Stormfront (Undertow Book 2) (28 page)

MJ wasn’t kidding when he sai
d
Cerberus was no longer the biggest fish in the sea. Rows of luxury yachts lined the docks at the Horizon Yacht Club, though Cerberus was still impressive with her ruby hull and sleek lines.

“I think I have died and gone to heaven,” moaned
Ana, whose bare feet were warming nicely on the teak decking of Cerberus’ bow. The towering palm trees that lined the edge of the pool at the yacht club’s main building seemed downright tipsy as they swayed in the ocean breeze. We had traded icy New England for sunny West Palm, and I wasn’t sure anyone could drag me back to winter, or the chaos that existed in the colder weather.

I started daydreaming about becoming a hermit, living on a tropical island where I painted seashells for the tourists, though they would mock my artistic abilities.

As soon as we had gotten to Cerberus, Ana and I had traded our heavy winter clothes for the few summer items we had managed to bring. Though she had told me I could borrow some of her clothes, which Kian had kept from last summer on board the yacht, I was hoping I would get to shop for a few things on the islands.

While Ana lounged on the front of Cerberus, soaking in the afternoon rays, I headed to find Raef. I passed by Kian and MJ, who were tending to some last minute needs of the yacht, and I gave them a quick wave.

Kian had contacted the yacht club yesterday, instructing them to ready the boat to leave. Not only had they fueled and washed Cerberus, they had also brought in gorgeous arrangements of flowers, and the scent inside the boat was sublime. The smell of jasmine and lily permeated the inside of Cerberus, forming a garden-like oasis that was to die for.

I saw Raef standing on the dock next to Cerberus, talking to a young man with several boxes on a cart. I hopped down onto the deck and walked up behind him, threading my arms around him. He glanced over his shoulder at me as he hugged my arms tighter to his chest. I loved the feel of how solid he was and how my body molded so easily into his back. Yeah, I could stay in this fantasy paradise for a LONG, LONG time.

“Wadda we doing?” I asked, glancing to the kid with the boxes.

Raef pulled me around next to him, keeping one hand snuggled around my waist. “I ordered some pr
ovisions for our trip. Sam here works for the marina and has brought us our groceries and a few other supplies.” Sam gave a little wave.

“So
, Sam, what is the likelihood that there is chocolate inside one of these boxes?” I asked with a wink.

“Pretty high, I’d say. The lady
at the Sand Dollar Candy Shop took over one whole box,” replied Sam, who looked as though he wasn’t much older than I was. “So, you guys on break from college or something? Your yacht is the bomb!”

I laughed. “Thanks
, Sam. We are on break,” I replied, leaving out the fact that we were in high school, not college.

“I bet you guys are headed to the Outer Islands. Bimini is awesome – really cool snorkeling out there,” he replied. I went to speak but Raef squeezed my side, a signal to keep me silent.

“We’re heading to a bunch of places. Not sure where we are going first though,” answered Raef.

Sam nodded, “Well, if you’re leaving now, the only place you can get to before midnight would probably be Bimini. You really don’t want to be stuck out there with all the reefs in the dead of night, know what I’m saying?”

“Good thinking, Sam,” I replied. “So which box has the chocolate in it?”

Sam pointed to the box beside me, “That one has enough sugar in it to keep
ya flying for days!”

I turned to Raef. “
Awww. Did you order me an entire box of chocolate?” I asked him in a sing-song voice. I was just a wee bit high on the whole tropical getaway thing.

“Of course, but you may need to hide it or Ana will clean you out in a matter of hours,” replied Raef, running a piece of my dark hair through his fingers. It occurred to me that Raef was far more addictive than my favorite candy. Chocolate? Who needs chocolate?

“What am I being accused of?” demanded Ana, jumping down from Cerberus onto the dock. Kian and MJ joined us, leaning down to grab a couple of boxes.

“Chocolate thievery,” I replied.

She gave a dismissive wave, “Oh please, I’m not that bad.”

Kian laughed, “Liar. You are some freakish super-criminal when it comes to anything related to a cocoa bean. You’re screwed, Eila.”

“Hey! Don’t go telling her that! Now she really will go and hide all the goodies!” said Ana, pouting. I watched her as she strode over to Kian and tried to peek in the box he was carrying. He deftly lifted it with one hand out of her reach, but she kept trying to make a grab for it, cursing him as he laughed. She lunged for the box, but missed and ended up hugging Kian.

She seemed stunned for a moment and he slowly wrapped his free arm around her back. They simply looked at each other, all amusement falling from their faces, until Kian finally cleared his throat and Ana let go. Kian turned to
Sam, “We’re going to need some more chocolate, kid.”

