Page 59 of The Captain
He blinked at me like I’d handed him fresh air. “Give me a job. Mopping. Hauling. Anything.”
Relief is a holy thing. I almost laughed. “We have a meeting with the Navy at fourteen hundred. Before that, I need hands.We always need hands when the strandings stack. You can help Miguel adjust the shade rig. You can run soft hose across the pen without spooking anyone. You can help Becca with electrolyte mixes and not get precious about the smell. You can stand on the dock and be gravity when tourists wander in with too many questions.”
He nodded, the muscle at his jaw easing like the room had handed him a weight he could lift. “Roger that. Consider me furniture you can move.”
“It’s less romantic when you say it that way,” I said. “But fine.”
He caught my hand before I could pull it away. He didn’t squeeze hard. Just held it the way you hold a line keeping something you love from drifting.
“I’m sorry about what a mess I am,” he said, voice low. “I didn’t mean to walk in here with my guts out.”
“It’s all right,” I said. “I’m glad you came to me.”
His phone buzzed against his pocket. He checked the screen—unknown number, local—and his posture changed, surprise sliding into focus.
He answered, turning half away out of habit. “This is Captain Jacob Dane … yes… I’m in town … the doctor’s with me … she’s right here … okay—coordinates? That corridor? … yeah, I know it … weather’s good … wheels up when?” He listened, eyes narrowing with purpose. “Understood. We’ll be ready. Thank you.”
He hung up and I could feel the shape of whatever he’d been before he was mine ghost his shoulders. Not secrecy. Competence that had been waiting for an assignment.
“What?” I asked, because there’s a tone men get when the world has handed them a lever.
“That was the Coast Guard,” he said. “The crew chief from the helo that pulled me out is running a flight along yourcorridor. Two seats open. He wants to give you eyes. Says there’s something he wants to show you. Could hand you clues on the strandings.” He watched me the way you watch surf for a rogue set. “Come up with me?”
It wasn’t a question as much as an invitation into a different kind of breath.
A hundred practical thoughts tried to shout at once. The pens. The meeting with the Navy at 1400. The way my palms sweat in helicopters even when my brain behaves. The stupid little superstition I carry about leaving my animals, as if my body near them is what keeps them alive. And then the other side of the scale: The thin ribbon of data that never feels like enough when you are standing ankle-deep in the problem.
I looked through the doorway at my crew. Tamika tipped me a tiny nod. Miguel had his hands on the shade rig and the exact patience that makes things possible. Becca, bless her, raised the clipboard without looking up.
They’d hold.
My phone buzzed in my pocket. McGuire.1400 still good? We’ll keep it tight.
I texted back with a speed that felt like pulling a line clean.1400 still good. I might step out for eyes on the water. Will ping you if timing shifts.
I slid the phone away and met Jacob’s gaze.
“You trust them?” I asked. “The Coast Guard?”
“With my life,” he said without performing it. “Twice.”
“Then, yes,” I said, and the word made something in my chest stop bracing. “I want to see it from up there.”
He smiled—quick, wrecked, real. “I’ll hit the shitty motel, take a shower, try to look like someone you’d let near a helicopter.”
“Do that,” I said. “And maybe pack a bag, so you can leave a couple things at my bungalow.”
He went still for half a beat, then the smile warmed from the inside. “Yeah?”
“Yeah.”
He leaned in and kissed me—clean, certain—and when he pulled back he looked like a man who’d just been handed a key.
“Yes, Dr. Allard,” he said, and this time, it sounded like a promise.
Inside, the facility lifted its head to the idea of a plan. Outside, the wind ran its fingers over the river like it had been waiting for us to ask the right question.
I put my hand to the Kogia’s flank and counted two breaths for luck. Then I went to explain things in more detail to my crew, because the only way to carry the weight of a day like this is together. And because sometimes, the mercy you get is a ride over the water with a man who wants to stand next to you while you look hard at the thing that’s been breaking your heart.
