1
Ashley
It’s raining in paradise.
And this hidden island, perched like a jewel in the middle of crystalline turquoise seas, is paradise. It has everything a girl could want. A mansion hideaway on a cliffside looking over a white sand beach. A woman who makes and delivers the most delicious food. A lush tropical forest that’s the stuff of Instagram #wanderlust dreams.
Or it would be, if I weren’t living in a nightmare.
The path through the forest dips low and rises in a punishing climb. My legs ache. My lungs burn. Even my abs protest with every step.
But crying outside is better than crying in the clean, white mansion, where everything is perfect and I’m the broken thing. I was a ghost in the mansion for our first week here, trailing around in the too-new sundresses that filled one of the walk-in closets and sobbing in every available corner while it rained and rained and rained.
It’s still raining. My heart is still broken.
It feels slightly less broken when I climb hills, or at least the pain of exertion covers up the blown-apart feeling in the middle of my chest.
This hill pisses me off. It’s the worst one, the steepest one, and I hate it. I hate it almost as much as I hate the fact that my dad is dead. I hate feeling this shattered-glass grief. Jagged edges cut into the vulnerable parts of me with every step, and for what? For what? The man who tried to have me killed. Who was going to have me shot over the waves and then retrieve my body for insurance money. I should hate him, not mourn him.
The heart doesn’t listen to reason.
My throat feels raw by the time I get to the top of the hill and double over. My lungs screech for air but I can’t stop crying. My shoulders curve in with it, my spine bows, and I would honestly collapse to my knees if I thought it would help.
It won’t help. Nothing helps.
Raindrops work their way through sheltering leaves and splash the back of my neck in cool droplets. The skin around my eyes burns. Too many tears. Too much salt. It has to be doing some damage. The tears feel as corrosive on the outside as they do on the inside.
They’re eating at my heart.
How long until they’re satisfied?
Probably the rest of my life.
I put my hands on my knees and push myself upright, every muscle on fire, and tip my face up toward the leaves. Breathing in the humid air is like drowning. Grief is like drowning. Everything I’ve lost wants to push my head under the surface until I run out of air. I’m never going to have dinner with my dad again. He’s never going to walk me down the aisle at my wedding. He’s never going to come to the hospital to meet his first grandchild with tears in his eyes. Some small, foolish part of me keens for that, even after everything. I didn’t only lose my father, the physical being, the man who wanted to use me. I also lost the dream, the father I thought I had, the parent I believed cared for me. The real man and the dream, both of them—gone.
This is not how things were supposed to go. I was supposed to have at least one parent left. That’s the deal I thought the universe had made with me. It would take my mom, but I would have my dad.
Instead I have nothing.
My heart gives another pissed-off beat. Fine. I don’t have nothing. I have Poseidon, who is as shipwrecked as I am. He’s a human storm who belongs at sea and has been forced to live on land. Who destroyed his home for me.
“You can’t keep doing this.”
Poseidon stands in the middle of the path ahead, soaked from head to toe, the green of the leaves caught in the depths of his eyes. He’s high-contrast in the gray filtered light. Every line of him seems etched. His shirt clings to his muscles and his tattoos spiral down from beneath the sleeves. His dark hair is wild, as if he’s been swimming.
He hasn’t been. I wish he would. New tears streak through the rain droplets clinging to my face. I ball my hands up against my fists. “I can go hiking if I want to.”
“Not alone. Not here.” He stalks toward me with dangerous grace. He looks graceful, but it’s a lie. He’s not at home here. Not the way he is on the water. He puts a hand beneath my chin and tips my face up so he can look into my eyes. “What will it take to make you understand, princess?”
I know he’s talking about the hike, but it feels like more than that. It always feels like more when he’s touching me. It feels like a lightning strike into deep water. It feels like my fingertips meeting a sturdy plank right before my head slips under. “I understand everything.”
His hold is strong on my face, but not painfully so. He could make it hurt if he wanted. “Obviously not, if you’re still crying over him.”
I am. I am still crying over that asshole, otherwise known as my dad, otherwise known as the man who attempted to murder me. Otherwise known as the man who died on Poseidon’s ship in a rolling wave of fire. “I can’t stop thinking about it.” The sound of the explosives. Steel, screaming. My dad disappearing into the flames. “It’s all I can think about.”
Poseidon’s grip tightens, his fingers pressing into flesh. “He was a bastard. He doesn’t deserve your grief.”
“Maybe not.” My throat is so tight I can hardly force the words out. All that hiking for nothing. It’s not making me any stronger. It’s not making this hurt any less. “But I still love him. I can’t just turn it off. No matter what he did.”
I’m not just talking about my father. I’m talking about Poseidon.
My father killed my mother. He put a hit out on me.
It’s hard to believe those things. It’s even harder to believe that I’m cocooned in a remote paradise with Poseidon. It’s hardest to believe that what I feel for him now—even with his eyes dark with frustration—has eclipsed what happened between us. I still love him. I can’t just turn it off. No matter what he did. Does Poseidon know it’s about him?
He laughs, cruel and harsh. “And I’m the heartless piece of shit who killed him.” It’s true. He is. But that’s not what makes more tears spill over onto Poseidon’s fingertips. His jaw tightens at the heat. “That’s right, princess. I’m the villain. Don’t you ever fucking forget it.”
Poseidon drops his hand, releasing me to sink to the bottom of this despair, and— “No. No.” I grab for his wrist without thinking and get both hands around it. The air crackles with unreleased tension and electric charge. It’ll be a storm soon. It does nothing on this island but rain and thunder and rage. “You don’t get to take this from me. You don’t get to make yourself evil.”
I expect him to shake me off, to push me away, but instead Poseidon uses my hold on him to force me backward, step after step until my back meets the trunk of a massive tree. I’m off-balance, my running shoes losing traction in the slick mud. His body is the only thing keeping me on my feet. Poseidon braces one hand next to my head and with the other—
Somehow, on the trip from path to tree, he’s taken over. He holds both my wrists in one of his big hands. Lightning arcs across his eyes. The flash illuminates everything. His grief at losing the Trident. His hatred of being confined to land.
And a question.
A raw, searing question.
Poseidon leans in and drags his teeth over the curve of my shoulder, exposed by a racerback tee that feels ridiculous in the face of him. My heart flutters, the pace kicking up to pounding. He’s so much bigger. So much stronger. It’s like the sea has come ashore and washed everything away except me. “What makes you think I’m not evil?”