Sam nodded, “Will do, sir. I’ll be right back.”

Ana began walking back to Cerberus to climb aboard, but I called her back. “Ana, hang on – I want to talk to everyone for a second.”

Kian and MJ set down the boxes and everyone came closer to me, Raef’s hand finally dropping from my hip. I instantly missed his electric touch.

“So, I need to lay down some rules,” I started, but MJ moaned. I gave him a shove. “I’m serious! Listen, we have three days to just be ourselves. No need to care about our pasts or what we are. So I have one rule: that we forget the world, for just three days, and enjoy ourselves and one another. I want to be plain old normal.”

“I thought you wanted to open the diary?” asked Raef.

MJ pointed an accusing finger at Raef, “HA! Rule Breaker! Right there! Time out for YOU!”

Raef rolled his lips, trying not to smile as I crossed my arms, acting pissed. Finally he tossed his hands, “Okay then. No talk of . . . well, you know. Stuff.”

“And there is a
ton
of stuff,” mumbled Kian, and I shot him a lethal look.

I wasn’t stupid.

I knew that trying to ignore the fact that some jerk had broken into my house and Nikki’s and was running around god-knows-where, wasn’t going to be easy. I knew that Collette and Christian were traveling with Mae, which made my skin crawl, and that Nikki held our secret over us like a giant stone. I knew that the FBI hadn’t given up on uncovering what happened, which was made worse by a damn gear that was somehow linked to me, and I knew someone had bought most of our files from dear, dead Agent Sollen. I knew that I needed to train with a Blacklist dealer who knew Elizabeth, and I knew that Ana’s mom was murdered.

I knew that I had died in Raef’s arms.

My deal seemed more like Mission Impossible, but it was worth a shot. All our problems would unfortunately still be there when we arrived in Polaris, but for the next three days, we were going to escape.

I stretched out my hand into the middle of my circle of friends, like a team getting ready to play the game of their lives. “I get it won’t be easy, but we have a rare chance to just be together, as friends. And I can wait on the diary. I’ve waited this damn long and a few days won’t hurt. The books and the necklace are in Cerberus’ safe. So who is with me?” I asked.

“I am!” replied MJ, placing his hand over mine. Ana agreed, adding a requirement for daily doses of candy as she placed her hand on MJ’s. Kian followed suit, placing his wide hand over her tiny one.

Raef looked at me, slipping his hand under mine. “Deal,” he replied softly, and then he leaned down and kissed me in front of our friends.

They all burst into moans and groans, fleeing the scene.

I couldn’t help but smile wide with Raef’s lips pressed against my own, but the best part was, he was grinning as well.

We could pull this off – we could be normal for once.

Right?

“If you even think about pullin
g
me in, MJ, I will smother you in your sleep,” warned Ana in an orange tankini as she inspected the crystal clear water below Cerberus’ dive deck.

I stood beside her in
a far more modest pair of board shorts and long-sleeved rash guard, admiring our finned visitors.

Their numbers were a bit overwhelming.

MJ had tossed some pieces of bagel into the water after breakfast, and the exotic fish of Bimini Island went nuts. There must have been a million brightly colored Nemos and Dorys swarming the silver ladder that hung from the back of the yacht. Their crazy behavior reminded me of Mae after she went on a strict protein-only diet.

Get between her and the rare donut, and you could easily lose a finger.

“Oh you are such a WIMP. They aren’t barracuda, for crying out loud. Trust me – they won’t bite,” encouraged MJ.

Raef and Kian were leaning against the back of the dive deck, watching the two of us with great amusement as we tried to drum up the nerve to go in the water. Their bare chests and arms were downright distracting, and I had to stop myself from drooling over Raef’s fabulous body.

I freakin’ love the Caribbean!

We had managed to arrive at Bimini last night around 10pm, making the crossing from West Palm in only five hours, beating Sam’s guesstimate.

MJ, brat that he was, proved our stellar wimpiness by leaping into the water just after breakfast. He hung onto the ladder, while all the fish formed their own aquatic flash mob around his legs and arms.

I shook my hands in the air trying to drum up the nerve to get in the water. I didn’t like seafood, period, and now I was expected to swim with it?

I can do this.

They’re just fish.

Little, superfast, squirmy, scaly . . . crap, I can’t do this.

I glanced back at Raef, my brain short-circuiting from the sight of him. “Can’t you come in too?”

He shook his head, “If Kian or I get in the water, the fish will scatter. Animals don’t exactly like soul thieves, remember? Just go in, experience the moment, and when you’ve had enough of the fish-lips, we’ll get in and clear the area.”

