Windswept by Anna Lowe Page A

had enough of the questions eight million New Yorkers kept asking. I had enough of the press. I had enough of my mind replaying their funerals, again and again. Seeing their widows, their kids, all dressed in black. The tears. I just—
    “I get it,” she said, cutting off that runaway train. She nodded into the darkness. “I get it.”
    There was more to say, lots more, and he knew he had to say it. Especially about what it had to do with that awful day when everything had gone wrong between them. About why his buddies had said what they did and why he didn’t stop them.
    It was his moment to finally, finally explain all that, and he knew it.
    But a single point of light was gaining on them from behind, and he stopped to point it out.
    “Somebody’s passing. Can they see us?”
    A cloud had passed in front of the moon, making the night darker still.
    Mia glanced back and veered inshore, muttering something he couldn’t catch. They were passing a beachside disco now, and the music was loud. Really loud.
    “I said, grab the flashlight,” she said, pointing to a pouch attached to the dinghy. “Shine it so they can see us.”
    He twisted the head of the flashlight and aimed the beam at the speeding motorboat.
    “Don’t worry, I’ll just let them pass.” Mia detoured a little farther right. “Plenty of space.”
    And there was, because they’d come to a section of the long, sprawling bay that was free of moorings. The area used for seaplane landings, if he remembered right.
    The thing was, the motorboat detoured, too, and stayed right on their tail. His pulse ticked faster. What the hell?
    “Hey!” Mia yelped, swerving left.
    The motorboat swerved, too, bearing down on them fast. He could make out the aluminum bow, slicing through the water at a good twenty, maybe thirty knots. A hell of a lot faster than Mia’s dinghy, puttering along at about three.
    “Shine the light! Shine the light!” she yelled, throttling up and turning more.
    “I am shining the light!”
    The motorboat curved, intently following their wake.
    God, a thousand-volt spotlight would come in handy right now to blind that suicidal driver before he did some real damage.
    Then it clicked. The operator of that motorboat wasn’t suicidal. More like homicidal. Ryan turned the light off.
    “What are you doing?”
    He didn’t answer, except to yell as the oncoming powerboat thundered closer. “Turn! Turn!”
    Mia yanked the outboard handle so far over, he thought the dinghy would flip.
    Nrrrr-zoom!
The powerboat roared past, inches away, slicing a curtain of water out of the sea and slapping it at them. Ryan ducked half a second too late to avoid getting drenched. When he looked up, spluttering, he barely made out two figures in the boat, motioning their way.
    The motorboat sped ahead.
    Mia threw it the finger and shouted. “Asshole!”
    Apparently, she’d picked up a couple of bad habits in New York.
    She’d barely gotten the dinghy back on course when the shadow of the motorboat lengthened, then shrank again. It wasn’t carrying legal running lights, but Ryan could see its outline in the pale starlight. Side view; front view. It was turning around.
    “Shit, they’re coming back!” Mia yelled.
    “Speed up!”
    The outboard screamed in protest. “This is as fast as it goes!” She swerved toward the nearest cluster of boats, a good two hundred feet away.
    “Faster!” he yelled, looking at the oncoming boat.
    “Oh, God!” Mia leaned forward like a jockey urging on her mount.
    “Turn! Turn!” he yelled.
    She waited for what he was sure was a second too long before cutting aside, dodging the motorboat by the closest of margins. The dinghy surfed aside on the bow wave of the motorboat, its engine sputtering, nearly swamped.
    Boom, boom, boom, boom,
went the thumping bass from the raging party on shore. The noise covered up the roar of the motorboat and the choking pant of Mia’s little outboard.
    “Go! Go!”
    Mia shot off again.