Jake woke up before the sunrise and heard the whimpering. Once his eyes adjusted for the low light, he sat up. Ashley was still sleeping silently next to him.
As he leveraged himself to the edge of the bed, Ashley rustled and tugged at the blankets. With a gravel voice she said, “What time is it?”
Jake got to his feet. “It’s early.”
Ashley groaned her way to a seated position. “Is that crying I hear?”
“Yeah.” Jake slipped his feet into his flip-flops and headed down the hallway toward the stairs.
As he got closer, the crying turned more into a moan. He turned the corner, rubbing his eyes awake while navigating the new-to-him dynamics of these curved concrete steps. The second he saw Ariel, he knew something was wrong. “Are you okay?”
From her hammock, she turned to look at him, tears streaming down her face. She just shook her head slowly but didn’t say anything.
“Ariel, what’s wrong?”
“Something’s wrong with my baby.”
“What is it?”
She moaned. “I don’t know, it just hurts so bad.”
Ashley came shuffling toward them from the staircase. His face must have given away the gravity of the situation because her posture changed from casual to urgent. “What’s wrong?”
Jake shrugged at her and widened his eyes. “I don’t know.”
Ashley touched his arm. “Where’s your phone?”
“Upstairs, nightstand.”
Ashley turned, and in a few quick steps, disappeared up the stairs.
Jake stooped over to the low-slung hammock. “Ariel, where does it hurt?”
Through tightly clamped eyes, she just shook her head with a soft whimper.
Ashley returned, already talking on the phone. Roger Pender had given them his emergency number in case they needed anything. She ended the call and said, “He’s on his way.”
The next twenty minutes went by excruciatingly slow for Jake, but no doubt, they felt like a lifetime for Ariel. Those minutes paled in comparison to the minutes that clicked by once they arrived and took Ariel in the exam room.
As he faced the pool, looking up at the rising sun through the glass, Ashley slid her arms around his waist from behind. “You okay?”
He nodded. “I’m fine.”
“I hate to be the voice of reality here, but…”
Jake nodded over his shoulder to her. “I know.”
“If something happens to that baby.”
“I know.”
“Jake, we need a plan quickly.”
He turned to face her. “Ashley, I want you to know that I love you.”
“I know you do.”
“Whatever happens next, just know that.”
“I love you too, Jake. I always have.”
After another few moments, Roger Pender stepped quietly out of the exam room into the pool area. The look on his face said it all. No matter what this man was, no matter what insanity this whole mermaid thing concealed, Jake knew that Roger did truly care about that baby. He wasn’t even sure how he knew that, maybe it was just intuition, maybe it was the fact that at his core this man was a doctor.
“How is she?” Ashley asked.
Roger puffed out his formidable chest and flexed his rugged jaw. “She lost the baby.”
“I’m sorry,” Jake said. “She must be devastated.”
Roger’s expression went cold. “I have to go. I’ll be in touch.”
As he turned, Jake stopped him. “Wait.”
Roger turned slowly. “Not now.”
“Hell yes, now.” Jake insisted. “So what happens?”
“We’re taking her for more tests.”
“Tests? For what?”
“I have some concern she cannot carry a baby at all.”
Jake felt his blood start to simmer. “And let me guess…that makes her a useless piece of meat to you people.”
Roger said nothing. He only turned and walked, stopping near the door. “We’ll see what the tests show.” He slipped out the door.
A minute later, as Roger’s car sped away up the drive, the group of three lab-coated men carried a sedated Ariel on a stretcher through the doorway.
Jake asked the more official-looking man with the clipboard under his arm, “Where are you taking her?” But he knew the answer. And the man didn’t even so much as look at him, they just kept moving through the wide doorway.
Attempting to follow, Jake hurried up to the white van, but was met with a stern straight-arm from the clipboard man holding the van door open.
“Hey!” Jake bounced back. “Get your hands off me.”
The man opened his jacket to make sure Jake saw the pistol on his hip. “Don’t even try me,” he asserted.
Jake took a step back, with every intention of letting this go. But then something came over him. He knew in his heart that if he let them go, he’d never see Ariel again, and he and Ashley would be dead. He charged the man, slamming into him as hard as he could and crushing his body into the van.
The van rocked, propelling them both away from the white vehicle. Jake had no idea what had happened, but in a flash, he was twisted, yanked, and slammed to the concrete surface. Before he could even move, a stiff boot found his chest just below his chin. He lifted his gaze to see the smiling man.
“You’re out of your league, punk. You probably thought I was some stuffy doctor. I was a Goddamned Navy Seal.” The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a silencer. With the calmness of a trained killer, he threaded the silencer onto the end of the black pistol then leveled it on Jake’s head. “Say goodnight, pumpkin.”
“I don’t think so!” Ashley said from the doorway to the pool. “Let him up.”
The man laughed. “Sure thing, sweetness.” He quickly moved, putting the gun on Ashley.
Jake twisted the man’s leg hard as gunshots erupted. The man fell and Jake rolled away and popped up to his feet to come face-to-face with the smoking gun in Ashley’s hands. He stepped to the side as he realized she was moving toward the van.
Jake bent and snatched up the loose gun on the ground.
“On the ground!” Ashley yelled to the other two men standing with their hands up.
They looked around, confused, then finally started, one-by-one, to sink to their knees and get on the ground. Jake quickly closed the van doors and hurried to the driver’s seat.
The second the engine fired, he slammed the shifter into drive and tore away up the driveway, glancing once in the rearview mirror to see the men in the white lab coats were climbing to their feet.
“Where’d you get that gun?” Jake asked.
“It’s Mike’s…well, it was Mike’s.”
“You’re getting a little too used to shooting people.”
“The first one was the hardest.”
“I don’t know if that makes me feel any better.”
“It was life or death, Jake.”
“I’m not judging you. What’re we doing?”
Ashley huffed. “You’re asking me? I have no idea here, Jake. This is your circus to conduct. I’ve just been following your lead this whole demented trip into the Twilight Zone.”
“Playing the hired-gun role apparently.” Jake cut the wheel, and with a screech of the tires, headed toward Fort Fisher.
“What’s happening?” Ariel called groggily from behind them.
Jake looked up at the mirror but couldn’t see her. “Ariel, we’re getting you to the ocean.”