Oceans Untamed (6 page)

Chapter 5

The sun was getting lower in the sky when Monroe swung her feet off the hammock. For a moment she swayed there before she could catch her balance and heave to standing.

Maybe there was a dignified way to get out of a hammock, but she sure hadn’t found it yet. There were plenty of hammocks on the island just waiting to humiliate her in front of Koenraad. She’d have to look online
and see if there was a trick.

She’d made little progress in her paperback. Pinning her book against her body with an elbow, she shook out her long hair before pulling her bag onto her shoulder.
 

A glance over at the beach didn’t show her a single turtle, though a small huddle of tourists was staring out at the sand. Even though she felt confident that the turtle thing was a lie, she slowed as
she neared the group, her eyes combing the white expanse for movement.

“Can’t believe we’re stuck here,” a woman murmured.
 

“If you have to be stuck, better here than somewhere else,” an older woman said, but there was a forced gaiety to her voice. Her watery blue gaze landed on Monroe. “Don’t suppose you’ve seen the turtles?” she asked.

Monroe shook her head. “Sorry.”
 

“God, this sucks,”
the younger woman was saying again. “My boss is going to kill me.”
 

Monroe took that as her cue to leave. If she ever got so spoiled that being “stuck” on Tureygua was a hardship, she hoped someone would put a bullet in her brain. What a miserable way to live. She laughed aloud at the irony; her first days on the island had been awful. Now she never wanted to leave.

The iguanas had all gone,
and she wondered where they spent their nights. As she walked by the giant kidney pool, she saw that tons of guests had come out. There wasn’t nearly enough room for them all to stake out private suntanning spots in the waning sunlight. Not that many seemed interested in sunbathing; excitement buzzed in the air. Curious, Monroe slowed enough to catch snatches of conversation.

“… Get a flight
out tomorrow, hopefully,” a middle-aged woman said into a phone. Monroe repressed a laugh. When she made phone calls, she tended to talk too quietly lest she turn into one of those people who screamed.

“… Canceled a bunch of planes or something…” a teenager was saying. “Guess I’ll miss the chem test tomorrow. How ever will I live?”
 

Monroe’s mouth went dry. Thomas had left hours ago, but what
if his flight was one of the ones canceled? The thought that he could still be on the island was frankly terrifying. She’d have to insist on staying in Koenraad’s mansion.

He’d want to know why. If only she’d told him about Thomas at the beginning.
 

But maybe she was getting ahead of herself. Thomas wasn’t hanging out by the pool, and his flight was hours ago. He was probably halfway home by
now. She paused a moment and licked her lips nervously.
 

A man in his late thirties, holding a tablet, was just to her right. He appeared to be idly surfing the web, looking at sports stats. If he didn’t know the answer to her question, maybe he could look it up…

“Excuse me,” she said.
 

He looked up, as did the woman next to him. She gave Monroe a quick but disdainful once-over.
 

Monroe smiled
and tried to look innocuous. “I overheard someone saying that a flight was canceled today. I don’t suppose you know which one?”

The woman pulled herself upright. “All of them,” she said.

“
All
? Why—”

“Some glitch in the airport’s flight control software. No more planes have been allowed in since around noon, and they manually sent off the ones that were here. The airport looks like a graveyard,”
the man said.
 

“So someone who had a flight a few hours ago would have made it?” Monroe asked hopefully.

“All the planes that were here left, so yeah,” the woman said. “It’s on all the news channels.” Her tone made it clear that Monroe and her too-small bikini could go elsewhere.

Monroe exhaled as she turned away. She was glad Thomas had gotten out, but the rest of her friends were supposed
to leave the next day. They’d already gotten food poisoning, sunburns, missed out on their super-expensive scuba diving charter, watched a woman have a breakdown after her boyfriend drowned… If Monroe got married in Tureygua, she’d never get them to attend the wedding.

She felt her face go white. Why the hell was she thinking about weddings? She’d only known Koenraad for a few days.
 

