by Alice Ward
“It’s not reckless when you’re saving lives. How is it any different from when I protected the herd of elephants by chasing down the poachers?”
“Because the poachers didn’t have human targets. They couldn’t come into a village, kidnap men, and get away with it.” Hyperventilating, I fanned myself, trying to force in a breath of air. “We’re not safe, are we?”
“The soldiers won’t be back,” he assured me. “They have their hostages. Now they’re waiting for the patent.”
I didn’t believe him. “Then why did you check the locks?”
“You. When I’m gone, I want to make sure you feel safe.”
I grabbed his arm and stared straight into his eyes. “I’ll never feel safe if you’re not here. Please don’t do anything that can take you away from me.”
“I’ll come back,” he promised, brushing his finger against my cheek. “You know I will.”
***
Next to the river, I sat in the tall grass with my feet in the water. It wasn’t safe to drink or bathe in, but a local woman had said feet were fine, as long as I rubbed them in the grass afterwards. The vegetation wasn’t exactly safe either, not with snakes and other crawlies stalking around. It was worth the risk. From above, the sun scorched the earth. I didn’t know how the land managed to remain so lush under the brutal sun.
Corey was gone, out on a scouting mission that left my belly in tangles waiting for his return. My journals were untouched on the writing desk. Fearing for Corey, I couldn’t focus, not on my research, not on anything.
Nearby, a group of women washed clothes in the river as children ran around their feet. I didn’t stray far from them, not after learning what Corey had told me the previous night. I still couldn’t believe he’d dragged me into the middle of guerilla warfare. It was shocking, but at the same time it was refreshing that Corey judged me strong enough to handle such an environment.
When the sun began to scald my skin, I returned to our residence and picked up my phone, tempted to call Julia. We were on the same time zone, but I realized she’d be in the middle of work, while I was in the middle of fretting. I couldn’t do this every day.
Praying for the hostage situation to end peacefully and soon, I climbed into the hammock and stared at the ceiling as I swayed, too restless to sleep but immobilized by thoughts of Corey. Where he was. What he was doing.
Hours later, when he lurched in, I nearly cried with relief. “How did it go?”
I tried to sit up, but it was impossible to do in a hammock, and I nearly spun around if not for Corey’s swift reflexes. “From what we could see through the sniper lenses, the camp is a lot bigger than we thought. Four men were taken hostage, but our intel tells us they have at least six men there. This isn’t some insignificant unit. It’s a massive outpost.”
It gave me the chills. “Where’s the government? Why aren’t they intervening?”
“There are loads of guerilla soldiers out there. The government doesn’t have the capacity to handle every case. If Barrett hadn’t come to organize the rescue, the village probably would have been forced to hand over their patent. If not, the men wouldn’t be returning home.”
I felt sick. “You mean the soldiers would kill them?”
“Not likely. They’d use them as manual labor, probably like the two unknown hostages at the camp.”
“This is why I enjoy being an environmentalist. Nature can be cruel, but it’s nothing compared to man.”
“I couldn’t agree more,” Corey said, looking at me with regret. “It’s why I’m sending you back. It’s not as safe here as I thought. No one in this village is safe. I’m going to call Noah and ask him to send his private jet to pick you up.”
“Just me?” I asked sadly, because I already knew the answer.
Holding the hammock steady, he crawled in with me and held me, laying back so that we swung leisurely, the ceiling our sky. With the heat outside invading our room and the heat between us licking our skin, I felt dizzy interred in Corey’s arms, but there was nowhere else I wanted to be. Not because I loved him, but because we truly did have a connection that was inexplicable.
“When this is all over, I’ll take you on an actual vacation. Somewhere safe, like Disneyland.”
“I’ve never been to Disneyland,” I told him. “But the mouse kind of freaks me out.”
He laughed, shaking the hammock. As he did, I felt the vibrations across his chest, penetrating deep into his heart which, to me, sounded perfectly healthy. “We’ll figure it out,” he said.
