The quaking began again, harder this time. Splashing broke the silence. I turned my head slowly and spotted Flipper struggling against a thick blackish-purple band encircling her waist. She leaned back in the water, arms slicing in a backstroke that got her nowhere. She kicked her legs—where was her tail?—but she didn’t budge.

“She’s in trouble,” I realized. Then louder, I said, “She’s in trouble.”

The marshal finally pried his gaze from the sink to glare at me. “In about thirty seconds, if she doesn’t get her shit together, we’re all going to be in trouble.”

“What are you talking about?” I flung my arm toward Flipper. “She can’t help us if she can’t help herself.”

A high-pitched shriek gurgled, churning bubbles that frothed the water and obscured Flipper’s torso. No one budged to offer her a hand. Good thing I had two spare ones.

I jumped across a craggy fissure and landed in a wobbly crouch three feet from the water. My ankles quivered, knees locked. Flipper was close, but the edge of the water was closer. The rippling surface mocked me as though the sink were laughing at my cowardice.

Salt burned my eyes, turned my skin sticky. I ran faster than the gulls flew. “Momma,” I screamed over and over until my lips moved in a silent plea for help come too late.

I banished the memories cramping my muscles. I had no time for the paralyzing grief. I should wade into the sink. Hell, I should use one of the ruptured pipes sticking out of the dirt at its edges as a springboard and dive in after her. I should, but I couldn’t. I squatted there, useless and shivering while the earth rumbled and Flipper’s pink crown vanished.

“Ellis,” Thierry shouted. “Get out of there.”

I held my ground. Easy to do with terror seizing my limbs. “Not without her.”

The marshal landed in a tense crouch beside me. “She’s a mermaid. You know how sturdy those are, right?”

Except Flipper was different. Mermaids didn’t exchange tails for legs when it suited them. Mermaids didn’t tuck their hands under their armpits to avoid touching a person who could classify them. There was more to her than bright hair and skimpy clothes. The kid had a secret, a big one if she was willing to take it to her grave, and it was going to get her killed in front of a live audience unless I rallied help.

Each gasp rang across the baked earth, every frantic splash echoed through the silence. Without gills or an oxygen tank, she would drown. I once stood paralyzed on a white-sand beach as a life snuffed out instead of wading in and braving the unknown. Fear be damned, I would never stand by again.