The surface was farther down than she’d thought, the bottom even deeper. Her foot slipped on wet stone, and she scraped her elbow as she slipped under. Cool water closed over her head, and it was like falling and floating and submerging all at once. She kicked hard, pushed her arms, and burst upward into bright air and searing sun, and she’d never felt more alive.
It took all she had not to whoop out loud with the sheer freedom of it. She plugged her nose and dropped back down and laughed beneath the water, sending bubbles rising toward the light.
For the longest time, she just… played. Swam and twirled and held on to the rock with her fingers while she let her legs drift. It was always better like this, with no one to watch. No one to have to pretend for.
Finally, the sounds of laughter on the other side of the barrier shifted, the splashing dying away. She sighed and took one more long dive, then kicked up reluctantly toward the surface. The rest of the gang would probably take their time moving on, but she didn’t want them catching her with her pants down. She paddled over to the point where she’d jumped in and looked for a place to grab on and haul herself up.
Only there wasn’t one. She looked to both sides and to the outcrop of rock she’d been standing on before, and it was all smooth and slick and angled wrong.
The first little shiver of uncertainty rumbled its way through her, her stomach dipping.
Shit. She knew better than this. Never get yourself into a situation you aren’t sure you can get out of.
She closed her eyes and counted to ten, keeping her breathing steady and not thinking about being stranded and left for dead or about having to call for help. She’d be fine. She was a strong climber, and she had always gotten herself out of jams before. This would be fine.
Looking up again, she picked her best prospect. Braced her feet against the most solid thing she could find and gripped hard, hauling herself up. She cursed when she slipped, knocking the underside of her chin against the rock. Fuck, that hurt. She swiped at the spot and got a thin trickle of red. Nothing major, but it was insult to injury, and her fingers already felt raw from where she’d lost her hold. There was no other way, though, and she tried again, arm muscles straining, only there was nothing to grip onto.
No one to call for help.
Okay. Okay. The panic was closing in on her chest now, but she could do this. She had to. She drifted over to another bit of rock and searched for a place to grab on, but it was all the same. Grasp and haul and slip and fall, and her breathing was too fast now. Oh shit, she was going to die here, in her underwear. She was fucked, and this had been stupid. How could she have been such an idiot?
She didn’t hear anyone around. Being by herself didn’t feel so great anymore. Nothing did. She shivered despite the sun and clenched her eyes shut tight.
She wasn’t going to snivel. Wasn’t going to cry. Wasn’t going to be the wimp her dad had always accused her of being whenever she showed weakness. But she had to do something.
“Hello?” she called, her voice scarcely wavering at all. No answer, and her heart beat harder. “Can anybody hear me?” This was awful. The worst. Her throat caught, jaw shaking, but she said it. She choked out a quiet, pathetic, “Help?”
“Jo?”
In her head, she said every single swear word in the English language as she whirled around. Because of course it was Adam, looking over the lip of the pool. He’d pulled on a shirt, but with the sun behind him, his golden hair looked like a halo, and she couldn’t even manage to be mad that he’d found her like this. Helpless and floundering and screwed.
There’d be plenty of time for that later.
For now, all she could do was blink back the tears of relief threatening to form at the corners of her eyes and say, “Hey.”
“Hi?” He gestured toward her. “You okay?”
Every instinct screamed at her to tell him yes, of course. It was all totally under control. But the edges of her smile wobbled, and a shudder made its way up her spine. She held herself rigid and swallowed against the lump in her throat. “Yeah. But. Actually. I could use a hand.” She bit down hard on the inside of her lip and forced the word out. “Please.”
It was the perfect opening for him to be an asshole. Anybody else would have. Hell, the first time they met, he’d tried to swoop in and help her, and she’d put him on his back. He had every right to lord that over her, or to leave her stranded, or to at least make her beg.
But instead he grinned and got down on his stomach on the rock. “Of course.”
His arms were long and strong. He braced himself and reached out toward her, broad palm extended and fingers open, and she nodded to herself. She couldn’t quite reach from where she was treading water, and her own arms were shaking from all the times she’d tried already, but she had another go in her. Another wild grasp.
She searched out the best bit of purchase she could find, got the pads of her fingers into a sliver of a crevice, and situated her toes against smooth stone. Nothing for it.
She caught his eyes, and he said, “I got you,” and that was it.
One floundering lunge, and her palm connected with his. His other hand closed around her wrist, and for a heart-stopping second, she slipped, but he grunted and pulled hard, and she got another toehold under her.
And then her chest was level with the lip. She scrambled with her free hand until she could drag herself the rest of the way up. As soon as she was free, she lurched and twisted and planted her butt on solid ground. Her limbs trembled, and she put her head between her bent knees. “Fuck,” she breathed. It was shaky and weak and all she had. “Just… fuck.”
“Yeah.” He got his legs underneath him and flopped down beside her in a mirror of her pose, shoulder pressed against hers.
And she was almost naked, and he was in nothing but a pair of swim trunks and a damp T-shirt. It was practically a dream come true, but all she could concentrate on was the solidity of him and the dull awareness of the scrapes and bumps and the trembling she couldn’t seem to stop.
“You okay?” he asked. He’d shifted, ducking his head so he could sort of see her face.
No. “Yeah.” She sucked in a deep breath and straightened up. She wasn’t quite ready to stand yet, and his body was so warm. Damn it all. She leaned into him, still shivering, but the tremor cut off when he wrapped an arm around her and tugged her close.
“Shh. You’re fine. You’re fine.”
“Of course I am,” she managed between chattering teeth. She didn’t move away, though.
He laughed and said, “I know. You always are.”
She closed her eyes and leaned even farther into his bulk. He smelled good and felt better, and she could have stayed like that forever. Pressed against him and barely clothed, and it didn’t even have to lead anywhere. Not that she would complain if it did. Just the thought made a tickle of heat bloom beneath her skin.
Like he was the sun, and he was piercing deeper than that fire in the sky ever could.
It was stupid—so stupid—but she’d already almost stranded herself in the middle of a rain forest, so how much more stupid could she get? It was relief and comfort and the fact that he’d helped her, without giving her a lick of grief over it. That he’d stayed afterward and wrapped her up like this. She squeezed her eyes shut tight and turned her face into his neck. Opened her mouth against that smooth, salt-and-sun flesh. Not quite a kiss and not quite an invitation, but an intimation. An opening.
One that slammed shut just as quickly as she’d dared to crack it open when someone called his name.
“Adam! Dude, you coming?”
She jerked away, and it didn’t hurt when he did the same, all but jumping to his feet and pulling his arm in close to his side, like she hadn’t just been nestled there, as if there wasn’t any room for her there. Maybe there never had been.
She never really fit into existing places after all. She always had to dig and scrape and build to make her own.