HostileTakeover by Cristelle Comby

Author:Cristelle Comby
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-05-10T19:39:06+00:00

Chapter four

Tears on a River

It took me another two weeks to finally give up. I told myself that I hadn’t really counted on that prick Morgan, given all the time he’d blown me off. He didn’t care like I did. So I was going to have to make up for that.

Still, despite my alleged lack of faith in the detective, every day after that cold case revelation left me feeling a little more defeated. Even my pickled excuse for a brain could do the basic math of how long it was since the accident. By now, the car I was looking for would have long since been fixed. It could pass me by on the street and I’d never know it. I had no other clues, no other leads…and now no one else was even bothering to look.

Normally, I’d have been walking the streets until well into the small hours, but that last day, I decided to wrap it up at dusk. The smell of the ocean was strong in the air. I sighed as I looked down at the dinghy in the water. Another funny thing…All this time I was living on that boat, I’d never once taken it out to sea. Part of that was because it wasn’t a good idea when the weather was nasty, like it was for the last two weeks. But the sea was calm that night, almost like glass. A cool breeze blew in on my face, soothing me with its soft touch. I closed my eyes to soak it in. It was way too long since I was out there.

When I opened my eyes again, I realized that I hadn’t taken a drink the entire day. It wasn’t like me to forget; the daily pain of being alone was enough to drive me towards it well before noon. I shrugged it off, deciding that maybe I was just tired of it.

I climbed into my little boat and untied the rope holding it in place. The outboard motor had a gas tank nearly as empty as the one in my car. It took more than a few tries to get it going. Once it sputtered to life, I aimed the boat out to the ocean proper.

I found myself humming the classic rock hit “Brandy” as the old engine took me to see my first love.

I went from humming to singing the tune the further out I went. The breeze felt even better now that I was moving across the water. The sunset in front of me was a glorious spray of oranges and reds across the sea and sky.

Then the lyrics of the song gradually caught in my throat. The hurt I’d normally keep at bay with Jack pounded on me. I was forced to stop singing because the sobs choked me off. The sea may have been my first love, but my true love was buried in the ground on shore, never to be seen again in this life.

The engine finally came to a sputtering stop a few miles offshore.

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