Total pages in book: 60
Estimated words: 57240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 286(@200wpm)___ 229(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57240 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 286(@200wpm)___ 229(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
“Who are you?” he asks warily. “Natives?”
“Fuck no,” Cy says. “I’m Cy Kaufman.” He doesn’t give them his military stats. He doesn’t trust them.
“And I’m Harper Lake,” I supply. “I came here aboard one of your ships and was left here.” I don’t say anything about the cameras or the vacation I won, or anything. What if I really was left here by accident, and the entire filming thing had nothing to do with me at all? I’m not going to lose my one chance of returning to civilization because of this. No way.
If I have to, I’ll defend myself, but I’ll have better tools at my disposal if I can get home first, or at least somewhere near civilization.
“My God,” the man says, blinking. If he’s acting, he’s good at it. “Come aboard. Please.”
To my shock, I’m whisked away. I look wildly back at Cy, and he’s glaring but following. The man in the uniform looks from me to Cy, noting our weapons.
“You won’t need those here,” he says gently. “And I can’t let you aboard with them.”
I look to Cy, and he looks back to me. What do we do? Finally, I nod, and he nods back. It’s dangerous as hell to be on board this ship unarmed, but what if they’re legit, and we lose our only chance of getting off this island? We have to trust that we can defend ourselves if we need to, and it certainly doesn’t look like any of these passengers are going to threaten us bodily.
We lay our knives down. I have one person on my left and one on my right, both speaking to me in soothing, quiet voices, but then there’s so many people talking and shouting, the commotion making me feel confused and scared. Soon I’m taken to a room with someone who looks like she’s the medic.
“I’m the nurse,” the woman says to me. It’s so weird looking at people, hearing them speak, seeing how they’re dressed and how they hold themselves. “What’s your name?”
“Harper,” I tell her. “Harper Lake.”
“Have you been stranded on this island?” she asks.
I nod. “We have.”
Her brow furrows in concentration and she looks at me warily.
“We?” she asks. “There are more than one of you?”
Panic seizes my chest and I look over my shoulder.
Cy is gone.
Cy is fucking gone.
“We,” I say insistently. “I came aboard this ship with a man. Where is he?”
I expected so many things. I was prepared for any number of dangers or threats, but this? Never, never in a million years did I expect that I’d be separated from Cy.
“Cy!” I scream. The medic comes to me and holds my arm.
“Sit down,” she says gently. “You’re likely hallucinating.”
I tear my arm away from her and run, but it’s no use. The ship has sailed. We’re too far away from the shore now, and I can’t dive overboard. The waters are shark-infested and leaping overboard would be too dangerous.
I run into the main cabin, where several passengers sit eating.
“Have something to eat,” one of them says. “Come and sit with us.”
“No!” I scream, in a full-blown panic now. How could I have lost him? Where did he go? Where is he?
And that’s when I see the helicopter.
The fucking helicopter, taking off in the opposite direction, and I know in my heart.
He’s on that helicopter.
Chapter 6
Cy
My eyelids feel too heavy, my limbs as if they’re weighted down. Somewhere above me or beside me, I can’t quite tell, there are voices. I think they’re talking about me.
“When he comes to…” but then I fade back out of consciousness. I don’t hear what they say, but I know the “he” they’re referring to is me. Instinctively, I know it’s best that I don’t open my eyes and start flailing around for attention. Something happened. I need to sort it out in my brain before I open my eyes.
And then it hits me so hard in the chest it’s like a physical blow.
Harper.
My plan to stay calm and reserved evaporates as soon as I remember, and my eyes fly open, as my stomach swoops.
We’re fucking airborne.
“Where is she?” I try to say, but my lips are too heavy, my mouth dry and uncooperative. I try to move my body, but I finally realize I’m not just drugged. I’m also bound, my hands in my lap but cuffed.
What the fuck is this?
In front of me I can see the cockpit. There’s one man flying the helicopter we’re on, and another, armed, beside him. Am I a prisoner? I try to piece together what I remember, but it’s hard because my mind is muddied and dim.
There was a… ship? And a helicopter. And we boarded the ship.
I’m sitting up, trying to figure out what the hell these restraints are, when the armed guard in front of me realizes I’m conscious.