Chapter 6 #2
Something softened in her expression—surprise, maybe, or tenderness. Whatever it was made his chest feel too tight.
"Your secret's safe with me, Dr. Carmichael."
"Alex."
"What?"
"You can call me Alex. I think we're past the formalities."
She smiled, and Alex felt warmth spread through his chest despite himself. "Okay. Alex."
They stayed at the nest site for another twenty minutes while Alex took measurements and made notes in a battered journal.
Lily watched, asking occasional questions, genuinely curious about the process.
He found himself enjoying her attention more than he wanted to admit—the way she leaned in to see what he was writing, the thoughtful pause before each question.
Who even are you becoming, Carmichael?
"There's something else I want to show you," Alex said, tucking the journal back into his bag. "If you're up for more walking."
"Lead the way."
The hidden lagoon was Alex's secret.
He'd discovered it during his first week on the island, stumbling across it while mapping the interior terrain.
A geological quirk—some ancient volcanic activity combined with centuries of erosion—had created a perfect swimming hole, sheltered from the ocean but fed by underground springs that kept the water crystal clear.
He'd never planned to share it with anyone.
And yet here he was, watching Lily's face as she emerged from the final stretch of jungle and saw it for the first time.
"Oh my god." Her voice was barely a whisper. "Alex, this is..."
"I know."
The lagoon was roughly the size of a large swimming pool, ringed by dark volcanic rock softened by ferns and flowering vines.
The water was an impossible shade of turquoise, so clear you could see straight to the sandy bottom.
Sunlight filtered through the canopy overhead, casting dappled patterns across the surface.
It looked like something from a fantasy movie. Like a place that shouldn't exist in the real world.
"You've been hiding this?" Lily turned to him, half-accusatory, half-awed. "This whole time, this has been here, and you didn't mention it?"
"I wasn't hiding it. I just..." He shrugged, suddenly uncomfortable. "It felt private."
Her expression softened. "So why show me now?"
Because I wanted to see your face when you saw it. Because I'm apparently a complete idiot. Because I can't seem to stop finding excuses to spend time with you.
"We needed a lunch spot," he said instead. "This seemed as good as any."
Lily saw right through him—he could tell by the slight curve of her smile—but she didn't push. "Well, I hope 'lunch' includes swimming, because there's no way I'm looking at that water and not getting in."
Before he could respond, she was already stripping off her tank top to reveal the bikini underneath—pink again, because of course it was—and picking her way across the rocks toward the water's edge.
"Coming?" she called over her shoulder.
Alex watched her dive in, surfacing with a gasp and a laugh that echoed off the rocks. Her hair slicked back from her face, droplets catching the light like tiny diamonds.
You're in trouble, his brain reminded him.
He was already pulling off his shirt.
The water was perfect—cool enough to be refreshing, warm enough to be comfortable. Alex swam lazy laps, trying to focus on the sensation of water against his skin instead of the woman floating on her back a few feet away.
But his eyes kept drifting to her anyway. The way her wild curls fanned out around her head like a halo. The peaceful expression on her face as she stared up at the canopy. The curve of her neck, the swell of her chest, the—
Stop it.
"Can I ask you something else?" Lily said when he paused near her.
"You're going to anyway."
"True." She righted herself, treading water. "What's the loneliest you've ever been? On one of these research trips?"
The question clearly caught him off guard. He was quiet for a long moment, considering.
"There was a trip to Antarctica," he said finally.
"Three months at a research station studying penguin colonies.
The team was small—just three of us—and the others were paired off.
Couple of climatologists who'd been married for twenty years.
" He smiled slightly at the memory. "I spent a lot of nights alone, watching the aurora and wondering why I'd built my whole life around avoiding exactly the kind of connection they had. "
"Did you figure it out?"
"I decided it was easier to study species that didn't make me question my life choices." His eyes met hers. "Your turn. What are you most afraid of people knowing about you?"
He watched her hesitate, her feet drifting toward the sandy bottom. The pause told him the question had landed somewhere real.
"That I'm not actually happy," she said, her voice quieter than he'd ever heard it. "That the whole brand—sunny Lily, positive vibes only, living her best life—it's mostly performance. I smile for the camera, and then I spend my nights alone in hotel rooms wondering if any of it means anything."
