, but his voice had softened. Fatigue, or possibly the cold, creeping over him. Stay awake, Axel. “I like you too. So I’m going to be really peeved with you if you die.”

“Roger,” he said softly.

Oh boy. “Okay, so when I was ten, we lived a neighborhood near uptown, in Minneapolis, with alleyways and detached garages, and one day I was walking home from school, and I found a dead body in an abandoned garage a block from my house. My sister was with me, and she completely freaked out, but I . . . I was curious. We ran home and my mom called the cops, but I sneaked back and watched them bag her up and take evidence, and I thought . . . someday, I want to do that.”

“Bag up dead people?”

“No—search for evidence. Find the killer. I actually met a cop on the scene—his name was Rembrandt Stone, and he was nice. He liked that I was curious. He explained what the crime-scene techs were doing—one of them was actually his wife, Eve. And then, later, he came by the house and gave me a detective book. Turned out he lived in the neighborhood. He quit being a cop after that, started to write novels. But after I graduated from high school, I tracked him down, and he introduced me to his wife. They became my mentors as I went to college. Then the police academy. And then into the forensics department. But I really wanted to be an investigator, so I became a beat cop and finally made detective.”

“And started specializing in serial killers.”

“Actually, that was . . . that’s a more recent focus. But I did recently catch one.”

Silence.

“Phoenix?”

“Mm-Mmmhmm.”

“Stay with me.”

Silence.

“Axel?”

Nothing.

“Lugnut!”

Crackling, then. “I heard that.”

“Do not sleep.”

“Not. Sleeping.”

“Listen. You can do this. You managed to escape a sinking ship! You’re tougher than you think—I know it. So, stay awake. Your turn to talk.”

“Fine. We have a serial killer in Alaska. The Midnight Sun Killer.” His voice was fading.

“I know,” she said. And oh, in that moment she wanted to tell him. Why not? Clearly it wasn’t him. What would it hurt? “Actually, I came to Alaska in search of?—”

Outside, the sound of a motor hummed in the air. “Stay there. Don’t move. I’ll be right back.”

“Where am I going to go?”

She didn’t answer—just set down the mic and headed outside. And wanted to weep when, through the dusty shadows of the forest, Peyton emerged, riding hard on her four-wheeler. Head down, helmet on, thundering over the field, throttle open.

Flynn waved, stepped off the porch, and Peyton almost skidded to a stop. Threw up her visor. “Why didn’t you answer me?”

Flynn jerked, stared. “What? I’ve been calling you for hours! Over and over!”

Peyton just looked at her. Then she grabbed the radio. Closed her eyes with a face. “Channel sixteen.”

“You said six!”

She drew in a breath. “Okay. Yeah. That’s the channel I use when I’m out with Echo—sorry. I got worried when you didn’t answer. Did you shoot off a gun?”

“Yeah, I did?—”

“Are you okay? Are you in danger?” Peyton pulled off her helmet.

“No—but I have a guy on the ham radio who is.”

“What?” Peyton got off the bike and headed into the house.

“He’s a rescue swimmer, and he got caught in a storm. I’ve been talking to him for the better part of the night. He was on a ship but it went down, and now he’s in a life raft, but I think he’s hypothermic and he’s barely talking?—”

Flynn charged in behind her, but Peyton had already picked up the mic. “CQ, CQ, this is AL7RAC?—”

“I don’t remember my numbers,” said Axel, barely mumbling.

Oh no.

Peyton’s eyes widened. “Axel? Is that you?”

“Mm-Mmmhmm.”

“This is Peyton. Where are you?”

“I’m . . . in a life . . . raft.”

“He’s in the Cook Inlet somewhere,” Flynn said. “He keeps asking me to call his brother, Moose, and some rescue team.”

“Air One. Okay.” Peyton toggled the mic again. “Axel, you stay alive. I’ll get Moose to you. Hang in there.”

She turned the dial to another frequency. “This is AL7RAC, Alpha Lima 7 Romeo Alpha Charlie calling AL7SKY, Alpha Lima 7 Sierra Kilo Yankee on the Copper Mountain repeater. This is AL7RAC calling AL7SKY. Mayday, Mayday, Mayday.”

Her gaze fell on Flynn. “Breathe. We’ll get him.”

Yeah. Breathing.

