Excerpts: Inside Passage

“Wouldn’t you like to get married in your own backyard?”

“Of course I would. You know that,” she snapped. “But I can’t.”

“Why not? Because Nick Season says you can’t. You have the right to live the life you want to live. Don’t give it up for that son of a bitch. Hell no. You don’t have to do that.” Abe leaned closer. There it was, those laser-like light blue eyes. “It won’t be easy, but together, we can figure out what to do. You and I can do this. We have to.”

“My God, what are you thinking? This isn’t like psycho-therapy.” She held his eyes. “We can’t ‘figure it out’ or ‘work on it.’ It’s not a head game. We have no evidence. Nothing. Nick’s a foolproof liar and a stone-cold killer. And he’s going to be Washington’s state attorney general.”

“And he has to be stopped.” Abe looked into their fire. “It’s not just about what you’d have to give up … think about what he’ll do if he ever finds out that you and Billy are alive. And though you might be okay for a year, or even two, eventually, he’ll start to wonder. And then to worry. It’s who he is. You’ve told me that. And then he’ll never stop checking. He’ll have me followed. Every year, he’ll run your prints, and Billy’s, through some Canadian database. And that’s just the beginning … unless we stop him.”

“And how do you propose to do that?”

Abe’s bushy brows furrowed in a “V” until they almost touched. “I understand the problem now.” They touched. Corey had never seen that. Very cool. He meant business. He turned to her, full face. “To begin, I’ll comb my hair and look this devil in his shiny black eyes.”

What? What was that? Corey was dumbstruck. Eventually, she softly mouthed, “What?” And louder, before he could answer, “Aren’t you afraid of him?”

“He’s very frightening, and I’m painfully aware of what’s at stake. And of course I see how very dangerous he is and yes, that scares me.” He scowled. “But I have other feelings that are even stronger than my fear.”

“What does that mean?”

“What I’m afraid of, what keeps me up at night, is losing you. Nick wants to kill the person I love most in the world. That makes him my archenemy, my nemesis. What I feel for Nick is inexhaustible rage.” He tapped his pipe against the log, emptying it into the sand, then he carefully set it down. When he looked up, his expression had turned fierce. Abe took both of her hands. “Nick Season be damned!”

“You’re being crazy.” She had never seen Abe like this.

“No, I’m telling you how I feel. I want to marry you Corey. I want to live with you and Billy in Seattle. I want to go to parent night at Billy’s school. I want to take you guys to dinner at Tulio and for pizza at Via Tribunali. I want to fish at your favorite spots near Bainbridge —”

“He’ll kill us all.” And Abe was really scaring her.

“I have to keep that from happening.”

“This isn’t a storybook. Nick isn’t like anyone you know. And this isn’t an insight kind of deal. Look what happened the last time you tried to help. They almost got Billy, and I had to kill someone. Look what almost happened last night. This time you and Billy and I, we could all die. Do you understand that?”

“Yes, I do. But I won’t let that happen.”

“Won’t let that happen?”

“No, I won’t.”

“How?”

“I’m working on that. “

“Working on it? How? You’re going to comb your hair? Look this devil in his shiny black eyes? What is that about?”

Abe considered her question. “It’s a way of starting.”

Corey put her head in her hands. She didn’t know what to say.

More from Inside Passage

“I’ve never done this — ” She pointed at the table.

“Oh?”

“You know — dinner. And French Champagne.” She finished off her glass. “I wanted to do something nice for you. After everything you’ve done for me.” She moved her hand, a gesture that took in the whole room. “Look, I know this isn’t much—”

“It’s home to your family,” he interrupted. “That’s quite a lot.”

“Thanks for that.” She touched his arm. “Why did you come tonight?” Corey didn’t know where that came from.

He set his glass on the mantel, considering.

If she hadn’t known him, the long silence would have been awkward.

“I thought about it, and I knew I wanted to come,” he finally said. “And I was flattered that you asked. I admire you.”

She raised her eyebrows, a question.

“It’s many things,” he explained. “The way you see things. Your directness. I especially like the way you make me feel — I don’t know how to put this — with you I’m not quite so serious. Even when we’re considering very serious things.” He hesitated. “I’m fumbling around, scratching the surface, I’m afraid.”

“Whoa, you admire me?” she asked, still in doubt. “I make you feel good?”