The admission hung in the air between them, raw and unexpected. Alex felt something shift in his chest—recognition, maybe. Understanding.
Lily's expression flickered with something that looked like panic. "God, I can't believe I just told you that. I never tell anyone that. My therapist doesn't even know that, and I pay her two hundred dollars an hour."
"Maybe that's the problem."
"What do you mean?"
"Paying someone to listen isn't the same as trusting someone enough to hear you."
She stared at him, and Alex had the uncomfortable sensation of being seen just as clearly as he'd seen her. "When did you get so wise?"
"I'm not wise. I'm just good at stating the obvious in ways that sound profound." The corner of his mouth twitched. "Marine biologist trick."
She splashed him, and he splashed her back, and suddenly they were both laughing, the heaviness of the moment dissolving into something lighter.
When the splashing subsided, they were closer than before—close enough that Alex could see the individual droplets clinging to her lashes, the gold flecks in her green eyes that he'd never noticed before.
"This doesn't feel like killing time anymore," she said softly.
"No." His voice was rougher than usual. "It doesn't."
The air between them felt charged, electric with possibility. Alex was acutely aware of every point where their bodies nearly touched beneath the water—her leg brushing his, his hand hovering inches from her hip.
Kiss her, some part of his brain demanded. Just lean in and—
For once in his life, Alex stopped thinking.
His hand found the curve of her waist beneath the water, pulling her toward him as his mouth captured hers. Lily made a small sound of surprise that melted instantly into something hungrier, her arms winding around his neck as she pressed against him.
The kiss was nothing like he'd imagined—and he had imagined it, despite his best efforts not to. It wasn't tentative or questioning. It was fire. Pure, unleashed heat that burned through every logical objection he'd constructed over the past week.
Her lips parted beneath his, and Alex deepened the kiss, one hand sliding up her spine while the other tangled in her wet curls. She tasted like the fresh spring water and something sweeter underneath—something that was purely, intoxicatingly Lily.
"Alex," she breathed against his mouth, and the sound of his name in her voice—wrecked, wanting—sent a jolt of desire straight through him.
He walked them backward until her shoulders met the smooth volcanic rock at the lagoon's edge, his body pressing hers against it. The water lapped at their chests as Lily wrapped her legs around his waist, pulling him closer, and Alex groaned at the friction.
"God, you're—" He kissed down her jaw, her neck, the hollow of her throat. "I've been trying so hard not to do this."
"I noticed." Her head fell back against the rock, giving him better access. "You're really bad at it."
"Clearly." He nipped at her collarbone, and she gasped. "Terrible self-control."
"The worst." Her fingers raked through his hair, pulling him back up to her mouth. "Don't stop."
He had no intention of stopping. His hands explored the curves he'd been studiously ignoring for days—the dip of her waist, the flare of her hips, the smooth expanse of her back. When his fingers found the tie of her bikini top, he paused, a question in his eyes.
Lily answered by reaching back and tugging the knot loose herself.
The fabric floated away, and Alex's brain short-circuited entirely.
"You're so fucking beautiful," he managed, his voice raw.
"Less talking," she murmured against his lips. "More of whatever you were just doing."
He was happy to comply.
His mouth traced a path down her neck to her chest, and Lily arched into him when his lips found her breast. She moaned—a real, unguarded sound that echoed off the lagoon walls—and Alex felt something primal surge through him.
He wanted to hear that sound again. Wanted to be the cause of it, over and over.
Thunder rumbled in the distance, but neither of them paid attention.
His hand slid down her stomach, fingers teasing along the waistband of her bikini bottoms. Lily's hips rolled against him, seeking friction, and Alex was so hard it was actually painful.
“Yesss,” she whispered, and the word nearly undid him.
A crack of lightning split the sky, followed immediately by a boom of thunder so loud it vibrated through the water and Lily yelped, clinging to him like a spider monkey.
They both froze.
"That was close," Lily said, her voice breathless but tinged with something else now.
Alex looked up. Through the canopy, the sky had transformed from tropical blue to an ominous gray-green. The dark clouds he'd noted earlier had arrived faster than expected, and the first fat drops of rain were already beginning to fall.