island and he was breaking it.
Once outside, he crossed the dark one-lane road that ran in front of the bed-and-breakfast and stepped onto the grass on the other side of it, walking up to the edge where the water kissed the land. As he stood there, in his plaid pajama pants and a worn T-shirt emblazoned with the logo of his college newspaper, staring at the glittering water and inhaling the briny air tempered with the scent of earthy grass, he tried to clear his mind but found it impossible.
A breeze came off the water, tugging at him, and Anders tore himself away from the view and followed it, thinking a walk might be just what he needed to help him sleep.
The bright moon and stars the only things lighting his path, Anders meandered up the one-lane road to the main street of town. If he thought Frick Island was desolate during the day, it was nothing compared to the dead of night. It was a strange feeling, to be so fully alone, every storefront, every house he passed dark and locked up tight.
Or was he? A movement up ahead in the dark caught his eye. He stilled, trying to focus. It was a figure, a person wearing dark clothing, but Anders couldn’t make out much more than that. Out of curiosity—and without making a conscious decision to do so—Anders began walking in the same direction the person went, toward the marina. As he closed the gap, he squinted, trying to make out a face, but it was too dark, and the person’s head was obscured beneath a ball cap. Anders paused when he reached the broken-down Chevy in front of the One-Eyed Crab, and thought about calling out, making his presence known, so if the person turned around, Anders wouldn’t appear creepy in his lurking. But something about the way the man—at least he thought it was a man—was walking, furtively, with nervous glances to his right and left, kept Anders silent. And made the hair on his arms stand on end.
Anders stood still, watching as the figure quietly approached the boat on planks. Tom’s boat. The man swiveled his head, looking around once more, causing Anders to quickly duck farther into the shadows of the restaurant.
What is he doing? Anders wondered, as the man stood at the boat, studying it. He walked slowly down its length, running his hand along the side, over the wormholes Piper had pointed out, as if he were assessing the damage. And that was when Anders noticed the object in the figure’s hand. He squinted, the moonlight just enough to make out the shape of a hammer.
Oh. Maybe he was going to fix it up, as a kindness for Piper; a surprise, he thought, just as the guy cocked his arm back as far as it would go and drove it forward with force, slamming the hammer into the side of the boat with a dull thud.
Anders blinked. If this was part of fixing the boat, it was a process he was unfamiliar with. He almost stepped out to say something, to ask what exactly the person was doing, but something stopped him. Anders didn’t like confronting people in general, much less men sneaking around under the cover of night holding hammers.
So he stayed put.
The man hit the boat once, twice, three more times, leaving the hull looking a sight worse than before, the wood cracked and splintered and even further beyond repair. Then he tossed the hammer onto the ground and, using the planks as steps, heaved himself up over the side of the vessel, disappearing into the cockpit.
Anders waited, dumbly, as though he were watching a television drama and had to find out what happened next. As he stared into the darkness, the stillness of the night was suddenly pierced with a deafening noise. A squawk of sorts, but it appeared to have no ending. Anders looked to the sky, thinking for a brief moment that he would come face-to-face with some kind of prehistoric bird, but the noise was farther away, behind him, somewhere on the island. Just as quickly as the noise started, it was over, and movement in the boat brought his attention back to the man, who had leapt from the craft as if it were on fire, and took off at a sprint.
Anders blinked to clear his vision, which had suddenly become blurred. And that was when he realized it wasn’t his vision that was blurred—it