Wave (33 page)

“Nancy! Bud! Are you out here?”

Her reply came in the form of birds chirping and a light breeze rustling the trees; the soundtrack of a peaceful spring day. But the feeling that she was alone—completely alone—suddenly entered her system and spread itself around, the way a drop of food coloring spreads through a glass of water.

“Patrick! Michael!”

My God, they’re already gone.

She went back inside, and the tears started again. She cried openly, leaning back against the sink, covering her nose and mouth with both hands.

There’s nowhere to go. No way to get back in time.

She thought of trying to call Mike. Maybe it would be easier getting through on an ordinary phone. He always left his cell on, in fact he made a point of doing so when he went on a trip—in spite of the absurd roaming charges—so he’d always be accessible.

What should I say? “Thanks for the memories, darling. By the way, I couldn’t find the kids, so I’m finished. Have a nice flight back.”

The distance from where she stood to the phone was maybe four steps, but in that journey a million thoughts surged through her mind—about death, about what came after, and about all the things she would miss in the land of the living. Patrick and Michael’s growing up, going to college, getting married. What would their wives be like? What about their own children? How would they fare professionally? Would one of them become a Nobel Prize winner? Find the cure for AIDS? Become a wealthy entrepreneur? She would never know. She’d always believed in God and the concept of an afterlife—some form of afterlife. But what if it was all a farce? What if someone, or perhaps a group of someones, had invented all that to provide peace of mind? What if this really was the end of everything?

She removed the phone from its base without really thinking about it. The plastic “click” and the ensuing electronic beep brought her back to reality. Half-dazed from a hail of uncommonly profound ideas, she entered Mike’s number and waited.

The call went through.

After two rings, she heard his voice—“Hi, this is Mike. I’m not available at the moment, but if you’ll leave—”

“Dammit!”

“—a brief message, I’ll get back to you as soon as I can. Thanks.”

“Mike, it’s me. Look, there’s a lot going on over here at the moment. If you turn on the TV you might see something about it. There’s a tsunami coming. I’m at the Ericksons’ house right now. I don’t know where Bud and Nancy are, but I assume they left LBI with the boys. I’ll call you back as soon as I know more.”

The whirl of horror and worry and other emotions in her mind suddenly came to a halt as one bright and shiny thought drifted forward.

“I love you, Mike,” she said, her voice wavering. “No matter what happens, I want you to know that I love you and the boys more than anything in the world. I always have, and I always will.”

Grief overwhelmed her, shattering the courageous facade she’d been working so hard to maintain.

“I’ll call back as soon as I can,” she said, barely able to shape the words.

Dr. Sarah Collins scribbled the last set of numbers on the clipboard, then handed it back to Dave Dolan, who was now so pale he looked as though he’d died and been drained by an embalmer.

“Will it reach us here?” he asked, his throat dry.

Collins seemed at first not to hear the question, but a moment later she replied, “It might.”

“It could pass over the island and then cross the bay?”

Collins was nodding. “I can’t believe how big it’ll be. Holy God….”

Dolan took a quick look around the room—there was nothing that belonged to him other than the knapsack with the textbooks.

“The fourth one should be more than twenty feet high,” Collins added grimly. “Only takes a ten-footer to wipe out a town.” She gestured to the east-facing window. “Take a good look, Dave, while you still can.”

Dolan went over. LBI stood majestically along the horizon, a postcard-picturesque scene on any other day. What must it be like, he wondered, to be over there right now? To know that your life would end soon and that escape was impossible?

He decided he didn’t want to find out.

“I think it’s time to boogie,” he said, turning away and heading toward his knapsack. “Don’t you?”

“Yeah,” Collins said hollowly, staring dreamily into space. “Is everything packed?”

“Everything important.”

Sarah Collins took one last look around. Her heart was going like a drum.

“Let’s go.”

With
so little time left, Donald Harper decided his future.

It would play out like this: The helicopter would arrive only moments before the tsunami, and he’d get on it. (He was actually intrigued by the possibility of watching the giant waves strike as he flew overhead, but he didn’t have the stomach to witness that kind of destruction knowing there were people dying down there.) He’d take the short trip to the mainland, manage the rescue effort, and then, once the island’s infrastructure was up and running again, he’d step down. He didn’t want to be remembered as the guy who got to keep his job because he was “lucky” enough to be in office when disaster struck. He also knew his detractors wouldn’t stand for it—they’d be back on him as soon as they were able. All would be forgiven for awhile, but not forever.

And, of course, eventually they’d find out everything.

His day of judgment would surely come if he clung to power. The longer he stayed, the harder he would fall, and the greater the humiliation. If he stepped down gracefully, admitting he had made mistakes and sparing the residents the details, and the despair, he might—might—be able to salvage the family name. Yes, he would be regarded as the black sheep, the one who screwed up. But at least he would be regarded as the exception, the dark chapter in an otherwise shining history. He would have to disappear, find some other way to make a living.

Maybe, just maybe, he could survive.

As he sat there behind his desk, elbows on the blotter, folded hands resting against his lips, the urge to cry was overwhelming. Just a year ago he and Tom had begun to plot—seriously plot—his road to Washington. Everything seemed perfect, could not have been going better. It was all within reach. He found himself wondering what it was like to be a United States senator. Real power and influence, making decisions that determined the course of a nation. Your effort affecting millions of people—millions. He saw it, like a bright light along the horizon. It was still a good distance away, but it was there. All he had to do was stay the course.

And then the light had gone out. Nothing but darkness and uncertainty lay ahead. The fragility of it was so…so pathetic.

You make a few mistakes in your private life, you ask God for forgiveness and move on. You make a few in public life, you’re finished.

