The Green Room (20 page)

Chapter Thirty-six

Storm fought her way back to consciousness with an uneasy stomach and spinning head. The sickening sweet residue of ether still clung to her, and she swallowed hard to quell a fat knot of nausea.

She cracked open one eyelid, closed it against the spinning, and opened it again, more slowly. She lay on one side, in the dark, with her hands bound behind her. Pinpricks of light stabbed through what she sensed was a small, closed space. She shivered with cold, and the abrupt movement induced another onslaught of green whirlies.

Her churning stomach was worsened by the fact that whatever she lay on rocked gently. The sensation of instability was exacerbated by pounding, a sort of sub-sensory vibration that thrummed around her. This pulsation was punctuated with an imbalance of pressure similar to the feeling one gets when a car window is opened at high speed, and it worsened her queasiness.

Storm could taste salt, and the swaying motion corresponded to the irregular movement of waves, as in a protected area. As if to reinforce this impression, a wavelet splashed her face, which caused her to jerk her head up and away. This brought about a wave of nausea so strong that she retched with dry heaves, then sagged from the head-spinning the sickness had brought on.

Another surge of water rose around her. This time, Storm sensed its approach from the change in air pressure, and she lifted her head a few inches. Droplets splashed her face, but she held her breath this time, and the coolness washed away some of her disorientation.

Each boom was accompanied by the buffeting sensation. Storm labored to sense the reason for the pressure change. In seconds, she knew, and the knowledge caused her to catch her breath. The rhythmic pounding was caused by huge waves beating on rocks, and she was within them.

She was in a cave, and she lay on a sticky, scratchy surface that swayed with a grating, breaking noise. Storm turned her head and eyed its rough, tacky exterior. She'd seen these sticky bumps a thousand times. She was on a surfboard, a beat-up old thing, which rested on a ledge in the cave. The water covering the rocky platform was two or three inches deep, and caused the surfboard to rock erratically, as if one of its skegs had been broken off.

How long had she been there? She had no recollection of anything that happened after she'd collapsed on the sand next to the beach cottage. Her arms were tied behind her, which caused her shoulder muscles to cramp and burn. Even that wasn't as bad as the fact that her hands were senseless lumps, either from cold or from lack of blood flow.

Storm craned her neck to look around. Her captor had removed her jeans and sweatshirt. Her bikini was all she wore, and she was thoroughly chilled. A sense of rage and violation at being undressed nearly choked her. Fear at the possibility of having been otherwise abused passed through her, but she let fury overtake alarm. Anger would be a much more effective tool, and she yearned to find the guy who put her here.

Another pounding resonated through the cave, accompanied by the shift in air pressure. She forced herself to take a shaky breath, then another. Panic, like the pulsation of the huge waves, battered her senses. But she held it off, and made herself analyze her surroundings. She needed to attract someone's attention. Lava caves riddled parts of the coastline, and they were often excellent fishing sites. If anyone would be out when the surf was big.

“Help.” She sounded like a sick puppy. “Help,” she called out, louder. This time she managed a cry that sounded like a child's.

Water rose around her again. Like a tide, Storm thought. An incoming tide, each wavelet a little higher than the last. The effects of the ether were fading, and this realization gave her enough strength to struggle to her knees. It took several minutes, and she could only do it because her legs, fortunately, were free. Even so, the surfboard rocked and tilted with her efforts.

Crouched on her knees, she surveyed the cave. Sharp-toothed rocks loomed only an inch or two above her unprotected back. When the next wave surged through the space, Storm had to lean forward to avoid hitting the back of her head. Even so, the craggy lava scraped her shoulder.

Now that her head had cleared and her eyes had adjusted, she could make out the entire cave: a ceiling a few inches above her bowed head, a sloping wall near her right shoulder, and a diminishing oval air space that ended in the rocky barrier fifteen feet away. The few inches of water on the ledge had deepened to almost a foot.

The water was rising. Since she had no concept of how long she'd been unconscious, she didn't know how much higher it would get. She thought it had been low tide when she went after Goober, which meant that the water could rise a couple of feet in the small space. It would fill the cave.

