The yacht Jurisprudence was following the course laid out by a sun making its slow descent into the Gulf of Mexico. With his hands on the wheel, Deke aimed for the trail of light that was setting the emerald water aglow. Miss Prudence, as Deke liked to call her, was nearing her destination.
They had timed their journey to arrive a little before sunset. The day was balmy, with just enough breeze to keep the heat at bay. The dozen passengers aboard Miss Prudence were congregated on the main deck.
Deke caught the eye of the organizer. This was her show.
“Permission to drop anchor, Captain,” he yelled.
Lily smiled. This outing was her idea. She looked around and seemed to test the area with all of her senses, making sure it was just the right spot. After a few moments of surveying, she offered a satisfied nod to Deke and called, “Drop the anchor!”
“Aye, aye,” Deke said.
Almost half a year had passed since Lily’s rescue. She was seeing a therapist three days a week, and her godfather checked in with her once or twice a week, which was probably as much as any teenager could stomach, but she humored him.
The healing process for what Lily had been forced to endure was slow. You don’t walk out of hell unscathed. But his goddaughter was coping, and her support system was doing its best to make sure she had more good days than bad days. During their voyage, Deke had been heartened to hear her laugh a few times. In coming to this place, she was looking for some closure. And Lily wasn’t the only one needing that.
For once, the bad guys hadn’t come out on top and had ended up either dead or in prison. It was rare for the universe to get it right. Peter Stone’s own soldiers had flipped on him and were testifying against him in Karina Boyko’s homicide. It was looking more and more like Stone would spend the rest of his days in prison. And even Geofredo Salazar and all his money hadn’t proved to be immune from retribution. A month earlier, he’d been shot and killed. There had been no witnesses to the shooting.
Karma, Deke wanted to believe.
Lily and Sylvia made their way to the center of the main deck where everyone had gathered. Conversations stopped, and the mood suddenly turned somber.
From his vantage point in the wheelhouse, Deke watched Sylvia give her daughter an encouraging shoulder rub. Even though she was among friends, Lily looked nervous. Or maybe she only looked like the uncertain sixteen-year-old kid that she was. For her to just be able to act her age again, Deke thought, was a good thing.
After getting a reassuring nod and smile from her mother, Lily found her voice. “I’m glad you guys are here,” she said.
She looked down at her feet and took a moment to gather her thoughts. When she raised her head, Lily’s eyes were wet.
“Today, I wanted us to come to this place to remember a friend. I never got a chance to know Karina Boyko like I would have wanted to, but because of her, I’m alive. I was a stranger who asked Karina to help me. And just before she died, Karina made a call on my behalf, and someone listened.”
Silent tears coursed down Diana’s cheeks, but she managed a smile for Lily.
“I know it’s kind of a miracle I’m alive, but that’s because of you guys. And because of Karina.”
Lily held up a picture of a red-haired young woman for all to see.
“I was the only one here who had the chance to meet Karina while she was still alive, so her mom sent me this picture to show everyone today. Even though Mrs. Boyko couldn’t be here, Michael and I have been talking with her through a translator, and she wanted everyone to know how glad she is that we are remembering Karina like this.
“Anyway, you can see Karina had really red hair. Because of that, she had this nickname. The other girls called her rusalka, which is like a mermaid with red hair. What sucks, though, is that you only become a rusalka after you’ve violently drowned. That’s the story, at least. But what really, really sucks is that’s how Karina ended up dying. If you believe the tales, most rusalki are pissed off at the world because of how their lives ended, but it’s not only that. The stories say the drowned woman’s soul will forever haunt the waters where she died unless her death is avenged.
“I’m not saying I believe any of that, because I know it sounds bat-shit crazy, but I’ve been through enough of my own crazy stuff to not want to take any chances for my friend Karina. I want her to be at peace, and hear from all of us that she doesn’t need to haunt these waters, because there are people here who have avenged her death, and who continue to avenge it.”
Lily stopped talking and took a few moments to look out to the sea. “You can rest in peace, Karina.”
There was a chorus of people saying, “Amen.”
Lily said, “My mom told me in ocean memorials like this, flowers are traditional, so we brought lots of red and white roses for everyone to remember Karina.”
Lily reached into a five-gallon bucket, removed a handful of roses, and made her way to the railing. After whispering some private words, she tossed the colorful blossoms into the air. More roses soon followed. Deke left the wheelhouse and joined the others in the floral ceremony. Everyone said their goodbyes in their own way. In the aftermath of Karina’s send-off, roses bobbed on the water’s surface, seeming to catch the last throes of light cast by a spectacular sunset. The end of the day was marked by a glowing red sky.
“Red sky at night,” Deke said, “sailor’s delight.”
And not only sailors. The gathering suddenly became convivial. Deke went around sharing conversation and laughs, but he didn’t linger for long. Even on calm seas, and with the ship anchored, he felt his place was in the wheelhouse.
Lily took her hosting duties seriously, going from person to person and spending time with everyone. She saved Deke for last, finally joining him at the helm.
“You’re missing all the good food.”
“No chance of that. Teri made sure there was enough for an army.”
“In that case, you’re missing the company.”
“I’m talking to you now, aren’t I? Besides, it’s the job of the captain to see to the needs of the passengers.”
“I had no idea how big this thing was. It’s like the size of a battleship.”
