Surfacing - Book One in the Swans Landing Series

Chapter 30

Chapter Thirty

I sat in Lake’s boat again, wrapped in a blanket to keep away the early morning chill as the sun broke through purple clouds above us. Dylan sat silent next to me while Lake steered us toward the first of his buoys in the sound. Sailor wasn’t with us this time, apparently angry at me now because Miss Gale had spent time with me the night before to teach me the finfolk song. But I was too preoccupied with Mrs. Canavan’s reaction to worry much about Sailor’s current opinion of me.

I had laid awake in my bed all night, reliving the sound of glass shattering and then raining down on my head. Mrs. Canavan frightened me and the fact that she could feel so strongly about me frightened me even more.

Lake slowed the boat to a stop and let down the anchor. Once he dove into the water to retrieve his crab pots, Dylan let his hand brush against mine. He smiled at me, though his eyes looked apprehensive.

“You’ve been pretty quiet lately,” he said. “Anything wrong?”

I blinked at him and it occurred to me that I’d never had the talk I meant to have with him. He hadn’t tried to kiss me in the past week, but he had to have noticed the way I recoiled slightly at his touch. I’d meant to talk to him before now. It wasn’t fair to let him go on thinking something had really happened between us.

I opened my mouth, trying to find the right words to say, but a metal box flew into the boat, startling me when it narrowly missed my nose.

Lake resurfaced, pulling himself halfway out of the water and over the side of the boat. He looked furious.

“Look at that!” he roared, pointing at the pot in the boat.

I looked at the twisted wire box that lay empty, dripping water at my feet. I wasn’t sure what I was seeing, but Dylan gasped and knelt down to get a better look.

“What happened?” he asked. He picked up the box, turning it over to examine it closely. “It’s been cut.”

He pulled at the wires, revealing the gaping holes in the pot that should have held the crabs in.

“All of my pots have been cut,” Lake growled. I looked away when he pulled himself back into the boat and redressed. He stood in only his khakis, glaring down at the ruined crab pot. “Every single one! Empty and cut.”

Dylan blinked up at him. “How?”

“I don’t know,” Lake said. “I can guess, but I have no proof.” His eyes scanned the water in the distance.

“What are you going to do?” I asked, pulling the blanket tighter around myself. The morning was cold and windy and the boat bounced on the choppy water.

Lake’s shoulders sagged. “There’s nothing I can do, except repair my pots.”

“You’re not even going to track down who did this and do something about it?” I asked.

Lake turned away and reached into the water to grab his buoys. The muscles in his arms were tight and rigid as he pulled up the remaining pots. “What am I supposed to do? I can’t blame someone for something I didn’t see happening.”

There wasn’t a question of who had done this. Making finfolk miserable seemed to be a Connors family trait. Lake was right, but that didn’t mean that I had to like his decision.

“Aren’t you tired of being treated like this?” I asked. “You let people like Mr. Connors walk all over you and you don’t do a thing about it. You know who sabotaged your pots. Go sabotage his!”