Flynn stood at the door, her arms around herself as Peyton repeated the call signs.

Then a female voice came on the line. “AL7RAC, this is AL7SKY 5-9. What’s your Mayday?”

“Echo, we got a call from Axel. He’s alive but in a life raft in the Cook Inlet. He lost communication with Moose. Can you ping Moose?”

“Roger. Dodge will call Moose.”

Peyton blew out a breath. Looked at Flynn. “You scared the pine out of me. I’ve been trying to call you for hours. And then, halfway here, I heard that gunshot.”

“Sorry. That was me panicking.”

Peyton raised an eyebrow.

Flynn stood up. “Who’s Dodge?”

“He’s an Air One rescue pilot, stationed up here in Copper Mountain.”

The female voice came over the line again. “AL7RAC, this is AL7SKY, I got ahold of Shep. The team is in Homer. Moose is receiving the message.”

Flynn leaned over to Peyton. “Tell them he’s in a life raft. The ship went down. And he’s really cold because he thinks it has a leak and?—”

Peyton held up her hand. “Okay.” She relayed that information to the other operator.

“I need to talk to him. Let me talk to him.”

Peyton turned the channel to Axel’s frequency. “CQ, CQ, this is AL7RAC.”

No answer.

Peyton tried again. “CQ, CQ, this is AL7RAC?—”

Flynn leaned over. “Axel, wake up! Wake. Up!”

No answer.

“Listen, Axel,” Peyton said. “Moose is on the way. Just hang on. Hang on.”

Still no answer.

Flynn looked at her, eyes wide. “We should go find him.”

“What are we supposed to do? They are hundreds of miles away in the middle of the ocean. The best we can do is stay right here in case he comes back on the line.”

Right.

Peyton gave her a sad look. “I’ve had my history with wandering off. We’re staying right here where people can find us.” She got up then and went outside. Returned with a sleeping bag and her pack. She shoved the bag on the top bunk. Then she pulled out coffee. “Coffee?”

“Absolutely.” Flynn sat down at the table. Picked up the mic. “Axel. Come in. Come in.”

Nothing. Her finger caught on the scratching of the bird.

Maybe it wasn’t a sparrow. Maybe it was a phoenix.

Maybe it was her one last chance to save a life out here in the bush.

* * *

“Moose, you okay in there?”

The voice came through the bathroom door from where Moose stood over the toilet, pretty sure that, nope, he wasn’t okay.

Might never be okay.

But maybe his stomach had called it quits for now.

He ran water, washed his face, rinsed out his mouth, and stared at himself for a long moment. His eyes bore the agony of the past five hours, reddened, raw, furious—and not just at Axel but at himself for not sticking around.

He’d left his brother to die in the frothing, roiling ocean.

Axel couldn’t be gone.

He opened the door to see the team EMT, Boo Kingston, standing there. Petite but fierce, her dark hair pulled back in a severe bun, she wore the red jumpsuit of the Air One Rescue team and held a Sprite and a stack of saltines. “You need to eat something or you won’t make it back out. And you need sleep.”

“Don’t talk to me about sleep with my brother out there.” But he did take the can of soda and walk to the massive hangar windows that overlooked Coal Bay. Outside, wind and rain lashed the Bell 429 chopper, sitting under the bloom of tall tarmac lights. The runway lit up the night, a trail of white into blackness. Voices and the bitter scent of burnt coffee languishing in the pot filtered into the room. Cessnas undergoing their 100-hour inspections filled the massive hangar, the mechanic boxes lined up against the walls.

Boo came up beside him. Said nothing, just stood, silent.

No amount of hopeful talk could deny the truth.

“How is the family?” he finally said.

“Alive. The father has a broken leg, and the mother is getting stitches and is being treated for a concussion. But the kids are alive and so is the captain.” She took a cracker from the sheath and took a bite. The crumbs spilled onto the floor.

He held out his hand, and she put a cracker in it.

If his brother, by some miracle, managed to stay alive, he wanted to be on his feet. Which meant that yes, he needed shut-eye or the FAA would shut him down and he’d have to rely on the Coast Guard, or maybe even Dodge from Copper Mountain to fly down and take the chopper out.

“Where’s the bunk room?”

She motioned toward the office area in back. “They don’t have a proper SAR bunk room, but they set up cots in the waiting room.”

