Page 22 of Chasing Riddick

“How do you think this beach got its name? These aren’t waves, Finn. They’re Leviathans. Sea demons sent to punish the men that try to tame them.”

That was… insane .

“See where the water turns black right where the break hits?” he asked, and I followed the line of his arm, nodding at the strip of darkness that ran parallel with the wave lines.

“That’s the reason for these massive swells. It’s a deep water canyon that funnels these waves to shore, but it’s also the reason ninety percent of these waves are susceptible to an unexpected break.”

I scoffed.

“An unexpected break isn’t that big a deal, Riddick. If I wipe out, I can just try again.”

He rounded on me, his face white with fury, and for a second, I thought he was going to grab me.

I narrowed my eyes on him, challenging him with my stare.

Do it. Grab me.

He stopped himself and clenched his fists at his sides instead.

“These aren’t those pussy swells you grew up surfing on the East Coast, Finn. An unexpected break when you find yourself on a rogue eighty-footer is a fucking death sentence. Do you know what happens to the human body when it hits the water after falling eighty feet?”

My confidence wavered slightly as I tried and failed to imagine just how tall eighty feet really was.

“Then, if by some miracle you do survive that fall, you could get pulled and trapped in the canyon beneath, rolling through the rip tide like a T-shirt in a fucking washing machine.”

“I just meant?—”

“ Then, if you survive that, you may break the surface only to find yourself in the death zone.” He pointed to the east side of the beach, where multiple wave sets converged and crashed relentlessly into the rocks, forming a deadly, choppy pool of white water.

“People more skilled than you have died getting caught in two wave-hold downs in the death zone.”

I blinked, and suddenly, his hands were wrapped around my shoulders.

His face was inches from mine, and my eyes widened in surprise at his sudden proximity.

I could feel the heat of his breath coasting across my lips, and I suddenly wasn’t thinking about eighty-foot waves anymore.

I was wondering if his lips would taste like saltwater and how the stubble on his chin would feel rubbing against me while we kissed.

“This beach could kill you a hundred different ways, Finn, but it only really needs one. One mistake. One fuck up. And you could lose your life. ” His fingers were trembling against me, and his blue eyes were angry but also strangely glassy.

A tear slid down his cheek, and without thinking, I found myself cupping the side of his face and brushing the tear away with my thumb.

The roughness of his stubble felt exactly how I imagined it would.

“Riddick. I’m not going to die,” I breathed, feeling like my heart was breaking for him. He was clearly hurting from the loss of his friend, and the thought of me dying the same way was eating him up more than I’d realized.

“But you could,” he gasped, shaking me roughly, his voice coming out strained and hoarse like he had a throat full of tears.

We were so close our chests were touching. I tilted my head back so I could look at him properly, marveling at the fact that he was still letting me stroke the side of his face.

“Shh. It’s gonna be okay.” I stood on my toes, brushing my lips against his so gently I barely felt it. His eyes fluttered closed, and another tear slipped free. His hands tightened on my shoulders, and I hovered there, keeping the tiniest sliver of space between us.

I wanted him to come to me. I needed him to initiate it.

The broken parts of me that had never really recovered from the abandonment of my father and the loss of my mother needed proof that he wanted me just as badly as I wanted him.

I needed to feel wanted .

“Finn…” His voice was feather soft, a whisper, and his lower lip moved against mine as he said my name.

Do it, Riddick. Kiss me…

I urged him as I continued gently stroking his cheek with my thumb, much like he’d done to the side of my neck earlier .

I parted my lips and turned my head to the side, giving him every opportunity to claim me, but it had the opposite effect. The slight movement seemed to snap him out of the moment.

He ripped away from me so abruptly I gasped, and I was left reeling and chilled from his absence.

The waves crashed against the shore with a sinister sort of violence, and for the first time, I wasn’t enthralled by them.

They felt like a metaphor for the crash and break of the stupid, naive organ that was struggling to beat in my chest.

I was an idiot.

Why did I keep bothering to chase after this guy? He clearly didn’t want me enough to pursue this.

The same hurt feeling I used to struggle with as a kid washed over me.

‘Why doesn’t he want us, Mommy? Why’d he leave us all alone?’

‘You’re not alone, sweet boy. I’m right here!’

But I didn’t have her.

I was fucking alone.

And now, Riddick didn’t want me either.

“I told you, we can’t do this, Finn!” Riddick was shouting at me. His fingers were buried in his thick hair, and he looked like he wanted to tear it out at the roots.

But I didn’t care.

I was so done with this.

“This is over, Riddick,” I said, shocking myself with how cold and dead my own voice sounded. I felt numb.

“What?” he snapped.

“I’m done. I don’t want to train with you anymore. In fact, I don’t want to fucking see you anymore. Stay off my property.”

He narrowed his eyes at me, and I could feel his rage like it was a living thing.

“We’ve been over this, kid,” he growled.

“What, all of a sudden I’m kid again? It’s like that? ”

“Yeah. It’s like that. I’ll surf wherever the fuck I want, and if I want to surf your beach, I will.”

I cut him a cool look and shrugged.

“Fine. I’ll go then.”

“What do you mean you’ll go? Go where?”

“None of your business.”

“Stop being ridiculous. You’re not abandoning your own house just because you don’t want to see me.”

I was already making my way back to the cliff face.

“Watch me,” I snapped.

“Finn!” He called after me, but I kept walking, and he didn’t chase me.

Once I made it back to the shack, I packed a duffle with some clothes and sent a text to Turtle, asking him to come pick me up.

I’ll admit I packed a little slower than necessary. Some small pathetic part of me couldn’t help but hope Riddick would show up and beg me to stay. To prove that it wasn’t all in my head and that he really did care about me.

But he never came, and by the time Turtle showed up with Shelly, my mood had soured even further.

Turtle helped me load up my fish board and my shortboard, which had both been recently waxed for me by the man I was leaving behind.

I tried not to let that fact sway me as we strapped the boards to the roof of the van.

I watched my shack get smaller and smaller in Shelly’s side mirror, and even when the silhouette of a tall, broad-shouldered man appeared next to it, I didn’t tell Turtle to stop.

I’d learned all I needed to know from Riddick to surf Leviathans.

I would do the rest of my training alone.