Page 32 of Fated

I reach over and take the bottle, my fingers brushing over his as I do.

My heart clamors, and for some reason I feel like for the first time in my life I’ve finally dove straight into the turbulent waters.

“Aaron?” I ask, unsure if that’s actually his name.

The ice-cold of the bottle seeps into my hand and the condensation runs over my fingers.

He looks over at me then, his hair glinting black in the sun, the light reflecting off the hard planes of his face. A wave crashes against us, swelling over my thighs, plastering the white dress against my legs. The wave drops and the sand below swirls over my feet, sinking me lower into the mire.

He smiles then, a flicker across his face, as fast as the waves rolling past. “You never call me that.”

I don’t call him anything. I don’t know him.

“What do I call you then?”

He laughs, reaches over, and settles his hand around my back, tucking me close. “You’re all riled up today.”

“Who are you?” I ask again.

He lifts his eyebrows at that, his arm stiffening at my back. “Becca?”

“Tell me,” I say insistently. A cresting wave hits me, the foam spraying up, and I knock against Aaron. He steadies me, his hand brushing against my back.

“I didn’t realize our fifteen-year anniversary would rile you so much. I thought a party was a nice idea.”

I turn to him, staring at the line of his jaw, his deep-set dark eyes, the apology in his expression.

Above a gull cries out and an icy line traces down my spine.

Fifteen-year anniversary?

There’s something wrong here. Something very, very wrong.

Everyone on this island is acting as if they know me.

As if they’ve known me forever.

And this man ... he thinks he’s my ...

“You’re my husband.”

He lets out a small huff of air, a stunned laugh. “Ye-es.”

I stumble out of his arms, the sand pulling at my feet. A wave crashes against my thighs, nearly knocking me under. A bit of the cola spills out of the bottle over my fingers. The liquid is sticky and cold on my hand.

“Becca, you all right? Should we cancel the party?”

The water grabs at my dress, pulling it down as I scramble up the sandy shelf, out of the water. I back away from him, the tide tugging at me, wanting to force me back to him.

I stumble again as another wave crashes into me. I drop the bottle, and it spills fizzing black liquid across the white sand. A second later a wave sweeps over it, wiping it free.

Aaron snatches the bottle, rescuing it from the water.

When he looks at me, smiling with the bottle in his hand, I’m struck again by how he watches me with such familiarity. It has my stomach clenching and rolling and my heart picking up speed.

“Come on,” he says. “We’ll go home, get some breakfast. Amy said she wants banana pancakes and I can’t make them like you. After we eat we’ll talk. We can cancel the party. It’s fine. I know you weren’t keen on it. I didn’t realize how much.”

He’s guiding me up the bluff, back toward the runway/road, and I’m letting him.

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