“What are you doing?”
The screech that leaves my mouth sounds like it came straight out of Godzilla. I’d be embarrassed if it wasn’t for the fact that I’m too busy trying to claw my heart back down from my throat.
“Oh, my God,” is all I manage.
I’ve been knocking lightly on the walls in the hallway outside our room for the past few minutes, searching for a hollow point. I’m hoping there’s a hidden entrance to a staircase somewhere.
Enzo stares at me, an unimpressed quirk to his thick brow. I grab my chest, sucking in a deep breath to calm my erratic heart rate.
“What are you doing?” I ask breathlessly. He holds up the lighthouse book.
“Looking for the beacon?”
I scoff, “No. Why would you think that?”
“You dog-eared the page.”
“Oh. Did I?” I mumble. I couldn’t sleep last night, so I stayed up late with the book shoved against the window, trying to read as best I could with the webs of moonlight highlighting only a few words at a time.
The book is about Raven’s Isle and its history, published in 2008. It has a record of what seems like every important event. Sylvester is even mentioned in it, named the official lighthouse keeper since 1978.
Over the years, he’s assisted with hundreds of vessels. These waters around Raven Isle are perilous and rocky and are known for sending ships down under. Lighthouses can have several meanings, and this one was meant to both warn and to offer a safe haven if it was already too late.
There are dozens upon dozens of recounts of ships wrecking and Sylvester guiding them to his island. Every one of them lists the vessel, what it was transporting and where to, and even the names of known survivors and deaths.
Except there is no record of the prisoners. Nothing about a transport ship capsizing or any of the survivors washing up on Raven Isle. It doesn’t mean it didn’t happen, but it only makes me wonder why it wasn’t documented like the others.
“Why are you looking for the beacon?”
In the book, there was a brief mention of how Sylvester would guide the sea captains here while manning the beacon. Which means that he had to have some type of way to communicate while up there.
There obviously must be another set of stairs somewhere leading to it, and I was curious as to where. There could be another radio up there. Maybe a way to send out some type of distress signal and prompt a ship to come to rescue us.
Or just me.
It would be nearly impossible to hide a boat from Enzo. Then again, I could always lie and say he’s dangerous…
I shrug, attempting nonchalance. “I wanted to go stare into the light.”
Enzo crosses his arms, waiting for an honest response.
The fucker can keep waiting.
Turning back around, I place my hands on the wall and start lightly knocking again, resuming my search for a hollow point.
“Sawyer,” he growls, the rough timbre of his voice deepening his accent and sending shivers down my spine. I never actually got to hear him moan my real name, and I think I’m glad for it. If I had, I don’t think I would’ve ever left that man’s bed, and while maybe that would have prevented this entire mess, it wouldn’t have prevented me from falling for him.
And that is by far more dangerous than shipwrecking in the middle of the ocean during a storm. Ask anybody.
“What?” I snap, embarrassed by the flush slowly crawling up my throat and the fact that I need to clench my thighs just to abate the throb between them.
“Why are you looking for the beacon?” he repeats, his voice closer than it was a minute ago. “I think it’s best you don’t lie to me this time.”
“I wasn’t lying. I was diverting. There’s a difference,” I defend lightly.
When I feel his presence close in on me, I yelp, twisting around and pressing myself into the wall.
“Don’t come a step closer, or I’ll scream,” I threaten, pointing a finger at him.
One of us is a lion and the other is a rabbit. And it’s not hard to guess which one is scared and which one looks hungry.
“Stop looking at me like that,” I demand.
Fuck. Didn’t work. He’s still looking at me like that.
“Answer my question. I’m not going to ask it again,” he orders, taking another step closer, his searing gaze locked onto mine.
The entire expanse of my body is flattened against the wall, and once more, I’m faced with the unbending fact that I can’t walk through solid objects.
He’s always using his body against me. Using it to intimidate me, to distract me, to get what he wants.
Flip the script, dumbass.
Right. Easier said than done when there might as well be a Minotaur in my face, huffing down at me.
