Marlin's Faith: The Virtues Book II (18 page)

Oh. Hope turned me to face her by my shoulders, “One thing at a time, Bubbles. You don’t get to panic, not yet.”

I nodded, but my eyes were affixed to Marlin, sorrow welling in the center of my being for having been so
stupid.
For having gotten him into trouble because I couldn’t hold my shit together. He stared back at me, his face unmoved, his expression shuttered and calculating, he ran his bottom lip between his teeth and eyed Radar.

“Captain’s orders?” he asked.

“Head out to the Locker, he’s stalling the local PD. He needs Hope here to plan but he figures a day, maybe two out there, long enough for the politician and his douchebag son to skip town and go back where they came from…” Marlin was nodding as he listened to Radar talk, and Johnny was on the dock smiling and sending off their fishing clients. Nothing was standing with Johnny and when the two men left, he and Johnny were exchanging words. It all blurred together making me a bit dizzy to think about.

How could I be so
toxic? I asked myself, sinking down to sit on the edge of the nearest lounger.

Hope was nodding, bags were being brought on board and my mind was whirling and spiraling uncontrollably.

What did I do, what did I do, what did I do…

“Faith…” I looked up sharply into Marlin’s face and he knelt down in front of me, he reached out and grazed a thumb through the tears I hadn’t even realized I’d started crying.

“We’ll get it sorted, just like Hope said.”

I nodded numbly and he stood, and my sister knelt down giving me a hug, “It’s not the end of the world, Bubbles. Just another bump in the road called life. We’ll handle it. You going to be okay?” I nodded bewildered and she hugged me again, I hugged her back and before I knew it, she was gone and the boat was moving; my sister on the dock with Radar watching us go.

I didn’t even know
where
I was going. Shouldn’t I know that?

Shit.

What was wrong with me?

I was sick and tired of every little nuanced thing feeling like it had life or death consequences. It was like I was constantly living in that moment, the one where after you’ve tripped and you don’t know if you are going to catch yourself or not. It was like I was there, trapped in that small sliver of time where your heart is dropping and your chest is seized up and you just
don’t know
all day long. I seriously just wished it would stop, but I didn’t have a name for it, or any idea of
how
to make it stop.

Nothing sat down beside me and handed me a bottle of water, “Drink this then take this.” He dropped a little round yellow tablet into the palm of my hand.

“What is it?”

“A valium. It’ll stop the anxiety attack, and if it doesn’t, it’ll at least help slow it down. Maybe make you feel like you can at least breathe again.”

I blinked slowly, the little round pill taking up too much of my vision.

“Is that what this is?” I asked.

He nodded, and I looked him in the eyes, he flinched when our gazes met and I blinked, “How do you know?”

His grey eyes slid from mine, off to the side and he pushed to his feet, “Because I have it too, where do you think I got the valium? Take it or don’t. I’m just trying to help,” he went around to the back of the boat and left me staring at the pill in my hand. Finally, I took it. Popping it into my mouth and swallowing it down before I could change my mind about it.

Nothing was like Marlin; a sweet man, who had done everything to help me and nothing to hurt me. I stared at the wristband around my wrist and closed my eyes, hoping that the pill would at least stop my heart from speeding like it was. I bit my lower lip and stood, finding Nothing and smiling a little sadly.

“Thank you.”

He looked me over and nodded, “No problem.”

“Where are we going?” I asked.

“We call it The Locker, but it’s not exactly, there’s this thing we built, out in the water. A place to stay a day or two at a time when the shit gets too deep, like now, and we need to take cover or just get the fuck out of dodge for a few days.”

“What, just out in the middle of the ocean?”

“Not exactly. It’s inside swimming distance of one of the Key islands if you’re ballsy enough. You and Marlin will be good there until the Captain can come out. He needs time to deal with the cops and for the shit storm to die down.”

“This is all my fault,” I said and gripped the railing, letting the wind carry my hair into my face, hiding my shame for the moment.

