Night of the Purple Moon (The Toucan Trilogy, Book 1) by Scott Cramer

Author:Scott Cramer [Cramer, Scott]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2012-03-25T00:00:00+00:00

MONTH 6 – TWO BURIALS

Jordan sailed thirty degrees into the wind, close hauled, tacking every fifteen minutes, zigzagging ever further from the island. Waves pounded the skiff’s bow in endless thuds, splattering icy droplets against his rain gear.

Seas this rough, with a strong northeast wind, usually spelled trouble. October was hurricane season. A Nor’easter, also common this time of year, was no picnic, either. Abby had pleaded with him to wait for better weather, but he had a job to do.

Toby and Glen had finally delivered Chad’s body to the mansion, and Zoe, too, needed a sea burial. Her skeletal frame lay along the port gunwale. Chad was at the bow, his face as gray as the clouds.

Half a mile at sea, Jordan baited a hook with the head of a smoked mackerel, threw it overboard, and looped the fishing line around his foot. The big schools of bluefish and striped bass had migrated to warmer waters, but still he stood a slim chance of snagging a straggler.

Ignore the odds, never give up—Jordan believed that was the secret of survival.

After only a few minutes he felt a tug on the line. A strike! He rammed the tiller forward, bringing the bow into the wind. The sail luffed and the boat bucked up and down. Jordan braced his right leg against the port side and hauled in the fishing line, hand over hand. Whatever he had hooked seemed to weigh a ton.

It was a whopper all right; a whopping disappointment.

He hoisted a mesh bag of pale, waterlogged grapefruit into the boat. The label said, Indian River, Florida. Jordan imagined the grapefruit had drifted in the Gulf Stream, all the way up the coast. He decided to keep the bag to show Eddie— otherwise his friend would never believe him.

Later, he once more steered into the wind, putting the skiff in irons. Jordan maneuvered Chad’s right leg over the side and waited for the crest of a wave to roll the body overboard. Pushed by wind and wave, Chad floated away.

Jordan placed one hand behind Zoe’s neck and his other hand beneath her tiny waist and lifted her as easily as a bundle of twigs. Some of the kids blamed Zoe for her own death because she was anorexic. They said the space germs only provided a convenient excuse for her to stop eating. Jordan did not agree. Space dust had killed her, just not in the same way it killed the others. The germs had infected her with fear.

Zoe slipped beneath the surface when he released her.

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