Page 57 of Priceless
“Dolphins,” Banner said, pointing toward the bow.
I didn’t move my head. I didn’t have to. They were everywhere—fat gray arches rose and fell, racing us like the seal had. Since no one else panicked, I trusted that all those fins were friendly. After a while, I think they got tired of our slow speed and went to find someone faster to race.
After the men devoured two more pies each, Jess gathered our empty papers and took a handful of pies to our water chauffeur, Mason.
I looked for the line where the sea met the sky, then closed my eyes. The wind filled my lungs, and I relaxed again. When I opened them, Jess gave me a smile and moved over to sit next to her husband on the opposite row of seats. They put their heads together and slipped into a world of their own.
Jacob’s arm came around me and pulled me back against his chest. His hand stayed put and I rested mine on top of it, then I stroked his fingers while I rested the back of my head on his shoulder. We fit perfectly, as if we’d sat like that so many times before that our bodies had worn down in just the right places.
“I shouldn’t have brought ye out here,” he said in my ear. “When ye hesitated on the dock, I should have paid closer attention.”
I shook my head and turned slightly so he could hear me. “Don’t say that. This, right here, is totally worth it. I wish…I wish time would just stop.”
He rewarded me with a squeeze and a kiss on the side of my head, sending a different sort of warmth straight to the center of my heart.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
If time couldn’t stop, I hoped we were a long way from where we were headed. But twenty minutes passed in a blink, and Jess got to her feet. At the end of her row of seats, she tapped a little screen, then let out a shrill whistle that got Mason’s attention. He slowed the boat and the wind dwindled to a breeze.
She pointed toward a patch of mildly rougher water. “Here,” she said. “We’ll try a drift. Current’s right.”
When we reached the edge of that patch, the engine cut altogether. Gulls gathered above us, crying for fish or scraps we didn’t yet have.
Jacob reluctantly let go of me, then stood and helped me get steady before heading for the back of the boat. Banner joined him. While I waited for instructions, I turned in a circle. The little hills were barely visible on two sides. Behind us, nothing but water. Ahead of us, blue, terrifying desolation.
We were all alone. Floating, by the grace of God, on top of a world teaming with things that wanted to eat us. Just like the seagulls, waiting impatiently for scraps of me that hadn’t yet fallen overboard!
The North Sea wasn’t a smooth sheet like a lake, and I couldn’t pretend it was solid. It created its own layers and folded onto itself, dark under light, light under dark. How could anyone watch it and not imagine what lurked beneath? How were these people so calm?
“Breathe,” Jacob said, close behind me. “If Christ could walk on it, we certainly can float on it, aye?”
In my present state of fight or flight, I could no longer say what Christ could or couldn’t do. I only knew what I couldn’t do, which was stand there. But there was nowhere to flee—except for into the mouths of monsters.
Come on! Get a grip! You’re unworthy of him if you can’t handle a little boat ride!
And I so wanted to be worthy. So I pretended I had done this a million times. This was just a play and I was playing a role. A woman who wanted to catch a fish, who wanted to play the game, who wanted to see what the ocean had to offer her. The gifts would be living and slippery, but how big would they be?
Banner passed rods forward, and Jess and I moved to the railing where she slipped a half-inflated life jacket over my head. I gave her a hundred percent of my attention while she talked me through the gear. Tug here to inflate the rest. How to work the reel. Where to cast. Thankfully, she baited my hook for me.
“Cod if we’re lucky,” she said. “Maybe pollack. Mackerel will hit fast if they’re about.”
“I just don’t want to catch anything too ugly,” I said. I figured if I could be funny, it might pass for being brave.
“Jacob, over here!” Banner was setting up on the other side of the boat. “Men against the women. Let’s show these lassies how it is done, aye?”
Jacob looked at me, worried. “What do ye say?”
I shrugged. “I want to know what I’m playing for!”
Jess grinned. “If the women win, we get…drinks served to us in our hot tub!”
That sounded good to me, especially if that hot tub was back in Inverness and we could go there as soon as possible. I tried to ignore the fact that hot tubbing was probably the first choice of date activity for those on dating sites. There was also the minor detail that I hadn’t brought a swimsuit. Who expects to go swimming in Scotland in September? I would just have to dangle my feet in.
Although, I was interested in what Jacob looked like under all those layers…
Jess shouted at her husband. “And what do ye want for a prize, my favorite Jacobite?”
He laughed. “We get to serve ye those drinks in the hot tub!”
