Stuck With You

by Sara Cate

  In response, he grinds his hips against me and helps me keep the rhythm going. I feel him harden even more within me and his eyes close tight. He tenses with his own orgasm, grinding my name out between clenched teeth.

  I collapse forward, my forehead touching his shoulder, then falling to the side, completely spent. I feel his long arms come around me as I drift on a wave of perfect relaxation.

  We stay in that bed, naked, for the rest of the night. We don’t sleep much. We have to make up for lost time.

  I am alone when I wake the next morning. Bright yellow summer sunlight is streaming through the windows and across the floor. The house is perfectly silent except for the hum of the air conditioner unit.

  I pull a small throw blanket toward me and wrap it around my body, listening for any signs that anyone else is here. The ladder creaks under my feet, but there are no other sounds.

  Ryder’s clothes and shoes are gone. His keys, which had been beside mine on the table, are missing. A lump swells in my throat, and I look out into the driveway. My Jeep sits there. Alone.

  Goddammit. The thought rises in my mind, and I’m unable to banish it: he’s done it again. After all that passion last night, after the most mind-blowing sex I’ve ever had, after him holding me carefully and gently cradled in his arms...he’s up and left. Probably gone back to Alexa or some other supermodel-looking bitch. That was what he did last time he disappeared on me.

  The lump in my throat hardens into anger, and I climb back to the loft. I drop the blanket on the bed and angrily snatch my dress off the floor and pull it on, fastening the large buttons. I try not to remember how sexy it had been when his callused fingers had opened them, so slowly...

  I start to stuff my feet into my flip flops but glare at them. They’re rubber and practically useless for anything except maybe preserving a pedicure. They’re not the kind of graceful high heels a model-looking woman would wear. The kind of woman Ryder would want wouldn’t want these shoes. And I didn’t want to see them again. Ever.

  I pad barefoot to my Jeep, yanking open the rear passenger door. My running sneakers are tossed haphazardly in the backseat. Amazingly, they are dry and I jam my feet into them.

  My family will be to the cabin this afternoon, bringing the Cox family with them. I suspect Ryder won’t be in the group. Either way, I am not about to face this day on an empty goddamn stomach, and I’m not about to choke down another one of those out-of-date Pop-Tarts. There’s a convenience store about five miles from the entrance to the property. If nothing else, they’ll have coffee.

  I start down the hill, trying to figure out where this weekend had gone so wrong. Had he simply taken advantage of me? Had I taken advantage of him? Some of the details were hazy from passion, but I remember clearly giving and receiving consent. That was one thing that had been drilled into both of us in high school: consent.

  I am so caught up in my own thoughts I am shocked by the sudden jolt that rocks the car as I pass over the ford. I wrench the wheel, barely keeping the Jeep from diving into the river, and pull it up to the other bank. I place the vehicle in park and pull the brake, staring at the ford behind me. The water runs unevenly over the asphalt my parents had put down, and I can see that a big chunk of the crossover is missing. But there’s something else...

  That’s when I see it. The green Jeep Wrangler, lying on its side in the water. The angry lump in my throat drops, along with my stomach. That’s Ryder’s—

  I am out of my vehicle before I even finish the thought. Even in shallow water, a flipped car is dangerous. As I get closer, I can see that the windows are all intact, but water is seeping into the vehicle slowly as it lays on the driver side.

  Ryder is still buckled to his seat, his head resting on the window. His eyes are closed and he’s not moving.

  I panic and don’t even hesitate before dropping into the river next to the car. The water is icy around my ankles, even with the summer heat. I lean on the windshield, tapping. Ryder stirs, his eyes blearily focusing on me. He smiles in relief when he sees me.

  “Are you hurt?” I ask him. I’m yelling. I tell myself it’s to be heard through the glass, but to be honest fear is bubbling in my throat. “Can you move?”

  “Everything but my left arm,” he says. His voice is muffled. “I think something is broken? I don’t have a lot of feeling in my hand.”

  I glance around. I don’t know how I’m going to get him out. The water is rising in the vehicle. I kneel down in the water. My legs are already going a bit numb in the cold water. “Hang on just a minute,” I tell him. “I’m calling 911.”

  He nods slowly and closes his eyes, his head falling back against the window. He might have a concussion. If nothing else, he’ll have plenty of whiplash.

  I call 911 and have to spend more time than I’d like explaining the location of the accident to the dispatcher. Meanwhile, I pop open the back of my vehicle and pull out a sharp hammer, one of those known for breaking glass. The dispatcher tells me not to attempt to move him, but I’ll be damned if I leave that man in an overturned vehicle as it fills with water.

  I wade back into the water and tap on the windshield again. I pray that it’s my imagination that makes it seem like he’s slower to answer me this time.

  “Cover your eyes!” I yell at him. I can hear desperation rising in my voice. He claps his right hand over his eyes and turns his head away as much as he can.

  I swing the hammer and lightly tap the windshield. It won’t shatter, not like in the movies. Safety glass is strong stuff, and it takes several moments to get it broken and cleared away enough I can get him out. As soon as the windshield is gone, I lean into the vehicle and help him undo his seatbelt.

