A Shade of Doubt (A Shade of Vampire #12)(17)

I stared at the thick jungle lining the beach. Then I looked down at my bare feet. I looked at Annora’s feet. She wore no shoes either.

“I’ll have to carry you both,” he said, following my train of thought. “We should leave now.”

Annora approached him first, reaching her arms around his neck and wrapping her legs around his waist. It left me no choice but to climb onto Caleb’s back. I made sure I bashed my legs against hers as roughly as I could as I climbed onto him.

Caleb was tall and sturdy—but both Annora and I were also fairly tall and with both our arms and legs wrapped round him, to say that there wasn’t much breathing space would have been an understatement. I hated that I had to twine my limbs with hers just to hold on tight enough as Caleb launched forward into the jungle.

I just hoped he would hurry and get us there as soon as possible. Especially when Annora pressed her lips against his neck. I scowled at her and rested my chin on his left shoulder, where her smug face was out of view.

* * *

It was lucky for Caleb that the jungle was dense. The trees shielded him from most of the sun’s rays.

As it turned out, what Caleb had seen the night before was more than a stream. It was a beautiful, crystal-clear lake. I breathed out in relief as it came into view through the trees. I was sweating. Both Annora’s and my limbs had been rubbing against each other. As soon as Caleb stopped, I jumped off him and walked over to the bank.

Discarding any concern for modesty—Caleb had seen me bare already, and I didn’t care what Annora saw—I stripped to my underwear and dove in. I realized as I was already underwater that I hadn’t considered the possibility of dangerous creatures lurking in these waters. But at that moment, I couldn’t think about that. It was just a relief to have fresh water. I scrubbed my scalp and ran my hands over my body, washing away all the sticky sea salt and sweat.

I wished I had some sort of soap. I caught sight of a bunch of exotic-looking flowers nearby. Hoping they weren’t poisonous, I reached up and grabbed them. They smelled wonderfully fragrant. I crushed them up in my hands and rubbed them against my skin. They smelled better than any bodywash I’d ever used.

By the time I climbed out of the lake, I was smelling like a flower myself.

I caught sight of Annora bathing further along the bank. She hadn’t bothered to even keep her underwear on.

I didn’t bother putting on my ripped clothes again. They were dirty and damp and sweaty. I would have to make do in my underwear. Stepping gingerly over the rough jungle ground, trying to not cut myself, I looked around for Caleb. I couldn’t see him anywhere in the clearing.

“Caleb?”

There was a snapping of a branch overhead. I looked up to see Caleb halfway up a tall tree.

“Up here,” he grunted.

Gripping hold of one of the branches, I started to climb up myself. I tried not to look at all the gross insects I passed as I climbed gingerly higher and higher into the tree until I reached the spot where Caleb was standing. He was ripping branches and snapping them all to the same length with his bare hands, laying them out over thick branches to form a flat platform. I looked upward to see he’d already laid out two platforms higher up. He worked fast.

“There are three beds here,” he said. “You will sleep on top. I will sleep in the middle. Annora will sleep down here, on the lowest level.” He looked at me darkly. “Clearly, there needs to be separation between the two of you.”

I kept climbing upward, past Caleb’s platform until I reached my own. It was surprisingly stable. Now I just had to figure out how to avoid getting eaten alive by mosquitoes while sleeping here in my bikini. Oh, and I’d have to hope I didn’t roll too much in my sleep… Still, it was comforting to know that Caleb was directly beneath me.

I began tearing off leaves and laying them down over the wood to hopefully make it more comfortable. I didn’t stop until the whole platform was covered in leaves.

I looked down at Caleb laying down the last slab of Annora’s layer. I climbed down to his layer and began laying down leaves as I’d just done with mine. Then I lowered myself back down to Annora’s level. She can make her own stupid bed.

Caleb leaned against a trunk as he finished, wiping the bark on his hands onto his pants.

Our eyes met for a moment before he looked away again, clearing his throat. The gentle chirping of birds surrounded us, the sigh of the wind in the trees. For once, I didn’t have Annora’s voice in my ears.

I didn’t know if it would make him feel uncomfortable, but I didn’t know how to stop myself. I reached out and held his hand, drawing myself closer to him.

I touched his chin, guiding him to look at me. The way he was still acting distant was killing me.

I just wanted to understand what was going through his mind, whether anything had changed between us, so I at least wouldn’t continue thinking and acting under false pretenses. If something had changed, I would rather face the pain now than have the uncertainty drag out longer.

As my lips parted to speak, he reached up to my face, caressing my cheek with the backs of his fingers. His touch sent tingles down my spine. The way my body responded to him made me realize just how much I ached for his affection.

“Caleb,” I said, my voice hoarse as I stared into his eyes. “I… I need to know—”

“Caleb.”