Nothing nodded, “Pretty much,” he agreed and I felt it like a needle prick to my heart, “But it doesn’t make a difference if it were you, or Hope, or Hossler or one of the other girls attached to the club. The result would have been the same. Hell, if we’d seen it and it was just another Spring break girl, he still would’ve got his ass beat. We don’t like that shit in our town. Period.”

I looked at him, and his dark hair, just long enough to fall into his eyes, did. He didn’t bother to push it back he just bowed his head and spoke honestly, “Truth is, I don’t think I’ve ever seen Marlin move that fast. The prick deserved to have his ass beat, sure, but because it was you? That son of a bitch got off light, because after everything you’ve been through, that fucker deserved to die.”

He left me then, standing there open mouthed and robbed of speech, as the wind buffeted me and the sleek sport fishing boat cut through the waters turned blue with their depth. We bounced through the small waves for a while, and eventually reached a structure, set out from a small and seemingly abandoned little island.

It was square in nature and mostly wood, with at least two stories to it. The top had a platform on it, and stairs leading up one side. The platform looked like it was for viewing the stars, and underneath it, open on one side looking out over the water, was a seating area. Backed benches were set in a horseshoe shape around a low square table, the seating area decorated with patio furniture cushions in oranges and yellows.

Marlin made the jump from the boat to the floating structure, “Looks like we had some partiers,” he called back then added, “Locks are in place! Johnny, help me clean up before Faith comes aboard.”

It was Nothing who made the leap across to the floating box, and disappeared behind one of the sides of it, there were a couple of nooks to either side of the ground floor, one held a small kitchen the other a showerhead and what looked like a small, boxy toilet. I sat on the edge of the boat and watched the men with fascination for a moment as they moved around this thing, then with a little apprehension when I realized that we would be
living
on it for a day; maybe two.

I picked myself up and gathered the long skirt of my maxi dress and made the unassisted leap from the side of the boat to the lower most platform of the Locker, which I had no idea why they would even call it that.

Marlin appeared almost immediately, “Whoa, hey, you shouldn’t be over here just yet, there were people out here and they left some needles and shit behind.”

I looked up at him and nodded, biting my lip between my teeth, “I thought I could help, if I’m going to be staying here too.”

He looked me over, appraising and finally nodded, “Let Johnny hand you some of the bags and gear and put ‘em down here.”

I turned back and Johnny was reaching out, plastic grocery bags laden with things presumably from Marlin’s fridge or freezer in them. I reached out and so it went until I had a neat pile of things around my feet. It was a flurry of activity and it felt good to be a part of it rather than just a sidelined observer.

All too soon, black garbage bags were being passed back to Johnny and Nothing made the leap back across onto the
Scarlett Ann
. Farewells were given and I watched them go, sighing softly to myself. I suppose it was time to face the music.

I turned and Marlin was looking at me, I waited for him to say something, but he just stood there, bags in his hands looking me over for the longest time.

“Hungry?” he asked finally and I was surprised to find that I was. I nodded mutely and he jerked his head to the side.

“Come help me put this shit away and I’ll fix us some dinner.”

I nodded and picked up a bag with food in it and followed him to the side with a small kitchenette.

“Stay here, I need to get the generator running to power the fridge and freezer.” He left me after unlocking the padlock and letting the hasp loose on the freezer then the fridge in the narrow space and soon the rhythmic grinding sound of a generator running filled the quiet.

“It’s old, but it’ll cool off quick,” he said returning around the back of the wall.

I nodded again and he sighed, “I’m mad at you Faith, but it ain’t nothing that’ll last. Let’s eat, we’ll talk and get it figured out.”

I sniffed, eyes welling and nodded when all I really wanted to do was drop what was in my hands and hug him. I felt grateful that he wasn’t giving up on me and I would give anything in that moment to say or do the thing that would erase the hurt, but I knew there wasn’t anything I could do. I’d opened the box and let it out into the world and once it was out, there was no putting it back in.

A gentle touch to the side of my face that I didn’t see coming through the curtain of my hair left me flinching. It didn’t go away though, Marlin’s roughened thumb so gently, so softly grazed my bottom lip as he tipped my face up to look me in the eyes.