Panic broke through the pretense of calm she'd wrapped around herself, and she screamed for help again, this time with a full, lusty roar. Though her voice was strong, it was muffled by water and dripping walls. Storm shouted again, shuddered with an effort at self-control, then moaned with despair. Screaming for help was fine, but she didn't have the luxury of succumbing to panic. She needed to do two things: get her arms loose and get out of the cave.

A scattering of small holes allowed narrow rays of sunlight to stab through a porous wall opposite the ledge on which she huddled, and the beams briefly bounced off the surface of a rippled and seemingly bottomless black pool. Though volcanoes hadn't erupted on O‛ahu for a couple million years, volcanic rock existed all over the island. The pencil-thin rays had penetrated porous
a‛a,
the type of jagged lava that would slash a body as easily as the teeth of a Moray.

Storm squinted with the effort to stay calm and scrutinize all the visible aspects of her enclosure. Think. Someone put her in here, so there had to be an entrance. She twisted her neck until it hurt to examine the ceiling, which was getting closer and closer to the top of her head. There was no place to drop a five-eight, hundred-forty-pound woman and a nine-foot surfboard through the ceiling. So the entrance had to be under water, at least once the tide came in.

Storm's throat closed with desperation, and tears burned her eyes as she looked at the tiny rays of light that seeped through the rock like the mockery of some ethereal fairy. Is this what happened to Nahoa? Her gaze flitted around the cave again, this time so frightened she didn't take in any information. Had he been in this very place?

Storm remembered the police detectives' comments about the damage to Nahoa's body. Sharks loved caves, didn't they? And they sensed blood from miles away. Was there one in the dark water beneath her, circling to defend its territory?

“Help!” she shrieked again. Her voice worked at full volume, a hoarse and desperate shriek that died in the closed acoustics of the cave. At the same time, she pulled herself back from the abyss of terror and told herself to think about the entrance to the cave. Even if it was under water, tides in Hawai‛i weren't the twenty-foot changes that occur in other parts of the world. She could dive to it—if she could get free.

Storm shuddered. She'd just have to take her chances with sharks. Weren't reef sharks the ones who liked caves? They were smaller than tigers, hammerheads, or whites, and not as apt to attack humans. She was counting on it.

She jerked at her bonds. Her hands were numb clubs on the end of burning arms and she had to get them loose. As she yanked, the surfboard jerked, then teetered. It was rising with the water, of course, and becoming less stable on its rocky shelf. If she fell off with her hands tied, it would be nearly impossible to get back on the board—or the abrasive ledge. She tugged again, this time more gently. Yes, she was attached to the surfboard itself, by its rubbery leash.

Storm found comfort in this knowledge for the simple reason that a leash was something she knew. At one end, the rubber tubing would be attached to a hole in the tail of the board, usually by a narrow nylon cord. At the other end, which would normally go around her left ankle, should be a Velcro band. Not that she expected to be bound by Velcro; that was hopelessly wishful thinking.

She had to get the feeling back in her hands. She needed to move her wrists and arms to get the blood flowing, and maybe, just maybe, loosen the tubing. If it was as old and abused as the board she sat on, it may have hardened, even cracked, with age.

Nahoa would have tried this, too, she thought with a stab of desperation. And pushed the fear away. Anger was okay, but terror would only freeze her and keep her from considering her options.

A sucking sensation, a whalloping thump, compression of air, and more water rushed into the cave. This time, it nearly washed her from the board. Storm sucked in a jagged breath. On its heels, another wave rolled through the little cavern, and the old surfboard, for the first time, lifted completely from the uneven shelf and teetered beneath her knees.

Storm twisted her wrists, grimacing against the rough, tight truss. She rotated them one way, then the other, slowly at first, as she tried to ignore the friction of the rubber against her skin. Slowly and carefully, she rotated on the board so that she could rub her wrists against the knobby lava wall. She needed to find a small, sharp outcropping at the right level. Her abraded shoulder hit the wall and she winced. Damn, the entire wall felt like knife blades. Salty, stinging blades.

