Page 41 of Hearts Adrift
Then Finn flinches—from the vibration of his phone. He pulls it out of the pocket of his shorts, still hanging loose and opened off his sexy hips, and peers at the screen. “It’s my friend Chase. No one’s at the bungalow or near it. Seems safe and, in his words … ‘totally lame and empty and creepy as always’.” He looks at me. “We can go back.”
I hook my arms around the small of his back, with him still straddling my lap. “If I remember correctly, there was a box of ten-year-old condoms in the bathroom cabinet at the bungalow.”
He bites his lip.
I think that’s a yes.
We’re off the sand in the next instant and heading back through the trees when he looks at his phone again. “Oh, I missed something from twelve minutes ago. Must’ve been while I was driving or—”
He comes to a dead stop.
I turn back, noticing. “What is it?”
He says nothing. Only stares at his phone. Unblinking. Panic setting into his eyes.
“Finn?” He slowly lowers his phone, silent, lips parted, staring off blankly. “Finn?” I try again. “What’s wrong?”
“It’s …” He looks at his phone again, as if to be sure of something, then slaps it to his chest. “Fuck.”
“What’s going on? You’re freaking me out.”
He faces his screen to me.
My eyes drop down to it.
It’s three photos—shots of Finn leaving the bungalow this morning. I recognize his disheveled outfit from last night, peering over his shoulder as he flees the front porch. Obvious shots from someone who was likely lurking across the street, sent from a number with no ID, no name or info, bearing the simple message: “It looks like you had a late night, Finn.”
Chapter 12 - Finn
“This is all my fault,” River keeps saying to me.
“We don’t know who sent it,” I remind him as we walk back to the car. “It could’ve been my ex.”
That surprises him. “Really? He’d be that creepy?”
“Who knows? I apparently didn’t know him as well as I thought I did. Didn’t the message seem a bit … personal to you?”
“Strangely.”
“So if it was some reporter or journalist, I think that pic would’ve ended up straight online. Doesn’t that make more sense? This was definitely personal. Someone I know.”
“You’re talking so fast. Are you sure you’re okay?”
“And if it wasn’t Theo—which it totally was—it could have just been a friend playing around with me.”
“Some friend.”
“I have some weird friends,” I point out as I step over a fallen branch. “I sure don’t think it’s a psycho fan of yours, otherwise the message would’ve been far more threatening, like ‘River’s mine, stay away from him!’ or maybe some nasty insult toward me … calling me a star fucker …”
“Star fucker?”
“No matter who or what this nonsense is, I think going back to the bungalow is definitely out of the question. At least until I know forsurethat it was a prank.”
“Then where should we go? Are you sure we shouldn’t just stay here? The beach seemed fairly safe to me.”
“Yeah, until the next message I get is a shot of my bare ass while the two of us are fucking. Then I’ll be thesecondnudist living on this beach.” I stop. “I … do have an idea. But it’s probably a terrible one.”
“My years in the industry taught me the only terrible idea is the one you don’t share.”
