Delirium (Captive Love: Forced Proximity Standalones #4)

Chapter 18

Chapter

Eighteen

SCARLETT

I couldn’t tell if it was excitement or nerves that made my hands shake while I changed out of my casual clothes and into an outfit more suitable for trekking through the rainforest. I wasn’t sure I wanted to know the answer.

I’d wanted an adventure, didn’t I? I’d wanted something that gave my life a bit of excitement. Made me feel alive. Finding a city most of the locals whispered about, chalking up to an urban legend was exciting. Right?

Now I just needed my gut feeling to agree.

I was being ridiculous. There was nothing to be afraid of. We’d trekked through the rainforest the day before and nothing bad had happened. No poisonous spiders attacked us, no jaguars either. Except for James blabbing Nash’s secret and storming off, but I wasn’t sure that could really be counted as bad. Nothing the rainforest did was bad. I shook my head, grabbing my hiking boots and stuffing my feet into them with more courage than I felt.

It was all fine, wasn’t it? A little excitement. I just wasn’t used to excitement. Or was it fear?

Maybe the city was a legend for a reason…

I stormed to the small wardrobe in my room, and staring at my face in the mirror that hung inside. “You’re being ridiculous. Get over yourself. Let yourself go for once. What’s the worst that could happen?”

Jaguars, spiders, poisonous plants. Venomous frogs and toads. All sorts of things were waiting to kill me in the rainforest—Nash had told me so, explicitly.

The bell rang again from the wheelhouse, Nash’s way of politely telling us to “hurry the fuck up.” I pulled on my paper-thin athletic top, glared at my reflection, and slammed the wardrobe door shut. Ready, if not mentally, I stepped out my door and almost collided head on with James.

“Shit, I’m sorry.” With the exception of the moment in the hallway, this was probably the closest we’d ever been. My hands pressed to his chest as I teetered, trying to find my balance.

James wrapped his hands around my upper arms, steadying me. “It’s okay. I should’ve been looking where I was going, too. I guess my head is just all…”

His gaze drifted to the riverbank, where the stone demanded our attention, even though the walls and water that separated us. He felt it, too. The uncertainty.

But bringing it up made it real. I didn’t think I wanted to make it real. Not yet.

Besides, his chest muscles tensing beneath my hands was real enough.

He peered down at me, neither of us making a move to leave. I shouldn’t be having this moment with him, not before I’d ever spoken to Nash, who was probably spiraling into an existential crisis the longer I left it.

But something about being in James’ arms just felt right . Plain and simple. I could probably write an entire thesis on exactly how right it felt. He’d never read it, but maybe it’d help to get the words off my chest, set them free into a world that might reject them as soon as they left my lips.

James opened his mouth, closed his eyes, and stepped away. “We should go. Nash wants to get a move on before we lose too much light.”

I rubbed my arms, weirdly cold where his hands no longer sat. Unfortunately, that also went into the category of things I couldn’t tell him. Add it to the never-ending list.

I tried cracking a smile, but even that felt false. “If he rings that bell one more time I might knock him out with it.”

I couldn’t make out James’ response, but I was pretty sure I caught something along the lines of “He’d probably like it.”

I didn’t disagree.

We walked to the front of the boat, where Nash had already lowered the gangplank. I wished there was a simple answer for my feelings about James, something as easy as he was hot. He was pretty. He had a good soul. He was good . Wouldn’t that be the simplest answer of them all?

Yes, he was pretty. Yes, he was rich. Yes, he was all these things, but he was also a massive asshole who couldn’t confront his feelings if they hit him over the head with a dinner bell. Was that something I really wanted to get involved with?

Did I even have the choice?

Right now it felt like I was just along for the ride, caught up in the current of my own life. It was a deeply unsettling feeling for someone who’d had control over their life for the most part.

I looked over at James, staring at him beneath my lashes, trying to find some kind of redeeming quality about him, something that explained exactly why I felt the way I did about him.

My conversation with Camp hadn’t helped me at all, and while he seemed more than fine with Nash—who I also still needed to talk with—he was less interested in James. I couldn’t say I blamed him.

Nash turned to me, offering his hand with a quiet smile, making me realize even he was subdued. I waited for someone to open their mouth, to scream that we shouldn’t be doing this, how something felt wrong. I waited for someone to vocalize all the words spinning around in my head. Nobody did.

I could. I could put my foot down. I could put into words the feelings we all had, the reason the sweat was creeping down my back, the reason I had goosebumps, even in this sweltering heat.

I could. But I wouldn’t. Because we all knew. We had to do this. We’d come this far.

So when Nash offered his hand again, murmuring, “Ladies first,” I took it.

Hyper-aware of his movements, I didn’t need to look back to know that James was next down the gangplank, following me closely.

Once we all stood on the muddy riverbank, boots slowly descending into the cloudy water, Camp broke the silence. “So, like, if I’m the first to step foot inside this city or whatever, does that mean I get to name it after myself?”

It was such an absurd thought I couldn’t stop from laughing. “Camp, babe, I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work like that.”

He winked at me, barely smiling, but I knew it was there all the same. “Worth a shot.”

“It’s not how it works at all,” James grumbled. “Besides, even if it did, it would be my company that got to name the city, seeing as you are all just along for the ride.”

I rolled my eyes without even thinking. “Maybe we should just all stay on the boat then, if we’re that insignificant.”

James stopped walking, turning around to glare at me. “Don’t twist my words. I never said you were insignificant. Despite whatever you all might think about me, I know how much discoveries mean to all of you, and I thought you might want to bear witness to such a momentous occasion, no?”

Again, I couldn’t disagree. Despite the discomfort rolling in my core, I was already thinking about all the possibilities the city could hold. Would there still be bits of civilization left we could examine, or would it just all be rubble, barely visible in the mud of the rainforest, nearly entirely dissolved by time?