  “It’s so cold,” he says, murmuring against my shoulder as I help him out of the vehicle. I can feel him shaking. I help him sit down on the bank of the river. I grab the old towel in my car and I use it to carefully wrap around his shoulders.

  “Tell me what hurts,” I ask him. I want to rub his arms to help him return some warmth to his limbs, but that’s a bad idea if something is broken.

  “Everything,” he says, his voice tight.

  I shake my head. “That’s not helpful,” I say. “What hurts the most?”

  “My shoulder.” He winces as I pull on his T-shirt, trying to see the injury. I’m not a doctor, but I do have a lot of first aid and wilderness training, and to be honest it looks like his arm is dislocated.

  “What else? Did you hit your head?”

  He shakes it. “I don’t think so.” His eyes are closed and his head is hanging.

  “Where were you off to this morning?” I ask. I don’t particularly want to know, especially if he was leaving to go back to a girlfriend, but it’s important to keep him talking and focused. His words are a little bleary, but he’s mostly coherent.

  He huddles more in the towel and turns his face to the sun. His eyes drift closed. “There was no coffee anywhere in that cabin,” he says. “I wanted to get you some breakfast. Thought I’d run to the corner store and be back before you woke up. I think I was driving too fast. Flipped when I hit the edge of the ford.”

  “You know better than to drive too fast across the ford, dumbass,” I scold him, the lump in my throat relaxing a little bit.

  “Yeah, but coffee,” he says. That sounds like his old sarcasm. That’s a good sign.

  “So you weren’t going home to your girlfriend?” I asked, goading him into continuing to talk to me. If he’s talking, at least he’s not passing out.

  He shakes his head, slowly and carefully. He opens his eyes and fixes me with a stare. “I couldn’t do that,” he says simply.

  I wait for him to continue but he doesn’t. “Why not?” I prompt him.

  He takes a deep sigh. “You know what scared me the most about being trapped in that car?” he says at last. “Not being injured. Not that the car was filling with water.

  “It was the fear I might not get to see you again.”

  M
y stomach churns, half with anxiety and half with excitement. My heartbeat stills as I wait for him to continue.

  He opens his eyes and looks over at me. I note that his pupils are the same size and his eyes are tracking together. All good signs.

  “You realize that when I saw you five years ago, that was the first time I really saw you since I graduated high school?” He shakes his head carefully. “The first time I had realized you had grown up, you’d become a woman.”

  He reaches out with his good hand, taking mine and pulling me down next to him on the riverbank. “You know I’ve always cared about you, right? As long as I can remember, you’ve been there and you’ve been my friend. But when I saw you, I realized that you were more than that. You were—” He breaks off, clearing his throat.

  “The ambulance should be here soon,” I say. “Maybe you should lay back and rest—"

  “I’d rather tell you this now,” he says, cutting me off. “I was in the water for about an hour. I had time to think about it, and I need to say it.”

  I want to argue with him, not sure if I can stay on this rollercoaster of emotions much longer. But I don’t. I know what it’s like to have an adrenaline rush and need to talk it out afterwards. So I settle next to him, carefully putting my arm around his waist and trying to help warm him with my body heat.

  “After I kissed you on the dock, I felt so guilty. You were beautiful, you were willing, and I’d never had a girl so sexy start it by kissing me first. I wanted to have you right there on the dock.”

  “Then why didn’t you?” I ask him. I realize I might sound petty but I want the truth.

  “You were still too young,” he says. “You still wanted to go to college. I couldn’t take those opportunities away from you.

  “I knew if I spent any more time around you, I wouldn’t be able to be strong enough. I started dating, trying to erase you from my mind.” A small smile cracks his face. It’s even on both sides, and a little more of the anxiety in my gut relaxes. “You would not believe how easy it is to get dates when you’re in uniform,” he chuckles.

  “Not that you’ve ever had difficulty getting any sort of date, ever,” I grumble, not meeting his eyes.

  He looks over at me, wincing a little with pain. His eyes are warm as he stares down at me. “You know what I found with those women?” he asks.

  I shrug. “Awesome, mind-blowing sex?” I ask, humoring him.

  “No, Giggles.” He sighs. “Nothing. None of it felt right. They knew it, I knew it. I was beginning to think I’d never find anyone. I actually broke up with the last one only last month, telling myself I was done dating.

  “And then you showed back up in my life, dressed in khaki polyester and covered in Tennessee river mud. And I realized what I’d been missing.”

  I cut my eyes over to him. “Say it,” I dare him.

  His mouth quirks into a smile. “I realized why I never felt anything with anyone else: you are the only one for me. Any time I was with anyone else, I was subconsciously wishing it was you.”

  The smile that spreads over my face starts in my heart, a wave of tingling warmth surging through me that has nothing to do with the heat of the Tennessee summer that is baking us.

  In the distance, I hear a siren and know that the ambulance is getting close. I finally breathe a sigh of relief. Ryder will be okay, and he will be mine.