“Noah will give you an earful,” I warned. “He’ll demand you come home with me.”
“I can handle my brother.”
“I know where I’d like to go when you return,” I decided.
“And where’s that?”
“To Milwaukee. I’d like you to meet my grandma’s friends at the senior center. They’ll get a kick out of you.”
Again, he laughed. “I’d like that. It sounds perfect.”
“Corey?” I asked, biting my lower lip. “If we can’t get to the place that we were at before, will we make it as friends?”
“Of course,” he insisted with unmistakable certainty. “But I’m going to make sure that doesn’t happen.”
Startled, I lifted my ear, certain I’d heard a woman scream. “What was that?”
Corey cocked his head, but there was nothing.
“Never mind,” I said, shaking it away.
Until there was another scream.
This time Corey heard it. We leapt out of the hammock, instantly on guard. From the corner of the room, Corey grabbed the rifle, and to my absolute horror, he handed it to me. “Don’t be afraid to pull that trigger!” he ordered. “Keep the doors locked. Don’t open them for anyone!”
Before I could protest, he ran out the door.
Tears running down my cheeks, I locked it behind him, then stood as far away from it as possible, backing into the corner by the bed, shaking uncontrollably. There was a lot of commotion outside. When gunfire sounded, I cried out loud, more frightened than I’d ever been. I was tempted to drop the gun and cover my ears, but thinking of the hostages held prisoner in the jungle, I kept it sturdy on the door.
Hours past, and the village quieted. I didn’t know if it was a good or bad sign. Without any windows in our residence, I was blind to the terror around me. Still weeping, I crawled on the ground, the rifle in my hand and reached up to the writing desk for my phone.
“Noah,” I sobbed into the phone when he answered, trying to keep quiet. “Help me.”
***
I don’t know how much time passed as I lay on the floor near the bed, sprawled out with the rifle in my hand, squinting at the crack in the door to see if it was night or day. It didn’t really matter. There was no way that door was opening, not unless Corey walked in. At one point, someone banged on the door, but I didn’t understand the language, so I kept quiet, unsure if they were friend or foe.
Sometime later, when there was a knock on the door again, I heard someone call out my name.
“Come in, Peter,” I said in my delirium.
“Imogen!” a man yelled. “It’s me. Open up.”
Corey. Finding the energy to stand, I pressed my head against the door. “Corey, is that you?” I hissed.
“It’s Noah.”
That’s right. I’d called Noah. Swimming in the torment of my fear, I’d almost forgotten. Endlessly shaking, I unlocked the bolts and pulled the door open, blinking back the glare of the sun, blind to who waited for me.
“Imogen!” With blatant desperation, Noah pushed his way into the room and clutched me like a child to a doll. “Thank God you’re safe,” he whispered into my ear.
Accepting that it really was him and not some delusion, I wept into his shoulder, trusting his strength and authority, my fears pouring out of me like a hailstorm. “I was so scared,” I cried. “I didn’t know what was going on. But you found me.”
“It’s over,” he pr
omised, tightening his grip around me. “You’re safe now. I’m taking you home.”
Inconsolable, I didn’t protest when he took me into the bathroom and turned on a cool shower. Stripping me down, he shepherded me into the water, and though it soaked the sleeves of his dress shirt, he scrubbed my hair and ran a cloth over my body, helping me wash the pain away. When I was clean, he helped me dress into a fresh pair of shorts and a tank top. I didn’t pay much attention to what he was doing, growing numb.
“What happened?” I asked, sitting on the bed with my arms crossed as he packed my bags. It was boiling out, but I was cold.
“There was a raid,” he told me. “The revolutionaries invaded the village in search of the patent.”
“I heard a woman scream,” I recalled. “And then Corey ran…”
I stopped. Corey. He hadn’t come back yet.
“Where’s Corey?”
Noah didn’t answer. Instead, he took my journals from the writing desk and tucked them gently into my rucksack.
Oh God.
“Tell me!” I screeched, finding the silence unbearable.
