Page 18 of All The Way Under

CHAPTER NINE

saylor

THREE WEEKS LATER

Brody’s arms are folded across his chest.

“You’re doing that wrong,” he deadpans. His face is dirty from the soil smudged across his cheekbone.

“I told you the irrigation output levers needed to be twenty inches apart because of the weak water pressure.” He nods at my dirty ass hands and the contraption I made myself.

“That’s about twenty-five inches, so the water won’t flow. ”

“Brody,” I chide.

It’s a warning. I’m exhausted. I’m hungry. My shoulders are sunburnt, and my spirit is nearly broken.

“It will work.” He’s right. I know he’s right. “What? Do you have a ruler in your brain? How can you look at this and know how many inches it is? There’s so much dirt. My eyes are crossing at this point.”

They are letting us eat the veggies and fruit that fall off the plants in exchange for the irrigation system we’ve developed and are installing.

Even with the extra food, it’s not enough.

I don’t need a scale to tell me I’ve lost weight, and the gaunt hollows in Brody’s face let me know I’m not imagining things.

I also think he’s gotten new abs. If that’s even humanly possible.

“Let me have a turn. We’re almost done, and then we can head to the waterfall. Mako is on, remember? He lets us stay as long as we want.”

His tone when he speaks to me is different. It’s no longer I told you so . It holds actual empathy.

I stand up, dusting my hands on the sides of my pants I found in the junk pile, and catch my breath. The skort wasn’t tactical enough for the work we’ve been doing. The sun is beating down on me, and I haven’t had water since the late breakfast they gave us.

I run the back of my hand across my forehead. “I need water.”

The irony of us laying irrigation is that it’s not potable. We’d get sick if we drank it. I tried last week and ended up vomiting for two full days. It was miserable.

Brody looks up after burying the nozzle at what I’m sure is the perfect twenty inches and exhales. He can read my face easily now. That’s the thing with spending every waking second with someone.

I see Turner and Collin coming back from the waterfall, clothing wet, with smiles on their faces, and get wildly jealous. They’re on a different project thanks to Brody.

He stands and walks over to Nery, gesturing over his shoulder to me. I’d swear Brody was one of them for how much they seem to respect him. He’s treated better than I am, but I don’t complain because it works in my favor.

He comes back with a flask and extends it down to me.

“He said we can go to the waterfall now. I told him you weren’t feeling well.”

“And he cared?” I hiss before uncapping the jug and chugging the water until my stomach is full and painful. I hand it back to Brody, and he walks it back to Nery.

I watch as Mako appears to walk with us to the waterfall. I pick up my satchel that holds extra veggies and a bar of soap I was able to make from shea butter and wood ash.

Mako told me the soap-making process after I promised to make enough for the base if I could keep some for myself.

The same goes for toothpaste. I explained that it would be better for everyone involved if we stayed healthy, and washing our bodies and brushing our teeth was part of that.

I was sure to figure out a way to brush my teeth after Brody brought it up the first time.

“It’s taking so long, Brody,” I say, trying not to break down, but tears brim at the corners of my eyes. I feel them, like hot traitors ready to ruin my tough persona.

I’m the strong sister. The one built like my dad.

I should be able to deal with this, but doubts creep in.

Will they hold me here longer because I’m useful to them?

Has my mother given up hope that I’m alive?

Will I die on this base from an infection that can’t be cured because antibiotics would be impossible to obtain?

I don’t know how much longer I can take of the manual labor day in and day out.

There’s no way to calculate time because every day is the same.

There are no weekends to break up the weeks.

Or lunches with friends. Or dates with a boyfriend.

Sure, I get to look at Brody daily, but he has the self-control of an armored vehicle.

He looks at me like he wants me. He touches me here and there, and the touches are filled with more. The chemistry is something from my mom’s romance novels. Like, I know this man would rock my world, and I’d go as far as to say I could destroy his, but he holds me at arm’s distance.

He’s been kinder, and his approach is gentler, understanding. Professional. Even when I nearly attack him at the end of the day.

It’s our usual song and dance. He knows it’s coming.

I plan what tactic I’ll try to see if he can resist. Aside from stripping down naked and forcing myself on him, I’ve tried every pickup line, corny or not, every flirt, suggestive smile, and seductive conversation I can muster.

