Stranded With The Navy Seal

Her gaze met his. His features were rough-hewn in the harsh daylight. There was a big lump on his temple, and dried blood clumped to his eyebrow.

“Are you hurt?” he asked.

She didn’t think she was, but she felt numb. She slowly took stock of her condition. Her mouth was still sore from the gag. She rubbed her wrists, which bore rope burns. Other than those minor discomforts, she was fine. “I’m okay.”

“Did you understand what they were saying?”

Cady spoke a smattering of French. She hadn’t caught every word. “They thought I was someone else.”

“Maya O’Brien.”

“The president’s daughter?”

“I was supposed to be guarding her.”

Now it made sense. The kidnappers had made a mistake. They weren’t targeting her. Cadence Crenshaw was nobody. Maya O’Brien was America’s daughter, rich and famous. “Were they terrorists?”

“I don’t know,” he said, frowning. “French Polynesia isn’t a hot spot for terrorism. Their motivations might have been financial.”

“When will they start looking for us?”

“The kidnappers?”

“The rescuers.”

He studied the clear blue sky above them. “Today, with any luck. They’ll know something is wrong when you don’t show up to work. Employees will see the signs of a struggle in the cabin next to mine. Then they’ll launch a search party with air support.”

“Do you think they’ll find us?”

“Yes.”

She hoped he was telling the truth. His expression revealed nothing, and she didn’t know him well enough to judge. Maybe he was honest to a fault. Maybe he was a strategic liar. Maybe that head injury had rattled his brain. He’d already said that the raft would be difficult to spot on the open sea.

“I thought you were dead,” she said in a hushed voice. She still couldn’t quite believe he was real.

“Nah,” he said. “I don’t die that easy.” His smile was wan, belying the boast.

“What did you do?”

“I swam.”

She gaped at him in wonder. Her head had been covered during the kidnapping, so she’d been disoriented. She’d assumed the men had pulled him out of the water for some reason, or he’d grabbed a tow rope. “You swam from the cruise ship?”

He nodded.

“How?”

“It wasn’t that far.”

Her next question was more important. “Why?”

“Why what?”

“Why did you risk your life like that? You hardly know me.”

His gaze darkened. “I know you well enough,” he said, squinting at the horizon. “Even if I didn’t, I’d have done the same thing. There was nothing else to do. Staying near the cruise ship wasn’t an option. My chances of getting rescued there were very low.”

She studied his battered face, trying to gauge his sincerity. He might have had no other choice, but he was also downplaying an incredible act of heroism. He’d swum after a motorized raft and overpowered two men—after sustaining a concussion. It was an amazing feat, almost superhuman. Most people couldn’t save themselves, let alone others. They froze in the face of danger. Cady had experienced this phenomenon firsthand as a child. She’d watched her grandfather die and been paralyzed, unable to help him.

It was the most traumatic moment of her life. Until now.

Logan removed his cell phone from his pocket. He took it apart, piece by piece, and set the components out to dry. It didn’t take long; the sun was brutal. Light reflected off the ocean, magnifying the effect. Within an hour, everything was bone dry, including her throat.

He had no service, of course. He couldn’t even send a text. He turned off the phone and tucked it away. “I’ll try again later.”

Cady stayed quiet. She doubted they’d drift into a better service area anytime soon. They were several days’ travel from Tahiti by cruise ship. She didn’t know of any other islands between here and there. She closed her eyes, swallowing hard. Maybe they’d arrive on the shore of a private resort and sip fruity cocktails at noon.

She mixed a fantasy drink with her favorite ingredients. Crushed ice. Fresh fruit. Something really bougie, like a strawberry-basil bourbon spritzer.

Logan emptied his pockets to study the contents. In addition to his cell phone, he had a wallet with cash and credit cards. She had nothing but the dress on her back. Her purse had been lost in the melee. Her shoes had fallen off. So had his.

His next project was hot-wiring the engine. He used his knife to disable the ignition and open the casing. He spent the better part of the morning with his head down, cursing. It reminded her of her father doing auto repairs. He flinched when one of the live wires singed his fingertips. After some trial and error, he twisted two wires together and the engine turned over. He flashed her a victorious grin. Then he disconnected it, killing the motor.

Her spirits fell. “We’re not going anywhere?”

“I have to save fuel,” he said. “We can’t travel far on a gas tank this size.”

“Why did you hot-wire it?”

“Because being able to move a short distance will help us get rescued. If we see a ship in the distance, we can approach it. If a plane goes by, I can fire it up and do some circles to get their attention.”

She searched the horizon for signs of an airplane or a ship, with no luck. The glare of sunlight on the water burned her corneas, and constantly scanning the area exhausted her eye muscles. When she couldn’t continue, he took over. She curled up in a ball, her stomach roiling. She wondered how long it took to die from thirst. She didn’t ask Logan, because she was afraid the answer might be one day.

The afternoon sun was brutal. He removed his shirt and dipped it in the water. Then he wrapped the wet cloth around his head, turban-style. The hunting knife he’d taken from one of the kidnappers was tucked into his belt. He looked like a storybook pirate, with perfectly defined abs and a tantalizing strip of hair below his navel.

She remembered how his body had felt against hers on the dance floor, and how eager she’d been to touch him. Their brief, lust-drenched interlude didn’t seem real. She’d never experienced such a powerful rush of attraction before. Who meets someone at a bar and wants to tear their clothes off after ten minutes? In what alternate dimension do two mature, sober people fall into a sexual trance and make out in public? She might have been embarrassed if she wasn’t so worried about dying.

“You need protection from the sun,” he said, drawing his knife. He motioned for her to move closer.

“What are you doing?”

“Cutting off this extra fabric.”

She held still while he sliced through her tulle overskirt. The serrated blade was sharp, with a wicked point at the tip. She tried not to think about where else it had been. She couldn’t afford to throw up again.

When he was finished, she used the fabric like a veil, covering her head and shoulders. It was blisteringly hot. Her lips were dry. His were already cracked.

They didn’t speak, because it hurt to talk.