Her hands were so numb from cold and diminished blood supply that she could barely manipulate them. But she felt the salt in her fresh wounds, by God. And when her sawing efforts didn't hurt quite so much, she figured the lava was scraping more rubber than skin. So she used her pain. With each ripping millimeter, the elasticity of the leash diminished. Instead of retaining its tightness, the resilience of the rubber seemed to lessen. Either that or the blood she imagined now circled her wrists acted as a lubricant. Whatever was happening, she had to keep it up.

Meanwhile the incoming sea water floated her higher in the small chamber. Her chest now lay directly on her thighs, and the awkward pose not only increased the strain on her shoulders, but caused the bones in her knees to grind against the gritty, hard surfboard. Tears of effort filled her eyes.

A particularly loud crash, with subsequent gush of water, bumped her head against the ceiling. She yelped, then allowed herself a bellow of rage, with a concurrent blast of effort against her restraints.

Storm sagged forward and moaned. The pain in her lacerated wrists was so bad she felt faint. She couldn't even feel her hands, let alone the binding rubber. It was all she could do to keep from flopping onto one exhausted hip, but her instinct for survival restrained her. If she tipped over the board now, she'd never have the energy to get back on. It was all she could do to stay balanced.

“Owwww, help,” she keened, and her voice rose and fell with exhaustion. Head turned to one side, she watched the last pinhole of light sink below the surface of the water. A subtle glow from below the surface was all that lit the cave. And only a few cubic feet of air remained.

Chapter Thirty-seven

Storm panted. The oxygen level was dropping in the cave. She set her teeth against the pain and rasped her hands against the cave wall. It was harder and harder to tell where the rubber was. This last swipe hurt enough to take her breath away. She leaned forward and gasped as if she'd been running.

The cave, as it filled, was becoming darker. Storm rested her forehead on the surfboard. Her wrists felt as if they bled; if she used her imagination, she could feel coolness running down the palms of her outwardly turned hands. She rested for a moment and fixated on the sensation across her poor, abused wrists.

And that whining noise must be from the lack of oxygen. Was she just going to drift off? She was so tired, she could probably go to sleep. Would she wake up when she fell off the board? She hoped not.

There was that whining again. If only her one shoulder wasn't so painful. It was because her one hand lay palm up, beside her on the surfboard. Moving that shoulder had hurt like hell.

Wait, she'd done it. Her hand was free. That last swipe against the vicious, sharp lava had cut the leash, and she'd been so numb she hadn't noticed for almost a minute.

The notion of freedom brought improved mental clarity. Not only were her hands prickling with renewed sensation, her shoulders, which had been pulled and strained, felt as if knife blades were imbedded in them. Blades of liberation, though. Storm jerked upright and clobbered the back of her head against the ceiling of the cave.

The whining was not part of her disorientation. It was an engine, heard as if from underwater. She drew deep breaths and looked around the small space as if she might notice other changes. Maybe Hamlin was outside, looking for her. He had to be frantic by now, didn't he?

“Hamlin,” she screamed. “Hamlin!”

A man's muffled voice answered, but she couldn't make out his words. Too much water and rock between them. She couldn't be sure, but it didn't sound like Hamlin. Still, Hamlin would have gone for help. It could be City and County lifeguards on a jet ski or boat. They'd be looking for her, wouldn't they?

“Help! I'm in here.”

The whining sound got closer, then dropped to a lower pitch. The man's voice sounded again, but she lost most of the words in a crashing thump and a surge of water. “….dive…entrance…out…”

Storm braced herself on the rocking surfboard. Both her hands were still numb from being bound so tightly, and she shook them to get the blood flowing.

What did he say? Dive? Storm eyed the only place where light still seeped into the darkening cave. It was underwater, below the little holes that had let in the air she so desperately needed. How much had the water risen? How deep was the hole? It had disappeared below the surface of the water before she'd regained consciousness. How long ago had that been?

She had to try. After all, what did she have to lose?

Storm was terrified. She swallowed hard and took deep, methodical breaths while she talked to herself out loud. “Can't be that deep. He got you in here, right? Even if it's five or six feet down, it's nothing. You do that all the time.” Right.

