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“I still don’t know how I didn’t notice you sitting there on the shore.” She twisted her lips into a sideways smirk.

“Maybe because I didn’t want to be seen.”

“But you talked to me first,” she said with suspicion.

“I did. And I’m glad. Because I couldn’t resist you then. And I still can’t. Something pulled me to you like...like water. And I know better than to fight the current.” I leaned in to kiss her between words.

As night fell, I noticed Bellamy and Serena were stirring. “Come on,” I said, scooping the food back up. “We should get back and start a fire. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s starving.”

We walked out to our friends on the shore, where we presented our gathering of crab and fruit. Bellamy worked to get the fire going, and we sat around it, cooking the crab meat and downing the coconut water like it was the most divine thing we’d ever tasted.

“The boat isn’t seriously damaged. A good flipping over and she should be ready to sail.” I explained, cracking a crab claw between my thumbs.

“So we could leave tonight?” Katrina asked.

“If you want to. It’s your call when we leave.” I took a bite, glancing at Bellamy across the flames of the bonfire. “Right Bellamy?”

He shook himself free of the dazed, empty look on his face and straightened. “Yeah.”

Katrina leaned forward, her gaze meeting each of our tired faces. “Of course I want to get back to my mom...but I think we all need the rest. We can leave at daybreak.”

“All right then.” Bellamy tossed a stick into the fire, his voice hollow. “We leave at daybreak.”

37

Where's the Rum?

Bellamy

We readied the boat at dawn while the girls slept a bit longer. Milo and I set to work rigging the sails and double checking the hull. Thankfully the masts had survived the crash. The skies were perfect for sailing, the winds in our favor. We didn’t have far to go.

“It’s about a two day’s journey, I’d say,” I called to Milo.

“I’ll take that over two years,” he chuckled.

I replied with a half-laugh, walking over to him as I tied the last bit of rigging. “We’ve missed you, mate, you know that?”

“You? Miss me?” He shook his head. “No hard feelings over the necklace?”

“You know that was a weird time,” I grumbled with a hint of fake laughter. “We were all desperate and half-mad.”

“I’m just joking.” He jabbed me with his elbow. “I know it was all that seawater finally getting to you. Don’t worry, I understand.”

“Hey now. Who showed you the ropes of pirating? You’d have been long dead on my father’s crew without me.”

“I’ll admit, I might’ve picked up a few things from you. But don’t pretend I didn’t help you with that God-awful sense of navigation.” He raised an eyebrow with a grin as he tightened a knot.

We both laughed as I shook my head, thinking back to how Milo, a scrawny fifteen year old, would dare correct me on star patterns and my map drawings, right in front of my father, at that. “Okay, fair enough there. Maybe there really was some useful reason my father wanted you aboard.”

“If I’m being honest, I’d rather there hadn’t been.”

“Well, if you weren’t valuable, you’d have been dead, so…” I leaned into the edge of the boat along with Milo, using all my strength to nudge it back into the water.

“Given what we’ve been through, that doesn’t sound like the worst option.” Milo tilted his head in my direction. He looked older than me now, with a beard thicker than I’d ever seen it and the scar across his eye. His skin was tanned from his time at sea, and he had a calm but wise look about him that spoke of some hidden strength he didn’t have before.

I tapped my fingers along the side of the boat. “Aye, come on, mate, it’s not so bad. We’re filthy sons of bitches and yet for some reason we’ve been given more chances than saints.”

“Maybe we’re supposed to learn something from it,” Milo waded in next to me, pushing the boat along out of the shallows. I took a breath, winded and thirsty.