In Love and Rescue: When love is the perfect rescue... (3 page)

The man set the food
down before prying the door open with the claw edge of a hammer. He disappeared inside only to reappear a few moments later with a panicked look on his face when he realized that the shanty was empty. He fingered the cut screen, then worriedly clasped his hands behind his head before his eyes darted around the wooded area for any signs of life. Spotting no movement, he detached a radio from his belt and held it up to his lips.

“My truck’s parked on the opposite
side,” Desmond added. “We won’t be able to get back over to it.”

Larke’s heart sank. “So, what are we going to do now?”

“We have to move forward on foot.”

She glanced down at
the five-dollar pink rubber flip-flops on her feet. They weren’t designed for trekking, but at that point, she had no other choice. If they abducted her again, she was certain that they would kill her on the spot this time.

“Come on,” Desmond ordered, turning and making his way deeper into the woods. She followed
closely and kept her eyes trained on his back, knowing that losing him most likely meant also losing her life.

Only a short amount of time passed before the terrain began to darken. A few spots of light could be seen in windows on the other side of the island as people turned in for the night, and the air held a distinct odor from the remnants of dying embers. Dried leaves underneath their feet crunched loudly with each step that they took, and Larke’s feet ached as the thin rubber from her flip flops offered no protection against sharp stones on the solid ground. Desmond, however, pushed forward like a madman, expertly navigating through the forest as though the trees were marked with street signs.

L
ow-lying clouds hugged the mountaintops and as the temperature dropped, with a bathing suit and wrap skirt cover-up as her only pieces of clothing, goose bumps scattered across Larke’s skin.

“Desmond,” she called out, stopp
ing to lean against a thick tree trunk. Immediately, he turned around and covered the space between them in a few steps.

“Can we rest a minute? I’m exhausted. Plus these,” she held up her shoe, “haven’t been the easiest to walk in.”

Desmond crouched and examined the shoe. With the way the rubber tugged at the piece in the middle, he knew that they probably had only a few miles left on them, if that.

“You’re not used to the elevation,” he said, mostly to himself. “That’s why you’re so out of breath. How much farther do you think you can go? I’m pretty sure that we can find a cave to camp out in for the night.
The island has dozens of them.”

Larke looked at the swollen soles of her feet, unsure how to answer the q
uestion. She’d bounced across the city in three and four-inch heels without so much as an ache at the end of the day, and had assumed that her feet had the capacity for many miles before they caved. But with the way they now throbbed, she wasn’t sure that she could take another step much less walk a mile looking for a cave that could possibly not even exist.

“I don’t know,” she replied. “How much longer do you think we’ll have to go?”

She shivered at a cool breeze passing through, and Desmond pulled off his shirt and handed it to her. Larke slipped the fabric over her head and since it was already warmed from being snug against his body, the contact instantly soothed her numbing skin.

“Try to
put pressure on it?” he asked, holding out his hand. She grabbed his hand and pulled herself forward, but a burning sensation spread from the balls of her feet to her arch forcing her to lean against the tree to ease the pain. 

“That’s pretty bad,” he said mostly to himself
again, and helped her take a seat at the base of the tree. Removing a shoe, he examined the sole of her foot. “I think you’re done for the night.”

“I’m sorr
y,” she apologized. “I don’t mean to slow us down.”

“Y
ou’re not going to slow us down.” In one swift motion, he scooped her and the shoe up into his arms. “We shouldn’t have much farther to go before we can rest. I’m going to swing you around to my back. Do you think you can hold on?”

She nodded and he swung her around until she was against his back, her arms around his neck and her legs against his waist. As soon as she was in place, she burst out laughing.

“What’s funny?” He asked, continuing on as though he wasn’t carrying an extra passenger.

“My little brother Jay,” Larke began. “
As you know, I’m much older than my siblings. Wren wasn’t born until I was ten and Jay came five years later. Up until he was about three, I used to give Jay piggyback rides to the park near our house. Then, I left for college and over time, instead of playing on the jungle-gym with all the other little kids, he developed a crazy love for basketball. So, when he turned fourteen, my parents surprised him by sending him to a basketball summer camp. He left that June around five-foot-nine, only to come back that September a staggering six-foot-four inches. You should’ve seen us at the airport looking around this huge
man
for our baby brother.”

She
leaned onto Desmond’s shoulder.

“When we got home that afternoon, after dinner, he asked me and Wren if we wanted to go to the park. Halfway there, he asked me to jump up on his back to repay me for all the rides that I gave him when we were younger. Being on your back, it reminded me of that.”

Desmond smiled quietly to himself.

“I know your alternate persona ‘Michael’ didn’t have any siblings,” La
rke began, “but do you have any? Desmond?”

He shook his head. “That part was true. No brothers or sisters.
Had a Rottweiler though. Gizmo.”

Larke smiled. “That’s an unusual name.”

“I named him after a friend.”

“Is it a friend who likes gizmos? Like a techie?”

“Yes.”

A
nd that was the end of the conversation.

They walked about another mile before stumbling upon one of the many caves that the island boasted. When Desmond stopped, they stared into the black entrance, unsure of what would meet them inside.

“Is this it?” Larke asked, easing down onto still tender feet.

“This is it. We’ll have to make a fire first.”

She
looked towards the ground. “I agree. I’ll do that while you walk around the site to collect some wood for us keep it burning through the night.”

