Total pages in book: 166
Estimated words: 157273 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 786(@200wpm)___ 629(@250wpm)___ 524(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 157273 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 786(@200wpm)___ 629(@250wpm)___ 524(@300wpm)
“I didn’t know it had a hole!” the one in the pink shirt shrieked at the girl in green, who had her back turned toward me. “Or that it was low on gas, and I certainly didn’t ask you to jump in as I left the boathouse!”
“Of course I jumped in,” the one in the green replied, her voice surprisingly calm despite the distinct sound of chattering teeth. “I thought I could stop you. Dad told us to never take this boat.”
“I just wanted a few minutes away from her!” the girl in pink wailed. “And now she’s going to kill us both when she finds out we sank the boat!”
“Feel like getting out of here?” I asked, my chest heaving beneath the jackets as I swam around the side of the vessel.
Both women snapped their heads my direction, soaked ponytails flinging water as they looked over their shoulders at me.
It was the streak of red down the closest girl’s temple that caught my attention, but it was her eyes that kept it. They were almost too big for her heart-shaped face, the color of straight-up whiskey, and bordered by thick, water-spiked lashes that lowered as her focus swept over me and lingered on the buckles at the top of my chest.
The second her gaze lifted to lock with mine, I forgot how to fucking breathe, let alone think. I’d never been hit by lightning, but I bet this was what it felt like. And she was bleeding. Right. Get ahold of yourself.
“You’re hurt—” I started, my chest tightening with a completely irrational amount of worry.
“Oh thank God!” The girl in pink pushed off the boat and flung herself my direction.
I caught her on pure instinct.
“I’m only fourteen, and that’s entirely too young to die just because I didn’t check the gas . . . or the boat,” the girl in pink declared dramatically, clutching my shoulders as she looked up at me with frightened brown eyes. “And I don’t swim very well.”
And she’d come out on an ancient rowboat without a life jacket? “Give me a second and we’ll get you sorted.” I kicked toward the boat. “Hold on like your life depends on it.”
The girl drew back her head in indignation, her jaw practically unhinging.
“He’s wearing two life jackets, Eva,” the girl with the whiskey eyes said quietly. “You need to get one of them on before he can take you back to his boat.”
“Oh. Of course.” Eva grabbed hold of the hull as another swell lifted, then dropped us but didn’t submerge the vessel. “You’ll come back for Allie, right?”
“I’ll be fine, Eva—” the other started to argue.
“Actually, I think I need to take you back first,” I said to the girl in green—who I assumed was Allie—as the cold seeped into my very bones.
“She’s sixteen, and she swims way better than I do.” Eva’s voice rose.
“That’s absolutely true.” Allie’s teeth chattered. “Please take Eva. I’ll wait.”
“You’re bleeding, and we don’t have time to argue.” I kicked to stay between them as the current dragged us along.
“It’s just my scalp, not my legs. I’ll be fine.” Her worried gaze darted toward Eva.
“I’m sorry?” In what world was a head wound better than one to an extremity?
“She really doesn’t swim well. Please get her out of here,” Allie pleaded, pink water dripping off her jaw. “What’s your name?”
“Hudson Ellis.” This was taking too long. I undid the top set of buckles, and Eva snatched the jacket as soon as it cleared my shoulders. “Hey—”
“Hudson.” Allie’s teeth chattered. “I’m Alessandra. I don’t know if you have siblings, but there’s nothing more important to me than my sisters.”
Sisters. That explained her refusal.
“Except dancing,” Eva muttered, shoving her arms into the life jacket one by one as another swell rocked us.
“Nothing,” Alessandra repeated, holding my gaze hostage. “You have to take my little sister first. Please. I can’t leave her here.” Fear streaked through her eyes, knitting her brow and pursing her lips, but she raised her pointed chin. “I won’t go until she does.”
Shit. Just like I could never leave Caroline or Gavin. I understood that need on a cellular, primal level. We might give each other shit, but we showed up for each other come hell or high water, and Alessandra felt just as vehemently about her siblings as I did. Something inside my chest cracked open, and every ounce of my common sense must have spilled out into the water, because that one simple demand made me feel like I knew her.
“I have siblings,” I said, reaching for the next set of buckles. “I get it.”
Her eyes quickly narrowed in confusion. “What are you doing?”
I shrugged my right arm out of the jacket, then reached up to hold on to the boat between them before sliding the rest of the yellow neoprene-covered flotation device off my left arm and offering it to her. “Put it on.”