Page 24 of Waves of Fury

He continues to stare at the churning water beneath him. When the water surges a bit, swelling over his ankles, he starts to panic. I watch helplessly as he flails his arms and legs.

“Help! Help me!” he cries out. “Tyler, help!”

“Kellen,” I growl, “look at me.”

“I can’t. I’m going—”

“Look. At. Me.”

His head jerks up and his frantic stare meets mine. For a bigshot CEO clearly in his late thirties or early forties, in this moment, he doesn’t look a day over Jesse’s sixteen years.

“Reach your arm up,” Gerry says, voice soothing. “We’ve got you, man.”

Kellen grunts as he attempts to raise his arm. He flinches and then shakes his head. “It hurts. This metal gored me.”

Sickness roils in my gut. How much metal is inside him? What if it’s keeping him alive?

“Well, we can’t leave you there forever,” I grumble. “Can you hold on to the end of the ax at least?”

Leaning over the railing, I grip both hands around the ax right under the blade and offer him the wooden, blunt end. It’s just long enough for him to grab onto.

“Don’t let go,” I tell him. “Gerry is going to do what he can to unhook you while I pull you up. Trust us to get you out of this mess.”

He nods rapidly, pleading eyes latching onto mine. “I won’t let go.”

I wait for him to get a good hold on the ax handle while Gerry slides on his belly, reaching his arms down below the bottom of the railing. He scoots until half of his body is hanging over the ledge. Brian rushes over to hold on to Gerry’s feet to keep him from flipping completely over.

“On the count of three,” I say to everyone. “I’m going to pull you up and when you can, use your feet to get a footing onto the rails.” I brace myself against the railing. “One, two, three!”

As I pull Kellen up, using every ounce of strength left in my reserves, he howls in pain. I can hear Gerry saying something placating to him but can’t make any of it out. My biceps scream from the exertion and the railing digs into my gut. I’m careful not to accidentally cut myself on the sharp ax end as I manhandle him off his hook.

“He’s off!” Gerry yells just as Kellen belts out a cry of agony. “Pull!”

I struggle to bring him any higher, but then Kyle is beside me, grabbing onto Kellen’s suit jacket. Together, we pull him up and over the railing.

Kellen is essentially dead weight and he collapses on me, his head narrowly missing the deadly end of the ax. Thankfully, Brian reaches over and tugs it out of my grip. The steps dig into my back and I’m completely spent from expelling what little energy I had left, but relief floods through me.

Kellen trembles and his teeth chatter loudly. Brian, Frannie, and Gerry stand around, worry gleaming in their eyes. Kyle has moved back over to where Barb is sitting leaned up against the wall beside Hope and Elise.

“We need to take a look at your injury,” I grunt out. “Come on, big guy. I can’t move under you.”

Kellen winces as he lifts himself off me. His face is pale and a bluish bruise is forming across his forehead. He’s alive and able to move, so that’s something. Gerry helps him to his feet and then guides him to the top of the stairs. The door keeps swinging open and closed, making all kinds of racket as the stormy weather continues on, but Gerry sets Kellen in front of it, using his back as a doorstop since our concrete hunk is now missing.

Brian offers me a hand, pulling me up to my feet. The backpack is still on me and weighs a ton, but I can’t take it off now for fear of losing it.

I climb the steps to where Kellen sits and kneel down beside him. “Let’s take a look. Can you get your jacket off?”

He squeezes his eyes shut and his lips form a thin line.

“I’ll take that as a no,” I say with a grunt.

Carefully, I move one flap of his jacket away from his torso to reveal his bloody dress shirt. Then I unbutton the buttons before gently peeling the torn material away from the source of his bleeding. Sure enough, he has a several-inch gash just under his ribs on his side. His ribs are probably what saved him and stopped him from completely gutting himself.

I need a first aid kit, but I also need a boat and my brothers and a damn cheeseburger. I’ll have to make do with what I have for now.

“Give me your ties,” I tell Gerry and Kellen. “We need to stop the bleeding.” Then, to Brian, I say, “Grab Kyle’s too.”

Brian grimaces but nods and then darts away. Kellen shakily tries to remove his tie. It takes him several attempts to get the knot undone. Gerry hands me his tie and then swats Kellen’s hand away to assist. I fold Gerry’s tie into a thick square to use for a bandage.

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