Working to swallow, I force my shoulders to relax, and then slowly, every other muscle in my body follows suit.
I cast my gaze to the floor long enough to gather courage that is entirely fabricated, then lift my eyes back to him, allowing myself to feel the throb radiating between my thighs and the way his proximity makes my nipples tighten painfully.
While my bravery is forced, the way my body reacts to him is anything but. There’s a constant battle of fighting my attraction to him and convincing myself that any man could make my knees weaken with a single look. And ridding myself of that internal war feels like wearing a tight costume for too long and finally taking it off to breathe. There are no pretenses, no denying the way my clit pulses beneath his stare, and the wetness that coats my inner thighs when he gets close enough.
There are no shutters over my eyes, hiding the truth from him as often as I hide it from myself.
Though he wasn’t moving, Enzo’s body seems to still. Like hitting pause on a movie. Except I double-clicked the button, and just as quickly as he stopped, he’s striking, wrapping a hand around my throat, and lifting until only my toes touch the ground. His form is pressing into mine so deeply, our lungs just might entwine.
How am I supposed to breathe if all my oxygen is going to him instead?
“I know what you’re doing,” he snarls. The heat radiating from his body threatens to burn me alive, the outline of my body forever charred into the stone wall behind me.
“I’m not lying to you,” I whisper, whimpering when he squeezes my throat tighter. His eyes dilate when the helpless sound reaches his ears.
Enzo hates me. But he also wants me. And I have no intention of letting him stop when it’s the only thing keeping me alive.
Slowly, I drag my leg up around his hip, inviting him deeper between my thighs. A low growl rumbles deep in his chest, yet he presses the hard ridge of his cock against my pussy, eliciting another cry from my constricted throat. A shudder works through my body from how good it feels, and it takes little effort to roll against his length, seeking something from him that I shouldn’t be.
“No, you’re not,” he agrees before leaning closer, his lips whispering across my jaw. “You know what else you’re not doing?”
“Hmm?” I’m distracted by the way he’s begun to rotate his hips, drawing out a breathless moan. A knot is forming in the trenches of my stomach, tightening each time his cock slides against my clit.
“You’re not begging, bella ladra,” he murmurs.
Then, he pulls away just an inch, enough for me to lose the sweet pressure he was creating between my thighs. In place, there’s a chill forming between us.
I can feel him distancing himself, and I’m latching on harder, desperate and needy. Any coherent thought has long fled from my brain, determined to escape the collapsing tomb of senselessness. Reason and logic don’t belong in there. Not when all it cares about is how to convince him to make me come.
Enzo and I stand in the eye of a hurricane, a perfect storm of lust and hate.
“Please,” I whisper, uncaring of how pathetic I’ve become. Reduced to thoughtlessness and single-mindedness with a simple thrust of his hips.
He makes a dissatisfied noise in the depths of his throat.
“Didn’t I say I wouldn’t fuck you even when you begged me to? Tell me why you think that is.”
His voice is so cold. So, so fucking cold.
I shake my head, feeling the heavy weight of denial soaking through my bones. Not just denial—but shame, too. I didn’t mean to beg for him. Didn’t want to. But the word slipped out as readily as my self-preservation did.
“It’s because it’s not good enough, Sawyer. You’re not good enough.”
There are tears welling in my eyes before I can stop them.
“You know why else?” he bites out through gritted teeth, anger beginning to glow in his eyes.
“Because I fucking hate you,” he spits, shaking me to punctuate his words. I claw at his hand, breaking the skin and leaving bloody trails in its wake, but the sting doesn’t faze him.
I hate him, too—God, do I hate him, too. I hate everything he is. His fucking arrogance. His holier-than-thou attitude. Everything. Fucking everything about him.
So badly, I want to shout these words in his face, but I can hardly draw in a breath, let alone utter a syllable of my wrath. Before I can do anything, there’s a long dragging noise coming from above us.
