Chapter 30
Luna paddledwith sure strokes to the finish line as everyone on deck cheered. She had fallen behind. She knew she would, it was a ship after all, but she was way faster than anyone had expected.
As she paddled up, she kissed both her biceps with a grin and Beckett laughed while Dan pretended to swoon.
Ropes stretched from the boat, across the large square submerged rooftop to the wooden dock, numbered 49. Luna looked at the scene, docks created a maze around submerged and half-submerged rooftops. Boats were lashed and tied everywhere. Sailers and crew bustling around, cranes hoisting, and farther up on shore, people, so many people and buildings and traffic — she looked back down at her paddleboard. She would need to take this in steps. Concentrate on Beckett. The dock. The port city would come later.
Luna lashed her board to the cleat as Beckett called down from the ship, “Welcome to Heighton Port!”
She called up, “I totally let you win.”
He said, “Of course, and because Dan’s ego is very fragile, I won’t tell him.”
Dan was leaning over the railing right beside him. “That was epic Luna. I could watch you paddle all day, but I have more work to do, so I’ll see you when you and Beckett come over for dinner, like next week. Sarah says you have to.”
Luna leaned on her paddle and beamed up at Beckett. “Want me to come up?”
Beckett glanced around and seemed surprised to see a stack of plastic boxes beside his feet. “Um, don’t come up, wait there for a minute, I want to come down and kiss you on shore. I’ll get this to its — and um — I’ll come down.” He spun away and turned back and rested the box on the railing. “Have I told you how epically glad I am that you’re here? That we made it?”
She smiled up at him and he smiled down at her, paused, smiling, happy, momentarily, until he remembered the boxes. “I’m finishing this — down in a second.”
He turned away for real this time and darted across the decks to the lab.
