I look from her to the wide expanse of the sea, then back to her again.
“Are you, then?”
She stumbles to her feet and plants her hands on her hips, glaring at me as if I personally took her ship for my own.
“I. Am.”
I shake my head and against my better judgment, try to reason with her. She’s being stubbornly stupid. “There were three of us. One, as you know, is dead, and the other ran off. You do realize that he’s probably going to come after you? That he ran from me but was as ready to violate you as the other was?”
She blanches, and it gives me momentary hope that maybe she’s coming to grips with the reality here.
I go on. “At the very least you should come with me to shelter before you make your plan.” I snort mirthlessly. “And if finding a way off this island were as simple as you make it out to be, I wouldn’t be here myself.”
“What do you mean?” she says, her bravado momentarily slipping. She swallows hard. She looks out at the wide expanse of ocean. “They… they have to come back. We’re not… stranded here…”
I shake my head. “You might say that.”
“But that doesn’t make any sense,” she says.
Will may eventually find me—find us, if she joins me—but knowing the location and intricacies still gives me a decided advantage.
“I’m going to find my ship,” she says stubbornly.
“Go, then,” I say, waving my hand toward the water. “If you find it, let me know?”
Panic flits across her features, and her eyes roam over my body again, as if she’s just seeing me for the first time. I don’t look like she does, like someone who accidentally found their way here after getting off a cruise ship. I look like Robinson Fucking Crusoe who’s been fending for himself for an eternity, because that’s what I fucking am.
I have no doubt it sobers her, but she juts her chin out and squares her shoulders, then turns to head back to where the body lies.
“Where are you going?”
“My bag is down… down there.” She takes off at a good clip, I watch her go.
I follow behind her, shaking my head. She isn’t going to find her ship, but at least she locates her bag. My stomach swirls with hunger when I catch up with her, the half carcass I ate earlier now a distant memory. I wonder if she’s eaten. I wonder if she has any food with her. She’s walking away from me and I have to stop her because I know if Will finds her, there’s no telling what he’ll do.
But is she even safe with me?
She takes off for the shore and I follow, cursing behind her.
She paces the white sand, like if she keeps looking, she’ll find the ship under a rock or something. She’s wearing a thin, light green sundress with a faded brown pattern and delicate sandals that will do little to protect her from the elements, looking every bit the part of stranded tourist.
“They wouldn’t just leave,” she says, biting her nails, and hell I wish she wouldn’t do that. She looks vulnerable and innocent, and I don’t trust myself not to lose my fucking mind, because my hold on my self-control is nebulous.
“No? They wouldn’t?” I follow behind her, though my eyes are on the forest and not the shore. Will is hiding. He likely won’t make his move anytime soon, but I know he will in time.
“No,” she says. “I was the one who won the prize. I only went because I needed the vacation. God! I was the one they attended to most. I mean I couldn’t even come out to breakfast without the entire staff making sure I was taken care of. I was the one every single member of that ship looked out for.”
What the hell is she talking about? She seems nearly irrational, and her chatter borders on the frenzied.
Prize? What prize?
It doesn’t matter, though. Not now. She’s not making reasonable sense, but she’ll have to find that out for herself.
I pace the edge of the beach to keep myself calm. To keep my instincts in check, because all I see before me is a weak, fragile creature. The rational part of my brain reminds me that she’s probably capable of taking care of herself and she isn’t here for me, and another thread of thought filters in and out of my consciousness, begging the question: what the hell has this island done to me?
I didn’t used to be barbaric and desperate. I used to know how to talk to women. Hell—the memory is faded, but I think I once had a woman I loved, even. Did I? God. And as I pace the beach, I filter through my thoughts and try to sort memory from dream. I can’t. I growl to myself, angry that I don’t know who I am, why I’m here, or what to do with the girl.