That warmth is long gone, now.
I shake off the memories as I push aside a wet branch, eyes scanning the overgrown ground. The foliage has grown thick in the summer heat, green and lush with new leaves. Small black crabs scuttle out of my path as I walk, their pebbled homes disturbed by my footfalls. It takes me a few minutes to find what I’m looking for — a set of rocky steps, embedded in the low hillside. Moss creeps across the stones, a living carpet.
“Over here,” I call over my shoulder to Jo. I have to shout to be heard over the rain. “I found the stairs.”
She’s a dozen feet away, searching a different stretch of bushes, but she turns at the sound of my voice. As she makes her way to me, she looks shaky and pale — her face slicked with rain, her feet swallowed by the spare set of boots I found for her in a cubby onboard, along with a translucent plastic poncho. It drapes her body like a shower curtain, offering meager water-resistance but little in the way of warmth. Her lips are blue; her eyes ringed by circles of deep exhaustion. Raindrops cling to her eyelashes like tears.
My throat goes tight as I look down into her upturned face. I’m bowled over by the urge to comfort her. I want to take her into my arms, to pull her close until the shivers stop. To hold her until the fear disappears from those sky-blue eyes.
Eyes that, at this moment, are fixed with sharp curiosity on my scarred right hand.
Shit.
In the numbing downpour, I didn’t feel the tendons spasming beneath the weight of the branch I’ve been holding aloft, nor did I notice when Jo’s attention shifted to the patchwork of scars left behind by my accident.
How much did she see?
I quickly release my grip, sending water droplets in all directions as the branch plummets. I tuck the damaged limb out of sight.
“Watch your step,” I tell her, turning my back on her inquisitive gaze as I start up the steps. “It’s slippery.”
There’s no railing, nothing at all to hold onto as we make our way up the embankment. The climb is steeper than I remember; the ascent slower in these conditions. But we can’t stay on the beach — the rising tide has made that an impossibility. Soon, the small strip of exposed shore will be swallowed entirely by frothing swells; the shattered remains of the Ebenezer along with it.
At the top of the steps lie the ruins of an old clubhouse, a decaying skeleton leftover from the island’s heyday, when rich vacationers used to flock here to drink and gamble away their summers. They should’ve known, on an island called Misery, the fun wasn’t destined to last. A sweeping fire in 1926 razed the whole resort to the ground, effectively putting a stop to the stream of money-touting tourists. The owners never rebuilt all they lost in that fire; what didn’t burn to ash was simply left to wither away in the elements.
After nearly a century, the once-glamorous casino has been reduced to a pile of rubble. Hope withers in my chest as I walk into the clearing, surveying our options for shelter. There’s not much left. No walls, no roof. Not a single dry spot to ride out the storm. I’m beginning to think we climbed all the way up here for nothing, when I feel a hand curl around my forearm. The unexpected touch sends a jolt through my system; stops me in my tracks like an electrical shock. I glance cautiously down at Jo’s fingers — small and slender and so very pale against my tan skin — afraid if I move too fast, they’ll disappear.
“There!” She’s pointing to our left, where a stone foundation slab juts out over the hillside, forming a narrow overhang. “Come on!”
Her grip on my arm slips away as she starts running toward the outcropping, those too-big boots sending mud-spatter in all directions as she tromps through puddles without a care. I suck in a sharp breath before I follow, swallowing down the hollow ache her touch set off inside my chest. One casual hand-graze, and I’m coming undone.
God, I’m pathetic.
I run after her, ducking beneath the low ceiling of hanging vines and heavy stone as I enter. The shelter is small — no more than ten feet across in any direction — but it’s dry, and right now that’s all that truly matters. Anything to get us out of the whipping wind and relentless rain long enough for some life to leech back into our bones.
We take up opposite sides of the cavelike space, each leaning on an earthen wall, staring at each other in the dim light as we catch our breath. Neither of us says a word. Tucked beneath the thick slab of rock, the storm is somewhat muffled. Muted. The world outside suddenly feels far-removed.
The silence stretches on, thick with things better left unsaid, questions better left unasked. Seconds curdle into minutes, stagnating the musty air between us. I focus on the faint rattle of Jo’s breaths, relieved she’s breathing at all. I don’t think I’ll ever recover from the moment I pulled her from the water, lips blue and lungs still. That’s not the sort of memory that ever fades.
She simply stares at me, perhaps waiting for me to break this wordless stalemate. Waiting for me to fill in the blanks her dazed mind is no doubt struggling to piece together.
She’ll be waiting a long time.
It’s difficult not to stare at her. After a year of absence, of aching memory and throbbing loss, being this close — seeing every angle of her face at this proximity — is damn painful. I thought I knew her details by heart, but she’s twice as beautiful as I remember.
Were her eyes always so blue?
Did they always cut into me so sharply, a knife slipped straight between the ribs?
Beneath the clear plastic poncho, her sundress is plastered to her skin, clinging to every curve, highlighting her perfect figure. Her nipples protrude against the thin fabric. I tell myself not to look, feeling like a bastard of the highest order when desire spikes through me, an unwanted current of electricity that shoots straight to my cock.
Not now. I grit my teeth and avert my eyes. Not here.
I chew the inside of my cheek so hard, I taste blood.
Jo breaks our stalemate first. Clearing her throat to shatter the quiet, she mutters a stiff, “I suppose I should thank you.”
My brows lift in question.
“For saving my life,” she tacks on. “Pulling me from the water. Thank you.” Her well-mannered upbringing is beyond reproach — even when it comes to someone like me. Someone she can’t stand. The girl would thank her mortal enemy if the right opportunity arose. She pauses for a long beat. “I guess I’m lucky you were nearby.”
“Don’t know if I’d call nearly dying lucky, but sure.” I shrug lightly. “We’ll go with that.”
Her eyes narrow. “What I’d really like to know is how you happened to be nearby.”
To this, I have no reasonable response. So I don’t respond at all.
“I assume you heard my radio call…” She lets the statement hang in the air, unfinished, waiting for me to offer a proper explanation.
I don’t.
I give her nothing. Nothing except a shallow, noncommittal nod.
Her brows pull inward, a furrow of frustration. When a full minute ticks by and still I remain silent, the furrow becomes a full frown.
Without the distraction of the storm, without the pressure of our lives hanging in the balance, she’s able to examine me properly for the first time. Her eyes move rapidly over my face, studying me with an intensity that makes me want to shy away. Beneath the anger, there’s an unmistakeable edge of incomprehension as she takes in the scruffy beard, the overgrown haircut, the hunched posture. I slide my hands deep into the pockets of my coveralls, hiding my scars from her pursuant gaze.