Free Sadie Walker Is Stranded by Madeleine Roux Page A

certain of: being chased by water zombies around a boat can turn a landlubber like me into Michael fucking Phelps on steroids. I didn’t look back, knowing I might catch a glimpse of one of the undead coming for me. Then I remembered that they could be under the water. Each of my clumsy strokes was punctuated with a girlish squeak of hysteria. A thin rope ladder swung back and forth, just a few yards ahead. Moritz, bless his heart, was already over the edge of the ladder, waiting for me to get close. He was just in time. Something unnaturally strong tugged on my ankle, hard, nearly pulling me under.
    Shane … I reminded myself sternly … I had to get back to him. No matter what, I had to make it back onto the boat. I was in deep, deep trouble, sure, but it was nothing, not when I thought about him being alone, surrounded by strangers and abandoned by every single family member he had.
    I heard Andrea shout up on deck and realized she was screaming at me. Moritz clamped a hand over my wrist and yanked with enough power to pull the arm right out of its socket. With another jerk, he scampered back over the edge of the railing and we hit the deck with a cold, wet slap, like so many suffocating mackerels flopping out of a fisherman’s net. Someone pulled the ladder up.
    Distantly, very distantly, I heard the outboard motor start. It gave a roar like a meat grinder and Moritz cupped his hands over my ears, presumably to keep me from hearing the dulcet tones of Uncle Arturo and his new friends being sliced into chum. And dimly I realized that I was almost naked in the arms of a stranger. His tweedy jacket rasped against my skin.
    “Cover her,” Noah was saying. Leave it to the teenage boy to be the first of us to have any sense. A blanket fell about my shoulders and Andrea rolled me a little, tucking the fleece around me and rubbing vigorously. The real aching cold was beginning to set in and I shook from toe to hairline. My vision wasn’t cooperating, either from the water clouding up my eyes or the chills. As if gazing through a thick glass jar, I saw Shane standing a few yards away, his hands tightened into pale knots at his sides. He looked at me like I was a ghost. Stumbling forward, I pushed through the others and grabbed Shane, hugging him close, squeezing until he squeaked in protest.
    “I was so … But we’re okay.” My teeth chattered as I tried to talk. “We’re okay.”
    Shane finally hugged me back. That was the signal I needed to stop gripping him so damn hard.
    Moritz and Andrea waited until I had calmed a bit more to suggest I sit down. Shane came with me, not that he had a choice about it. His hand was icy in mine, though that might have been the lingering effects of the cold water. Moritz sat next to me, one hand on my back as he tried to rub some warmth back into my bones. The motor cut and Noah appeared again. His brows tented, his forefingers scraping up and down his temples. “What do we do now?” he asked, looking between each of us. Nobody had an answer. “What do we do now?”
    Cassandra the nurse had started crying again. That was a given. Andrea gave her a look that could freeze lava.
    “We should say something,” I managed between shivers. “She’s a wreck.”
    “We’re all a wreck,” Andrea replied shortly. “And she didn’t fall in the water.”
    I turned briefly to look at Moritz, still too numb to properly overthink his proximity. His jacket smelled of dust and sweat. For some reason having him there, his hand on my back, made me feel better, or safer. It was all in the eyes, which were a color match for the crisp green-blue of the water surrounding us. And there was something in his gaze that reminded me of sugar-high toddlers, all enthusiasm and curiosity; and it was this feature of his that made me—almost against my will—relax.
    Shane gave my knee an unexpected squeeze and even though I knew it would bug him, I leaned over and gave the top of his head a quick peck. We