2 Empath (16 page)

But that was about to change.

“I’m hoping to take the car and drive to the North Shore to see Zane,” I admitted. I looked back at my phone. “But I’m not sure when, yet.”

My father’s face fell. He harrumphed. “Well, it can’t be too late. You’ll be jetlagged, you know. Midnight here will feel like three in the morning.”

“I know, Dad,” I said automatically, then realized that wasn’t true. I hadn’t even considered the time change. What did it matter? I was seeing Zane
today,
and nothing was stopping me.

I stared at my silent phone again, then shifted another box to read its label. Where
was
the stupid kitchen one my mom wanted?

“Have you heard from him since we landed?” my mother asked, poking her head out from the kitchen.

I felt a sinking feeling in my gut. So, she thought his silence was odd, too. “No,” I admitted. “I’m not sure where he is.”

“Did he know we were flying in today?” she pressed.

“Not exactly,” I said with a sigh. “I kind of led him to believe it would be tomorrow.”

“Why’d you do that?” my dad asked, sounding surprised. He knew I didn’t play mind games with guys — something he appreciated in my mother as well, and had encouraged in me the second I hit puberty.

“I wanted to surprise him,” I explained. “But now, I’m not so sure it’s a good idea.”

My mother came fully into the family room. “Maybe not, Kali,” she said gently. “You still don’t know exactly what his situation is… it might not be fair.”

My dad looked from my mother to me with a frown. “What the hell are you talking about, his ‘situation?’ Does the boy want to see you or not?”

I swallowed. I couldn’t believe we were seriously having this group conversation, when my dad hadn’t so much as mentioned Zane’s name in months. But I was glad that he remembered. And that he seemed to care. The truth was, no matter how regularly Zane sent his light and witty texts, I couldn’t rid myself of the cold, hard knot of fear in my stomach. The fear that keeping up a texting relationship from a distance, and his wanting to be with me as much as I wanted to be with him, were
not
the same thing.

“Zane’s always said he wanted to see me when we both got back to Oahu,” I tried to explain to my dad. “He still says that. It’s just that… Well, when the chance to get together came up for real, when I offered to go see him in California, it was pretty clear he didn’t really want me to come.”

My dad’s eyes widened. Both eyebrows lifted. “Well, why the hell would he?” he asked sharply.

“Mitch!” my mother scolded, looking as horrified as I felt.

My dad flinched, then looked wounded, like a little boy who has no idea what he did wrong. He looked from one to the other of us for a long moment before a light seemed to switch on. Then he smiled. “Oh, for heaven’s sake, honey,” he said apologetically, touching my arm. “I didn’t mean he wouldn’t want to see
you.
What I meant is, he wouldn’t want
you
to see
him.”

“And why not?” I demanded, still upset. He was making no sense at all.

My dad looked back at me with equal confusion. “Well… hellfire, girl! The boy nearly died, didn’t he? He was in a car crash, had a coma. Most likely he was laid up in a bed, tubes coming out his arms, stuck using a damned bedpan. You think he wants a girl seeing him like that? You think he wants the likes of you within a hundred miles when he’s struggling to get out of bed, ambling around with an old man’s walker, letting a bunch of strange women poke needles in his butt?”

My heart skipped a beat. He seemed so certain. “But you let me invite him to come to Cheyenne for rehab,” I protested weakly.

“Oh, I knew he’d never go for that,” my dad said dismissively. “I’m sure he appreciated the offer. But trust me, the Florence Nightingale thing is a woman’s fantasy. To a man, it’s a damn nightmare.”

I blinked, then looked at my mother. She shrugged. “He’s probably right, Kali. The male ego knows no bounds.”

“But why wouldn’t Zane say so?” I asked. “If that was the only reason he didn’t want to see me?”

My dad threw me a heavy look. “Did you ask him outright why he didn’t want you to visit?”

I didn’t answer for a moment. “No,” I admitted. I had been too afraid of Zane’s answer.

I put my head back down and examined the last few boxes. None were labeled ‘kitchen.’ “I’m going to look for that box upstairs, Mom,” I declared, hoping to end the conversation. But before I could reach the staircase, a rooster crowed in my pocket.

“Speak of the devil,” my father said with a grin.