The career of a politician, no matter how charismatic or successful, was as delicate as the wings of a butterfly. He hadn’t realized that. Or maybe he did and chose to ignore it. Whatever the case, he would’ve given anything for the chance to go back to that day one year ago and do it all over. But human beings weren’t permitted the luxury of going back in time and fixing things. You could only go forward. And that option didn’t seem to offer much for him at the moment.

He stood, took his jacket off the back of his chair, and slipped into it. I’ll never sit here again, he thought stupidly, hardly able to believe this moment had really arrived.
Next time it’ll be someone else.

Maybe a different chair, maybe even a different building depending on the extent of the destruction. But the same chair in the figurative sense. It wouldn’t be him in it.

Who’ll be the lucky S.O.B.? he wondered. It wasn’t the first time he’d mulled this over. Davis? Surely not—he was never in the running. He doesn’t have what it takes. No way. Maybe Naughton, or Phillips. Maybe even Valerie Pruitt. She’s about as bright as they come.

One thing he knew for sure was that he would not have an official say in who his successor would be. No one would want that. Maybe the election committee would make some kind of grandiose gesture in public, just to seem forgiving and decent. A feel-good move designed to show a little mercy. But offstage his input would be about as welcome as a vial of anthrax.

He stepped to one side and slid the chair under the desk. A futile gesture, he realized, as everything in this room would be swirling in a billion gallons of water very shortly. It was more a symbolic gesture, and for some reason it made him feel proud of himself. He was at least still trying to carry himself with class and dignity.

He turned off the green banker’s lamp, leaving only the sunlight through the windows. He went to the doorway, turned for one final look, and mumbled, “Thanks for the memories.” Then, out of nowhere, he thought,
Maybe I can lose some weight, grow a beard, dye my hair, and run again.
An utterly absurd notion, but it gave him a chuckle.

There was a kitchenette on the other side of the main room, directly across from Marie’s desk. On the shelf above the sink was a coffeepot and a police scanner. The former was already off. He didn’t drink coffee, and Marie had only a cup in the morning. The scanner, however, was on and very active. Harper liked having it on when he was here; it made him feel more in touch. The downside was that you got so used to hearing it after awhile that it gelled with all the other background sounds and became meaningless. Acoustic wallpaper.

He went over to turn it off, but just before he got there he heard a voice, troubled with static but clear enough—“Terri, it’s Jeff. Look, I’m still with Mrs. King, and we’re almost to the refuge, but we’re going to run out of time. I need some help.”

He knew that voice—it belonged to Jeff Mitchell, one of LBI’s best cops.
What the hell is he still doing here?

The dispatcher’s voice immediately followed—“Like what?”

Mitchell: “Something in the air. A helicopter, preferably. Didn’t they say the National Guard and the Staties were sending a few?”

Dispatcher: “Yes, they’re all here already.”

Mitchell: “Can you ask them to send one over there?” A pause, and then he added, “I don’t think we’re going to make it, Terri.”

“Oh, shit,” Harper murmured.

He went back to Marie’s desk and picked up the phone. He knew the direct number to the dispatcher’s office by heart (along with all the other municipal numbers, including those he rarely used—his memory for phone numbers was legendary). It rang five times before it was picked up.

“Long Beach Police Department, Dispat—”

“Terri, it’s Don Harper. I just heard Jeff on the radio. What’s going on? Why is he still on the island?”

“He’s out at Forsythe looking for some kids.”

Harper’s heart skipped a beat. “You’ve got to be kidding.”

“Carolyn King insisted he take her. Her daughter apparently went over there looking for her boyfriend—Mark White, the
SandPaper
photographer. No luck finding them so far.”

“Jesus Christ. They’ll never make it now.”

A pause, and then, “I’m trying to get a helicopter to them, but they’re all tied up.” She started crying. “I’ve got to go, too, Mayor Harper. I can’t…I….”

A plan formed in Harper’s mind in a span of milliseconds. “Look, Terri, get out of there. There’s no point in staying.”

“But what about Jeff and the others?”

“I’ve got an idea. I’ll take care of it, okay?”

Another pause, and then, “What can you possibly do?”

“Trust me, Terri. Get moving.”

He hung up without waiting for a reply.

Harper knew Carolyn King, knew the whole family. The Kings were among the wealthiest people on the island. Burton King, Carolyn’s husband, owned an engineering firm in Parkertown and made his fortune with government contracts. He designed and manufactured the small parts to military equipment that most people never noticed—custom nuts and bolts, hooks and levers, locks and frames. He held over a dozen U.S. patents and was a bona fide millionaire, not just on paper. He was also one of the straightest, most upstanding human beings Harper had ever known. As far as he knew, Burt King didn’t drink, smoke, cheat on his wife, or fudge his tax returns. In fact, in the nearly twenty years Harper had known him he’d never once seen the guy lose his temper or say a bad word about anyone. Back before the scandals broke, Harper played Friday-night poker with a few friends about twice a month, and sometimes King would join in.

How his daughter, Jennifer, had gotten mixed up in this mess was a mystery; she certainly wasn’t a problem kid. Whatever the case, there was no time to puzzle it out now.

He ran outside just as the chopper came into view. He waved, and it moved toward him. It landed in the parking lot, spraying sand and pebbles everywhere. The pilot pushed the door open as Harper ran over.

“Ready to go?” he shouted, more of a statement than a question.

As Harper stepped in, the cardiac beat of the machine networking its way up his legs and into his ribcage, he said, “Actually we have to make a quick stop first.”

The pilot’s face went blank. “Where?”

“The Forsythe Wildlife Refuge.” Harper got into his seat and slipped on the belts. “Do you know where it is?”