Free The Serophim Breach (The Serophim Breach Series) by Tracy Serpa Page B

at the water’s edge in front of him.
    “Greg! You okay?” he called out. The look on his friend’s face stopped his feet.
    Greg paced in the shallows, muttering to himself. Blood pulsed out of a gash on his right arm, turning the froth at his feet pink. Eyes locked on Paul, he snapped his teeth and took a step deeper into the water. When a scream came from the beach, Greg’s mouth wrenched open, and he screeched in some kind of terrifying, primal answer. A shudder ran through his body, and an ugly grin spread across his face.
    Paul kept his eyes on Greg, who was prowling deeper into the water with every turn, his eyes still locked on Paul. He was close enough for Paul to see that his pupils were blown out and the gash on his arm was only one of many bite marks.
    Paul shouted, “Greg! We need to call nine-one-one!”
    His friend slowed his pacing, his body shaking with cold or shock. It wasn’t until he thought he heard Greg laugh that Paul took a few slow steps back into deeper water. His board bumped against his calves as the surf rolled in, and Greg inched closer. Paul continued to back away slowly, and let his eyes focus on the beach behind his friend.
    He could no longer see Boomer, Jones, or Derrick. Neither could he understand what was happening: bodies moved in every direction. Several people struggled to pull a larger man off someone cowering on the asphalt. The air was filled with screams, shouts for help, growls, and vicious snarling. A woman shouted for someone named Scott to call 911. Still working his way back into the water, Paul was disoriented by the thought that he could see the violence as it pulsed down the shoreline, toward Waikiki.
    He was still distracted when Greg lunged, leaping forward, clawing the air, swiping at Paul’s face with a hideous snarl. Ducking backward, he stumbled over his board and fell to his knees in the water. Greg thrashed behind him, pulling himself into deeper water with handfuls of water and sand. He jabbered insanely at Paul, screaming and gnashing his teeth.
    Frantically, Paul thrashed through the water, dragging his board behind him. Greg launched himself from his knees again and latched on to the edge of the board. The force yanked Paul’s feet out from under him, and he slammed face-first into the water. As he struggled for the surface, the cord yanked against his ankle again and again. Another wave washed over him, pushing him back toward the beach—and Greg—as he tried desperately to regain his footing.
    He popped up gasping for air, face-to-face with Greg. Paul’s shout was garbled by a mouthful of seawater, and he pushed himself backward just as Greg swung an elbow at his face. He flipped over onto his stomach and swam as hard as he could, hoping he could wrest the board away and escape into deeper water. He dug deep, keeping his face buried in the surf until he felt that his lungs would pop. Greg’s weight still tugged on his ankle strap, yanking violently against the rhythm of his strokes. Taking a quick breath, he threw the last of his energy into a frantic burst of movement. Finally, the weight on his ankle broke free, and he shot forward through the water. Surfacing, he turned to look for his friend.
    They had already been in chest-deep water when he started swimming, and his panic had pulled them to the point where he could just barely skim the sand with his toes. Behind him, Greg’s head stuck out of the water; he was coughing and sputtering as he flailed against the surf, trying to turn himself around to face the beach. His eyes were wide, unblinking, like a child in the deep end of a pool for the first time. Paul pulled his board to him and loosed the ankle strap.
    “Grab on!” he shouted, and shoved his board toward his struggling friend. But Greg’s eyes remained focused on him; they never even acknowledged the surfboard that floated only a few feet from him.
    Greg was still thrashing in the water when Paul felt the gentle suction of a