A Season for Second Chances(106)

Chapter 80



Annie’s breath caught in her throat and froze her to the spot; she didn’t notice the foamy water running over her wellingtons. John began to yell Alfred’s name, but the ocean’s answering bellows drowned his shouts. And then she saw, out by the entrance to the rocky cove, unmistakably, an arm waving. Alfred was clinging tenuously onto a rock, the waves crashing relentlessly over his head.

“Alfred!” Annie hollered.

John followed the line of the torch and swore. At that moment, a terrific wave loosened Alfred’s grip, and they watched helplessly as the water overcame him. Annie screamed in horror. Maeve and Gemma came running back along the promenade. Alfred bobbed back up, his arms fighting against the waves in some attempt at swimming. John tore his coat off and yanked off his boots, throwing them back up the beach.

“Call the coast guard and an ambulance,” he shouted, kicking off his jeans and hurling them back toward the rest of his things.

“What the hell?” Annie shouted. “You can’t go in after him. John, stop for a minute! Stop! John!”

John wasn’t listening. He began to wade out into the sea; Annie grabbed his arm, but he shook her off and in another second he had thrown himself into the water and was swimming against the waves.

Annie’s boots had filled with water, but she didn’t notice. She waded back to the shore and pulled out her phone with shaking hands. Annie could hear Maeve’s and Gemma’s shouts as they tramped down the beach toward her, their shouts becoming exclamations of horror as they took in the scene.

“I couldn’t stop him!” Annie shouted to Maeve, as she waited to be connected to the emergency services. Annie had to put her hand over her other ear to be able to hear the phone operator over the noise of the storm.

“Coast guard and ambulance,” she shouted breathlessly into her phone. As she gave their location and situation details, she cast a look over at Gemma, who had collapsed to her knees, her hands clasped over her mouth. Maeve stood frozen, her face a grim reflection of Annie’s own feelings. Annie looked back out over the water. John was still swimming hard, the water swallowing him one minute and then spitting him back into view the next. The fear was almost paralyzing; she was breathing so hard she felt dizzy.

“He’s reached him!” yelled Maeve.

Gemma began to stand shakily. Annie felt hope leap through her; if they could just make it back to the rocks and hang on till the coast guard arrived, everything might be okay. She could hear snatches of Maeve’s conversation on the phone with Sally.

“Seen him, yes, in the sea, struggling. Wait by the pub and let the ambulance follow you down. No sign of them yet, weather’s bad, though.”

Out on the water, the two men were tossed back and forth by the waves like they were partners in some horrifying danse macabre. Annie could see that John had one arm wrapped around Alfred, but it seemed impossible that he would have enough power in his free arm to swim them both to the relative safety of the rocks. And if they got too close without securing themselves, they would just as likely be dashed by the rocks as saved by them. Annie couldn’t bear to watch, but she couldn’t tear her eyes away either.

“They’re going to make it!” cried Gemma.

The waves had taken a blessed break from crashing over their heads, and John took full advantage. He surged forward toward the rocks through the roiling water. Annie could feel herself breathing for him, her limbs twitching in sympathy. She couldn’t feel the rain or the cold anymore; she was outside herself, willing and pulsing every ounce of her energy toward John, pushing him forward, hoping beyond hope that she would get the chance to tell him how she felt about him.

“Sweet Jesus, have mercy on them!” came Maeve’s strangled cry.

Annie followed Maeve’s horrified gaze out past the struggling men, to where a wave was steadily and stealthily building in height and girth. The air whooshed out of her lungs. There was nothing she could do. There was nothing anyone could do but watch the horror slowly unfolding before them. The wave began to pick up speed, growing still higher as it slid toward the struggling men.

“Swim!” Annie screamed. “Swim faster!”

Gemma began to sob. Maeve’s face was frozen in angst.

John looked up as the wave towered over them, a great foaming mouth of water, and then its jaws snapped shut, swallowing them whole, and they were gone.

It didn’t seem real; it couldn’t be.

Annie felt trapped in a nightmare, a horrifying, gut-wrenching nightmare, but she was awake. She felt emptied, as though the waves had dragged her insides out to sea too.





Chapter 81



All three women were drenched as the water gushed furiously past where they stood, transfixed, their breaths held as they desperately clung to their hopes. The seconds ticked by, but neither John’s nor Alfred’s head broke the dark surface of the water. Maeve began waving and pointing, and Annie was vaguely aware of the orange helm of a lifeboat bouncing across the waves from the other direction. But she couldn’t tear her eyes away from the water; she swung her torch uselessly this way and that, hoping to catch sight of a hand or head. She reasoned that the wave could have sent them off course, it could even have propelled them forward toward the shore. The boat slowed as it reached the peninsula and powerful flashlights began sweeping the sea. Annie followed the streams of light on the water. But water was all they illuminated; miles and miles of water and no sign of John or Alfred.