Page 11 of The Four Engagement Rings of Sybil Rain

My eyes lock with his. The warm brown has darkened to molten chocolate, and the sizzling current in my body settles into a languid heat.

His thumb absently grazes the inside of my wrist, and my pulse skyrockets.

Memories flash through my mind of other times Jamie took my wrist and pulled it above my head, hovering over me, then pressing into me…

My eyes drop to his hand. There’s a pause as he looks down, too, and, as if realizing he’s overstepped, he releases me instantly. He clears his throat and steps back.

I feel the lack of him immediately. The warmth he left roils inside me, crashing up against my skin, begging to be let out. I shake my head and take my own step back.

It’s just lust , I tell myself. It’s just hormonal muscle memory responding to the last non-battery-operated thing to give me an orgasm. It’s just a year’s worth of sexual frustration finally coming to a head at the most inopportune time possible.

I croak out, “Apology accepted.” Jamie blinks at me in confusion, and then, a moment later, nods again as if finally processing my words.

We continue along the path as it makes a steady incline.

The tender pads of my feet sting every time I step on a rogue pebble or rough piece of bark.

I can feel the tendrils of hair tickling the nape of my neck.

It’s like every inch of my skin is aware of the man just a few steps behind me.

What the hell is happening to my body, and how do I make it stop?

Finally, we reach the crest of the hill we’ve been climbing, and the view unfolds before us—Halia Falls laid out like the Emerald City twinkling in the distance.

Beyond the resort, you can see the curve of the bay where the water sparkles, steady breakers landing softly on the shore.

And you can see even farther, to the more mountainous part of the island.

I think I can even spot the rushing waters of the beautiful waterfall the driver pointed out to me this morning.

“Wow,” Jamie breathes out. It’s the first thing either of us has said in thirty minutes.

“Yeah,” I can’t help but agree.

Jamie finds a seat on a fallen log, catching his breath. “You know, I didn’t actually want to come here,” he says quietly, like he’s talking to himself more than to me. “I thought it would be too hard, given everything…”

I swallow and nod, even though Jamie’s not looking at me. His eyes are still trained on our bird’s-eye view of the resort.

“It was Amelia who encouraged me to come down,” he continues. “She kept telling me I shouldn’t let the past stop me from moving forward with my future. And she always gives the best advice.”

Yeah, like telling you not to marry me.

The memory of what happened last year is too much for me to handle right now.

I need to change the subject away from Jamie’s older sister and her opinions about how I wasn’t marriage material .

I turn away from Jamie, pointing toward the sky.

“Hey, look! You can already see the moon. A waxing gibbous.” Jamie’s brow crinkles in confusion as he follows my gesture up to the pale, nearly full smudge of a moon.

“Did you know that the waxing gibbous signifies a time of reflection on the mistakes of the past?” I blurt out.

“Um, no, I didn’t.” Jamie’s looking at me like I’ve swallowed a deck of tarot cards.

“I’ve got all this content lined up about the blood moon eclipse on Friday,” I say. “Did you know we’re in the path of totality? I’m the social media manager for a brand called Flowies, and my boss is actually letting me do a whole campaign about—”

“Wait, what?”

Yes, Jamie, I know I’ve gone around the bend. Just go with it.

Except, Jamie’s no longer looking at me like I’m ridiculous. He’s got his “working out a tough logic puzzle” face on.

“I thought you were here with your boyfriend so he could study the squids?”

Shit.

“Um, yeah, no, I am.” I drag my fingers through my hair in a failed attempt to tame some of the snarls. “It’s a vacation-slash-work trip for both of us, actually.” Smooth save.

Jamie studies my face for a moment. His dark eyes can be so expressive, but right now, they look guarded. I can’t tell if he’s buying my explanation. Then he looks away, turning back toward the path.

“We should probably get going. It’ll be nightfall soon.”

I nod. The sky is rapidly darkening.

We walk a few minutes in silence, then come to a fork in the path.

I pause, not sure which way leads back to hot showers and fluffy towels.

“I think we need the left one again,” Jamie offers after a beat.

Then he looks down the other fork. “Although, it does look like the trail levels out to the right…” He seems hesitant.

“So… right, then?”

Jamie closes his eyes for a minute. Then opens them. “No, it’s left. I remember it from the resort map. Going left each time will bring us back to the hotel. No use risking a shortcut. We should follow what the map said.”

I nod once—lord knows I have no sense of direction—and head left.

We go a few yards down our chosen path and pretty soon find that this trail does not level out. If anything, it gets steeper.

And right as the path becomes filled with boulders, rain dumps out of the sky like someone’s turned on a water hose. I’d been mostly dry, but in seconds, my hair and my cover-up are nearly as wet as when I stomped out of the ocean.

“We should have gone right,” I mutter.

“Excuse me?” Jamie’s words are punctuated with puffs of air as he exerts himself up the hill.

I stop in the middle of the path and take a step toward him. “I’m just saying, if you had listened to your gut, instead of obsessively following the—”

“And if you had given one ounce of thought to your plan before you jumped off the boat, we wouldn’t need to rely on my memory of the map.

