Authors: Kristi Lea
She smiled at him and took his hand. The ship was
in flames behind her, glowing like an angry halo behind her hair. He tried to
offer her the floatation ring but she shoved it away. “I can swim. You need it
more than I do.”
“Ready?” he asked, knowing that they had no
choice.
She nodded.
“Now jump.”
***
They crawled on shore, breathless and bedraggled
and cold. Salt stung Jessica's eyes and her lungs felt like they would explode.
Noah lay in the wet sand beside her, face pillowed on the life preserver,
letting the waves wash over his feet.
She was more of a dog paddler than a swimmer, but that
was enough to get her safely to the shore. Thank heaven it was enough. Noah
seemed strong, but he kept threatening to slip into unconsciousness. Without
the floatation device and her urging, she wasn't sure he would have made it.
Just as the last remnants of Tallie's yacht
disappeared beneath the water, searchlights appeared, their high beams slicing
across the darkness. A Coast Guard ship trawled the deeper water and a voice
growled across a bullhorn. Sirens blared. They were searching for survivors.
Or bodies.
Jessica shivered. She clutched her arms to her
stomach. She tried closing her eyes, but behind her lids were images of Noah, a
gun to his head. Tallie's crazed expression. The feel of sparks from the burning
yacht singing her skin, floating down to the water's surface like fireflies. The
shivers grew until they were full body shudders.
“Hey.” Noah's voice was hoarse. More a croak than
a whisper. “We're all right. It's going to be all right.”
He pulled her into his arms, sitting her on his
lap like a child, and she buried her face in his shoulder. He smelled of
seawater and blood, but he was warm and solid. She felt beat of his heart and
heard his breathing, still fast but slowing and deep.
“We are safe, Jess. I promise we are safe.”
Her face was wet and she realized that it wasn't
water from her hair—her close-cropped head was nearly dry. She touched Noah's
cheek. The line of his jaw was hard, stubbled, and damp with his own tears.
“You came back for me. Again.”
“Always. I will always come for you.”
The moonlight disguised the beautiful color of his
eyes, and shadows hid the bruises on his face. But as their gazes held, she
could see fire in his eyes.
“You were unconscious in the car, bleeding. They
left you for dead…”
“Shh. It’s all right. I am going to be fine. I
promise.”
Anger poured through her and she tried to shake
off the hands on her shoulders. Too close. He was too close. She couldn’t
breathe because of how close he was. “You can’t promise that. No one can
promise something like that.”
She felt rather than heard his intake of breath.
He didn’t release her, even as she tried to squirm away.
“Please let me go.”
“No.”
With a sob, Jess slipped her hand up into his hair
and pulled his lips to hers.
He resisted. Held, just a breath apart. His
whisper tingled across her mouth, his words stealing into her heart. “You’re
right. I can’t promise that everything will always be fine. But I can promise
that I will love you as long as I live. And I will always come back for you.”
She pressed just the tiniest kiss against his
lips. The touch was magic. It was torture. Her body ached to melt into his, her
heart ached to rest in him. She wanted so badly to trust in him. To trust in
the future.
Noah pulled her close, nestling his chin on her
head. Somewhere nearby, police sirens flashed and lights danced around them
like a disco. Their time alone on the beach would be over soon. So soon. “I
can’t go back to who I was. I won’t. I can’t be that girl again.”
“Jessica. Jo Lynn. My love. I want you to go
wherever you need to go. Be whoever you need to be. As long as you are happy.”
“With you?”
He quirked a smile. “Only if you want.”
“I do.”
Duffle bag slung over his shoulder, Noah walked
the last half mile up the sandy road. He paused at the top of the small hill
and took out the photograph he’d kept in his shirt pocket, close to his heart,
for the past four weeks.
Below him sat a modest white cinder-block and
wrought-iron beach house, surrounded by palm trees and dune grasses. A veranda
wrapped the entire second story, and a dusty white compact car sat parked in
the carport below the home. The morning sunlight twinkled over retreating
waves. Down below, a figure crouched in the still-wet sand, pail in one hand and
shovel in the other. Her hair had grown longer, covering the back of her neck
in tousled waves of a sandy blonde-streaked brown.