He set the rucksack down and faced me, sorrow etched within the creases of his face. “He was captured and taken hostage.”
I gasped and shook my head. “No. That can’t be.”
“It’s the truth.”
Looking at my rucksack, I felt a pain in my stomach. All I wanted to do was get on the private jet and never return, but not if Corey was prisoner within the jungle. “We can’t go,” I insisted. “Not until he’s released. He needs us here fighting for him.”
“You think I haven’t considered that?” Noah said, his anguish evident. “I’m coming back, as soon as I see you home safely.”
“I won’t go,” I proclaimed.
“It’s what he’d want,” Noah insisted.
“Probably, but he wouldn’t leave me, and I won’t leave him.”
Noah swallowed. “You love him.”
I shook my head, looking at the brother who held my heart. “No. Not Corey. But I care deeply for him. We understand each other. We share a wildness.”
“You really won’t go, will you?” Noah asked, studying me.
“No,” I said boldly. “I won’t.”
Dropping his broad shoulders, he pulled me off the bed until we knelt on the floor facing each other. The sorrow that he carried terrified me. Taking my hands, he squeezed them forebodingly. “There’s more.”
His voice shook as he began, and I knew it was bad.
“I talked to Barrett on the flight over,” he said, tears filling his eyes. “A few hours after the raid, reports started circulating that one of the hostages perished unexpectedly. They think it was Corey. There’s no reason you should suffer the torment of waiting, not when you’ve already been through so much. I was only going to tell you after we knew for sure.”
Taking a shuddering breath, I let my own tears fall, swollen with heartache. “But they don’t know for sure?” I asked, trying to grasp on to hope before my body and soul crumbled completely.
“No. They don’t know for sure, but they’re pretty certain.” Pressing his hands to his head, he wept, great aching sobs that tore me in two. “I couldn’t save him. I tried, and I failed.”
***
The following day, we still hadn’t heard any news about Corey. Swallowed by our grief, we paced the room, listening to the radio. At times, Noah left to get food from the canteen. More men like Barrett and Corey had arrived — vigilantes summoned to protect the village and rescue the hostages. It was a war between armies, or so Noah told me. He wouldn’t let me leave the residence. Vaulted in, I was safe.
“You know I love you,” he burst out one evening as we sat outside, needing the fresh air to fend off the walls and the worry. Even a man as austere as Noah Stafford could be worn down by the torment of waiting, left raw, scoured down to his hidden truths.
“I know,” I replied, picking at a blade of grass. “But sometimes love isn’t enough. You pushed me away.”
“Because I was in a race against time to save Corey, a race I’d been stuck in ever since we were kids. I didn’t know how to break free. And then you came along, and you showed me what happiness looked like, but I couldn’t let go.”
“He’s your twin. I understand,” I said. “Not in the way you handled it, but why you did it. You were coming from a place of love. I can’t fault you for that.”
“You can, and you should,” he insisted. “I knew you wanted more, but I was too afraid to provide it, even though you’re the one person in this world I want to give everything to.”
I couldn’t comment, couldn’t say a word. Not with rumors of Corey’s death circulating throughout the camp. Already, I’d been offered black beads of mourning, mistaken for his wife. I wouldn’t wear them, even if the reports claimed Corey’s heart had given out. I refused to believe it, not because of my own instincts, but because of Noah’s. Twins shared a bond no one could begin to understand. Noah was devastated, but he wasn’t broken, and that gave me hope that somewhere inside of him, he knew Corey was alive.
We didn’t have to wait much longer to find out. Later that night, waking us from vulgar nightmares, we got the call. Noah picked up his phone, listening intently, unreadable. Holding my breath, I waited for him to deliver the news.
Pale, he dropped his phone on the writing desk and turned to me. “The reports, they were about Corey.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
I stopped breathing, my chest filling with intolerable pain, making it impossible to speak. Hugging a pillow from the bed, I slumped onto the floor and rocked back and forth, in too much anguish to cry.
