Day One
July 21, 1952
Monday Night
The storm would kill her. Waverly knew that, deep down. Her core temperature was dropping and the wind was pounding the rain through her clothes and straight into her bones.
“I need to get out of the weather.”
“Can you hold on another half hour until we’re sure he’s asleep?”
“No.”
A beat.
“Okay, stay here a second.”
Su-Moon crawled to the front of the boat, hung over the edge and studied what was below. Then she came back, slowly.
“There’s no way down except to jump,” she said. “It’s not far but there’s no way he won’t feel it.”
Waverly’s heart raced.
She couldn’t outrun anyone.
She could barely move.
“We have three options,” Su-Moon said. “We can climb down the ladder, get in the water, make our way to the finger and climb up.”
“I can’t swim.”
“I’d have to hold you up.”
“No, you’ll drop me.”
“You’ll be fine.”
“No I won’t. I already had a vision about drowning.”
“Okay,” Su-Moon said. “The other option is for you to get to the front of the boat. I’ll climb down the ladder and get on the swim platform. I’ll beat on the door to distract him. You jump down and head down the dock.”
“How about you?”
“I’ll dive in the water.”
“What if he comes after you?”
“He’ll still be half asleep. I don’t think he will.”
“What’s the other option?”
“Okay,” Su-Moon said. “The third option is that we both crawl to the front of the boat and drop down. As soon as we land, you head down the dock and disappear as fast as you can. I’ll stay there. If he comes out, which he probably will, I’ll pretend that I’m drunk and I’m on the wrong dock, I’m looking for D-22.”
Waverly chewed on it.
Her core temperature dropped even more.
“Let’s do it,” she said. “Number three. I’ll stay behind though, not you.”
“Can’t do it that way,” Su-Moon said. “He’ll see your face.”
“So?”
“So, you’ll be working at his shop tomorrow, remember?”
Waverly hesitated.
“I just won’t show up,” she said. “Forget work. I don’t want you taking the risk. This is my issue, not yours.”
Suddenly the boat shifted, ever so slightly, the kind of shift that would come from the movement of weight.
The black silhouette of a man appeared over the edge of the roof where the ladder came up.
A hand darted out and grabbed Waverly’s ankle with the force of a vice.
“Got you!”