“Thanks for thinking of us,” I muttered, gripping my backpack a bit tighter.

Nash led the group further down the path, twisted and tangled with vines higher up, tapering down to nothing but mud on the ground. Even there, life sprung, desperately defying everything that said it shouldn’t be there.

James followed Nash, Camp followed James, and I trailed along behind, torn between wanting to take everything in, and not wanting to proceed. I knew the science behind the behaviors, sure. I knew it was nothing more than me getting in my own head, letting the whole idea of a “forbidden city” taint my thoughts. And yet, I would’ve put money on the fact it was steadily growing darker the further we walked in.

That’s just the rainforest getting denser.

But was it?

I would’ve happily bet that the temperature had fallen since we had left the boat—although my sweating said otherwise.

What would you expect? Less sunlight means it’ll be cooler.

As much as I wanted to believe my rational brain, the irrational part of me was standing its ground, too.

Deeper we walked, so much so that I lost track of time. Not that it mattered. Time felt like a made-up construct this far into the wilderness.

Well, technically it always was “made up,” but by societal standards, I couldn’t begin to explain to someone how an hour felt like five minutes, but the same five minutes could feel like ten years. I was so lost in my thoughts, I didn’t realize our line had shaken up. When a hand waved in front of my face, I startled, nearly falling backward into the mud. “What the hell?”

James stood in front of me, a nearly blank expression on his face. “I wanted to apologize for what I said earlier. I didn’t mean to insult you.” His gaze drifted to the side, looking for something other than me.

I stared at him ready to snap back until I really studied him. For the first time, I noticed how flushed his cheeks were, and the way his white shirt clung to his body, completely soaked. While his wardrobe had never been adventure-appropriate, I hadn’t seen him look this uncomfortable the entire time. “James, do you feel okay?”

His eyes narrowed. “Of course I do. I feel fine. Why?”

My arm stretched out of its own volition, ready to feel his forehead with my hand, and then I dropped it. What was I even thinking? One apology and I thought I could touch him?

“You just look a little hot, that’s all.”

James pushed back his blond hair with a huff. “Of course I look hot. It’s the fucking rainforest. I just came to apologize, but if you don’t want to hear it, you could just tell me that instead of changing the subject.”

He turned, ready to stalk off. This time, it was me who grabbed James’ wrist. “Wait. I accept your apology. I just wanted to make sure you felt okay. Rainy season means there’s all sorts of diseases out there. That’s all.”

The pinched expression on James’ face fell immediately. “Fuck. I’m sorry. I don’t know what the hell is wrong with me.”

“Besides just your natural state of being a jerk?” I smiled, trying to soften the blow.

James laughed, a quiet sound. “I know I’m not the nicest person around, okay? It’s not some huge shock to me. But I don’t know what it is about this fucking boat, or the people on it, that has me so goddamn worked up.”

I shrugged, stepping forward. James followed suit. “Close proximities would have anyone worked up. Why do you think sailors on submarines develop cabin fever? We weren’t meant to only see one thing, talk to one person, eat one thing for our entire lives. We need to see changes in our environment, or we slowly lose our minds.”

“Sometimes you’re too fucking logical for your own good,” James grumbled. “What’s wrong with me being a jerk to you, and you getting mad about it, and then we both move on with our mutual hatred?”

“Because you don’t hate me,” I said. “Besides, I’ve come to learn that we live a lot of our lives in the grey area. It’s easier to see things in black and white, but most of life exists in between the extremes, in the fringes of what the textbooks say.”

I could feel James looking at me as we walked. I flushed under his examination. Thankfully, he wouldn’t be able to notice my blush with the heat already.

“How are you real?” James’ voice was hushed, little more than a whisper. I was certain I wasn’t meant to hear those words.

Playing the back and forth game with James was hard, and never knowing where I stood was harder, but I couldn’t deny the thump of my heart from his secret words, or the way goosebumps spread across my skin from knowing he thought that way about me.

I shook my head, needing to change the subject before my skin shrank two sizes too small. “How much farther do you think Nash is going to make us walk?”

James sighed. “I hope not much, but who knows. Clancy, my business partner who is running the site, gave me very few details to go off of, in case they fell into the wrong hands. Which means I’m relying on Nash at this point. He seems to always know where he’s going, or at least he figures it out in the end. But I can’t imagine it’s too much farther, not with all the supplies they would’ve had to bring in.”

“Weren’t you ever nervous about the supposed curse?” I waggled my fingers in a poor impression of a cartoon villain.

He laughed. “I think in order to be afraid of a curse, you’d have to believe in them first. All we’re going to find is an abandoned city, a crew of men who enjoy wasting half my money, and my business partner who apparently is trying to run away with the other half.”

The rainforest had grown thicker while we talked. I brushed aside a thicket of vines to catch up to Nash and Camp. When we both stepped through, we found them standing, unmoving.

I had forgotten my nerves while I spoke to James, but seeing the two of them, still as statues, my heart sunk. “Nash? Camp?”

Nash turned around to face me, his usually tanned face quite pale. “Well, I think we found the city.”

I cautiously took a step forward. “Okay, that’s a good thing, isn’t it? Why does your face look like you’ve seen a ghost?”

James pushed past me, rushing past Nash and Camp. “Clancy?” he called. “Clancy, you better get your sorry ass out here this instant.”

Nash only shook his head and waved me forward.

My feet moved without my control, because my brain was gone, lost in a deep train of thought I wasn’t sure I could ever dig myself out of. I moved past Nash, pushing through leaves, until I saw the city, in all its glory, nearly entirely preserved just as it would’ve been a hundred years ago.

Completely and utterly devoid of people.