Save Her Soul (Detective Josie Quinn #9)(2)
“Damn signs!” Brownlow said. “Hard right!”
Josie and Gretchen pitched themselves to the right side of the boat as Brownlow steered hard around the detritus. Josie watched as they narrowly avoided a bunch of Dutton for Mayor signs, followed by a series of Charleston for Mayor signs. She breathed a sigh of relief when they were out of the way.
With a mayoral primary coming up in two weeks, Denton had been besieged with yard signs from the only two candidates: incumbent Tara Charleston, and her opponent—who was also her neighbor—Kurt Dutton of Dutton Enterprises, a commercial real estate development company. The buzz around the city was that Dutton was dangerously close to ousting Charleston, who had held the position as Mayor for nearly a decade. The issue with the yard signs in flooding was that the signs themselves were attached to galvanized nine-gauge steel stakes which, in swift current, could prove dangerous to inflatable rescue crafts and any person who found themselves in the water.
They followed the sounds of the rotors chopping the air overhead, the boat dropping precipitously as Brownlow steered them onto Hempstead Road. The green and white sign announcing the name of the street was only two feet from being overtaken by the water. More debris rushed past them—tree branches, sticks, household items, and what looked like the roof of a car.
“It’s really bad down here,” Gretchen said as the last few houses on Hempstead came into view. Beyond them was more rushing water. Josie knew that there had been a wooded area there before. Now only a few treetops reached up from the water, their spindly arms straining toward the gray, swollen sky overhead. Josie blinked moisture from her eyes and stared at the abyss once more. Would there be anything left when the water receded? she wondered.
The rotor wash from the news helicopter above them caused a flattening in the current of the water. Josie felt a sense of heaviness; the air was pressing down on her in the boat. She looked up to see the black helicopter looming, the letters WYEP stenciled in bright yellow letters on its side. She motioned with one hand for them to back off and a few seconds later, the helicopter ascended a little.
Gretchen muscled up beside Josie and pointed to their right. “There,” she shouted.
The flood had overtaken the front yards and porches of the houses. The last house was a two-story prefab with tan siding, its porch roof held up by thin, square white pillars made of PVC. Several mayoral candidate signs had become stuck on one of the pillars. Evelyn Bassett’s scrawny arms were wrapped tightly around another one of them. Her thin face was gray, her white hair pasted to her skull. The water rushed past her, already up to her armpits. Brownlow maneuvered the boat as close to her as he dared, but her arms were already slipping.
“She ain’t gonna be able to hold on much longer,” he hollered to Josie. “Get the throw bag!”
Josie’s hands scrambled to find the heavy red bag on the metal floor of the boat. It was filled with fifty feet of bright yellow floating rescue rope. Quickly, Josie uncinched the bag and pulled out several feet of rope, coiling it in her non-throwing hand. As she worked, Brownlow steered the boat downstream and away from Mrs. Bassett, anticipating that she’d be swept downstream soon. Brownlow was right. Mrs. Bassett’s arms tore away from the pillar, and the current rocketed her away. Josie stood, spreading her feet apart for balance, throw bag in her right hand.
“Remember,” Brownlow shouted. “To and through. Don’t miss.”
“To and through,” she mumbled to herself. Her heart thundered in her chest as she watched the water practically consume the elderly woman. With an underhanded throw, she tossed the bag toward Mrs. Bassett, aiming past—or through—her but also directly into her path so she could grab the line as soon as it reached her. The bag landed perfectly, a few feet above her head, the bright yellow line falling across her shoulder. As the current carried her past the boat, one of her hands reached up and grabbed onto the rope. Quickly, Josie wrapped her end of the rope behind her waist.
Brownlow yelled, “Give the end to Palmer! She’ll be the anchor.”
Handing the end of the line to Gretchen, Josie got on her knees and leaned over the edge of the boat for stability, working to pull Mrs. Bassett toward them.
The woman’s head bobbed up and then down, under the water. Gretchen hollered, “She’s not going to be able to hold on.”
Josie looked at Brownlow and in an instant saw that he agreed with her—the current was going too fast, and Mrs. Bassett was too weak to hold on to the line long enough for them to pull her into the boat. “Get in there, Quinn!” he told her.
Josie checked the line that tethered her to the boat via her life vest and stood, wobbling as the boat rocked beneath her. She dove into the water, paddling after Mrs. Bassett. The woman’s arms flailed, the rope gone. Her head tipped back, mouth open, sucking in air.
“He—help me,” Mrs. Bassett choked as Josie got within a few feet of her.
Josie swam as fast as she could, grateful to be moving downstream because she didn’t have to fight the current. She extended her hand as she got closer. Mrs. Bassett reached for it, fingers closing around Josie’s wrist just as a large tree branch shot past them. It knocked into Josie’s shoulder and ricocheted off Mrs. Bassett’s head. She slipped under the water. Josie lunged forward, fingers searching for anything she could grab onto. This woman was not going to die right in front of her. Something hard and bony brushed against Josie’s fingers and she seized it. It was a shoulder, Josie realized, as her own body was slammed against Mrs. Bassett’s by the current propelling them both downstream. Working by feel, Josie slipped her arms under Mrs. Bassett’s armpits and leaned back, pulling her out of the water. Mrs. Bassett’s back rested against Josie’s chest, Josie’s life jacket keeping them both afloat. She held as tightly to the woman as she could. Relief flooded through Josie when she heard her cough.