Page 52 of One Secret

My skin racks up a few degrees when I spot her stare lingering on my bare chest.

'No,' she says, coming back to my face. 'I meant smile.'

'I smile,' I grunt, feeling oddly defensive.

'No, you give little tweaks of your lips now and again. Today—like right now—you're actually smiling.'

I'm suddenly very self-conscious of my face. Whatever expression I was making is, of course, instantly disturbed. And Darcy's smile dissolves with it.

'Sorry,' she calls from where I ordered her to sit, out of the way of the slip-hazards. 'I shouldn't have said anything.'

Well, wasn't that the way to kill a mood?

Congrats Alesi. Literally the most romantic spot in the Mediterranean and you managed to bum out your girl.

Only one of the many reasons Darcy is smart to be running in the opposite direction as soon as she's able.

Choosing a pointy-looking rock, I work to secure the second line for Darcy's jet ski and mask, watching her from the corner of my eye.

She's perched on a select piece of rock just big enough for her tight little butt and one of her feet. Her arms are looped loosely around her upturned knee and her gaze is on the sea. Despite the shades on her head, she winces into the light, experiencing the view for all that it is, au naturel.

The island we've landed on hardly merits the name, but it's stunning in its own right. About a mile from Nisí tou Chrysoú, it's less a whole isle and more a hunk of volcanic rock jutting out of the sea. There's no plant life, besides the deathtrap moss near the waterline. And it's so small you'd struggle to fit more than a dozen people on its surface. Provided they didn't topple over the uneven, boulder-like terrain. Even so, it's a beautiful little spot of the Aegean and fetches a wide, vista view of Nisí tou Chrysoú to the east. A pretty silhouette of the island town, surrounded by miles upon miles of aquamarine waves. Here, the salt water is crisp in the nose and the acrid scent of the rock isn't so much sulfuric as earthy... Natural and vivid.

I take a deep breath, amused when I spot Darcy doing exactly the same thing.

'God...' she sighs, 'it really is spectacular. What do you think—?'

She cuts herself off. All color abruptly drains from her face and I forget to hide my surreptitious observations of her.

'Darcy, wait—!'

Too late! She's off down the rocky, uneven stairwell at a pace that has my heart in my throat and my asshole squeezing tight.

One wrong step, one false move...

But Darcy runs and leaps with the strength and confidence of an athlete, with power in her thighs and accuracy in her feet. Even her face is controlled, a look of manic determination in her eyes, as she rushes for a nearby ridge. One that, on the other side, tips straight down into a rushing current.

'Darcy, not that—!'

But she doesn't go over the edge. That's not her intention.

She just falls to her knees at the ridgeline and pitches her head over its peak. Beneath the dull roar of the waves and hum of the wind, I can't hear what's happening but upchuck triggers a very particular pattern of muscle work along the back.

I can see it in her shoulders and the way her spine undulates in unnatural spasms. Darcy is throwing up.

Bigger and heavier than Darcy, my rush over the rocks is slower. By the time I reach her, she's already vertical again, leaning back onto her heels, and washing her mouth out with sea foam.

'You all right?' I ask. I take hold of her shoulder and squat down at her side. She's pale and clammy but the look of urgency on her face is gone, so the nausea itself has probably passed.

I shrug the drawstring bag from my shoulder and take out the bottle of water I brought for the afternoon. She swigs, gargles, and spits gratefully.

'Yeah,' she finally says. 'I'm good.'

I glance pointedly over the ridge and Darcy grimaces.

'It's just seasickness.'

'You get seasick... and you wanted to go jet skiing?'

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