I whipped out the phone. It was a text.

Sorry — was out on the water! Where are you? Want me to drive to Honolulu?

I stood still at the bottom of the staircase, my blood all seeming to pool in my feet. “He wants to see me,” I announced, my voice ragged. “Like… now.”

“There’s a shocker,” my dad teased. He threw a triumphant look at my mother. “Tell me I don’t know about these things!”

“You’re brilliant, Mitch,” she deadpanned back. Then she looked at me. “Do you want to take the car?”

I envisioned the reunion I had been looking forward to for so long happening out front with my parents surreptitiously peeking out the window. They would want Zane to come in so they could meet him…

No way.
Zane could face the Colonel’s interrogation another day. But today we would meet where it all began — at the beach. “Could I?” I asked hopefully. The missing box had still not been found.

“Go ahead,” my father said cheerfully, surprising me. “Your mother and I can always take the bus if we need to get to the store. One nice thing about city living!”

My mother’s face showed less enthusiasm. But I knew she wouldn’t stop me now. “It’s fine by me,” she said tiredly. “But don’t stay out late or you’ll get too drowsy to drive. And don’t forget you’ve got more unpacking to do before your bed will be fit to sleep in.”

“I won’t,” I promised, running up the stairs to change out of the grungy clothes I’d been unpacking in for the last two hours.

Stay where you are,
I texted to Zane as I moved
. I’m coming to the North Shore!

Chapter 13

I was so nervous I couldn’t stand it. It was a miracle I got the car out of the city traffic in one piece. But I
did
do it, and here I was. The Kamehameha highway. Ehukai Beach Park was just ahead.

My fingers had been gripping the steering wheel so tightly that my knuckles felt stiff. If my dad’s motivational analysis was right, Zane could be as anxious to see me as I was to see him. But I couldn’t help worrying that he might still be weak or struggling with injuries he wouldn’t talk about. He said he’d been “out on the water,” true, but he didn’t say he’d been surfing; and if he had, he’d almost certainly be bragging about it. Maybe he wasn’t strong enough to swim in such dangerous currents yet. Maybe he was just getting used to the ocean again, paddling around…

Sunset Beach Elementary School loomed up on my right. The playground stood empty; it was summer now for everyone. I turned left into the small beach parking lot. There were plenty of open spaces — a dead giveaway for lousy surf conditions.

I parked the car and took my keys from the ignition. I was beyond excited now. I was nearly sick to my stomach. I briefly considered sitting still a moment and trying to collect myself. But instead I jumped out, locked the car, stuffed the keys in my shorts pocket, and pointed my feet toward the beach.
It’ll be okay,
I told myself.
No matter what kind of shape he’s in, no matter how awkward it might seem, no matter how big a fool you make of yourself… it will be okay.

I lifted my chin and looked up. I couldn’t see the ocean; the beach sloped up from the parking lot to a rise where the bathhouse and lifeguard tower were. From that ridge, I knew, one could look down across a sweeping view of Ehukai beach and its world-famous Banzai Pipeline. But I wasn’t interested in seeing that. I was interested in the lone figure who looked back at me from his perch on top of one of the concrete picnic tables near the ridge.

He smiled.

It was Zane.

Time seemed to stop as my eyes took in what my mind was still too muddled to believe. This wasn’t the pale, frighteningly weak Zane who had left me behind in Nebraska. Nor was it the wispy, nebulous wraith I had seen here once before. This Zane was standing tall, barefoot, wearing a sun-faded tee shirt and board shorts still damp with seawater. His arms and legs were toned with healthy muscle and dotted with sand. His blond curls hung loosely about his face, fluttering with the breeze.

He was even freakin’
tanned.

I watched, speechless, as he jumped off the table into the air and then down to the ground, his arc of movement so high and smooth I was sure it was deliberately theatrical.

He did stuff like that.

“Kali!” he called, still smiling.

I had been moving toward him; now I was ten feet away. He wasn’t permanently injured. He was perfectly fine. He was better than fine. He was the most incredibly gorgeous thing I’d ever laid eyes on.

And he was smiling at
me.

My feet stopped moving. It was too much. At any moment, surely, he would disappear. I was afraid to breathe.

