Fangtooth

Chapter 8

Shazam barked eagerly as she ran along the beach for the driftwood Bruce had thrown for her. He watched as she splashed into the surf, snapping at the small waves that broke against her legs.

A warm day; there was already a heat haze on the horizon and Bruce had built up a sweat with the three-mile jog he’d undertaken after breakfast.

Jack had still been in bed when he left–probably still annoyed at moving out here. With the house being in such a state, Bruce had erected camp beds for them to sleep on until they were sorted out. Jack had complained as usual.

A couple of kids were making sandcastles at the water’s edge while their parents lay on beach towels. Bruce was surprised how quiet the village was considering it had such a wonderful little beach, but he supposed most people opted for the new resort further along the coast, where the kids could be more easily appeased with arcades and amusement parks.

From where he was, he had a good view of the harbour and the houses clinging to the hillside beyond it. There were a couple of small dinghies setting sail, and a couple of trawlers moored up. The tide was out, which literally grounded the big boats. Bruce couldn’t imagine being controlled by the tides of the sea.

A dog howled somewhere in the village and the sound carried across the bay. Shazam cocked her ears and barked in response and the dog howled twice more then fell silent. Bruce remembered reading somewhere that if a dog howls three times; it signified someone was going to die. He guessed the thing with superstitions was they had to have had some basis in fact somewhere.

When he reached the end of the beach, Bruce walked onto the path at the side of the road. The sand to his right had given way to rocks, and now the tide was out, numerous rock pools remained.

Recalling Jack’s comment about the house, he headed for the bar to ask Duncan about its history.

When he reached the harbour, he spied the woman Jack had given the light to in the bar. His heart did a little flutter at the sight of her, which made him feel guilty. Not that Veronica would have wanted him to become a recluse; she had made that perfectly clear on her deathbed. It had been eight months, but he felt almost as though he was being unfaithful. He realised he was unconsciously revolving the wedding band around his finger so he released it.

The woman was talking to a man on one of the trawlers. She laughed, and the sound carried across the harbour. Bruce felt his cheeks flush with colour and he clenched his fists.

This is stupid. I don’t even know her, he thought.

Ordering Shazam to heel, he walked around the harbour. It wouldn’t hurt to say hello.

When they drew close to the woman, Shazam barked.

The man on the boat and the woman both turned.

“Hello again,” the woman said, smiling.

“Hi,” Bruce said, looking from the woman down to the man.

The man on the boat nodded and continued unravelling the nets, stringing them across the deck like a web.

Shazam growled from the back of her throat. “Shush,” Bruce said. “I don’t know what’s got into her.” He shrugged apologetically. “Away. Go and lie over there if you can’t behave.” He pointed to a spot by the harbour wall about twenty feet away. Shazam whined softly and then licked Bruce’s hand. “You won’t get around me like that.” Tail between her legs, Shazam walked away. “Lie down,” Bruce said. Shazam obediently dropped to the ground, resting her head on her front paws, ears pricked as she watched her master.

The man on the boat looked at Shazam and chewed his gums. “Perhaps she doesn’t like the smell of fish.”

Bruce nodded. “Yes, that’s probably it.”

“What’s the dog’s name?” the woman asked.

“Shazam.”

“Strange name.”

“Long story.”

“Perhaps you’ll tell it to me sometime.”

Bruce blushed again. He hoped she thought it was only the heat. “Yes, I’d like that.”

“I didn’t introduce myself the other day. My name’s Erin McVey.”

Bruce shook her hand. “Bruce Holden.”

He looked down at the man on the boat, noticed what appeared to be a look of green-eyed rage that disappeared almost immediately.

“Trent Zander.” He nodded curtly and returned his attention to his nets.

“I’m not interrupting, am I?” Bruce asked.

Erin laughed softly. “No, Captain Zander here was trying to convince me to go for a drink with him, that’s all.”

Bruce felt another flush of jealousy. Zander looked up, his blue eyes unreadable. Toughened by the elements, his skin looked like leather, and his stubbled chin and angular jaw gave him a rugged appearance. He reminded Bruce of a young Clint Eastwood, so he wouldn’t be surprised if Erin accepted and went out with him.

“You on holiday?” Zander asked.

Bruce wondered whether he should post an ad in the local paper. “I’ve just moved here.”

“Was that your son you were with yesterday?” Erin asked.

