A Dawn Most Wicked (Something Strange and Deadly 0.5)(14)

I paused only once—to throw a glance up to the very top of the ship. To where Cassidy Cochran stood in the glass-domed pilothouse, sunlit and beautiful. Her spyglass was to her eye, her posture straight. My heart warmed; my lips twisted up.

Fastest team on the Mississippi. That was us—and we were about to prove it. Together.

I kicked back into a run and finally burst into the engine room, and the thunder of the moment crashed into me full force. We were about to race. The next eight hours of my life would be absolute and total hell—whether Cassidy and I were a team or not.

Murry, stationed at the engine on the right, looked up when I barreled in, and when his scorched face turned to me, he bellowed, “Start the left paddle! Now, Striker, now!”

So I did. But I barely had the engine valves open, the steam bursting from the boilers to set the pistons turning—which then got the paddles going—before the distant boom of a cannon signaled the race had begun.

Then the firemen began to sing. But the shanty’s rhythm didn’t match the increasing thwump-thwump-thwump of the paddles, and nothing matched the clanging of the command bells.

Never in my apprenticeship had I heard such a discordant jangle come from the bells beside each engine. They connected to the pilothouse, and such a battle of bells could only mean a lot of tricky turns and deft maneuverings at the steering wheel.

As engineers, we had to get both paddles moving at exactly the right—though not always the same—speed to match whatever the pilot needed. Cassidy was our eyes, steering the Sadie Queen around curves, and we were her muscles, pushing and stopping and twisting through a river we couldn’t see.

And I could just imagine Cass up there, her eyes locked on the distant horizon. Her grip firm and sure on the wheel . . .

Focus! I ordered myself . . . but every three seconds a new thought of Cass would weasel in. . . . The way her breathing had turned to shallow gasps when we’d kissed. The way her waist felt when I’d grabbed—

FOCUS!

Thick and fast, the commands from the pilothouse rang one after another—stop, come ahead, back, and again to stop and back and come ahead full steam. I had no idea where we were, only that we weren’t at the pier anymore. Only that me and Cassidy really were one hell of a team.

And only that thinking of her made this a lot more bearable. It wasn’t miserable when I knew she was up there, waiting on me. . . .

“Club!” Murry screamed, and I dove for the wood shaft, thrusting the club into the enormous uprising piston arm that drove the paddle.

I bolted backward just as steam erupted. With a shriek like an angry bull the engine moved to maximum speed.

Time blended into a myriad of bells and levers, steam bellowing and explosive exhaust, thumping strokes and distant singing. Hours or maybe only minutes blurred past until suddenly all the bells ceased ringing save one.

It was the tiniest of them all, placed next to a long brass tube. The speaking tube. I darted to it and pressed my ear flat against the mouth.

Cassidy’s voice snaked down. “Wide channel. Just past Carrollton. Keep her full steam.”

I tugged my own bell rope—it would ring a confirmation in the pilothouse—and then turned to Murry, whose chest heaved like a dying man. I winced. He was too old to be doing this.

“We’re to Carrollton,” I relayed. “We’re supposed to keep her full steam.”

“Only Carrollton?” His shoulders dropped. “That’s no more’n eight miles out of New Orleans. By the Shadow of Death, how will I get us all the way to Natchez if I’m already this beat?” His eyes narrowed, making the scars pucker. “Years o’ thankless work, Striker. That’s what engineering is. It’s years of no gratitude. Why, Cochran might kill me yet.” Then he shambled to the door, where a breeze licked in. “Yep, if we have to keep this pace, Cochran might just kill me yet.”

It wasn’t often that Murry elicited my pity. The man was spiteful and lazy, and he’d done me a bad turn last week—lying to Cochran about me and Cass. But there was no denying that Murry had once been a great engineer. Nor denying that he’d had more than his fair share of suffering in an engine room. And no denying that the life of an engineer was as thankless as they come.

With a sigh I shifted my attention back to the engines. Even with no change in speed, I had to keep an eye on all the gauges and valves, had to keep the steam pressure from building up. . . .

And had to keep from dwelling on a short-tempered, gorgeous girl four stories up who’d let me kiss her . . . and who had kissed me back even harder.

CHAPTER FIVE

At midnight the blond, pink-faced Second Engineer Schultz came to relieve me. For half a moment I considered offering to take Murry’s watch—let the old man have a break.

But then he opened his mouth, and I remembered how much I hated him. And why.

“Blast you, Striker,” he snarled. “You ought to take my watch. You’re a quarter of my age, and you’re barely even tired.”

“I already did two shifts today, Murry.” I inspected my fingernails as if I wasn’t about to collapse from exhaustion.

“A third won’t kill you.”

“And a second won’t kill you either.” I scowled. “I did most of the work on the last watch, so you should be dandy for only a half shift more.” I turned to Schultz, bobbing my head. “See you in three hours.” Then I spun on my heel and ambled—as jauntily as I could—toward the door.