Read On Deadly Tides (A Wendover House Mystery Book 3) for Free Online Page B

die under that cold moon. With dawn I might be seen by someone. Help might come. Of course, not everyone would come to save me. But Ben might.
    Though it seemed futile, I ran where the mist seemed thinnest.
    I fell. The white curtain was ripped away by a violent wind. I could see Barney standing on a rock, wagging his stumpy tail and dancing happily. I tried to warn him away but I had no breath. The stench had crawled down my throat and stolen my voice.
    I heard a low-toned bellow, a roar from the deep behind me, and then a high-pitched screaming which I thought was coming from my own mouth, but presently awoke enough to understand that it was Barney and Kelvin yowling in unison, trying to wake me up, to pull me from that terrible dream.
    Frustrated at my slow return to reality, Kelvin stuck out a paw and struck me several times on the nose.
    “ Ow ! I’m awake—stop it!”
    I was awake, but clumsy and disoriented and I had a terrible pain in my leg.
    Kelvin jumped back as I threw off the covers to examine my stinging limb, and I rolled out of the bed which was clammy with terror sweat. For one terrible second I thought I smelled sea rot in the air and began coughing. But it was gone before I could draw a second breath and I was sure that I had imagined it.
    My leg had no marks on it, but it took the pain almost a minute to recede, and it was only when the last twinge left me that I realized it was dawn.
    “Thank you, God.”
    Barney barked his agreement.
     
    *   *   *
     
    After a night of storms and dreams worthy of any horror film, the morning arrived with sun and only a light wind which barely disturbed the water. I took it as a sign to continue my hunt for answers on the mainland.
    Normally I might have relaxed for a day, chastened by my subconscious’ clear unhappiness with my current activities. But that warning dream had gotten my back up. I had been threatened by the show of teeth in the monster’s mouth and felt ready to snarl back my defiance. This concerned me, damn it. I had a right to know what happened.
    Fortified with coffee, I called Ben who was deeply engrossed in the book I had lent him and needed a moment to switch his attention from the printed words to the spoken ones. I was vague about my reasons for wanting to go to the mainland and Ben was too distracted by my book to ask too many questions.
    My neighbor absently assured me that Barney and Ben were equally happy to spend the day together, so I said I would be over shortly to drop my puppy off and catch a ride with him to Great Goose where I could get the morning ferry to the mainland.
    “Huh. Oh, fine. I need some milk.”
    I hung up the phone. Kelvin opened one eye long enough to give me his blessing, but didn’t stir from his favorite spot on the desk. I didn’t call Harris or Bryson to tell them what I was doing, but knew that word of my renting a car would get around fast enough.
    I hoped they wouldn’t follow me. Frankly, I was still a little freaked out by what I had read in the book. The monster aside, if the information was correct, then at some point there was a chance that a Sands or a Ladd had been compelled to marry into my family. Bryson and Harris might be some kind of very distant cousins. The thought made me feel a little icky, though any relationship had to be so removed that there was no question of incest in my occasional romantic thoughts about them, but the notion of hidden ties was disconcerting. I needed some time to adjust to the new information.
    Logic said that Great-grandpa Kelvin—or whoever the man was who had washed up on the beach—had died in the ocean, therefore he was living near the coast. This was actually far from a given since any number of occurrences could have brought him back, but I had to begin somewhere and Route 1 was closest and most coastal. I just hoped I wouldn’t have to go all the way to Danforth. I was out of the habit of driving and windy roads sometimes make me ill. Apparently the