Page 89 of Paid to the Pirate

Instead of paying Estelle on our way out, I instead requested yet another favor. Gossip often found its way to her home because there it found its end. Estelle knew a lot because of her very pride in keeping secrets. But I wanted Estelle to bend that honor. I wanted her to help me learn more about the pirate who killed Charlotte’s mother. I’d always wanted to solve that mystery, but now…

Now if you help her, give her something she wants, she might soften for you. Look upon you with new eyes. Eyes filled with something other than hate.

Estelle nodded once, accepting my request. The motherly way she fixed Charlie’s hairnet on her way out the door told me she agreed to help not for me, but for the girl with the shorn hair.

It was only a short walk back into town, but we made slow progress as Charlie grew accustomed to her new shoes.

We’d reached the midpoint when the world rocked, violently and completely without warning. The ground beneath our feet shook like the fires of hell were rising up to claim all that lay above it.

I’d never experienced an earthquake before but knew it at once.

I also knew this one was severe and we weren’t quite at the epicenter. But we were close, and cracks could spread in seconds.

Screams echoed from every corner of Port Royal. Not two hundred feet before us I watched one building, then another, and another, collapse to the ground. More screams of terror rang out in a chorus of horror I’d never forget.

Charlotte clung to me and I searched in desperation for somewhere to run, to keep us safe. But we were surrounded only by trees -- trees which could fall upon us and kill us at any moment.

The shaking abruptly stopped, only to begin again.

Not here,I begged a god who surely didn’t listen to men like me.Don’t let the quake spread this far inland.

With no better option, Charlie and I were forced to stay in place, and I shielded her body beneath mine. From our location, I saw the tops of buildings disappear into the ocean, which, I presumed, had already gobbled up the wharves. The blood-curdling cries came from everywhere before us as countless men and women were swept away to sea, lost to the cracks in the earth, or even crushed between the ever-changing fissures.

When the ground stopped moving, the screams continued.

But Charlotte and I were safe.

“Thank God it’s over,” she breathed, slumping like a rag doll against me. My shoulders relaxed as I exhaled as well.

It’s over.

I hadn’t realized the silence enveloping us until it broke. Below, lizards scurried past our feet, heading east. Above, birds followed suit. The hair on my neck stood on end as I worked it out.

It’s not over. The earthquake had been at sea. A tidal wave was coming.

How long? Minutes?

“Charlotte, we have to run. Now. I think a wave is coming.”

“What?” she asked, looking up at me with round, disbelieving eyes.

Shit. Which way?

If I chose incorrectly, we might die.

I grabbed Charlotte’s hand, adrenaline surging through my veins, and began pulling her toward town. “Come on. I need you to lift your skirts and run.Now.”

Charlotte pulled back. “No! The earthquake came from that direction and if all the animals are scurrying that way,” she nodded her head east, away from town, “we should too.”

I pulled her with more urgency and she stumbled after me. “Normally, yes, but there’s no high ground there,” I cried. “If the wave comes too far, we’ll get swept away. It’s a risk but we can make it back to town and onto a roof in a few minutes. Now pick up your skirts and run!”

Charlotte did the best she could with one hand while I dragged her with the other.

My men,I thought.Would they be safe?

“Faster!” I yelled. Charlotte cried out as somewhere along the way she lost her new shoes. Her feet took a beating, but better to be bruised than buried.

How long after an earthquake did it take for a tidal wave to come?If the animals were already running, it couldn’t be more than a few minutes.

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