A boy catching
a foam football ran backward, right at her. At the last moment, she hopped to the side—too close to the edge of the pool. She swayed, trying to keep her balance.
 

It was dark, and she was falling. The only light came from the blazing white moon. Koenraad stood above her, and he looked pissed.

Her side burned. Sticky warmth covered her torso and hip. She could feel the teeth still biting, tearing
into her.

She was going to die, and Koenraad was just watching.
 

“Miss? Are you ok?”
 

Blinking, Monroe looked up at the boy who had almost run her over. “Yes,” she gasped, not even sure how she’d ended up on the ground. She could still feel the pain in her side, the water closing over her head, but it was all fading quickly.

“Sorry,” he said as he extended a helping hand. “I didn’t mean to
run into you.”

Monroe pushed to her feet. “I don’t think you did.”

“Your book,” he said. Monroe turned to see her paperback floating in the pool.

“Shit,” she muttered.
 

“I’ll get it,” the boy said, but Monroe wrapped her arms tightly around herself and stumbled away, her bag bouncing against her hip.
 

What the hell had just happened to her? It had felt so real, like a memory. A flashback?

She shivered. She’d told Koenraad that she regretted not remembering the shark attack, but that had been… not exactly a lie. More like an exaggeration. He’d been so upset the night before, and he clearly blamed himself for the attack.

She’d wanted to reassure him.
 

But she didn’t actually want to remember.

What had just happened didn’t even add up. What could she have fallen off of, and why
would Koenraad look pissed? Maybe it was a dream, no more real than the one she’d had about gumdrop rainbows.

“Excuse me.”
 

With a start, Monroe looked up. She’d come to a stop just inside the hotel door, and she was blocking the walkway. She moved out of the way and gathered her thoughts.

She needed to see Koenraad. Or at least to be somewhere that wasn’t here.

Maybe, because of the “turtle
mating,” Tara and the others had been sent back to their hotel early. Monroe could go over, get drinks, catch up.

Or maybe it wasn’t a good idea. Her best friend would take one look and know something was wrong. Then Tara would do that cross examination thing, and Monroe would have to lie. Tara would know she was lying. It wouldn’t go well.

She noticed the concierge walking across the lobby
and holding a coffee mug in both hands. She caught up to him.

“Really quick question. Where’s the closest bike rental place?” she asked.

“Right here,” he said with a wide smile, like he lived to answer questions during his coffee break. “Complimentary loans for all our guests.”

Twenty minutes later, she was rolling into the street on a bike. It wasn’t nearly as nice as Koenraad’s, but it was
a heck of a lot better than she’d expected for free. The best part was that it was a woman’s bike. She’d put on a shirt-like, button-down denim dress over the bikini—a Tureygua purchase and not at all her style. Her beach bag, filled with her phone and charger, a sweater, and two new paperbacks, was in the front basket.

There hadn’t been any new messages from Koenraad, and it was driving her
up a wall. At least biking would burn off some energy as well as stop her from sending him a series of desperate texts.

Riding to the other edge of town took longer than she’d expected. The bike didn’t have lights, so she had to go slowly; even though she hadn’t seen an iguana away from the beach areas, she didn’t want to accidentally run over one.
 

Most of the stores were closed, which seemed
weird, but then it was about dinnertime. Not everyplace had New York hours.
 

As she pedaled past the real estate office where she’d talked to Ralph, one of the dreadlocked guides who had introduced her to Koenraad, she glanced inside, but it was dark, empty.
 

A little shiver shot down her spine, and she wondered if she should stay near the lights and crowds. She decided she was being a wimp
and pressed on.

The bike only had three speeds, so she stood up on the pedals and worked them harder. She coasted down a small hill. The wind ruffled through her hair and pressed her dress against her legs.

Soon she was on the long, winding road that would eventually lead to Koenraad’s seaside mansion. There wasn’t much traffic, but the few times cars did pass, she checked out the drivers.

None of them were Koenraad.