Storm floated the surfboard toward the imagined entrance. Her hands were still tingling clubs, and they made clumsy paddles. Her fingers were barely functional, though sensation was beginning to burn through them.

She heard a shout from outside the cave, and the pitch of the engine rose. It got loud, and then faded, as if he'd headed away. Hadn't he heard her?

“Stop!” she shrieked. “Stop! I'm here!”

That was it, she had to go. Slipping from the board into the cold water revived her more, and she took a desperate last gulp of air before she dove.

Storm felt her way down the bumpy rock face. Her numb fingers were just able to grasp protrusions on the wall, enough to pull her deeper into the water. The cave wasn't completely dark, and she knew the faint glow had to come from beneath the surface of the water. There wasn't enough light to see clearly, and all she could make out were light and dark shapes. But none was a beacon of escape.

Storm felt along the wall, pulling herself deeper by grabbing onto jagged knobs of lava. Her lungs were on fire, and her diaphragm began to convulse with the need for air. With a cry of anguish, she let go of the wall and kicked frantically to the surface.

The cave seemed even darker, and when she broke surface, she almost hit her face on the nose of the drifting surfboard. It took up most of the remaining space, and she hung on for a minute while she wheezed for whatever oxygen was left in the diminishing room.

She leaned her face on the board, and tried not to give in to despair. She had to dive again. And keep thinking. If the entrance involved a short tunnel, it wouldn't necessarily let in enough light to be visible from the surface of the water. She'd have to go deep to find it. That must be what the person outside was trying to tell her. But she had to find it this time. There wasn't enough oxygen left in the cave.

Hyperventilating might help, especially in this thin air. She knew free divers who'd died from the practice, but it was a chance she'd have to take. She was going to die if she didn't.

Ten breaths. Ten deep, slow breaths. Storm actually used her fingers, splayed on the surfboard, to count. And she dove again, straight down. When she'd surfaced before, she'd been surprised to find that she'd only been about four feet down, though it had felt much deeper. She didn't grope along the wall this time. Instead, she kicked and stroked as hard as she could, down, down, until her ears popped. Where it was dark, and there was still no bottom that she could see.

She grabbed the wall, crabbing along sideways, head toward the bottom. Around the perimeter, if she had to. No, just along the wall where the light had come in. That was her best chance.

Storm actually surprised herself with these thoughts, glad that her brain still functioned on some level. She had very little time. Already, she'd guess that twenty or thirty seconds had passed. How long until she passed out? Two minutes? Three? Don't think about it.

Her eyes were getting used to the diminished light. She could just make out the bottom, sandy and scattered with black rocks. There was even a little fish, a reef triggerfish, common to anyone who enjoys swimming or diving along Hawai‛i's shoreline. In fact, it was a
humuhumu-nukunuku-ā-pua‛a.
Storm giggled, which sent a few bubbles to the surface. Oops. The humuhumu with a snout like a pig, her own
pua
‛a
. Little pig-fish. Uh oh, she was getting silly. That was oxygen deprivation again, wasn't it?

Where'd that fish go? There he was, two feet from her, and heading into the wall. Into the wall. Storm grasped a bulge in the rock and pulled herself toward him. She kicked hard, rounded a corner, and peered ahead, where a halo shimmered.

It was a tunnel, more of a long arch, about three feet wide, but deep. It extended to the sandy bottom. Lots of room, if she could go two or three feet deeper. And if it wasn't too long; she couldn't see the end.

Storm's diaphragm shuddered with need, but there was light ahead, only six or seven feet away. There was the little fish again, nibbling at something on the wall of the tube. Good little pig-fish. Wished she had gills, like he did. Pull with her arms, use 'em like he does his little pectoral fins. Kick, kick. Feeble feet, not nearly as good as a tail fin.

Wished her eyes were letting in more light; she was getting tunnel vision. Black on the sides. Pull with those pectoral fins. Maybe use a dolphin kick. Her vision was fading, but she could still swim. Follow the little
pua‛a
. Helpful little fellow, finding that tunnel for her.