I looked at Ana, closing off all thoughts of how many fish were in the water. She narrowed her eyes at me, reading my emotion shift from nervous to bold, “Don’t. Don’t you dare.
”

With one good shove, I knocked a screaming
Ana into the water along with me. I surfaced with MJ laughing in front of me, the fish going bonkers around us.

I could feel their little bodies brush against me and I sucked in a squeak between my teeth. Ana popped up behind MJ and latched onto him while she screamed obscenities, though she was smiling. MJ got shoved under water for a second, but then managed to pry her hands off his neck.

“Jeezus woman, you’re like an octopus. Calm down,” coughed MJ, wiping the water from his face.

“Oh my gosh. Oh
my gosh. Oh my gosh,” chanted Ana through her panicked laughing, jumping every once in a while when a fish would bump her.

Raef leaned forward on the dive deck with a piece of bagel in his hand. “Here – take this and hold it away from your body. They will eat out of your hand.”

I took the bagel from Raef and pushed away from Cerberus, holding the piece of bread above my head. Once I was away from the swarms of fish, I slowly lowered the breakfast snack into the water and was instantly rushed by every guppy in a five-mile radius.

I squealed, and their little lips felt like slimy gummy bears all over my hand. They thundered around my legs and back, bouncing over my arms and tapping my toes. I was engulfed in the living jewels of the Bahamas, splashing and jumping. My life felt amazing.

Kian hoisted Ana out of the water, and she was now walking around the yacht’s deck as she gathered our picnic items and towels. He then began easing three paddleboards from Cerberus into the water near MJ. We intended to paddle over to the nearby private beach and spend the day there.

I looked back at Raef, who was standing on the dive deck like a lifeguard in his red, low-riding swim trunks. He was
talking to Ana while keeping an eye on me.

I loved my friends. Loved everything about them. They were my world, my family, and I’d do anything for them. And Raef? Raef was so much more than my guard, more than just a boyfriend. I felt as though he was a piece of me, his heartbeat shadowing my own.

He was a gift, sent from another era, to stand with me, and face Fate with me, hand-in-hand.

I swallowed back the overwhelming emotion that was building in me – happiness and joy, flooding my mind. “Thank you, Elizabeth,” I whispered to the sky, and I saw Raef cock his head slightly.

Even at a distance he had heard me, and he dove off of Cerberus, swimming towards me. The fish hightailed it from the area as he finally reached me and grabbed me by the waist.

“You okay?” he asked, his forehead wrinkled.

“Heard that, did ya?” I asked, taking a breath and he nodded, holding me a little tighter. All my bagel was gone and the warm, blue water around us was quiet except for the sound of Ana, Kian, and MJ laughing. In the arms of the boy I loved, surrounded by the world’s untouched beauty, I had found my own earth-bound heaven.

I sighed, “We would have never met had it not been for Elizabeth. I blame her for a lot of things, but the reality is, she made my life complete. Unforgettable.”

Raef stroked back my soaked hair, his eyes tracing over my face. He finally rested one hand to my cheek, smiling. “You know you’re going to need a time out, right?”

I gave him a curious glance.

“You said no ‘stuff’ and she-who-shall-not-be-named falls under that category. You broke your own deal, Ms. Walker.”

Damn. I did. But then I remember what he said a few minutes ago. “Wait! YOU broke the rule first! You called yourself a soul thief before I mentioned E –.”

Raef halted my words with a salty kiss and I entirely forgot what the heck I was talking about. He traced the curves of my lips with his own and ran one hand gently across my back, scrambling my brain. He pulled away, whispering, “Don’t say her name, or I will have to stop you again.”

I hung onto his shoulders while he kept the two of us afloat.

Somehow he always kept us afloat.

“I am completely down with breaking my deal if
that
is how you intend to get me into line,” I replied.

My stunning lifeguard smiled at me. “You’re right. There needs to be a lot of rule breaking,” he said, but his smile faltered. “I mean
, rule breaking that is okay with you. Not rule breaking that goes over the line, or anything. I mean, we can . . . just . . .”

His words trailed off as the Fallen marks subtly appeared on his face and cheeks, which actually had a slight blush to them. I would have teased him about getting flustered, except his face was serious.

The stupid butterflies started to circle inside me and I swallowed as I ran a hand through his wet hair. “If there is a line, we will know it when we get there. I trust us.”

Raef cradled my cheek, pulling my face to his, “If?”

“If,” I replied, my voice like a feather in the wind, and I kissed him as if he was all that kept me from spinning away into the universe. I could have kissed him until the ocean swept us away, but MJ’s voice rang out, demanding we get a room, and I felt Raef chuckle.