Colony East (31 page)

He eyed Jordan suspiciously. “You from around here?”

“I’m staying with my cousins: Jenny, Monty, Stone, Nikki, Alisha, and Todd. Do you know them?”

“Nah.”

Jordan’s eyes darted from the pirate’s nest of tangled hair, to his freckled cheeks and sunburned arms. He avoided his neck, fearing the intensity of his thoughts would telepathically give his intention away. “Bet you can go really fast.”

“Sixty-five,” he boasted.

“Knots?”

“Miles per hour!”

“No way!”

The pirate grinned. “Want to go for a ride?”

Jordan whistled softly. Avenge the deaths of his friends at sea? That was more than fitting. “Is it safe?”

“Gimme a break.”

“All right.” Jordan climbed into the boat. “Don’t go too fast. I don’t want to get hurt.”

“I’m Billy.”

“Jordan.”

Not wanting to know anything else about the pirate, Jordan settled into the passenger seat and sat with his back straight to keep the tip of the scalpel pointing up.

A girl cried out, “Billy.”

Jordan tensed, but quickly settled when he saw she was only six or seven years old. She raced across the playground and onto the dock.

The pirate grumbled, “My twerpy little sister.”

Soon the girl stood above them, gawking at Jordan. She had the pirate’s rusty colored hair and knobby knees and elbows. “Who’s that?” she asked shyly, twisting back and forth.

The pirate fired up the motors. “None of your business. Amy, get lost.”

Her face brightened. “Can I come?”

“Don’t bug me. Untie the rope.”

“Please,” she begged.

The pirate untied the mooring line himself. “Stay out of trouble! Promise me!”

Amy pouted. “No.”

The pirate smirked at Jordan. “Like I care.” He nudged the throttle and they pulled away from the dock, leaving his disappointed sister behind. Jordan wondered what her reaction would be when her brother washed ashore. He put Amy out of his mind.

Well clear of the dock, the pirate shouted gleefully, “Hold on,” and rammed the throttle lever all the way forward. The twin outboards roared and the nose of the whaler lifted so fast that Jordan saw nothing but blue sky. From the force pushing him back in the seat, he worried the scalpel blade might snap off. He slipped the weapon out of his pocket and held it by his side, out of the pirate’s sight.

Whooping and laughing, the pirate drove the boat hard, a boy playing with a powerful toy. The hull pounded and skittered across the waves. They hit one wave and flew through the air, the props whining like dentist drills. They landed with a thud. Jordan sensed the wave was groundswell from a large and distant storm.

“You want to drive?”

They were cruising slowly three hundred yards from shore, tossing side-to-side in the chop. Many miles away, the white sail of a gypsy boat was a tiny speck. Jordan saw the pirate’s eyes lock onto it for a second.

“Really?”

The pirate slid out of the seat. “Go for it, dude.”

Jordan reached over and killed the engines.

“What the—?”

Before the pirate could utter another word, Jordan snatched his wrist, a cobra striking its prey. Twisting his arm, he forced the pirate to his knees. The pirate struggled, but with Jordan’s adrenaline pumping, he easily overpowered him. He caught a faint whiff of ammonia and musk. It was the odor of fear coming off the pirate. He locked his fingers on the back of the pirate’s neck and pushed his face against the deck. Then, he rolled him over and pinned his shoulder down with his knee. The pirate made little grunts as Jordan’s knee drove harder into him from the rocking motion of the boat.

Jordan brought the scalpel to his mouth and scissored the paper with his teeth. He unraveled it and gripped the metal handle in his sweaty palm.

“Remember
Lucky Me
? The two-masted schooner you attacked. That blew up. That burned.” His heart hammered in his chest as he spoke. The pirate’s eyes showed confusion at first, darting and narrowing, then suddenly, they widened. “Jenny, Monty, Stone, Nikki, Alisha, Todd. This is for them.” Jordan pushed the pirate’s chin back with his left hand and held the scalpel against his neck.

While he only had to push a few millimeters to puncture the pirate's skin, a canyon opened up inside him, which he couldn’t cross. He was not a murderer. A sick feeling sloshed in his stomach and rose up in his throat. He leaned back, breathing hard.

“I knew someone who did some terrible things and she changed. Her name was Mandy. You can change, too.”