Bruce nodded.

“And Mrs. Holden?” Zander interrupted.

Bruce swallowed. He still felt raw having to explain. “She’s dead.”

He noticed Erin glance at the wedding band on his finger. Women always noticed these things.

When neither Zander nor Erin apologized or asked further questions, Bruce found himself explaining anyway.

“She died of cancer eight months ago. Since then, it’s just been Jack and me.” He looked at Erin and smiled sheepishly as though apologizing. He noticed Zander staring up at him venomously “What about you two? Do you live around here?”

Erin reached into the pocket of her baggy grey pants and withdrew a packet of cigarettes and a lighter, which she held up for inspection. “I came prepared today,” she said as she lit a cigarette. She exhaled slowly. “I’m a marine biologist employed by a deep sea mining company to ascertain the ecological implications of their drilling, so I’m just a visitor.”

Bruce raised his eyebrows. He was impressed, but it made his fear of the sea seem childish.

Zander paused mending his nets. “If I had my way she’d move here permanently. The village could always do with more pretty girls.” He shot Bruce a glance and then winked at Erin.

Clive Dunn wiped sweat from his brow. It was damned hot today.

He pulled his sunglasses down from his forehead to shield his eyes and sat up on the beach towel. Sweat trickled down his chest, navigating a course through the sand that had stuck to the suntan lotion.

“You two be careful,” he shouted to Ben and Jane as they splashed at the water’s edge. Kids! They seemed to have no fear.

“Now that you’ve woken up, would you rub some oil on my back?” his wife Gaynor asked.

“What makes you think I was asleep?”

“Because you don’t usually snore when you’re awake.”

“You got me there.” He leaned across and picked up the bottle of oil. He opened it and squirted a liberal amount onto his palm. Gaynor held her blonde ponytail out of the way to allow him to rub the oil onto her back.

“You could have wiped your hands,” she said. “It feels as though you’re rubbing me with sandpaper.”

When he looked down, he noticed the sensual act of applying the oil had given him an erection, and he was glad the kids were too far away to see. He ran his hands over the thin string holding the blue bikini together; knew it would be a cinch to undo the bow before Gaynor could complain. Testing his luck, he circled his hands to the edges of her back, and then quickly slid them forwards and underneath the cups of the bikini and squeezed her breasts.

Gaynor let out a little squeal, turned, and playfully slapped him on the arm.

“The kids might see,” she said as she readjusted her top. Then she noticed his erection and she gave him a quick kiss. “What do they say, only mad dogs, Englishmen and horny middle-aged men go out in the midday sun?”

He winked.

Clive leaned back on his elbows. Since the new resort had opened, the village of Mulberry had dropped off people’s radar. Having holidayed here for a number of years, he remembered when you couldn’t move on the beach. Now it was deserted. Life didn’t get much better.

The sun was at his back and the shadows of the cliffs to his right were thrown across the sand and into the sea like a fisherman’s net. In the distance, he could see a tanker moving slowly towards the horizon. As a kid, he’d always dreamed of sailing around the world, visiting exotic locales. The dream persisted until he left school, but then he met Gaynor and the dream was put on hold. He settled down, got a job in the local branch of a chain of supermarkets, worked his way up and was now the youngest manager in the company.

Occasionally the wanderlust returned, only now it was going to have to wait until the kids had grown up and left home–which would be at least another eleven years. But as he’d waited this long, he could wait a while longer.

“So what do you want to do tonight?” Gaynor asked as she lay back down.

“Do you really need to ask?”

“Well, that takes care of three minutes, but what about the rest of the evening?”

“Very funny. I’ll have you know I’m a sexual athlete.”

“More like a sexual deviant.” She chuckled.

Clive grinned. “We could take a drive to that restaurant we went to the other year. The one a few miles along the coast.”

Gaynor frowned.

“You know, the one where we had sex in the parking lot before the kids were born.”

“Oh, you mean the one that we hadn’t noticed had security cameras.”

Although he was wearing sunglasses, he couldn’t help noticing his wife blush.

“As long as they don’t remember us,” she continued. “Probably have our pictures on the wall of shame.”

“Great.”

“Or perhaps the film made its way onto the internet. Look what happened to Paris Hilton and those other celebrity tapes.”

“We’re not celebrities.”

