For Those In Peril (Book 1): For Those In Peril On The Sea by Colin M. Drysdale Page A

‘I should’ve come up front with you.’
    ‘Even if I hadn’t run out of bullets, there were too many of them. The problem was the boat getting away from him.’
    ‘Are you saying it’s my fault?’ Jon was shaking with anger. ‘It wasn’t. If anything it was Mike’s. He was the one who didn’t get the anchor line in fast enough. That’s why it wrapped around the propeller. That’s what stopped us picking Bill up in time.’
    ‘I’m not the one who ran the boat into the sandbar in the first place,’ Mike shot back.
    ‘Stop it, stop it all of you!’ CJ yelled at the top of her voice. ‘It doesn’t matter whose fault it is. What matters is that Bill’s dead. He’s dead!’ She was teetering on the brink but she was just managing to hold herself together. ’Don’t any of you care?’
    There was a moment of silence as her words hit home. I sank down onto one of the seats in the cockpit. We’d lost Bill and I wasn’t sure how long we could survive without him. As I sat there, physically and emotionally numb from what had just happened, I watched the others as if from a distance.
    ‘Of course we care.’ Jon glanced round at the rest of us. His eyes lingered on me. ‘CJ’s right. It doesn’t matter why Bill’s dead. We need to decide what we’re going to do next.’ Sensing my fragile state, Jon was taking charge.
    ‘What d’you mean?’ CJ was no longer close to the edge. Instead, there was a hit of anger in her voice.
    ‘We can’t just float around out here. We need to do so mething.’ Jon looked down to avoid making eye contact with CJ. ‘I think we need to keep going.’
    ‘Yeah, you’re probably right.’ Mike’s voice wavered as he spoke. ‘We need to keep going,’
    ‘We can’t just leave Bill there,’ CJ glared at Jon and Mike almost daring them to disagree with her.
    ‘We don’t have a choice.’ Jon wiped his eyes before carrying on. ‘Besides, it’s what Bill would have wanted us to do.’
     
    As we set off once more, Jon got the others busy with different tasks, not ones that really needed done but ones that would keep them occupied, making sure they had no time to dwell on Bill’s death. This was a smart move. With Bill gone and while I was in no state to help, he couldn’t afford to lose anyone else, even temporarily.
    As I watched, I was struck by how CJ was reacting to Bill’s death. While she was upset, she seemed to be dealing with it better than I was. It was as if losing him to the infected was the trigger she needed to finally accept that the world had changed, and that she had to change with it or become lost within it. I watched as she moved around the deck. There was no hint of the fragility that had haunted her since she’d gone to pieces in the cockpit just a few days before. Instead, she had a look of grim determination on her face, as if she’d resolved to never let this new world beat her, no matter what obstacles it threw in her path.
    The others worked well together, with CJ acting as the second in command, marshalling Mike and Jimmy to the tasks Jon assigned them. Soon the spotlight was removed from where I’d left it wedged on the bow, the anchor was retrieved and the dinghy was raised back on board. While the others were doing this, Jon worked out how to get us back on course and rearranged the watches, not that anyone was going to be able to sleep. Soon we were underway once more.
    As we left Great Sale Cay, I couldn’t help but stare into the darkness off our stern. Somewhere out there, the infected were feasting on Bill’s lifeless body and there was nothing I could do about it.
    I felt so helpless, so empty, so lost. I knew I needed to bring myself back to reality, but I was unable to do it. I remained detached somewhere deep within my soul, trapped by my inability to do anything for Bill even after he was dead. He deserved better than to be left alone on that beach, being picked over by the horde of infected that had killed him. Yet what