For the last stretch toward his beach house, she was alone on the road. She hadn’t appreciated just how remote his place was considering its relative proximity to the town. She hopped off the bike and took a moment to catch her breath and finger-comb her tangled hair away from her face. If she ended up spending lots more time on the island, she’d have to consider cutting
it shorter. Between the salt water and the wind, long hair was a liability.

She walked up to the first set of security gates—Koenraad had two—and punched in the code. To her surprise, the gate stayed closed.

She reentered the code, tried again. Nothing. As she looked at the panel, she realized none of the lights were on. And it hadn’t beeped.

Jangling the locked gate didn’t get her anywhere.
 

Either Koenraad had locked her out or there was a power failure.
 

She lifted onto her toes and tried to peer through the gates, but the mansion itself was too far back to see, and anyway it was too dark out.

As she walked the bike out to the road, she couldn’t help but wonder if maybe she
should
be taking this personally. He’d blown her off several times since they’d met, and while it was true
that his job was a bit hectic at the moment, he’d left her alone all day. He’d broken several promises to call.

Busy she could understand, but the lack of communication was seriously fucked up.

Maybe he wasn’t the man she’d thought. Maybe it was out of sight, out of mind with him. If this had been the first time… but he’d stood her up twice before.
 

She was the problem. Nya, one of her friends
who was also one of Linda’s bridesmaids,
never
had a guy stand her up. It was “one strike and don’t let the door hit you” with her.
 

The more Monroe thought about it, the angrier she became. And she was stuck here, dependent on a guy who had vanished.

Unless he’d gotten sick. He’d told her that the contaminant in the water did bad things to shifters… In which case, the thoughts going through
her mind made her a horrible person.

If only she knew for sure what was going on.

She leaned the bike against her hip and tried to decide what to do next. She was stuck here for several more days. Funny how just a few hours ago she’d been wanting to stay forever.

She turned and looked at the wall around Koenraad’s estate. It was too high to climb, and she was certain he had a pretty good alarm
system.

She hated feeling insecure like this. She wanted to be more like Nya, to believe that if Koenraad couldn’t be bothered to keep his promises, she was better off without him. To believe that she’d find someone better.

Koenraad had been pretty open with her about all the shark stuff. That had to count for something, right? He’d saved her life twice.
 

But maybe he’d only felt responsible
for her. Maybe he’d gotten tired of having to rescue a weak human all the time.
 

Exhausted, she massaged the bridge of her nose, then she pulled out her phone and dialed. She went right to his voicemail.

Where the hell was he?

It was the not knowing that killed her. When she’d been with Thomas, everything was so stable. So predictable.

Life with Koenraad was the opposite of that, and while
it had been kinda fun at the beginning, she wasn’t sure she liked it.

She scrolled through her messages and wasn’t surprised to see that Koenraad hadn’t texted.
 

Dating Thomas had made her feel a lot of things, but pitiful wasn’t one of them. Not until the end, at least. Koenraad had managed to make her feel pathetic in just a handful of days.
 

She perched on the bike seat and was about to
push off when she heard a car approaching. Even though she was already at the extreme side of the road, with nothing but boulders and spiky bushes to her right, she squeezed over a bit more and waited for the car to pass.

But the car was slowing.

Turning, she saw a white luxury sedan with darkly tinted windows. It wasn’t the one Koenraad had been driving the last few days, and she didn’t recognize
it from his garage, but who else would be about to turn into his driveway?

So she waited, but the car didn’t turn. Not Koenraad, then. Could the driver even see her? And if he couldn’t, why was he stopped like that, diagonally across the road?

Goose bumps rose on her arms as the car started rolling again—toward her.

It wasn’t moving fast. Smiling uncertainly, she rolled the bike forward a few
more feet until the front tire smacked the edge of a jutting boulder.

The car kept coming.

“Watch it!” she screamed. Fear made her voice shrill. She couldn’t believe the driver didn’t see her, but she also couldn’t believe someone would try to deliberately run over a stranger.