Unseen Messages(71)

I tried again to find rescue. Scanning and searching for any hope of connection. I dialled the emergency number in all its variations, listening for anything but the empty silence of unsuccessful outreach.

Silent tears cascaded down my face. Sniffing quietly, I brought up the calendar app and rubbed the sudden ache in my chest.

Yesterday, I had a lunch date with Madeline.

The day before, I had a vet appointment for Shovel-Face and his yearly check-up.

Next week, I had a Skype conference with my agent to discuss the songs I’d agreed to pen and perform for my producer.

A life waiting for me to return.

A life thinking I was dead.

I can’t look at it anymore.

Closing the app, I switched on the camera. I didn’t dare flick through the gallery and torture myself with pictures of the trip in the USA, of funny faces with Madi, and landscape panoramas of the crowds who’d come to hear me sing.

I merely opened the camera, switched it to night mode, and stood.

Silently, I catalogued our beach. I imprisoned heart-splintering pictures of Conner and Pippa sleeping back to back. I guiltily snapped images of Galloway, slumbering with a frown permanently on his face.

I took photos of the moon.

Of the sea.

Of the beach.

Of shells.

And a selfie of me with the campsite behind.

I liked to think I took it so I had evidence when we were found. A picture to discuss with Madeline when she begged for tales of my castaway days.

But the truth was, I took it to monitor how I fared over the next few months.

I took it knowing full well that if we didn’t eat better, drink more, and figure out a way to survive, the selfies would slowly show a young music-writer with hazel eyes and long blonde hair turn into a haggard, skeletal woman walking quickly into her grave.

I didn’t want that.

I won’t let that happen.

I had Galloway and the children to fight for.

We would find a way.

We have no choice.





Chapter Twenty-Six


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G A L L O W A Y

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DAY SIXTEEN

I WOKE UP drowning.

My muscles hauled me into a sitting position; I opened my eyes to a bloody miracle. “Estelle!”

Estelle flew upright, her eyes wide and unfocused from sleep. Understanding registered instantly, and the brightest smile I’d seen in days spread across her lips. “Oh, my God!”

“Get whatever you can.” I hurried upright, wincing against my break.

Conner and Pippa sprang to their feet, dancing in the phenomenon.

Rain.

Delicious, precious, drinkable rain.

Fat raindrops exploded on our skin, washing away the salt for the first time in weeks.

“Yay!” Pippa squealed, holding her face to the sky. Her tongue flicked over her chin, slurping as fast as she could. “More! More!”

Conner whirled around with his arms spread. “Yes!”

Estelle bolted to the forest edge where we kept our clothes and belongings. We still hadn’t built a shelter. We hadn’t needed to. The fire kept away most of the bugs and chilly nights and the sky had been dry up till now.

It’d been a blessing not to have to build and struggle with my broken limb. But now, we paid the price as everything we owned was drenched.

The sand pockmarked with raindrops, slowly darkening the harder it fell.

The fire hissed and spat, fighting to keep burning.

Part of me wanted to protect it. To cover the blaze so it didn’t go out. But we had my glasses. We had the sun. We could rebuild it.

“Grab whatever you can and store as much as possible.” I looked for items of use. We’d already dug holes and lined them with deflated life-jackets. We’d been prepared for this for weeks.

Estelle flew past with the three bottles we drained every night, planting them securely in the sand.

Conner dragged a piece of fuselage that would eventually lose its contents as it had no sides, but as a quick gatherer to drink from, it would do.

Pippa grabbed the pot we used to boil clams, tipped out the seawater, and held it in her skinny arms to the sky. “Fill it up. Faster!”

I laughed as Estelle looped her arm through mine. She kissed my cheek. “I’ve been dreaming of this to happen. Begging it to.”

My body came alive beneath her touch.

I was stupid to keep her away from me. For days, I’d avoided her, refusing to talk, letting every moronic excuse turn me into an ass.

I’d been miserable—we all had. Why had we segmented ourselves off from one another? Things were so much more bearable when fought side by side.

I’m sorry.

I wanted to apologise, but she wouldn’t understand. She wouldn’t understand that I wasn’t just apologising to her but to myself, my past, the circumstances that’d made me this way.

I trembled with desperation as her eyes glittered brown and green. I dragged her closer, wrapping my arm around her waist.

Ever since dealing with the dead, we’d been linked. Despite our days and nights apart, I was achingly aware of her. I hadn’t tried to kiss her again, but it didn’t mean my heart didn’t leap whenever she was near.

I needed her with an inferno that licked every part of me but my need was more rounded now. I no longer wanted the quick satisfaction of sex but the full-bodied joy of connection.