Val’s face flushed as he ushered me toward the exit. “You needed to be safe last night. I needed to know you were okay. I was going to figure out something for when I was gone.”

“I don’t take well to being manipulated, Val.”

The emotions on Val’s face ran the gamut from annoyance, to hurt, to indignation. “You’ll be putting Skyla at risk, too, remember?”

“That excuse isn’t working for me anymore. Besides, the point of this trip is to get away from the trouble for a few days. Lie low, you know?”

“You could do the same thing on the backpacking trip with me.”

I scowled at him. Going on a trip with him required trust, and my confidence in Val was at low tide. “No, Val.” I put my hand up, a gesture meaning I would take no arguments from him. “I’m doing this my way.”

He inhaled and blew the breath out fast. “I don’t like it.”

“Of course you don’t, because it means you won’t be in charge. It will be fine. Nothing’s going to happen.”

Val frowned; a wrinkle formed between his eyebrows. “That’s what they always say right before something bad happens.”

“Maybe you’re right,” I said, “but it doesn’t matter. I’m going.”

Chapter Twelve

Skyla met me at the store at first light, an hour so indecently early even the wildlife refused to get out of bed. She helped me find a wetsuit, gloves, and neoprene booties before we hiked to the marina. She led me to a storage shed on the bank near the docks.

“Thorin keeps the rental stock here,” Skyla said, “so we don’t have to haul it back and forth. I keep my boat here too.” She unlocked a door and towed out a silver and neon-green kayak. “This is Molly.”

“Your kayak has a name?”

“It’s good luck.”

“I thought that was only for ships.”

“Shhh,” Skyla said, patting her boat. “She thinks she is a ship.”

“What’s my boat’s name?”

Skyla returned to the shed and lugged out a smaller, faded red kayak, plain and well used. “The rentals don’t get names. You have to form a bond before you can name it.”

“But I need good luck.”

Skyla passed me a paddle. “Don’t worry. I have enough for both of us.”

After we launched our kayaks and paddled to an open area away from the dock, Skyla instructed me on basic techniques. I adapted quickly, but then she said I had to learn to roll, which involved immersing my entire body into the frigid Alaskan waters. Here in Resurrection Bay, glaciers melted into the flow; kayaking in it equated to paddling in a glass of liquid ice. A wetsuit could only go so far in this situation.

“Do I have to?” I whined.

Skyla smacked her paddle on the surface and sent an icy splash over me. I shrieked and splashed her back. “Come on, Mundy,” she said. “Time for a dunk. Do it fast—like tearing off a Band-Aid.” Skyla squeezed her eyes shut, took a deep breath, and executed a perfect demonstration of something she called a Pawlata roll. She came up wet and as sleek as a seal.

“I have a feeling that’s a lot harder than you make it look.”

“Practice makes perfect. Now roll, Mundy, before I make you roll.”

I sighed, took a breath, and shifted my weight. Skyla had explained the process and demonstrated the technique, but the moment my body plunged into the frigid water, all her instruction vanished. My breath dispersed. Shock inhibited my coordination. I fought to find the correct grasp on my paddle while the cold sapped my strength.

Where was Skyla? Why wasn’t she helping? My arm muscles burned, my lungs turned to shrunken prunes, and panic screamed in my ear, ordering me to submit. But Skyla’s voice rose above the din: “If all else fails,” she had told me, “just climb out. You’ll have a bitch of a time getting back in the boat, but you probably won’t drown.”

Seizing upon Skyla’s advice, I yanked my skirting free and floated away from the kayak. The moment I bobbed to the surface, I sucked in a glorious breath, and then another, and another, almost to the point of hyperventilation. Skyla paddled close and helped me flip my kayak. Then she held my boat steady as I fought my way onto the stern and scooted into the cockpit—deep water reentry, another necessary skill Skyla insisted I had to master. She patted my back. “You gonna be all right?”

I glared at her and tried to convey murderous intentions. “I… a-almost… drowned.”

“But you didn’t. You saved yourself. It’s important you know that, know what you’re capable of.”

Still panting, I said, “Y-you were just… going… to watch. No help.”

Skyla jerked her chin up and peered at me through narrowed eyes. “That’s not how you learn.” She paddled a circle around me and then stopped and faced me again. “I wouldn’t have let you drown. But I knew you would save yourself before it came to that.”

“How could you be sure? I wasn’t sure.”

Skyla shrugged. “You might not be as brazen as me, but you got guts. Girls with guts don’t drown. We keep our heads above water, and we survive.”

“What are you?” I asked. “An ex-drill sergeant or something?” Skyla’s girl-power speech worked; I felt less like knocking out her teeth and more like giving her a salute.

“Marine,” Skyla said. “Four years—enlisted right out of high school.”

“Are you kidding?”

Skyla drew the tip of her paddle across the surface, making little swirls in the green water. “No. I got out at the end of my tour. Went to Afghanistan. Had mixed feelings about the potential of my career path in the long run. Decided I couldn’t do a job half-assed and declined their offer to reenlist. I came here the day they signed my discharge papers.”

The more I thought about her as a marine, the more it made sense. “I pegged you as a dissident type at first.”

Skyla grimaced. “Well, I can’t say I was in love with the routine and authority. It was another reason I didn’t go career. I probably would have been low ranking my whole life because I would never be willing to kiss the right ass.”

Skyla and I had little in common beyond our dedication to Mani, but I should never have underestimated the value of that common interest. “Thanks, Skyla.”

Skyla shook her head, not understanding. “For what?”

“For all of this.” I motioned to the water and the kayaks. “For loving Mani and for helping me.”

Skyla rolled her eyes and paddled backward. “Don’t get all sappy on me. We’ve got more practicing to do. You’re going to learn to do that roll like second nature before we leave here today.”

By the time Skyla was satisfied that I could hold my own in the open waters, I was frozen, exhausted, and starving. After I helped her stow the boats, we trekked uphill to the store on wobbly legs. Needless to say, I lacked the enthusiasm to deal with Val and Thorin when they met us in the employee lounge.

“You looked pretty good out there,” Val said.

I blanched. “You were watching? I didn’t even see you.”

“I’m like a ninja that way.”

“Miss Mundy,” Thorin said, “I’ve got some paperwork for you to fill out if you’re going to accompany Skyla. For insurance purposes, if you don’t mind.”