“I’m glad it’s big enough that you had a nice stage. Your father would have been very proud of his daughter.”
“Do you think so?”
“Without a doubt.”
“I don’t remember him very well,” Lily confessed.
“The only thing you need to remember is how much he loved you. In his own way, your father was a romantic. When I first got to know him, we were both single, but even then, Art knew what he wanted. He was thinking about you even before he met your mom.”
“Come on.”
“I kid you not. One night the two of us were out having drinks, and I can’t remember how the conversation came up, but Art asked if I would be godfather to his first child. That sounds crazy, right? Here was a guy who didn’t even have a steady girlfriend, and he was asking me to be godfather to some imaginary child in the distant future.”
“What’d you say?”
“I told him, ‘I’d be honored.’ And I was. Even though it wasn’t until about ten years later that you came along.”
Lily tried not to show it, but Deke could see how pleased she was.
“You’ve probably seen some of the pictures from your baptism,” Deke said. “If you can’t tell from the photos, your father was absolutely beaming. I don’t think he wanted to share you with anyone. At the party, I’m not sure if he ever let go of you.”
“Did you see him much after that?”
Deke shook his head. “By then I had entered private practice, and Spanish Trace is the better part of seven hundred miles from Fort Lauderdale. I wish I’d made an effort to bridge the distance, but I didn’t.”
“I’m kind of glad he didn’t live to see what happened to me.”
“Why?”
“Because of all the bad shit I went through.”
“Nothing that occurred would have tarnished your father’s opinion of you.”
“Yeah, right. Every dad wants his daughter to be a sex slave.”
“Art would have been proud of your grit, and your smarts, and your finding a way to hold on long enough to survive.”
Lily blew out some air, not hiding her skepticism.
“It’s true,” Deke said. “A German philosopher named Nietzsche once said, ‘What doesn’t destroy me makes me stronger.’ If Nietzsche’s right, that makes you one of the strongest people on this planet.”
“I don’t feel strong.”
“I’m not about to tell you that you haven’t had more than your share of adversity, but bad things have happened to everyone here, and they’ve still managed to come out on the other side of that.”
“Really?” The word came out as a challenge. Lily turned her attention to the passengers and settled on a laughing Gina. “What about Gina? She’s got it going.”
“Yes, she does. But Gina’s father was a piece of work. He was abusive. Gina can tell you just how abusive. For a long time, her personal life was a train wreck because of him.”
A begrudging Lily said, “You’d never know.”
“No, you wouldn’t.”
Lily still wasn’t convinced. She looked to the deck again, in search of another happy face. “What about Jake?”
“A week before graduating from law school, Jake lost his twin brother, Blake, to an opioid overdose. That same addiction almost killed Jake. It’s been a long road back for him.”
“I never would have guessed,” Lily said.
“No one would.”
Curious now, Lily pointed to the very pregnant and glowing Mona. “Mom-to-be looks like she’s won the lottery.”
“Looks that way, right? And yet Mona’s entire family was slaughtered in war, and she barely survived. The severity of her wounds made it difficult for Mona to conceive.”
“And I suppose Michael’s got a sob story as well?”
“Did you notice that tattoo on his chest?”
“When he was sunbathing earlier, it was hard to miss. I thought about giving him shit for advertising he was an A-plus student.”
“You’ll have to hassle him about something else. The tattoo is his blood type. Michael is A positive. He and the other rescue rangers in his unit had their blood types inked into their skin so that in the event of a severe injury, the medics would know how to treat them.”
“Wow.”
“Michael was only a year older than you are when he became an emancipated minor. He and his mother had to do some serious planning when she was diagnosed with terminal cancer. At the age of seventeen Michael got his GED, which allowed him to skip his senior year and join the Air Force early when his mother died. That couldn’t have been a cakewalk for him. I know his service wasn’t. He came home with a broken back and traumatic brain injury.”
Lily wasn’t making any more skeptical sounds.
Deke said, “That’s how it’s going to be with you one day. People won’t know what happened to you unless you tell them.”
“What about you?”
“Too much baggage to mention.”
“Bullshit. You’re this hotshot lawyer who’s got everything going for him. I mean, who could afford this boat? And you’ve got the perfect wife and family. It must be nice.”
“It is nice. But when I was your age, there wasn’t a person in the world who believed in me. If you’d asked anyone, they would have told you there was no way I would ever succeed in life. I would have told you the same thing myself.”
“Come on.”
“My parents gave me up to foster care when I was just a kid. I lived in four separate foster homes until I aged out of the system at eighteen.”
“For real?”
“Cross my heart. I know there’s a part of me that will always feel like an abandoned kid, but I’ve refused to let it define me. In some ways it’s even been a strength. It’s made me want to take on cases representing the dispossessed and the voiceless.”
Neither spoke for a minute. Deke could see Lily was thinking about what he’d told her. Her eyes kept looking at those out on the deck. She seemed to be seeing them differently now.
“So, we’re all misfits?”
“Every single one of us,” Deke said.
“That’s kind of cool.”
“Yeah, I guess it is.”
“You don’t always have to be the one steering the ship, you know.”
“It’s an old habit.”
“The anchor’s in the water. I’m thinking we should join the others.”
“I’m thinking you’re right,” Deke said.
THE END