I gape at Emma. Maybe Beth was right to suspect her. Was she trying to get one of us killed? “What?”
“That way,” Emma explains, “Russell and I can keep the boat afloat and help get you down if there’s a problem.”
“I’ll go,” Beth says quietly.
“No.” I shake my head, recalling Beth’s panic attack when we rode the glass elevator to the top of the Space Needle our junior year.
Courtney had driven all five of us to the Bainbridge Island Ferry on Beth’s seventeenth birthday, keeping the destination a secret from us until we got to the Space Needle. When I realized where Courtney was taking us, I tried to talk her out of it, reminding her of Beth’s fear of heights. Courtney feigned unawareness of Beth’s phobia, saying how the tickets were nonrefundable, even though we all knew that Beth couldn’t so much as climb a stepladder without hyperventilating. Since we were kids, Beth hated even sitting at the top of the bleachers, and we’d always make sure to find seats down below.
Beth’s not wanting to appear ungrateful turned to sheer terror when she passed out in the glass elevator. For a moment, I thought she’d had a heart attack and died. I called 911 as soon as we reached the top. Beth had regained consciousness by the time the medics arrived at theobservation tower’s revolving glass floor. They had to give her a Xanax for the elevator ride down.
Now, Beth places her hand on my shoulder. “Think of your girls. I’m not letting you risk your life while I stay down here and watch.”
“You can’t. What if you have a panic attack at the top?”
“You don’t do great with heights either,” Beth adds.
That’s true. But I’m not as bad as Beth.
“I found the bosun’s chair,” Russell calls from the stern. “Who’s going up?”
I look up at the teetering mast, then lower my gaze and turn to Russell, swallowing the lump of fear that swells in my throat. “I am.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Present: Day Five at Sea
“Are you sure this will hold?” I cautiously shift my weight against the bosun’s chair as Emma clips the shackle onto the end of her bowline knot. She then tests the second rope, which she refers to as a halyard, attached to my seat.
She avoids my gaze, and I know she’s still livid after learning I lied to cover up Courtney’s being the one who spilled the dish soap on the locker room floor.
“I’m sure.” Emma tugs on each halyard. “I trust the knot more than the shackle, because shackles can break. But I did both just in case.” She clips a short yellow rope that looks like a dog leash to the halyard.
Russell had tied the first line to the chair before Emma insisted on doing the second one while he steered the boat.
“We can’t trust him to do both,” she whispered as she checked his knot while he retreated to the helm.
At least she doesn’t want me to die, even though she’s pissed. I lower my gaze to the knot Emma tied before comparing it to the one Russell tied. Or what if Emma made a faulty knot and that’s why she’d stopped Russell from tying both? I swallow, lifting my weight from the chair asI think back to Beth accusing Emma of conspiring with Russell to kill Nojan and Gigi.
“What’s that?” I ask as she clips the other end of the yellow rope to one of the lines suspending my chair.
“This will keep you from swinging out too far and slamming into the mast.” The boat rocks, and Emma wraps her arm around the mast for support. “Especially in this weather,” she adds. “Ready?”
I adjust the heavy strap of my shoulder bag filled with the various tools we guessed I might need at the top: a screwdriver, a wrench, pliers, a bungee cord, and a few spare screws. I glance above at the swaying mast as the satellite dish clamors against it, hoping for an easy fix when I get to it. I’m not great with a screwdriver on solid ground. How the hell am I going to screw something in on a moving target while I’m suspended over forty feet in the air?
I lower my gaze to the rolling seas. They’re calmer than they were earlier but still speckled in whitecaps. Water sprays across the surface from the wind. I tear my eyes away, my mind wildly envisioning the boat getting knocked down a second time while I’m secured to the mast.
I lower my weight into the chair, ignoring my racing heart. “Ready.”
The seat feels surprisingly secure, especially with the shoulder and crotch straps connected to it.
Emma nods, patting me on the shoulder on her way to the cockpit. “Just keep calm and focus on fixing the Starlink. Keep your eyes up. Don’t worry about anything down below. Wouldn’t want you to break something.” Seeing the fear in my eyes, she adds, “I won’t let you fall.”
“She’s ready,” Emma calls to Beth, who’s waiting in the cockpit, gripping the end of one of the halyards wrapped around a winch. “Russell, keep us as steady as possible.”
Behind the wheel, Russell gives Emma a thumbs-up. I take a deep breath as I wait for Emma to get in position behind the other winch. Beth warily meets my gaze. I look away, closing my eyes in a futile attempt to quell my nerves.
“On three.”
