The Trade. Shirley Palmer

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      CHAPTER 2

      Matt stripped away the wet silky covering, struggled out of his polo shirt and wrapped the newborn infant, a girl, in the soft cotton. Her eyes were closed, her hands curled into tiny fists. Downy strands of gold hair feathered damply against her head.

      He scanned the beach but the blowing sand and smoke and falling ash cut visibility down to a few yards. Rabbits and a couple of raccoons huddled against the low bluff close to a flock of gulls. He could see nothing that could possibly be a human form.

      Who would leave a baby like this?

      He held the almost weightless bundle against his chest with some idea of warming her with his own body heat, put on his wet jacket to protect them both against falling debris, and started back along the beach toward the stairs up to the Edwards house. If they were still standing, maybe there would be firefighters trying to save it.

      He scanned the beach as he ran. Trash thrown up by a polluted ocean was caught in the giant kelp above the high tide mark—nylon fishing line, plastic holders for six packs, bits of Styrofoam coolers. No sign of the mother, no patch of blood, nothing to show that a woman had just given birth. He stumbled across a beam of charred wood and saw the beach was littered with planks.

      The stairs. Since he had passed them only minutes ago, the ferocious wind had blown the damaged stairs apart.

      He swept his eyes across the low bluff, looking for another way up, handholds, anything, but even if he could find a way, the top of the cliff was blazing. He hesitated—the empty restaurant was closer than his own place, he could go back. But he’d lived in Malibu all his life, seen flames leap two hundred feet in seconds, consume a house in minutes. And the tide was roaring in. He had to get home.

      Flooded with relief, Matt jogged across the dry sand, toward his own beach stairs. The small gray clapboard house was intact. The large houses on either side were dark, not surprising. His neighbors used them only on weekends, and that rarely.

      For the last hour he’d been running nonstop, across soft sand, in and out of the ocean, holding the baby close as he clambered over the bare rocky reefs that would normally be covered by resting seals as the tide receded. On a night like this, though, they’d stay out at sea.

      The sky was a cauldron, the fire dangerously close. He could feel blasts of heat from the thirty-foot flames now whirling south on the ridge above the Pacific Coast Highway as it followed the curve of the coastline toward the enormous expanse of lawn fronting Pepperdine University. That lawn still pissed a lot of people off, they were still arguing about the amount of water used to keep it green, the contaminated runoff draining into the Santa Monica Bay, but in a wildfire it could be a godsend, a break where fire crews could make a stand.

      If the wind turned west again as it easily could, a maelstrom like this created its own wind patterns, flames would be across the highway in minutes, take the houses above his on the land side of Malibu Road, jump to the beach side and burn clear down to the water. From what he’d seen, so far the flames had reached oceanside houses in a staggered pattern, driven by the changing wind. His place was vulnerable, clapboard with an old shake roof, it would go in seconds.

      He pushed open the door into his smoky kitchen, staggering as eighty pounds of terrified dog hurled himself at his legs.

      “It’s okay, Barns. It’s okay, boy.” Matt held off the Lab with one hand and picked up the phone. No dial tone. The line was dead. He shook it in frustration. Of course it was dead—the phone lines were down. This wasn’t the first fire he’d been through in his thirty-six years, he should have remembered that. At least he had his mobile.

      The baby close against his chest, he searched his jacket. Then again. Patted the pockets in his pants. The phone was gone. He’d dropped it somewhere on the beach.

      He laid the child down on the soft couch in the living room, touched her pale cheek. She was cool. Colder than she had been when he picked her up. Matt felt for the pulse in the baby’s throat, as he’d done on the beach. He couldn’t find it. He flexed his fingers, felt on the other side. No pulse. Maybe he was doing it wrong. He rubbed his fingers on the couch to sensitize them, tried again. Nothing. Heart hammering, he knelt, held the tiny nose, blew gently into the infant’s mouth. Once, twice. Again. But he knew it was useless. There was no breath, no heartbeat. The baby was dead. Sometime in the last hour, as they made their way down the beach, she had died in his arms. He had not even known when life left her. Surely, he should have felt something.

      He sat back on his heels. She was so delicate, so fragile, she made barely a dent in the cushion. Long lashes fanned her cheeks. He didn’t even know what color her eyes were. What sort of woman would abandon her defenseless newborn on an empty beach?

      Minutes passed. Barney pushed his nose at Matt’s hand, then started to howl as if he knew, a mournful sound that gave a voice to the tangle of feeling swelling in Matt’s chest.

      Matt put a hand on Barney’s head, and took a long, deep painful breath. The smoke inside the house was thicker now, the heat increasing. Barney nudged at him insistently. Matt knew he had to get some water on the roof, and soon. He looked at her one last time, then covered her face with his shirt and got to his feet.

      “Come on, boy.” He snapped on Barney’s leash in case they had to make a run for it, took the Lab with him into his bedroom. Black particles of ash hung in the air and coated every surface; shadows danced madly in the dirty amber glow that was the only light, but it was enough СКАЧАТЬ