The pirate sneered. “Screw you.”

Rage exploded in Jordan’s brain and seized control of him. He grabbed the pirate’s hair and yanked his head as he brought his hand back. A frightening beast had risen from the deepest, darkest part of his soul and fed on his pent up anger. The muscles of his shoulder stretched tight. Hand and scalpel were one. He grunted as he whipped his arm forward and down. Yet, something in him altered the trajectory—something stronger than the beast. He drove the blade into the hull where it snapped off. He would honor Mandy and his friends from
Lucky Me
, not by killing this boy, but by putting an end to this senseless cycle of violence.

Billy was crying. He had melted into a frightened ten-year old. Would he rob and kill again? Jordan drew in a sharp breath and got off him, thinking the answer was probably yes. But just maybe the boy would change.

Too exhausted to feel, much less think, Jordan moved to the skipper’s seat and headed for shore. About twenty yards from the dock, he told Billy to jump.

“I can’t swim.”

Jordan tossed him a life jacket and threw him overboard with one hand.

Then he made a wide sweeping turn with the whaler, and when the boat was aiming straight out to sea, he nudged the throttle forward and leapt out.

Jordan dived under the water and held his breath until his lungs ached. The ocean coursed through his veins and washed away his oily sick feeling and dissolved his rage. He broke the surface and took a huge gulp of fresh air, ready to begin a new life.

CHAPTER ELEVEN
Colony East

Abby anxiously scanned the faces at Grand Central Station. All four companies were here for evening chow and there was no sign of Toby. Abby had a sick feeling ever since the lieutenant had taken him out of History Class. She feared they’d caught him outside the Biltmore, but if so, it didn’t explain why Jonzy was still there. Unless the boys had split up and Jonzy got away. She waited until Jonzy was returning his tray to the galley and moved beside him. “Where’s Toby?”

“I don’t know,” Jonzy replied. “I’m worried.”

They both kept their eyes straight ahead.

“Worried,” she snorted. “This is your fault.”

Abby broke away from the line and headed for the door. Outside, fleeing to the Biltmore, she had nearly reached the hotel when the lieutenant caught up to her on Lexington Avenue. “Come with me, Cadet Leigh.”

Shivering from his cold tone, she followed him into a meeting room next to his living quarters. There, he smiled and asked her in a pleasant tone to take a seat. The anger welling in his eyes belied his attempt to pretend he was friendly.

“Abigail, when you first arrived, you admitted to me that you lied. You told Ensign Mathews that you knew me. I admired you for your honesty. Do you recall me saying I valued honesty above all else? Care to be straight with me?”

Her thoughts swirled madly. Should she admit that she knew Toby was going outside the Biltmore? Her heart thundered in her chest, the echo of each beat throbbing in her head.

After a long moment of her silence, the lieutenant leaned forward. “Toby Jones.”

Abby dropped her chin to her chest. Then she looked up and matched his stare with one equally intense. “It was my idea. When my sister got sick, Toby was the only one on the island who would help us. He made it possible for us to make it here. He risked everything, and after we reached Brooklyn, he saw the adults take a girl who had the Pig.” Abby noticed the lieutenant lean back as if hit with a little puff of wind. “Toby heard them say they were looking for healthy siblings. He wanted just me and Touk to go. I mean, Lizette. I begged him to pretend he was my brother. Before I swam here, I told him about my family. If anyone should be punished, it’s me.”

“Too late, Cadet. We went before the council today. Toby Jones was expelled from the colony. Don’t worry, he received a week’s supply of food and water. From what you told me, I’d say he’s an industrious young man.”

Abby took breath after deep breath. Her mind was so clogged it felt blank.

“Abigail, you’ll be allowed to remain in Colony East, if that’s what’s concerning you.”

She barely registered his words. Then, the dam burst and a flood of raw emotion swept through her. She boiled in a quiet rage. If what Toby had told her was true, they had expelled him knowing that a deadly epidemic was on the way. Clenching her fists in anger and too shaken to look the lieutenant in the eyes, she fixed her gaze on the bump on the bridge of his nose. “When we first met, you were curious about what happened to the babies after the night of the purple moon. We took care of them because it was the right thing to do. Was it right to kick Toby out of Colony East?”