Gently, Noah took the pillow from my arms. “Imogen, listen to me,” he commanded. “The reports were about Corey, but they were inaccurate. He’s not dead. He’s in the hospital, having collapsed. The revolutionaries must have thought he had died and left him. He was found and taken to an emergency room. I’m going to go get him now, and then we’re all going home.”
“He’s alive?” I needed to hear him say it again.
Beaming, Noah nodded. “He’s alive.”
I threw my arms around Noah’s neck, elated, and somewhere in the sea of emotions that poured between us, tearing at our depths with its powerful current, my lips found his, and we kissed with a passion that outshone the sun. Like a picture reel, the time we’d shared together in Chicago flashed before me — the seduction, the storm, his lessons, my father, the gala — they seared into my brain. It was healing, drawing us together in a way that left me breathless and weak when it was over.
And undeniably still in love.
***
With reluctance, I’d watched Noah walk out the door, fearing the worst. The jungle was a dangerous place, and Corey was far away. But I had nothing to worry about. When the door opened again, the Stafford brothers walked in together, Noah supporting Corey on his shoulder.
Happiness burst through me as I stood to greet them. “Corey, you’re here.”
“And so are you,” he returned, beaming through a slightly bruised eye. “I knew you could handle it. You’re strong.”
“We all are,” I said. “And now that we’ve proven it, let’s go home. I’m sick of this place.”
I reached for my rucksack, but Corey didn’t follow. Instead, he hopped over to the bed and sat. “I’m not leaving.”
“What?” I cried. “After everything you’ve been through?”
“It was only a concussion. It wasn’t my heart. I’m fine. And now that I’ve seen firsthand the conditions the hostages are living in, I can’t go back, not until they’re safe. I have important intel I can provide. They need me here.”
Recognizing the stubbornness in his tone, having heard it many times from Noah, I accepted that there was nothing we could say or do to change Corey’s mind. I was devastated. “I can’t stay,” I muttered softly.
“I know,” Corey said sadly, our paths dividing once again “You’re not meant to.�
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Grimacing as he listened, Noah didn’t look any less distraught than the rest of us, but for once, he didn’t argue. “Promise us you’ll come home and visit when this is all over.”
“I will,” Corey vowed. “I may even stick around for a while.”
With a heavy spirit, I threw my rucksack over my back. “If you don’t come home, we’ll find you,” I said, attempting a smile.
Corey took a deep breath. “I know you will. Be happy. Be together. Love each other. Do it for me.”
Hugging him goodbye, I prayed that he would stay safe, and before a fresh batch of tears could fall, I hurried to the door. Noah shook his hand and followed, but as we were about to leave, Corey called out to his brother.
“Yes?” Noah asked.
Corey glanced at me, his eyes shining, and then he turned to Noah. “Don’t be a fucking idiot. You know what you have. Watch over her.”
Noah stalked across the room and grabbed his brother, pulling him into his arms. The tears I’d been holding back fell as I watched the brothers hug, hanging onto each other, their fingers digging into each other’s backs.
They stood that way for long moments, not saying a word.
“I love you, Corey,” Noah said finally, pulling back and clapping a hand on his twin’s shoulder.
“I love you too, bro. Now go. Be happy together.”
Noah nodded and stepped away. Turning, he took my hand, then glanced back at his brother. “You too, Corey.” Then he grinned. “You officially have my permission to be happy however and wherever you want.”
Corey’s laughter followed us out the door.
***
On the private jet back to Chicago, I sat across from Noah, our knees bumping against each other as we drank each other in.
“Are you okay?” he asked me and leaned forward to take my hands in his.
Linking our fingers together, I met the eyes I loved so much. Corey had freed me from any emotional promise that had once held us together, and I was free to be here with Noah, if he still wanted me.
“I’m sorry,” I told him and watched his face cloud with pain. I realized he thought I was rejecting him and quickly went on, “I’m sorry I’ve been so confused. So hurt. So unsure of what to do or who to turn to.”
