Page 34 of Hooked By a Hero
Every word that had almost been on Elias’s lips and every thought in his head was blasted clear away by that kiss. Caspian slanted his lips over his and teased his tongue into his mouth. Elias’s shock quicky gave way to all the desire that had been building within him for weeks. He hooked a hand behind Caspian’s neck and pulled him closer, deepening their kiss as though he could gain sustenance from communion with Caspian alone.
It was only when some distant person cleared their throat that Elias remembered they were in the open and that not every person among the survivors was still asleep. Even though they had made many friends throughout the journey, there were just as many from theFortunewho had never looked approvingly on their attachment and never would.
“We cannot,” he whispered, pulling away from Caspian and glancing around.
Still, Caspian smiled and chuckled, shaking his head. “I will never understand you lot and your prescriptions about who can love whom.”
Elias whipped to face Caspian again, his heart pounding with hopeful excitement. “I swear to you, Caspian. If we are saved from this island, if we are returned to some sort of civilization and allowed to live on to old age, I will spend every moment of the rest of my life with you.”
Caspian didn’t just smile, he beamed. “I would like that,” he said, reaching for Elias’s hand as it rested on the sand between them. Elias could see in his eyes that he wanted another kiss, but there was an increase in activity around them as their fellow passengers awoke. “I would like much more than that,” he said, shifting to a lighter tone. “But for now, we have an island of survivors to see to.”
He winked, then pushed himself to stand.
Elias followed as they made their way down the beach a bit to where Hunt, Ruby, and a few of the other survivors stood near the edge of the surf.
“Look,” Hunt said, pointing out into the ocean. “TheFortunesurvived the night.”
“So it did,” Elias said, pushing a hand through his sticky, matted hair.
TheFortunestood in what Elias figured was the same spot out on a shoal where it had run aground during the storm. It was difficult to tell, but it appeared to be completely stationary. Surely, if it had not run aground in some way, the remnants of the storm would have blown it away or sunk it entirely.
“Is it still seaworthy?” Ruby asked, squinting into the morning light. “Can it be saved so that it might take us on to, well, anywhere?”
“Likely not as it is,” Hunt said. “I may only be a ship’s surgeon, but I’ve sailed on many voyages over the years. I’ve heard stories of ships that have wrecked, stranding their passengers and crews on islands such as this one. There were enough survivors that they were able to rescue the stores from the ship, then salvage what was left and build a new boat to take them on to their intended destination.”
“Bermuda,” Mr. Woburn, said, coming up behind them. Elias was relieved to see that the sensitive young man had survived the storm. “That is how the colony of Bermuda was founded.”
“Was it?” Ruby asked, raising a hand to her forehead to ward off the sun and blinking at him.
“Yes,” Woburn went on excitedly. “Those people were sailing for America, but their ship wrecked in a storm off of the island of Bermuda. Nearly all of them survived to make it to land, and they remained there, living off the bounty of the island, while the ship’s carpenter and crew salvaged what they could from their ship to build a new one that took them on to their destination.”
“And how long did it take to build a new ship?” Hunt asked.
Woburn looked a bit crestfallen. “Two years, I believe.”
“Two years?” Ruby exclaimed. “Can we survive on this island for two years?”
They all turned away from the sea and looked inland. The jungle-like vegetation suddenly seemed foreign and foreboding instead of sunny and paradisal.
“There has to be a source of fresh water somewhere,” Elias said. “Otherwise, there would not be so many palm trees and other plants.”
“True,” Ruby said, her shoulders dropping. “And I am quite certain I heard wild animals in the underbrush during the night. They could not survive without fresh water.”
“An astute deduction, my dear,” Hunt said, smiling at Ruby.
“If they can survive, then we can survive,” Caspian said, his confidence seeming to grow by the moment. “And the ocean itself is a bounty of fish, shellfish, and seaweed, all of which are delicious.”
Elias’s suspicions about Caspian flared once more, but there was no time to do anything about them. “We need to find fresh water, first and foremost,” he said.
“Brunning and a few others have already gone to look,” Hunt said. “We might want to gather the others, take stock of who and what we have, and decide how to proceed from there.”
“Agreed,” Elias said.
Their little group broke up as they moved back to the line where the beach met the vegetation to see to the others. Everyone who had made it to the island seemed to be in reasonable condition, though they were all stunned to one degree or another. Lady Adelaide was in tears, though the morning had hardly begun, but had Mr. Cartwright to keep her company. Cartwright had one arm looped around her back as they sat on a fallen tree trunk, staring at the sea.
Elias was pleased to see that all the ladies from the ship had survived the ordeal. Miss Winters and Emily were already at work. With the practical ingenuity that women always seemed to have, they had gathered sticks, logs, and dead leaves and were attempting to start a fire in a hollowed-out pit of sand. The storm had left their materials too damp to easily start said fire, but at least they were attempting it.
Brunning and the others who had gone in search of water returned roughly half an hour later with several carefully balanced leaf baskets filled with water.