He knows I’m protected from pregnancy with an IUD, and how I have a come kink. I want it in me and all over me.

Nope. Nothing. Shot down.

Does he want to? That’s a thousand percent affirmative. His reasons for not are what I need to discover. Today, though? I’m exhausted, my body weary, sore.

He lays a hand on my shoulder.

“We’re almost there,” he says. Then I swear he says, “I almost have everything I need,” under his breath, but I’m so tired I’m probably imagining it.

“The work is done for today,” he adds.

When the waterfall comes into view, my mood immediately improves. Mako takes a seat next to a tree in the distance and folds his arms behind his head before snoring. He truly is the worst guard ever, but we’ve also never given him a reason to believe we’d do anything wrong.

“Thank God it’s Mako today,” Brody says, and I notice for the first time how exhausted he looks.

I have a routine at the waterfall. I sit down, take off my clothes, grab my soap and toothpaste, and swim behind the waterfall to clean myself. After, I sun myself on a rock, but I won’t today because I’ve had enough damn sun.

Brody takes his turn, then joins me near the shore on an adjacent rock. We don’t do much chit-chatting while we’re here. It’s sacred.

The only time I feel normal is when I’m here. In the open air, where I can hear the tropical birds singing and the water rushing. I’m not caged or working when I’m here. I can just be.

Today, as I pull myself up on the rock behind the waterfall, strip down to my bra and panties to begin my cleaning process, Brody follows me.

He lumbers up next to me, water dripping off his skin onto the rock and my legs.

“Hey, you feeling better?” he asks, pitching his voice louder so I can hear.

“Careful, Brode,” I say, using the nickname I coined when Brody felt like too much. And it rhymed with chode, which drives him bananas. “That sounds a bit too much like caring, and you wouldn’t want to give me the wrong idea.”

I smile, looking over at him. A small smirk plays on his lips, and I hate how my stomach flips.

I close my eyes and exhale loudly. “I am now,” I reply. I look at him, placing my chin on my knees. “Are you doing okay?”

He nods, and his square jaw draws my attention. “Yeah, I’m doing okay.”

His blue eyes melt into mine. It’s another of those moments where he completely dismantles my insides with a mere look. It’s happened hundreds of times, and each time, I’m shocked he still has the ability. There’s never been anything else to compare it to in my past.

“I do care about you. You know that, right?”

I mock choke. “Did the man, myth, and legend finally cave and admit to owning some sort of emotion?”

Brody grins, and it causes an actual riot inside of me. My stomach flips, and my skin electrifies. If a feather touched me, it would be enough to send me to another dimension.

“Guess I’m more tired than I thought, then.”

He didn’t refute it. This is monumental when it comes to him and his lack of anything, except rude wit and avoidance tactics.

We’ve been close to breakthroughs when we talk about our lives back home, but he won’t ever delve too deep.

I know he has a twin he has a soft spot for, a dog that lights up his entire universe, but he doesn’t talk much about his job or friends.

It’s as if there’s a place in time where he won’t or can’t go past. A stamp marking a period obsolete.

“This is huge,” I say, pulling the bar of soap out of my bag and lathering it on one arm. “You’re admitting to emotion and that you’re tired.”

I lather my other arm, neck, and chest. He watches my hand as it moves over my chest.

“I don’t think you’ve complained about being tired once yet.”

He shakes his head, watching me wash my legs and feet, dipping them in the water to get them wet. Brody clears his throat, drawing my gaze from my toes to his face.

“It’s less of me being tired, and more of me being worn out. Worn out from resisting this.” He clears his throat again, jutting his chin up at my body. “It’s ah, getting to be a lot.”

I lose my breath at the sheer honesty in his shining eyes, and the breath stays lost when it turns to something more sinister.

He stops my hand holding the soap when it’s on my thigh closest to him. I freeze at the contact. He’s touched me here and there—my shoulder, my face, my wrist—when he loses himself, but this time it feels different.

Taking the soap from me, he runs it over my leg. I startle at the touch. Not just because it’s been so long since I’ve been touched like this, because it’s him .

I don’t dare say a word for fear of him stopping. The waterfall in front of us shields us from Mako and anyone on the bank of the lagoon. It’s a private lush oasis.