Even from the distance, even with yet another
change of hair color, he knew her.
The photograph of the beach house had been hand-delivered
from her lawyer with no return address, no letter, only the name “San Fermin”
scrawled on the back. By then, Jessica had been gone for nearly two months.
When Cole found them on the shore after the yacht
explosion, huddled together and dripping, he brought news of Tallie Wilson. Her
man, Harry, had been pulled from the water, a gunshot wound to the back of the
head. The senator’s wife had brandished a gun from her rowboat and fired at the
Coast Guard patrol boat that had tried to pull her ashore. Officers returned
fire.
She died a week later of her wounds, providing
more fuel to the media firestorm that erupted after the Senator’s suicide and
the massive manhunt that followed. Somehow, Tony and Cole had kept Jessica’s
part in the ordeal a secret, though news of her hospitalization did leak.
During the week after their rescue, every gossip rag in the country ran stories
speculating about Jessica Kingsbury being in rehab. She claimed not to mind the
stories, but had to leave the hospital in the back of a delivery van to avoid
the cameras.
No one seemed to connect the starlet to the FBI
agent injured in the yacht explosion who was recovering from head trauma. Or to
the Federal Marshall found shot in her car several miles away. No one leaked
the fact that they spent their days in the hospital together in one room or the
other. Watching TV, playing cards, talking. Sometimes while Noah slept, Jessica
crept into his room and sketched the views from his window, or the flower
arrangement sent by his family
She never told him when she would leave, or how,
or where she was going. But he knew it was coming. She wouldn’t go back to her
old life and he understood. One day, she simply left Los Angeles. Her mansion
was listed for sale. Her staff given a generous severance. For Noah, she left
nothing.
Noah began the slow walk down toward the beach
home, following a trail of mosaic stepping stones that depicted roses,
mountains. One reminded him of a certain jeweled necklace, but could just as
easily have been a spray of flowers.
Finding San Fermin had been more of a challenge
than he had expected. It wasn’t the name of a town, or even the local church.
Instead, it turned out to be a festival held in the local village, along the
Amatique Bay on the coast of Belize. It had taken him three long weeks of
frantic preparation to give notice at work, find a renter for his house, sell
his car, arrange one-way travel.
The beach house’s entry was a huge pair of
mahogany doors that looked like they belonged to a church. Through the window,
he caught a glimpse of tall unframed canvases lining the walls of a tiled open
living space. He left his bag on the porch and walked around the side of the
home. Pots overflowing with tropical flowers and brightly colored lounge chairs
gave the balcony a welcoming look. It looked happy. Cluttered. Picturesque
without looking too perfect.
He rounded the last corner of the house and his
breath caught as he saw her, walking up towards the house. The sun had darkened
a noticeable trail of freckles across her nose and bared shoulders. A flowing
white cotton sundress draped her figure, and she carried a bucket of freshly
dug clams in one hand. Her face looked fuller, less drawn than when he saw her
last.
The moment she saw him standing there, her eyes
flew wide. She dropped the bucket and ran toward him.
They met in the middle and clasped their bodies
and their lips and their hearts. He cradled her head to him, running fingers
through her silky hair. As their lips melded, he slid one hand down to her lower
back to pull her closer. Her breasts were full and warm on his chest and her
belly rounded firmly against his own.
He inhaled a deep breath and slipped his hand from
her back around to her hip, his thumb caressing her thickened waistline,
looking down at her expression, still slightly dazed from the kiss.
“I am so glad you came,” she said with a smile and
a blush.
“I told you I would always come for you.”
She smiled again and placed one finger on his
lips. “I know. That’s what I love about you, Noah Grayson. How long can you
stay?”
“Until you make me leave.” The light that appeared
in her eyes warmed him from the inside.
Jessica stood up on her toes and kissed him, while
she led his hand to her swollen abdomen.
“Stay forever.”
The
End
A voracious reader since before she can remember, Kristi has
always been drawn to romance, science fiction, and fantasy (preferably all
three). Now, when she isn’t reading her favorite books to herself or to her kids,
she is writing her own stories. Kristi, her husband, their two children, and
their two cats live in St. Charles, Missouri.
Visit her online at www.KristiLea.com