“Thanks.”

He felt her gaze on him when he walked away. It wasn’t every day that their fearless leader lost it as completely as he had after they touched down and after the winds hit ninety knots.

He’d barely made it to the head.

But he’d never been as sick as he’d been watching from a safe three hundred feet above as the Lady Luck pitchpoled, bow to stern, then rolled over, exposing her keel before plunging under the waves.

Axel trapped inside.

Oh God, please save him.

He’d said the prayer then and again a thousand times as they tried to reach Axel via radio, and as he’d flown the crew back to the Homer Airport, where they’d tried to locate the boat on radar.

His brother had simply vanished.

Moose came into the waiting room and spotted London lying on a cot, her eyes closed, curled under a blanket. The other cots remained empty. He found one in the corner and lay down.

Behind his closed eyes, he watched the horror replay, over and over. “Moose, pull up. Pull up!”

He’d have to try harder. He dug out his phone, opened a sleep app, and set it to waves. No, not waves. An airplane. No, not that . . . A train.

A nice constant, loud locomotive.

Then he lay on his side, the sound pressed to his ear. Closed his eyes.

And all he saw was waves, thundering down over the boat.

He sighed, his gut churning again.

Please, God. Save Axel. Please, save Axel. Please . . .

He must have dozed off, because a hand on his shoulder jerked him awake. He stirred, turned over, and stared up.

“You were making sounds.” London stood over him, her blonde hair tied back, concern in her blue eyes.

“That was the locomotive.”

“Sounded more like—” She frowned. “You okay?”

He sighed. “No.” He sat up. “What time is it?”

“About three a.m.”

“I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“I wasn’t sleeping.” She sank down on the nearest empty cot. “I’m worried too.”

He scrubbed his hands down his face. “I should have never asked him to jump aboard this . . . team. I knew he was reckless?—”

“Moose. He’s the best rescue tech I’ve ever seen. No one dies on his watch—not if he can help it.”

Moose sighed. “That’s because he has history.”

“The Coast Guard rescue gone bad. I know about it—Shep told me.”

How Shep knew, he didn’t know, but Moose nodded. “But not just that. Years ago, when Axel was about fifteen, our cousin went missing. She got lost on a camping trip and was never found. A month or so later she showed up, dead—shot.”

London’s eyes widened. “That’s terrible.”

“What’s more terrible is that she was with Axel when she went missing. They were swimming in the Copper River. She got swept downstream and . . . he couldn’t get to her.”

“That explains a lot.”

“Yeah.” He shook his head. “I was trying to give him . . . I don’t know . . . purpose, maybe. A way to sort out all that grief inside. Maybe get free of it after he saved enough lives. But it’s always with him. Always telling him he’s not quite enough, that he needs to be better.”

She touched his arm. “If anyone can survive out there, if it’s even possible, it’s Axel.”

He nodded. And for a second wished he was back in Anchorage, waiting it out at the Skyport Diner, his favorite waitress—no, friend, at least for a while—Tillie sitting across from him, listening to him with that way she had, her face in her hands. Wow, he missed her. She seemed to know how to soothe the prowling frustration inside him. And it had less to do with the diner’s pie or chocolate shakes and more to do with the fact that she asked. Listened. Cared.

And she wasn’t a teammate that he had to protect, emotionally, physically, or financially.

London got up. “I’m going to check the weather—you try and sl?—”

The door banged open. “Moose. Get up.” Shep came into the room. “Axel is alive.”

Moose hit his feet. “What?”

Shep always seemed so reserved, the kind of guy who thought first, left his emotions at the door. But now he slammed on the lights. “We got a call from Echo—Axel used the boat’s ham radio and got ahold of someone. He’s on a life raft—at least, he was a few minutes ago.”

Moose headed out the door to the office just down the hall. Boo stood in the doorway and stepped away as he barreled inside.

A big room with radios and weather monitors, and the female director standing behind the radio operator seated with earphones, listening.

“Angie, what do you know?”

The director looked up at Moose’s question and stepped away from the radio operator.

“We got a call from a ham-radio operator out of Copper Mountain,” Angie said. She nursed a cup of coffee in a well-seasoned cup. “They gave us the frequency of the boat’s ham radio, but so far no answer.”

He looked at Boo, then Shep and London. “We gotta go back.”