But then he moved toward me. It was only a step, but that was all it took to break my paralysis. Because with that step came a motion my heart couldn’t resist even if I’d been totally and completely brain dead. He lifted his arms.

I ran into them.

What happened next was indescribable. I threw my arms around his neck; his own wrapped around the small of my back and lifted me off the ground. Beyond that I knew nothing, could think of nothing. All I could do was feel. Warmth. Ecstasy. Peace. Joy. His touch was sunshine, it was rain, it was hot cocoa and a crackling fire on a cold winter’s day. I was enveloped, I was cared for, I was safe, I was
home.
I held him tighter and tighter still, savoring the warm, solid, human feel of him, marveling at his holding me back in equal measure, wondering how could I have ever lived one moment in the absence of such complete and utter bliss. The force that pulled me toward him was so strong, so alive, so insistent… This was good. It was right. It was real. It was forev —

OMG, how long have I been holding him?!

I broke away like a strong magnet lets go of metal — reluctantly and not without a kickback. I couldn’t do it any other way. I took a step back and tried to collect myself. Had he let me go? Had he been trying to detach me before that? I had no idea. My brain hadn’t been working.

And still, I could feel that incredible pull…

I took another half step back. Gathering all my strength, I looked up at him.

He blinked back at me. I couldn’t feel his emotions, which didn’t surprise me. But his green eyes weren’t particularly difficult to read. Joy. Excitement. Puzzlement. Perhaps a stunned sense of shock.

Or maybe that’s just what I was feeling.

At least he didn’t seem embarrassed. That was all me.

We looked at each other for a moment without speaking. I thought, for a second, that he was about to reach a hand up towards my face. But then he took a half step back instead.

“Wow,” he said simply.

Had he felt the same thing? Or was he just flattered by my enthusiasm? I couldn’t tell. He had a way of masking his emotions when he wanted to. It was one of many small things I knew about him. But of course, he wouldn’t know me as well. Aside from two conversations at his bedside, a couple on the phone, and a whole bunch of texts, he really didn’t know me at all.

I had to remember that.

Take it slow, Kali.
I begged myself.
You have time.

“You
are
going to say something eventually, aren’t you?” he asked good-naturedly, raising one eyebrow.

I realized I had yet to say a word.

My lips twisted into a grin. “You have a problem with nonverbal communication?”

His smile broadened, showing straight white teeth as perfect as the rest of him. “Oh, no,” he corrected. “As of now, I’m a big fan.”

The ice was broken.

I smiled back at him. Then I stepped away and pointed toward the longboard leaning against the picnic table. “Been ripping a few, have you?” I said lightly. “I was worried that you weren’t fully recovered yet. I guess you must be feeling pretty good.”

“I feel fabulous,” he returned, picking up the board and tucking it under his arm.

Tanned biceps… oh, my.

“But I’m not 100% yet,” he continued. “The doctors said it could take up to a year for me to get back into peak condition; I’ve been shooting for three months.” He began walking toward the beach, gesturing for me to follow. “Ordinarily, I’m a patient person. But come on… it’s
Hawaii,
you know?”

Did I ever.

“Just look at that,” he said with reverence as we reached the top of the rise. “I still can’t believe I’m really here.”

Neither could I. I joined him in looking out over the sweep of beach. Pale sand, blue water, funky lava rocks, towering green peaks beyond. This particular stretch was a familiar sight to me. But this time, something was wrong. “What happened to it?” I cried.

He looked at me strangely. “What happened to what?”

“The waves!” I moaned.

He laughed out loud. “It’s
June,
Kali. The big surf won’t get kicking again until fall. Summer’s flat as a pancake.”

I knew that. “Oh, right,” I said, not bothering to hide my disappointment. “So what have you been doing ‘out on the water?’”

He shrugged. “Just paddling around. Getting the feel of the breaks. Every once in a while, a two- or three-footer will roll in. Most of all, I’m getting to know the locals. There’s a pecking order here — you have to respect it and work your way up.”

I looked out at the placid ocean. Not a single surfer was in the water — at least not a live one. The beach was nearly deserted except for a half-dozen walkers and two girls in bikinis who were sunbathing on mats a couple hundred yards away. Both girls appeared to be watching us.