Inga threw her hands in the air and gave up. She reached over her shoulder, got hold of the back end of the griffin and pulled it up—which had the incidental effect of yanking up her shirt and giving Luke a brief, tempting glimpse of her flexing, freckled back and a slash of pink underwear above the waistband of her jeans. “Fine, you annoying, wretched creatures. Come on.”
She headed back down to the boat, with one of the “wretched creatures” on her shoulder and the others trooping behind her like rather ugly ducklings.
“If this causes any problems, I want you all to remember that you could have helped me and didn’t.” It was clear that Inga wasn’t truly angry; she had gone slightly pink, but her eyes were sparkling.
Luke helped her remove the griffin from her shoulder, Basil, and got nipped for his efforts. They put the four babies in the bow, with a tarp arranged to shield them from the wind of the boat’s passage. The parents both flew around during this process, squawking anxiously and getting Rogue riled up again, and finally swooped down to settle in with their offspring.
“This is starting to feel less like a boat and more like the circus clown car,” Nita laughed. “Are we ready to go?”
Inga scrambled up on the dock, which rocked wildly under her feet, and untied the mooring rope before climbing back into the bow. As she did, the part of the dock where she had been standing wobbled and gave way, the rotten boards collapsing into the water underneath.
Nita gave a cheer. “Nice timing!”
Inga pumped a fist in the air. Nita, at the steering console, began idling the boat slowly away from the remains of the dock.
“Guess we’re gonna have to fix that the next time we’re here,” Inga muttered.
As Nita steered the boat away from the shore, Luke noticed Inga gazing back at the dock and nudged her. “You okay?”
“Oh—yeah.” She tore her gaze away from it. “It’s not that important. I just wondered—oh, never mind.” She swiped her hair out of her face, the ends already curling and frizzy from salt spray. “Let’s get this show on the road.”
The ride was pleasant,the day cool but calm. Luke wore a slicker that belonged to one of Nita’s relatives, slightly too small across the chest, with the hood up just in case the helicopter came back. But they saw no sign of it. Nita handed off the driving duties to Inga, and she showed Luke how to steer. The skiff’s handling was very simple, and although Luke had never piloted a boat before, he found himself enjoying it thoroughly.
“It’s a different experience when the sea is rough.” Nita was sitting in the stern seat with Jo-Jo. “You’d get a workout then. A little boat like this can easily flip over in high waves.”
She was bouncing Jo-Jo on her knee, while the baby looked around curiously. Luke had expected Jo-Jo to be bored on the boat; he’d pictured a nightmare of all three adults having to constantly snatch her back from disaster. But instead she seemed calmer and less overwhelmingly energetic than anywhere else. The rolling of the waves really did seem to be soothing for her.
None of them were too worried about life vests, since they all had swimming shift forms that would handle a lot more capably in the water than a human encumbered by a flotation device. Nita appeared confident that Jo-Jo would shift the minute she hit the water, if it came to that, but even if not, the baby was surrounded by aquatic adults.
The coast skimmed by, and all too soon, they approached the harbor.
For all his nervousness about going somewhere more public, Luke would never forget his first sight of Westerly Cove from the sea. He had seen these pretty little coast towns before, or similar ones, but there was something utterly stunning about the view of the small many-colored houses as they motored into Westerly Cove’s horseshoe-shaped bay. A picturesque red and white lighthouse stood on a point overlooking the cove.
Nita, at the helm again, motored deftly into the bay and turned off the engine as they approached the shore, allowing momentum to carry them forward until the hull ground gently on a long gravel beach with a number of other small boats. A larger set of docks accommodated commercial fishing boats.
Inga splashed into the edge of the water and pulled the boat further out. She showed Luke how to tie the mooring rope, and gave him a nod of approval when he executed it on the first try. Then she straightened and stretched, pressing her fists into her lower back in a way that made her breasts do truly unfair things under her sweater and windbreaker.
“The good thing is that my dad’s down the coast for a week or so with some fishing buddies. So we should have the house all to ours?—”
“Inga!!” came a bellow down the beach.
“Oh no,” Inga said under her breath.
Seconds later, she was engulfed in a hug by an absolute bear of a man, wide and tall, silver-haired, pulling her close with such enthusiasm that Inga gave a faint “Oof!”
“Back so soon!” bellowed the enthusiastic man, who Luke—with a certain amount of nervousness—assumed was her dad. “We all knew you were fine, but it’s great to know for sure.” He finally set her down, and Luke realized her feet had literally been off the ground. “Where’s the boat?”
“Long story, tell you later.” Inga paused for a moment, catching her breath, then turned to Luke. “Dad, this is Luke. He’s a hiker with nowhere to stay, and I figured he could spend the night at our place, but I thought you were going to be?—”
“Ah, a guest!” Her dad engulfed Luke’s hand in his massive one. He had a grip like a steel vice. “I’m Stieg. Luke, eh? Good name! Solid name. From away, eh?”
“Er, yeah.” Luke had figured out enough to know that meant from the mainland. “I don’t mean to impose on your hospitality?—”
“Nonsense. And whose’s this fine fellow?” Rogue bounded ashore, and Stieg ruffled the big dog’s ears. “Fine beautiful fellow. And there’s Miss Westerly. Is that the lovely little girl?” He cooed over Jo-Jo a bit, while Inga and Luke helped get the rest of their stuff onshore. There wasn’t that much of it.
The griffins had settled down on the ride. Other than having to step over them as they came and went from the boat, it seemed easiest to just leave them there. Nobody said anything about the feathered heap that occasionally squawked.
“Here, what’s the heaviest thing? Give it.” Stieg shouldered a cooler effortlessly. As the group straggled up the shore toward the town, he said cheerily, “So let’s hear your story, lad! Hiker, eh? Hiking where?”