” He takes a step toward me, and we’re nearly chest to chest. The closeness sends another jolt of energy burning through me.

Or maybe it’s the unrestrained anger in his voice.

“I did what I thought was right,” Jamie spits out.

“Sorry I didn’t want to risk us getting stuck in the wilderness overnight just so that—”

I bark out a bitter laugh. “You never risk anything .”

“I jumped out of the damn boat, didn’t I?” Jamie shouts. “I suppose your squid man boyfriend always takes the risky bet. I suppose he probably has the patience of a saint and never asks questions even when you disappear for days on end.”

“That’s not fai—” I try to object, but Jamie is not finished.

“I’m sure he’s just a perfect specimen who always shaves his sideburns…

” I almost laugh at that—I did used to criticize Jamie for those overabundant sideburns—but I’m struck by the intensity of Jamie’s gaze.

It’s a little unnerving, but it also feels like a veil being lifted.

Like we’re finally breaking through the wall that’s been built between us.

Rain falls down heavily, plastering our bathing suits to our skin, making me shiver. Drops of it meet his forehead, his cheeks, his jaw, before trailing toward his mouth. I dart out a tongue to lick my own lips. Jamie blinks, as if gathering himself up for something.

Finally, he speaks, his voice softer now but still just as raw.

“But Sybil, I was never that man, and you knew it when you agreed to marry me. You knew that I like structure and order and certainty. That I only let the people closest to me see the real me. I thought you were one of those people. But obviously, I was wrong.”

He turns around and continues hiking, leaving me standing there stunned. He thinks I didn’t accept him for who he really is? That couldn’t be further from the truth.

“And I thought you knew me ,” I call to his back.

“I told you everything, Jamie. About what happened in my past. About my… episodes.” Panic attacks , Gwendolyn has explained to me.

Though until I started seeing her, I never had a name for those moments when my heart would race and my breath would turn shallow and it would feel like my mind was unspooling.

“You knew, and you said you understood,” I say to Jamie, raising my voice over rain.

“You said that even if I sometimes had to run away, you’d always be waiting for me when I came back. But that was a lie, wasn’t it?”

“You mean like the lie about where you went on our wedding weekend?” Jamie tosses over his shoulder. “You were gone for two whole days, Sybil. How stupid do you think I am? And don’t act like that’s the only thing you ever hid from me.”

I swivel around. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

But before he can answer, I yelp as my foot twists on a root and my knee hits the ground hard.

The rain has made everything slick. We’ve come to the other side of the hill, and the trail has descended into a steep drop. I skid into Jamie, toppling him over with me.

As he falls, he manages to use some of his momentum to roll us. We come to a stop with my body sprawled on top of his.

My face is once again just inches from his, and the rest of his body is pressed along my entire length. The warmth from earlier rushes back to me, and I have to stop myself from rolling my hips against his.

“Are you okay?” The anger is gone from his voice, and all that’s left is concern.

My mouth falls open again. “I’m fine,” I lie. There’s nothing “fine” about nearly dry humping your ex-fiancé on a public hiking trail.

I roll off Jamie, brushing a few leaves off my shins and straightening up. Pain shoots through my left ankle and I instinctively pick up my foot to rub the sore joint.

“Can you put any weight on it?” he asks.

I try but let out a sharp hiss. In an instant, Jamie’s arm is around my waist, supporting my weight. I let myself lean into the broad warmth of his body.

“Let me help you.” He’s tall enough that he has to crouch down a bit.

We take a few more steps, but the angle must be awkward enough for him that he gives up.

Before I realize what’s happening, he’s pulled me up, cradling me in his arms. I’m overtaken by the scent of him again.

Even soaked with rain, his T-shirt once again drenched and sticking to him, the distinct smell of Jamie pulls me back and sends a rush of familiar adrenaline through me, and the feeling is intoxicating.

As I look up at the firm line of his jaw, a wave of nostalgia rolls through me.

For a moment, I let myself sink into the sensation of it.

A damsel in distress, lost in the woods and rescued by a familiar stranger.

“Do you remember when you carried me over to the stables in Napa?” It was our first trip home to meet Jamie’s family. It was also the trip when Jamie proposed. Craning my neck to look up at him for an answer, I inhale sharply at the look on his face.

“Of course,” he says softly. There’s a strained note in his voice.

Like maybe our nearness is having the same effect on him as it’s having on me.

Or maybe the heat and the pain in my ankle have just gone to my head.

The trail begins to level out—finally—and the gently rolling lawn of the hotel comes into view. It’s easy going the rest of the way, and as we make it back to the resort grounds, he sets me down gently on the path and flags a passing golf cart.

“Are you going to be okay from here?” he asks.

“I’ll be okay. I just need to rest it for a bit, and I’ll be fine.”

But will I? I wish all it took to wash you free of your past was an evening rainstorm.

I hop over to the golf cart and start to slide into the passenger seat but lose my balance on my wobbly ankle.

Jamie takes my hand and helps me up, and for some reason, just the spot where our palms meet tingles, as if a shared language has passed between us.

I look up into his eyes.

“Make sure you put it on ice,” he says. “Your ankle, I mean.”

And then I’m watching—again—as he walks away.