Jenny reached, and she wasn’t sure if she was reaching above her to the storm, or below her to the depths of the island, only knew that she had to shift, and that she needed to break her otter out of her trap, and that the means were here, within her reach.
Power answered her, bright and clear and terrifying in its intensity, and otter sprang from her in the smoothest shift that Jenny had yet managed.
The restraints fell away from her small paws and Jenny was scampering away from Wrench as he cursed and grabbed for her.
She could escape, she realized, exactly as she realized with a wave of relief that Travis and Laura were back in her head with her, along with her otter self. All she had to do was get away from Wrench and hide.
Even as she thought it, she knew she couldn’t turn her back to any survivors that might be out in the plane. She had the ability to lead them safely back to shore, and she had to try.
Jenny turned back to Wrench, to find a pitch black panther standing in a pile of shredded clothing. Perhaps getting free would not have been as easy as she’d first thought.
But he didn’t pounce, and after a long moment of mutual consideration, Jenny turned her back on him and ran for the ocean, diving in without hesitation.
Chapter 23
“Jenny!” Travis said, nearly losing control of the Jeep around one of the hairpin curves.
“What the hell?” Breck yelled, clutching at the seat and glove box handles.
“She’s okay!” Laura shouted with tremendous relief from the seat behind them where she was sitting with Tex.
“What was that?” Travis asked, twisting to look back at her.
“The road!” Breck hollered. “Please watch the road!”
“I have no idea,” Laura said, looking as shaken as he felt.
It had felt as if their bond had been lit on fire, all the cotton burned away in a fiery blast.
Jenny, Travis thought fiercely, desperately.
And clear as a summer day, her voice came to him.
Travis! I’m alright!
Where are you? He asked, relief in every cell of his body.
The answer was wry amusement and a sense that it was complicated. In the ocean. Rescuing the people who tried to kidnap me.
Travis laughed out loud. Of course she was.
“She’s free,” he told the others. “But we need to get to the airstrip.”
“On, James,” mocked Breck, and Travis shifted gears as he drove around another tight corner, fighting the Jeep against the wind that was driving hard out the low, dark sky.
Chapter 24
Jenny reached the wreckage in no time, swimming mostly underwater. She scanned the water for any sign of human survivors, diving under the surface to find any sunken bodies. She found that her otter had a strange vibration sense, and she listened for any motions in the water, someone swimming or struggling.
The water rippled with the force of the wind over top of it, but was quiet further down. The song of the ocean was still peaceful here, water buffering the power of the storm, and dampening the strange energy of the island. There were fish, going about their fishy business, and she almost went swimming after them before her human self reminded her firmly about why they were here.
It occurred to her again that she had no compulsion to return to the shore where Wrench waited. All she had to do was swim away, safe in her otter form from whatever the storm threw at her.
But that wouldn’t keep Wrench from trying again, and perhaps getting Laura for real next time.
Jenny bobbed to the surface, looking for anyone clinging to floating debris. She nosed through pieces of fuselage, and parts of seats. Bits of unidentifiable plastic cluttered the surface, confusing her otter senses. Finally, she gave up, and she was just debating her return to the shore again when she found a floating briefcase.
While she didn’t see anything special about it, her human gave a crow of triumph at spotting it, convinced that it had that spy movie ransom suitcase look. She swam over and wrapped her small forearms around it, then tugged herself onto her back to drag it to the beach.