The bloom of white light startled me. I slapped at the wall with my sweatshirt. The sleeve thwacking against the rock.
I heard my phone skid over rock.
Had I pushed it deeper?
I aimed for the same spot again. My arms trembled as I held my arms over my head and slowly pulled the fabric down.
The case came down, nailing me in the cheek.
I caught it against my neck. “Yes. Oh, yes.” I could barely feel it in my hands. Frostbite.
God, please don’t take my fingers. Take a toe. Whatever. Just not my fingers.
I fumbled with my cell and the face lit up again. Blake.
I swiped to answer the call. Passcode.
I tried to press my thumb along the bottom but it didn’t recognize my waterlogged, pruny fingers.
“Code. What’s the fucking code?”
1206
The call dropped into voicemail.
“No.”
The screen went dark. No signal.
“Dammit.”
I tapped until the screen came alive again. Recent calls. I tried to get my finger in that corner. Finally.
Finally.
The call dropped again.
I dialed again and held the phone up. One sliver of a bar. Not even all the way into one bar.
“Please.”
“Grace!”
I almost dropped my phone. “Blake. Oh, God. Thank God.”
“Grace.” His voice was so far away.
“The cove,” I screamed into the night. “Blake?”
I pressed my thumb into the button at the bottom of the phone. The call was gone. No signal.
Had he heard me?
I couldn’t get my fingers to work. Text? Could I get a text out?
A wave crashed in and flooded up my back. I curled my fingers around the phone, but it was worse than a bar of soap. Even worse, soap I couldn’t see.
It dropped into the water and the face glowed with a green text bubble before it went out and sunk near my foot.