The colorful words poised on the tip of my tongue dissipate like smoke, and the blazing fire shining in Enzo’s eyes quickly freezes into ice picks.
Both of our heads shoot up, paralyzed by the sound of chains dragging against the ceiling.
Slowly, Enzo releases me, stepping away as his eyes track the footsteps.
“Hello?” he calls out, keeping the volume of his voice controlled, assumingly, so Sylvester doesn’t hear.
The footsteps don’t falter, and it’s only when my chest begins to ache that I notice how hard my heart is beating.
Enzo drops his chin and scrutinizes me, asking in a low voice, “Perché, Sawyer? Tell me why.”
I blink, taken aback that even now, he’s asking why I’m looking for the light. “Are you asking because you think I’m, what—conspiring with the ghosts? Because if I’m being perfectly honest, I have no fucking interest in going up there now.”
“Sawyer.”
“Oh my God, because I thought maybe there would be an extra radio up there,” I whisper-shout, fed up with him invading every aspect of my privacy. It’s bad enough being forced to share a goddamn room with him, but him trying to get inside my head is just too far.
There’s a small thump from above, causing me to jump and snap my gaze up. After a moment of silence, the dragging sound continues.
Aside from the prisoner above us, there’s an eerie silence pressing in around us. Glancing around nervously, I note how dark this hallway is, with no source to allow the early morning sunlight to pierce through.
Just a dark hallway with an imprisoned spirit pacing above.
“Hello?” Enzo calls again, this time a tad louder. And this time, the footfalls do stop.
Holding my breath, an ominous silence descends. So quiet, it makes my ears ring while an impenetrable cold closes in around me. There’s no noise from Sylvester below, even. For the first time, it seems like we’re completely alone on this island, save for the souls who haunt it.
I’m not entirely sure I like it.
Heart racing, I attempt to force my shoulders back down again with the spirit now gone. Until something bangs against the ceiling loudly, causing a startled yelp to rip from my throat.
Enzo stands firm and silent as another loud bang ripples across the wood. I, on the other hand, am nearly shitting my pants. It feels as if my ribs are cracking from how hard my heart thrashes against it.
It sounds like someone is stomping or slamming their fist into the floor above us. Hard enough that I can feel it tremble the ground beneath my feet.
“Enzo,” I breathe, my chest tight and a dangerous cocktail of terror and adrenaline mixing in my bloodstream.
“Let’s go outside,” he says quietly, but the end of his sentence is cut off by another booming thud.
There is one last pause, and then two limbs are pounding against the ceiling in quick succession, growing louder and more frantic.
The panic becomes too sharp, and I’m screaming and bolting toward the spiral steps, sightless in my desperation to get away. I lose my footing and pitch forward. Another scream is torn from my throat as I go down face-first.
Suddenly, Enzo’s hand is gripping my arm a moment later, hauling me up before my nose can connect with the metal stairs.
“Fucking hell, Sawyer,” he growls, nearly dragging me the rest of the way down and out of the lighthouse.
The burst of sunlight is startling and blinding as he nearly drags me down the steps and onto the beach. I cover my face, reeling from the last twenty seconds that for sure removed twenty years off my life.
“What’s goin’ on?” Sylvester shouts from a little way down the shoreline, but my nerves are too fried, and I hardly hear him at all.
“Something was pounding against the ceiling,” Enzo answers, his tone hard as Sylvester approaches, struggling as his peg sinks in the sand.
Knees weak, I crouch down and drop my head low, sucking in a deep breath and working on getting my pounding heart under control.
“I… heart attack,” I gasp.
“You’re not having a heart attack,” Enzo responds dryly.
“Dying,” I wheeze. “Need the water police. Call 911.”
I’m only met with silence, but I would hardly be able to hear them past the thumping in my ears anyway.
Then, “Did she just say water police?”
“Ignore her,” Enzo grumbles. “911 isn’t even the right number to call.”
“Well, did she hit ’er head or somethin’?”
Enzo sighs. “I wish I could say yes. But that’s just Sawyer.”