“Yes, yes.”

“Huh.” Corey took a breath, wanting to remember this moment. “Just so you know mister, that’s a two-way street.”

“Good.” He tapped the mantel, obviously thinking about something.

She waited patiently.

“And the honest answer to your question is that I’m not sure why I came … I’m glad I did.”

When he smiled, she said, “I’m glad you came too.”

“Thank you.”

She set her glass beside his on the mantel. Then, without even thinking about it, she kissed him lightly on the lips. When he put his big arms around her waist, their kiss turned into something more serious. This was not what she had meant, she thought, as his hands moved across her back. He was stronger than she imagined, though his touch was gentle. And then she couldn’t think. She could feel her excitement building as he carried her to the couch.

On the couch she hurriedly unbuttoned his shirt. He was burly and hairy and, she realized, at ease. He undressed her, surehanded.
 Their lovemaking was intense. She especially liked that it was also generous. They were, in turn, responsive and demanding. Afterward Corey wondered if he was as surprised, make that mystified, as she was. She would ask him one day, for sure. Sometime later they made love again, beginning where they had left off. It made some kind of weird sense, she decided, that two misfits should do so well together in bed.

After she-had-no-idea-how-long, Corey lifted her head, wanting to see his face. She had drifted off and she was still a little drowsy. “You’re awfully damn sexy. Never guess it looking at you.”

“In my work I’ve learned that in matters of importance, appearances mean very little,” he said.

Corey gave him a soft sleepy kiss, liking that idea. She gently tapped her finger on his chest, waking up now. “I have to say something. It’s been more than two years since I’ve done this.”

Abe covered her hand, considering this. “It might be a year I’ve been telling myself it’s been a year.”

She grinned at that, then lay her head on his chest. She closed her eyes. “I can’t move.”

“There’s no hurry.”

“What about dinner?”

“Whenever you’re ready.”

“Will you stay the night?”

“I’d love to.”

“And what about tomorrow?”

“I’ll cancel everything.”

“You would do that?”

“I’d be crazy not to.”

“Yeah, you would.”

More from Inside Passage

After a leisurely picnic lunch, they finished their sea aquarium and carefully carried it back to the cabin. Abe proudly set it on the porch.

“If you pick some blackberries, I’ll make a pie,” Corey offered. She pointed toward the blackberries at the edge of the field. It was a sparsely treed field that sprawled almost fifty yards down the bluff before disappearing into a slew of blackberry brambles that fronted an inland forest. “The berries should still be a little tart, which is perfect.”

Billy didn’t hesitate. “I’ll get a pail.” And he was off.

Corey watched him run to the shed. This afternoon he was still a kid who loved his mom’s blackberry pie.

When Billy came back with the pail, she saw them to the door. “Make a lot of noise, so you won’t surprise a bear.”

Abe shot her a look.

Corey nodded, she meant it. “Singing should work,” she added as they headed toward the brambles. She stayed behind to make the pie crust.

Corey watched Abe and Billy from the window, singing loud scare-the-bear songs, laughing and filling the pail. She was putting the crust in the pan when she glanced out again. She saw Billy slip on something and almost fall, barely holding the pail upright. She was smiling at how he’d saved their blackberries when she saw his pail of berries fly through the air and she heard Billy screaming. Corey flew out the door and down the porch steps. She ran out onto the field where she could see Billy near the brambles, flailing his arms wildly at swarming insects. She put it together instantly: Billy had fallen on a wasp’s nest, yellow jackets that commonly build their nests in the ground. And now the wasps were everywhere and Billy was covered with stinging yellow jackets. Corey ran toward him, yelling incoherently, beside herself, unsure what to do. And then out of nowhere, there was Abe, hauling Billy over his shoulder and running like hell across the field. They came charging out of the field onto the bluff’s rocky edge, both of them covered with yellow jackets now, and without breaking stride, Abe jumped into the freezing cold water with Billy slung over his shoulder.

Corey ran to the edge of the bluff. When they came up for air, she could see that the wasps were gone. Billy was having trouble breathing, she could hear him gasping for air. Abe was flailing in the cold salt water of the deep, glacially gouged inlet. He was being carried into the deeper water.

That’s when she remembered that Abe couldn’t swim.

Corey dove from the bluff into the icy water.

And she decided to marry Abe.