THIRTY-SIX

Present Day

Chesapeake Bay, Maryland

    I tried to kick my way up to the surface. I couldn’t get enough air in my lungs, no matter how hard I sucked on the regulator. Frantic shouts came over the intercom, but I ignored them. I had only one thing on my mind-I had to get out of the water.

    I broke through the surface into the moonlight and ripped the mask off my face and the regulator out of my mouth. I gulped the air and tried to think of happy thoughts.

    Christian Nielsen, our dive master, popped up a moment later and tore off his own mask. He slapped his palm hard against the water and sent up a great splash. Then he swam to the boat and clambered onto the dive platform.

    Christian’s eight-year-old son Julian walked back to the stern. “Dad, give the man a break,” he said.

    “He could get us all killed by acting like that,” Christian said. He pointed at me. “Do that next week, and you’ll both end up in a compression chamber.”

    At that moment, I didn’t really care. “There’s not going to be a next week,” I gasped.

    Val surfaced next to me. She turned to the instructor. “I think Scott was better this time.”

    “Bullshit,” Christian said. “He panicked again. We’re done here-this isn’t gonna work.”

    “I think he can do it,” Julian said. He gave me a smile. “I know he can.”

    Christian faced his son. “What makes you so sure, Julian?”

    “Sometimes I just know,” he said. “You know I’m right, Dad.”

    Our dive instructor frowned. “My son is usually a better judge of talent than I am,” he said to Val and me. Then he turned back to Julian. “But this time I think you’re wrong.”

    The boy shook his head. “No, I’m not. Mr. Waverly can do it.” He looked at Val. “When I was little, my mom sang me lullabies after I had nightmares. Do you know any lullabies?”

    Val smiled. “I do, Julian. That’s a good idea.”

    “It’s a stupid idea,” Christian said. “Start the engines, son. We’re heading back.”

    “Wait,” I said. I gritted my teeth. “Let’s try it again.”

    The dive master shrugged. Then he twisted his wrist to read his dive computer. “You’ve got time for only one more shot,” he said. “It’s now or never.”

    I threw a grimace at Val and then put on my mask. I bit down on the mouthpiece and dove under the waves.

    I never would have thought I’d get a panic attack. But there it was: a big gnarly monster living inside of me. And it would mess up our trip if I couldn’t figure out how to dive in dark places without becoming a danger to everybody else.

    I’d been in plenty of tight spaces before. Last year, when Val and I hid in the trunk of Bob’s limo, I didn’t panic. And I stayed calm when Andre Feret tossed us into an airless closet in Venice-along with the body of the assistant he had shot.

    But diving in the dark was different. Maybe it was the cold water squeezing my wetsuit. Maybe it was how my wrist-attached flashlight only pierced a few feet of the murk in front of me. Whatever it was, the panic overwhelmed me, and I wanted nothing but to push myself off the bottom of the Chesapeake Bay, leap out of the water, rip off my wetsuit, and gulp fresh air-not the recycled stuff the rebreather pumped into my lungs.

    Fortunately, we were diving in only twenty feet, and we didn’t have to worry about decompression. An old culvert lay on the bottom, and our instructor was having us retrieve a stainless steel toolbox he had buried at the deep end. Val had done it the first time without a hitch, but this was my third and final attempt.

    “Ready?” Val asked. The rebreather’s regulators garbled our voices, but we could understand each other.

    “As much as I’ll ever be.” I kicked forward and glided up to the culvert. The entrance was lit by my and Val’s lights. One last glance back at Val and the dive master, and I swam into the opening.

    And my panic monster came hurtling back to join me in that tiny space in the middle of all the murk. My body screamed for me to return to land. My heart raced, and I let loose a strangled cry. My flippers thrashed in the water.

    I heard somebody on the intercom, barely audible over the din of my own heartbeats. What were they saying? I scrunched my eyes shut and balled my fists and tried to hear.

    It was Val, singing softly in Russian. It was a tune I had never heard before, and I couldn’t understand the garbled words, but listening to her voice calmed me down just enough to stop my thrashing.

    I pictured the waves of Val’s singing carrying me gently up the culvert. I kept my eyes closed, and I gave gentle kicks to propel myself along. And after a few minutes, my head bumped into something. I opened my eyes, and the toolbox gleamed in the beam of my flashlight. I had made it, with Julian’s idea and Val’s help. We’d be able to do this in Europe next week.

    That night, as we lay in our bed before the morning’s trip to Germany, I closed my eyes and could still feel the gentle rocking of the waves. I opened them to the moonlight and rolled onto my side. “What was that lullaby you sang in the water?” I asked Val.

    She smiled. “It’s not quite a lullaby. It’s a love song that tells of a beautiful girl dreaming for her prince.”

    I made a face. “You stopped my panic attack with a love song?”

    “It worked.” She kissed the tip of my nose. “You were in such bad shape.”

    I rolled onto my back, bringing her on top of me. “Can you sing it again?”

    She snuggled into my arms, her lips close to my ear. “I’ll sing you the first few verses.”

    I closed my eyes and listened to her beautiful, calming voice. “Tell me the lyrics,” I said when she stopped.

    She propped herself up on her elbows and smiled. “The golden rays of the sun are caressing the shore. The waves are washing up, and somewhere far away, a beautiful ship is floating, its scarlet sail blooming.”

    I raised my head up off the pillow and gave her a long kiss. “You saved me, my beautiful girl,” I murmured. “What shall be your reward?”

    “I’ll get it myself,” she said, her hand sliding down my side and across my hip.