breathed, pumped. She heard someone calling 911.
“I thank he’s a goner.” A woman in the crowd, nearly hysterical.
This was country; EMTs would take time. Hallie began to feel light-headed, her arms burning. She kept at it, breaths and compressions, over and over and over. It could have been ten minutes or an hour, she wasn’t sure. Was that a siren? She couldn’t be sure about that, either. Foul liquid kept leaking out of Brewster’s throat andnose, but she ignored it. A child in the crowd was screaming. A man bent over her, red-faced, fearful.
“Lady, I don’t think he’s gonna—”
Just then Brewster bucked, convulsed, spewed vomit. She rolled him over onto one side as two EMTs in blue jumpsuits shoved through the crowd.
“What happened?” The EMTs, sweating like laborers from their run in the heat, were breaking out oxygen and defib kits.
Hallie and Brewster knew exactly what had happened. But she said, “Equipment failure. His regs silted up.”
Hallie leaned close, as if to give Brewster a light kiss, and whispered into his ear. “You were lucky.”
Vomit-smeared, eyes stretched wide, he grabbed her hand. Squeezed, pulled her back down. Whispered,
“Thank you.”
“No worries.”
She patted his shoulder and left.
MARY WAS THERE, RED-EYED, GREEN-FACED, CLUTCHING A mug of black coffee in one hand and a Marlboro in the other when Hallie came in. The paramedics had taken Brewster to their local hospital, worried that he might have aspirated vomit and possibly collapsed a lung as well. Hallie had sat with two state troopers, giving information they needed for their report. It was almost two by the time she made it back to the shop.
“I got a call. What the hell happened?”
Mary’s voice was deeper and rougher than cigarettes could make it. Insurgents in Iraq had done that, bringing her Apache down with a Stinger and filling her lungs with fire.
Hallie told her.
“Jesus Christ. How
are
you?”
“Trashed. Can I take the afternoon?”
“For sure. Those guys want a word with you, though.”
Mary nodded toward the back of the shop, and Hallie saw the red, wrinkled mat of scar tissue on the left side of her friend’s face, a sight she would never get used to. Then she let her eyes travel farther.
She hadn’t noticed the two men by the racks of masks and fins. Gray business suits, white shirts, and ties with wide, diagonal stripes. One tie was red and gold, the other blue and green. Both had little American flag pins in the right lapels of their suit jackets, short, razor-cut hair, and cheeks shaved so close they gleamed.
“I don’t think they’re looking to dive.” Mary blew smoke toward the men.
Hallie approached them. “Can I help you?”
“I’m Agent Fortier,” said the one with the red-and-gold tie. “This is my partner, Agent Whittle. We’re with the Department of Homeland Security.”
They showed ID folders with gold badges and photos.
Hallie flushed, folded her arms across her chest, pissed off just by the sight of them. “Let me guess. You’re worried we’re diving with terrorists, sowing mines in harbors or some such bullshit. Am I right?”
Fortier’s mouth dropped open. Apparently people usually showed more respect. While Whittle coughed and examined a wet suit’s price tag, Fortier maintained a neutral expression. “Can we speak privately, Dr. Leland?”
That surprised
her
. Hallie wasn’t called “doctor” around here, where people just knew her as a dive instructor and guide.
“Nope,” she said. “Let’s do this tomorrow. Rough day at the office, gentlemen.” She started to walk away, already tasting an ice-cold Corona, then stopped. “In fact, let’s not do this at all. You want to see me, I have a lawyer you can talk to first.” It wasn’t true, but she thought it might get them off her back.
“Dr. Leland,” Fortier’s eyes flicked from side to side. His voice dropped to a whisper.
“This is a matter of national security.”
That
Norah Wilson, Dianna Love, Sandy Blair, Misty Evans, Adrienne Giordano, Mary Buckham, Alexa Grace, Tonya Kappes, Nancy Naigle, Micah Caida