Desmond
burst out laughing and the reaction startled her. She hadn’t expected that much animation from him, especially not in reaction to something that she’d said. However, she found that she liked seeing him light up like that. The change was refreshing and it helped to put her more at ease with him.

“You can build a fire?” He asked.

Larke knitted her brows. Did he really think that she grew up in the suburbs? Her family’s farm bordered acres of woods. Before her siblings were born, she was the one who had to be up at daybreak to collect eggs, milk cows, and shred hay for the horses. She’d camped out with her father on one of his numerous bird-watching trips with a fire as their only source of light, and they’d even encountered a mountain lion and bear tracks right in their very own backyard. Just because she’d been living in the city for the past fourteen years didn’t mean that those experiences had disappeared.

She hobbled around the
site to look for a pair of solid, dry sticks. After having trouble finding two good pieces, she turned around to find Desmond standing with a makeshift torch in his hand and putting a lighter back into his pocket. Folding her arms, she tried the most defensive look that she could muster, but a smile still peeked from the corner of her mouth.

“I always carry a lighter,” he
said nonchalantly, hiding a smile as well.  He jerked his head to motion her over and again, hoisted her onto his back.

Walking into the black entrance, t
hey moved over a series of rocks before finding a dirt path that hugged the side of the cave. The flames from the torch cast dancing shadows along the wall, and the cavern grew even more ominous with each step they took. Larke tightened her grip on Desmond and tried to force away images of bats swooping down from the ceiling to feast on her ripe, young flesh. Although National Geographic claimed that bats ate fruit, insects, and small animals, she didn’t want to be the first person to prove that observation wrong.

“You’re thinking about bats, aren’t you?” He asked as if reading her thoughts.

“How did you know?”

“A hunch.”

“That’s quite the hunch.”

Suddenly, h
e stopped and lifted his nose to the air. “Larke, do you smell that?”

“If you’re talking about that distinctive c
ave smell…”

“No, not that
. Do you smell it? Wet earth. Like after it rains.”

Larke lifted her nose and picked up on what he was referring to.
“Water?”

He nodded. “Let’s go.”

As they continued to walk, she heard a low, constant rumble somewhere up ahead. Desmond increased his stride, his long legs covering large squares of the path with each step. As they neared, the rumble grew even louder, its growl reverberating off the stone walls of the cave. When they rounded the back corner, Larke let out a small gasp.

A waterfall whose stream seemed to come from the heavens billowed into a waiting body of freshwater where rocks jutted
up like stepping stones. Lush vegetation decorated the serrated border of the lagoon, and down the river expanse, a path continued as though they’d walked directly through the wall of the mountain. In the middle of the water was the rippling reflection of the moon which illuminated the entire alcove.

“This is amazing,”
Larke exhaled.

Desmond
gently set her onto her feet and tested the water with his fingers. “And warm. We’ll be able to set up here. You sleep and I’ll stay up to keep watch.”

Larke reexamined their surrou
ndings. “What about you? Don’t you need to rest? We can take shifts.”

He silently stared at her for a moment, his unblinking eyes flickering even darker in the light from the fire. She was offering to stay up to keep watch over him despite everything that she’d been through that day, and while he certainly didn’t need anyone protecting h
im, the gesture had stirred him to his core.

“I don’t need to sleep,” he told her, walking out into the clearing.
“We’ll stay here until sunrise, then make our way down to the harbor.”

Larke took a seat on a section of grass while Desmond surveyed the clearing for any imminent signs of danger. She watched as he meticulously overturne
d rocks, retested the water, and fingered tall blades of grass. When he was seemingly finished, he remained standing several feet away from her as if, all of a sudden, nearness made him uncomfortable.

“Desmond,” she called, patting the space next to her. “Have a seat with me.”

He hesitated, but realized that the look in her eyes meant that the issue wasn’t up for discussion. Scanning the area one final time, he took a seat in the space next to her. Larke sighed and drew her knees up to her chest.

“I never
got a chance to say thank you. Without you, I probably would be dead by now,” she said.

Desmond nonchalantly shrugged. “It’s my job.”

She placed her chin atop her knees. “I guess it’s because I didn’t trust who you said you were. I’m not sure if I still do, but you’d be going through an awful lot of trouble for someone that you’re just going to end up killing later.”

He shrugged again. “You could say that.”

Frustrated, Larke faced him. “When did you all of a sudden become a man of very few words? I mean, was Michael that much different from Desmond?”

He
picked up a smooth blue stone and threw it into the water. “Maybe.”

When he didn’t elaborate, she loudly sighed and he took a quick glance at her out of the corner of his eye. Some of her hair had become matted to her forehead
and her face shined with sprinkles of moisture from the fall. Although she appeared to be relaxed, he knew that she was afraid of what could have happened if he hadn’t shown up at that old wooden house. Yet, her ability to adjust to stressful situations without going into total hysteria was still quite amazing. Perhaps with about a hundred more pounds of muscle, she could have even been a SEAL.

He suppressed a smile at the thought.

“I can feel you looking at me.”

She turned to meet his eyes and w
hen she smiled, he felt a familiar knot tighten in the pits of his abdomen.

“Do you really trust me?” He asked.

Larke shrugged and fiddled with her hands. “You haven’t given me a reason not to. Right now, I guess you could say I’m blindly walking by faith.”

A pang hit him in the center of his chest.
“What’d you say?”

She looked up. “I’m blindly walking by faith. Going with my gut. Leaving my fate up to the cosmos.”