  4

  His shoulder is only dislocated. No bones are broken, and the EMTs can’t find any sign of concussion. They offer to take him to the hospital, but he refuses. They relocate his shoulder, put him in a sling, make him sign a bunch of paperwork that says he has refused hospital care, and disappear.

  He doesn’t release my hand the whole time. I don’t want him to.

  As the ambulance is pulling away, our families show up in a caravan. They are shocked to see that a car is in the river but with Ryder’s dad being a mechanic getting it out is merely a matter of getting Bob from the body shop down here with a crane on Monday. Not the worst outcome.

  I warn them about the issue with the ford, but as long as they’re careful it’s safe enough to cross. I load Ryder into my Jeep and drive him back to the cabin. I announce to the family that the loft is mine, but don’t catch my mistake until our parents notice that only one bed in the house was used last night. No one comments on it, just like no one comments on the new level of intimacy between Ryder and myself. I do catch my mom and Mrs. Cox exchanging significant glances, but I’ll be completely honest: I only have eyes for the tall, dark, handsome man I spent the night with last night. I realize, staring at him grilling hot dogs with my dad out by the dock, that he’s the only one for me. A warmth spreads through me, from my scalp to my toes. I guess Mrs. Cox will get that second wedding, after all.

  About the Author

  Ava Rae is a romance author from the dusty part of Texas. She enjoys Wild West stories, oatmeal cookies, and walking her dogs.

  avarae.romance@gmail.com

  Into the Cave

  By Jessica Walker

  Seven years after a plane crash strands 45 passengers in the Australian wilderness, life has begun to feel normal. Over time the passengers work together to create their own society. A society with rules to protect them. Rules like men and women should not be alone together and sex is forbidden.

  Christa and Tanner have always played by the rules, but when a monsoon strands them in an anchialine cave they learn that desire has rules of its own.

  Into the Cave

  Copyright © 2020 by Jessica Walker

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Prologue

  When the plane crashed, there were four of us, close in age and newly orphaned. We clung together, like Lord of the Flies was about to break out and someone would proclaim themselves King. It didn’t happen like that.

  Forty-seven passengers went up in the plane. Only forty climbed out of the water. We lost old people and children, the pilot and one stewardess, all before we knew we were a we. Swimming to shore I thought it was a dream. I would wake up, pack my bag, board the plane, return home, but the waking never happened. Instead I stood shivering beneath a mammoth moon.

  That first night, while the families and partners huddled in one another’s arms, the four of us stood like silos, alone and afraid.

  Lena spoke to me first. She was twelve, one year my junior. Followed by Cade, fourteen, and Tanner, sixteen. We had all read enough dystopian books to know that we had to form an alliance if we wanted to survive. At one point, Cade lined his pockets with the sharpest rocks he could find while Lena and I stood in front of him, as a makeshift shield. I think we felt bold and decisive, but maybe I just remember it that way because I’m not terrified anymore.

  That first night in the wild, Tanner stayed awake, watching over the three of us as we slept in a heap. He was the oldest and our protector by default.

  Later, this would all seem silly, but it could have gone the other way, and had it, we would have been prepared.

  In the seven years since the crash, our forty have shrunk to thirty-two. There have been deaths and there have been exiles, but no one has ever had to pull a sharp rock from their pocket.

  I used to think we would be found. How could a plane with forty-seven people disappear without a trace? Where was the ripple effect? The family and friends who would never stop searching for us?

  Maybe they were looking for us. Australia, it turned out, was very large.

  1

  It is a hot and sticky morning on the island with no name. Lena has a habit of tucking her head into the crook of my arm while we sleep, and I have to gently push her aside to stand and stretch.

  Members of our group are already up and moving. Some are standing ne
ar the fire. Others are coming back from their morning bath.

  We have a system for bathing. The families go together. Then the men, then the women. Never men and women together. That would be against our rules. Heaven forbid we see one another naked and forget how to be civil. I think there is a real fear within our group that too long in the wild will rob us of our civilization.

  I’m probably the reason they’re worried. At this point I can hardly remember life before the crash, and I have a hard time telling myself I ought to behave like a proper woman of society when I’ve pulled the skin off any manner of small animal.

  We hadn’t been on the island very long when a vote was called, asking all group members to abstain from romantic contact between a man and a woman. None of us had struggled to vote in favor of the rule. Because that very morning we’d buried both a member of our group and the stillborn baby that killed her. When you’ve buried a baby, sex feels like a curse.

  I yawn and slip my feet into a pair of tennis shoes. If you are going to get lost in the wilderness for years on end, it does help to have a plane full of luggage with you. The clothes I brought with me are now worn by the youngest of our group while I have grown into items once owned by other passengers.

  Tanner is standing by the fire, his copper hair unruly as ever. It has been days since he shaved. I think I sort of like him with facial hair. When I stand beside him I have to resist the temptation to reach up and stroke his jaw. I have never touched him the way women and men are supposed to, and my fingers itch at the prospect.

  I swear sometimes he can hear me thinking because he raises his eyebrows and bumps me in the ribs.