my favorites.”
“But if you allowed those dreams…didn’t you open yourself up for the bad ones?”
He sighed. “Yes, but it was worth it.”
I sighed, too, remembering how I relished the memory-dreams, even the bad parts. “I know what you mean.”
His eyes changed quickly, from dark to sparkly, and he smiled. “But now I get to wake up to you by my side every morning.”
“Yeah…to all the beauty of my ratty hair and morning breath.”
He chuckled. “I love it.”
“I know you do. For now, anyway. After a hundred years or so, I’m sure you’ll get tired of it.”
His brows furrowed, as if he thought hard about this possibility, then he smiled again. “Nope. Don’t think so.”
He pulled me close to him and we lay in each other’s arms again until I finally had to get up for the bathroom. My body burned and I assumed it was healing itself. My skin looked purplish-green with partially healed bruises covering almost every inch. When I came out, Tristan just stood in the middle of the room with the white sheet wrapped around his waist, looking around with an amused expression. His torso also appeared to be purple and green.
And our room…the poor Caribbean room. The white chaise lounge in the sitting area lay on its side, broken in two, cotton and spring intestines pushing through the torn upholstery, and its purple throw-pillow now just a pile of feathers. Splintered pieces of the wooden table lay strewn across the floor. The window treatments over the sliding glass doors barely hung from one corner, the jewel-colored fabric torn in several places. The bed stood as it should, but pillow-top stuffing exploded from the shredded mattress. Pieces of the headboard rested on the bed and surrounded the remains of a turquoise pillow. The walls looked like they’d been tattered by shrapnel and chunks of drywall littered the carpet. The dresser seemed to be the only piece to survive, although the mirror hanging over it now looked to be a puzzle of jagged pieces.
“I think Hurricane Alexis hit our Caribbean island.” Tristan wrapped his arms around me and kissed the top of my head. “Did you have fun?”
I smiled. “Despite the results, yes. Last night was unbelievable.”
He chuckled. “I agree.”
“But it could have been Hurricane Tristan.”
“Nope, first of the season. It has to be Alexis.”
I tilted my head to look up at him. “So tonight will be Tristan?”
He grinned. “Can you handle it? Because it’ll be a category five.”
I laughed. “You already blew me away last night. I don’t know how much worse—or better—it can get.”
“Ah. I love a challenge.”
We showered together, too sore to do anything but shower. He sat outside with a cup of coffee by the time I dressed in one of the sundresses. Owen knocked on the front door as I came out of the bedroom. He followed me through the kitchen and family room as we headed for the balcony. I yanked the bedroom door shut, but not before Owen caught a glimpse of the mess. He pulled me to the side and his eyes fell on the last of the bruises on my arms when I cringed from his grip.
“Are you sure you’re okay with him?” he whispered, as if Tristan couldn’t hear him anyway.
I rolled my eyes. “I’m fine.”
“Alexis, I saw your room. And the bruises. Did he do that to you?” His eyes showed genuine concern.
“Don’t worry about it.”
“It’s my job to worry about it. What happened? Did you two get in a fight?”
“No. It’s really none of your business.” Please don’t push it, Owen. But he did.
“I’m supposed to protect you. If he’s hurting you…”
“Geez, Owen, if you really have to know, we were just…making up for lost time.”
I gave him a significant look. The bewildered expression on his face told me he still didn’t get it. I groaned with frustration.
“We went balls to the wall fucking the hell out of each other! Got it now?!” I clapped my hand over my mouth. Oh! Did I really just say that?
“Oh,” Owen said flatly. Then realization finally overcame him. “Oh!”
I heard something about Hurricane Alexis muttered from the balcony. I threw Tristan a look through the glass doors. He shook with laughter. Owen looked at Tristan, then at me and then at the bedroom door. He shook his head slowly.
“I need to get a motorcycle,” he muttered.
I didn’t know if I’d ever heard Tristan laugh so hard.
Chapter 13
As soon as we all sat out on the balcony, the guys hounded me about what I could do, briefly taking me back to my old school days when kids called me a freak for healing in front of their eyes. But, of course, to Tristan and Owen, what made me freaky was my lack of powers. In addition to what I could always do, I could only think of the heightened senses.
“So can you see that boat way out on the water?” Owen asked.
The only boat in our view appeared to be a small fishing vessel about a half-mile away.
“The one with the white hull and blue stripe?” I asked.
“Nice.” He sounded impressed.
So something had changed over the last few days—not even two nights ago could I see so far.
“Can you read the name or the numbers?” Tristan asked.
“No. I can see that they’re there, but I can’t distinguish them,” I answered. “Can you?”
“It’s called the ‘Trojan Horse,’” he said.
“It’s kind of an odd name for a boat,” I said.
“Makes you wonder why they’d name it that.”
“Maybe it’s not really a fishing boat,” Owen said and then he quickly grew excited. “They must be hiding something bad. Maybe they’re pirates. Or maybe there’s a bunch of Cubans or Haitians in there, escaping to the States. Or maybe they’re drug traffickers. There you go…that’s it. Tristan, you wanna have some fun with a drug bust?”
Owen was obviously joking, but Tristan shook his head and answered anyway. “I just got back from hell. I’m not really in the mood to deal with automatic weapons and lunatic drug dealers.”
“Well, I can hear a guy talking, and his words don’t make any sense, but I’m pretty sure he’s talking about fishing anyway,” I said.
They both stared at me, their eyes wide and their mouths slightly open, apparently forgetting Owen’s theories.
“You can’t hear him?” I asked. Owen shook his head.
“I can hear him moving around,” Tristan said, “but not any words.”
“Huh.” My brows furrowed as I tilted my head. “I don’t know who he’s talking to. I can’t hear anyone else. And he keeps interrupting himself with incoherent and irrelevant words.”
It wasn’t just what he said that seemed strange. The quality of his voice sounded odd. His words kind of echoed or reverberated, as if spoken through a wrapping-paper tube.
Tristan peered out at the boat.
“I only see one guy. I think he’s alone.” He paused, looking at me, then back at the fisherman and back at me. “I wonder… It’s a unique gift, but just maybe…”
“What?” I asked with trepidation, not liking his tone or the look in his eye.
“You might be hearing his thoughts.”
