Page 71 of Savage Blooms
Finley trekked back up the hill and peered down into the loch. Adam was nowhere to be found. There was just a series of ripples emanating from the center of the loch, where bubbles were disrupting the surface of the water. Had he tried to dive down to the bottom?
Finley waited for three heartbeats, then four and then five as he anticipated Adam coming back up from under the water.
Six heartbeats passed.
Seven.
Wherewashe?
Adam burst from the water with a ragged gasp, his arms flailing. Finley’s stomach lurched.
Something was wrong.
Adam struggled to catch his breath, then disappeared beneath the waves again. When he came up for air a second time, he could barely keep his head above water.
He was being dragged under.
Finley was watching a man drown.
“Goddamnit,” Finley swore, then wrenched off his shoes and shucked off his jacket. He ran down the side of the hill, heedless of the sharp rocks underfoot, and hurled himself down the dock.
Without thinking twice, he dove into the green waters of the loch.
The water was bracingly cold but not shockingly so, and Finley knew this loch from his youth. It was ancient, but it wasn’t that deep, and Finley could swim to the bottom before losing his breath.
Adam was thrashing in the water when Finley found him, fighting off some unseen foe. He had kicked up so much sediment that Finley could barely make out anything at all, but strange shadows loomed up behind Adam.
Finley’s eyes must be playing tricks on him, because he could have sworn he saw a webbed hand circle Adam’s ankle and tug him further towards a watery grave.
Without sacrificing precious brain space to processing what he was seeing, Finley hooked his hands under Adam’s arms and began to kick furiously back up towards the surface. Adam was lead in his grasp, heavier than he ought to be, and for a moment Finley believed they wouldn’t make it. They were going to die down here. He thought of Eileen finding them both floating bloated and lifeless in the loch, of Nicola’s shrieking cries of grief. He thought of his father on Skye, receiving the news with watery eyes.
Then, just as his morbid visions were pressing down on him with the weight of the suffocating water, Finley broke through to the surface.
He gulped in air, eyes stinging, chest heaving. Adam was still a dead weight, and the comparison suddenly seemed all too apt. Finley laboriously kicked through the water until he could feel the silt and stone of the loch bed underfoot, and then he dragged Adam out of the water.
Somehow, Finley managed to get them both onto dry ground. A merciless wind whipped down off the mountains, making Finley shiver, but Adam didn’t stir at all, which was more concerning. He had stripped down to his boxers, and his lips and eyelids were blue.
“Adam,” Finley pleaded, kneeling on the water-smooth stones next to the other man. “Adam, wake up.”
He jostled Adam’s shoulder but nothing happened. He couldn’t really tell if Adam’s chest was rising or falling; if he was breathing, it was only shallowly.
Panic started to rise up in Finley’s throat. He didn’t know CPR. If Adam died on his watch the girls would never be able to look at him again, and he would never be able to forgive himself.
“Come on, Lancaster,” Finley said through gritted teeth. Utterly out of options, he slapped Adam briskly across the face.
Adam stirred with a groan. Then, he rolled onto his side and spat up a frightening amount of water.
Finley rocked back on his heels and let his eyes slide shut.
“Thank Christ,” he breathed.
“Finley,” Adam rasped, turning those cornflower-blue eyes on his rescuer. “How did you find me?”
“I heard you call out for help,” Finley lied. Adam might be full of generous feeling towards Finley for the small matter of saving his life, but he wouldn’t take kindly to Finley spying on him.
“There was something…” Adam went on, coughing up more water and a green thread of loch grass. “Something in the water. I swear it.”
“Like a fish?” Finley said hopefully, half leaning, half falling down onto his back. His chest was on fire from panic and exertion, and he felt a bit lightheaded.