“The storm’s still pretty rough,” said Angie. “Wind’s at forty knots, easy. And who knows what it’ll be out at sea?”

He turned to her. “The sun is on the upside—it’ll be full daylight soon. The ocean always dies a little in the morning—we’ll use that window.” He looked at his team. “Wheels up in five.”

They took off and he grabbed a cup of coffee, emptying the pot. Then he turned to Angie. “Keep trying. And alert any ships in the area.”

“It’s a pretty big area, Moose. You keep track of that bingo.”

“Roger. But I’m not coming back without my brother.”

She raised her cup and he left, finishing his coffee on his way out of the hangar.

The rain spat down on the chopper, but London had already climbed into the copilot’s seat. Boo was sliding the door of the belly shut, and he got into the pilot’s seat.

He commenced the check with London, then, “To be clear, I won’t risk your lives. But I do want to bring Axel home.”

London looked at him. “Let’s get him.”

He radioed the tower, they cleared him, and he eased the bird into the air. The rain had died, but the wind fought him as he rose. Still, he’d flown in worse conditions in Florida, and even the Gulf of Alaska.

Okay, none of those included rescuing his brother. But he’d searched the sea many times for lost sailors.

Please, God, help me find him.

The sea still churned, and he rode high, the winds less brutal as he headed to Axel’s last known position. Below, the vastness of the foamy gray sea seemed an endless lethal cauldron.

“Get out your glasses! Boo, portside, Shep, starboard. London, log our coordinates. We’ll search in a box pattern . . .”

The sun had risen, brilliant gold over the horizon, the mountains white-capped and glistening. Below, the sea also gleamed under the light, creating impossible shadows, the glare blinding.

The sea had simply gobbled him.

A dispatch came through the radio from Homer. “Air One Rescue, advise that we have picked up an EPIRB. Sending coordinates. Hold.”

Moose looked at London and she nodded. The lats and longs came in and she adjusted their course.

Five miles to the southwest.

“Keep your eyes peeled!” He angled the chopper toward the coordinates, the wind still fighting him, but over the last hour, it had died nearly to thirty knots. He spotted Augustine Island to the west, the volcano rising from the ocean, less than a mile away, maybe. Beyond it, from the mainland, the McNeil range rose, a rocky, forbidding game land.

No boats to be seen amidst the vastness of the water, and in the sunlight, the water turned a ghastly green.

He could almost see the shoreline of the island now, the waves breaking at ten or twenty feet over the shallower shelf. “Where are we on those coordinates?”

“Right above them, sir,” London said.

“Anything?”

Silence. “Not from starboard?—”

“Wait! I see something—over by the island!” Boo kept her eyes trained to her glasses. “It’s orange—a life raft.”

He angled the chopper west and spotted it too. A crumpled hull of rubber beached on the shore, half-deflated.

Abandoned.

It couldn’t be from the Lady Luck. He’d plainly seen her life boat caught on the cables at the bow.

“It’s not from the Lady Luck,” he said quietly. “And no signs of—wait.”

As they drew closer, the raft started to sway—although it might be the rotor wash. But then?—

A body rolled out of the raft.

Red suit, helmet, boots . . . He crawled onto the rocky shore, then fell onto his back.

Lifted his arm.

“It’s him!” London shouted. “It’s him!”

“Not sure I can land on this shoreline,” Moose said. “It’s pretty narrow?—”

“I’ll grab him,” Boo said. “Shep, you work the winch.” She was already climbing into a harness, attaching a sling to the winch hook.

He held the bird steady, fifty feet over the shoreline, as Boo went down the line. Shep gave him a play-by-play. “She’s on the beach. He looks pretty whipped—she’s attaching the sling around his back and shoulders. Okay, coming up.”

He managed to hold it in as Boo and Shep pushed Axel into the deck.

His brother sprawled there, barely moving. “Is he alive?”

“He’s alive,” said Axel, pulling off his helmet. “But he’s cold. Really cold.”

Shep shut the door. Boo wrapped a blanket around him, and London took the controls as Moose turned. Found his brother’s eyes, his smile. And had nothing.

But Axel just grinned at him, his body now shaking so hard his teeth chattered. “I hope someone brought sandwiches, because I’m starved.”

Moose turned back, took the helm. Yeah, me too. “Let’s go home.”