“I get it, Baby Girl, you’ve got a lot going on in there. We ain’t never been the best at communicating and I aim to fix that, but first some dinner. Go on up top, I’ll meet you up there and get the grill fired up.”

I nodded mutely and slipped out and around to the side with stairs, taking them in my bare feet to the platform at the top. There was a gas grill bolted to the ground in one corner and the raised platform was all wood. It was beautifully put together but sadly marred with people carving their initials into the wood. In some places, it looked as if girls had painted designs, crudely done, with nail polish. Other things were drawn and written in black permanent marker.

“It happens,” Marlin said with a shrug of one shoulder. “We got lucky this time. All the locks are in place and checking things out, everything is in order. Just some partiers came across it. We’ve had to chase a few off from time to time. It isn’t a big deal.”

“It looks like you all put a lot of effort into this place,” I murmured.

“Yeah, a couple of summers back, one of the boys came across this video on YouTube. This place called the Manta Resort out in Africa somewhere. We built this. It’s a replication structurally and was expensive as hell to build, but the whole club did it.”

“Why do you call it the ‘Locker’ though?”

“Davey Jones’ Locker, its code. Law enforcement, hell even the Coast Guard would be hard pressed to find this place, and if they did? We would probably just build another one or tow it to another location.” He explained all of this while hooking a propane tank to the grill. Rising in a surprisingly fluid motion and looking back over his shoulder at me as he got the grill started.

“Fish okay? It’s the only thing not frozen.”

I nodded, and he nodded back carefully. He made several trips back and forth from the little kitchenette up to here and I helped where I could, which wasn’t much. Marlin had a thing about people in his kitchen or invading his space when he cooked. Eventually he sent me back down to sit on the couches they had graced with cushions from some storage locker or other.

I sat on the bright orange, canvas wrapped foam in the shade and had a cold drink pressed into my hand as I stared sightlessly out over the water. Soon, Marlin set two plates of grilled fish and vegetables down on the table and eyed me with a grave expression.

“Eat,” he said softly.

I did, and it was good, but in some ways it almost felt like a last meal.

Why and how did I always get myself into these awful situations without meaning to?

Chapter 23

Marlin

She looked both somber and deathly afraid and I could tell it was eating her up inside. The fact that she was so distressed made me wonder. I don’t think Hope had it right; it was Hope’s opinion that when Faith was growing up, when she was caught doing something wrong or whatever, Faith was more upset about being caught than any of the actual damage she did. That wasn’t what I was seeing here. Every time I caught her looking at me she would turn those jewel bright eyes away, made brighter by her fight to suppress the tears. I think Hope was projecting more than a few of her own issues onto her younger sister, and that Faith was climbing the walls on the inside with anxiety over what she’d done. Not because she’d done it, but because it’d hurt, and damn did it ever. I was surprised to find how much.

The worst part was, that hurt was more over the fact that she didn’t trust me yet. Not enough to be plain with me, at any rate. That blew, but could it really be considered unexpected? I mean shit, look what she’d gone through.

We finished our meal and I rinsed the plates over the side for now, before setting them in the kitchen. I refreshed her glass of iced tea and mine out of the pitcher I’d brought out of my fridge on the
Scarlett Ann
and held out my hand to her. She looked up at me, blinking from behind a curtain of her long blonde hair, and tentatively took my hand. I took her up top where we could watch the sunset and the rainclouds roll in.

“Will it be bad?” she asked looking at the clouds in the distance, the flicker of occasional lighting forking through them.

“Nah, a lot of rain, some thunder and lightning, but wind shouldn’t be too bad. Just another thunderstorm in Florida.”

She turned and looked at me and her expression was fuckin’ heartbroken. I sighed and took her into my arms which felt fuckin’ good with how long I’d been fighting it.

“I owe you an apology, Baby Girl,” I held her close and she looked up at me sharply.

“I don’t understand…”

“Oh, don’t get me wrong, you owe me one too, but we’ll get there in a minute.”

She looked so confused that it was hard for me not to laugh; I managed though, “I’m sorry I ever made you feel like I didn’t want to touch you.” I murmured, and she searched my face in silence for several long moments.