“Perhaps we are now.” She laughed, then pulled a T-shirt over her face. “Anyway, it’s your turn to watch the kids while I snooze.”

He looked up and saw Ben and Jane were building a sandcastle, letting the incoming sea fill the moat they had dug around it. Satisfied they were okay, he picked up his Richard Laymon novel and began to read.

After fifteen minutes, the words started to blur as sweat rolled into his eyes, stinging. He reached across and grabbed a towel from the top of the bag Gaynor had packed. After wiping his eyes, he took out the bottle of water. He unscrewed the top and took a sip. It was warm. He was going to have to invest in one of those cooler packs. He would kill for an ice cream right now. Then he remembered they sold them in the village shop.

Deciding to take the kids for a walk while Gaynor slept, he looked towards where the kids were playing and saw Jane was on her own. He quickly scanned the beach, but couldn’t see Ben.

Panic flooded his body; felt like a cold icicle piercing his heart and flooding his veins with ice. He jumped up.

“Jane, where’s your brother?” he shouted.

Jane looked up from where she knelt at the water’s edge, a collection of seashells in her hand to adorn the sandcastle. She shook her head. “He was here a minute ago.”

“Clive, what is it?” Gaynor asked as she sat up and pulled the T-shirt from her face.

Clive didn’t answer as he jumped to his feet and scanned the beach. He cupped his hands around his mouth. “Ben,” he shouted. He shielded his eyes and looked towards the cliffs, then towards the rock pools on the way to the village, but there was no sign of Ben. He wouldn’t wander off without telling them… when he found him, Clive was going to give him such a smack. He shouted his son’s name again.

He ran down the beach to Jane, the warm sand oozing between his toes. “You must know where he’s gone,” he said when he reached her, a tremor in his voice.

Jane shook her head.

“Where’s Ben?” Gaynor asked as she arrived at his side.

Clive felt a lump in his throat. He looked out to sea. Thought he saw something floating about thirty feet out. Liquid nitrogen superseded the ice in his veins. Ben?

Without hesitating, he ran into the sea. Despite the heat of the sun, the water was cold and gooseflesh spread from his legs to his torso. Bits of seaweed floated around his legs. The further out he went, the colder the water became. The seabed sloped quickly and he was soon up to his waist. He started to swim, heading in the direction he had seen the object. Saltwater stung his eyes. Panic fuelled his strokes, and before he knew it, he reached the spot where he thought he had spied something, but there was nothing there. He trod water. Looked around. Small swells caused him to bob up and down.

Suppose Ben was underwater?

The thought chilled him even more. He took a deep breath and dived. Visibility underwater was difficult, like looking through Vaseline, the saltwater stinging his eyes. Using his arms, he searched the area like a blind man, probing into the depths. Something brushed past his leg, making him squirm. He reached out and grabbed it, only to find it was a piece of seaweed.

He didn’t know how deep he was, but he hadn’t touched the bottom. He kicked with his legs, spinning in circles, a human whirlpool. He was going to have to head back up soon, but he had to find Ben.

His lungs felt as though they were burning. He needed to reach the surface, take another breath and then dive back down.

He kicked and groped at the water, forging a path back up. Bubbles burst from his nostrils as he started to exhale.

Seconds later his head broke the surface and he gulped in a deep breath. His breathing was rapid, his heart beating fast. He hadn’t exerted himself this much since betting his best friend Alex that he could beat him in a race to the bar. He’d lost.

Saltwater stung his eyes, and he rubbed them with the backs of his hands.

“Clive.”

He heard Gaynor shout and he looked back towards the beach; saw she was waving, and then she pointed down to Jane and Ben at her side.

Relief washed over Clive like a wave. He exhaled a long sigh and let his legs drift up, floating on his back to breathe as he circled his arms to stay afloat. I’m going to kill him, he thought. But really he knew he was going to hug him so tight that Ben would shout for him to let him go.

About to turn over and swim for shore, he felt something brush his back. His first thought was more seaweed. Then something grabbed him.

Clive gasped. Sharp pain erupted around his waist. He kicked out and thrashed with his arms. Seawater frothed around his torso like rabid foam. He reached down to prise off whatever had grabbed him, felt sharp teeth and bony skin. Fear unlike anything he’d ever felt rushed through his body.

Shark!

The creature pulled powerfully down, and Clive sank into the deep. Bubbles surged past his face, and the inky blackness turned red with blood.