His head jolted back, this time as if struck by an unexpected gust of wind. With the color draining from his face, he pulled his shoulders back and lifted his chin. “Ordinarily, I’m not at liberty to discuss the specifics of what happened at a council meeting, but I’ll make an exception. Cadet Jones wanted me to inform you that he knew you didn’t mean the last thing you said to him.”

Abby felt the sob coming, and she fought with every ounce of willpower to keep it contained. “May I be dismissed, sir?”

“Dismissed,” he said in a distant tone. The color had yet to return to his face.

Abby suddenly knew what she had to do for Toby, for Jordan and for every survivor outside Colony East, Colony West, and any other colonies the adults ran. She did her best to suppress the pulse of anxiety that came with her newfound determination. “Thank you, sir,” she said in a respectful tone, giving a crisp salute.

CHAPTER TWELVE
Mystic

At the Mystic Harbor playground, Jordan sat next to Wenlan on the swings. Nearby,
Mary Queen of Scots
floated in five feet of water. With the tide going out, Jordan figured he had thirty minutes before he had to sail—before the hull would sink into the soft mud and delay his departure for another six hours.

The mainsail luffed in the stiffening breeze, and he had more than enough food and water stowed in the boat to make it to Castine Island. Wenlan had even packed him a germ mask. Everything was ready. Almost everything.

He reached out and took Wenlan’s hand. He slipped his palm against hers and cradled her slender fingers. Giving him a sweet smile, she squeezed his hand briefly as she pushed with her toe to start a gentle swaying motion.

“You and CeeCee would love Castine Island.”

She gave him a sidelong glance.

Jordan gave her a playful bump. “Hey, I’m allowed to try.”

He tried to imagine Abby’s reaction when he told her he planned to return to Mystic. If her initial reaction to his leaving with the gypsies was any indication, he knew she’d put up a lot of resistance, especially after he told her about Lucky Me. Jordan held out some hope that Abby and Touk might want to join him in moving to Mystic.

The clatter of halyards striking the mast caught his attention, as if
Mary Queen of Scots
was calling out to him to hurry. The boat rocked side-to-side in three successive waves.

“Those are set waves,” he said. “They’re coming from a big storm at sea.”

Alarm filled Wenlan’s eyes. “Is it safe for you to go?”

How he wished that storm was barreling down on Mystic. It would provide the best reason to postpone his trip, to stay with Wenlan another day, another month. But the wave maker was still a ways off. He estimated the storm, whether a Nor’easter or possibly a hurricane, would hit in four or five days, giving him ample time to sail home safely. “Yeah, no problem.”

He worried more about the storm that was battering his mind. The last time he had left a girl he loved, a chain reaction of events had started that ended in her death. Superstition had kept him in Mystic as much as the longing he knew he would feel the moment he set sail.

Glancing over at Wenlan, his heart wrenched. A solitary tear ran down her face.

Jordan stood up and turned to face her. Not wanting to see any more tears, he took her other hand in his and pulled her body close. “I’ll leave at the next high tide.”

Wenlan shook her head. “No. You’re leaving right now. The sooner you go, the sooner you’ll come back.”

As her tears dried, he realized she was right, and he felt a pressure building in his chest. His throat thickened. His tears were about to begin.

Giving Wenlan a quick goodbye kiss, he ran to the shore and into the water, making splashes as he pumped his knees high, racing against the falling tide. The short-lived competition would go a long way towards helping him postpone his hard sobs until he was out of sight.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Colony East

Lieutenant Dawson inched the vase until it sat dead center on the table. He had almost settled for an arrangement of squash flowers from Central Park Farm before scoring a bouquet of Queen Anne’s Lace. He had picked the wild flowers along the East River, during an inspection of the shoreline as part of the readiness preparations for Hurricane David.

The food he had set out for the evening—corn on the cob, beets, lettuce, string beans—was also compliments of the hurricane. Admiral Samuels had issued an order to pick all the crops before the storm hit.

Completing the table setting, Dawson had swiped a linen tablecloth from the hotel’s restaurant along with fancy silverware and plates. He had briefly considered inviting Sandy to the rooftop for a candlelit dinner but opted instead for his living quarters. He did not think it was the time or the place for a celebration on the rooftop, with Hurricane David barreling down on the east coast.