Chapter 12
JASMINE
By the fifth morning, I’d almost gotten used to Kai being in my space.
The thump of fishing boots by the door, the scent of salt and sunscreen clinging to his clothes, the deep rumble of his voice drifting down the hall when he answered an early call from a charter guest. Things that should’ve felt intrusive in a one-bedroom bungalow suddenly felt like guardrails, keeping me upright.
It was strange, living side by side with Kai Rodman. Like playing house with someone I barely knew. Only this wasn’t some silly game. We hadn’t chosen it, hadn’t asked for it. We’d been shoved into this arrangement at gunpoint.
Still…there was something about it I didn’t mind.
The orgasms, for one. Kai had made good on his promise to try to get me to a hundred, and we made headway daily, often in the middle of the night after I woke up with another nightmare.
The sex was a release for us both, I could tell. But it was also a connection.
I sat at the small kitchen table with my mug of coffee, contemplating the very rough attempt at a turtle in my sketchbook.
Really, I was listening for the sound of Kai moving around—the steady rhythm of his presence anchoring the feeling of home.
After nights of waking up tangled in nightmares, that rhythm was my comfort.
My body was finally starting to unclench.
The first few days, every slam of a car door outside had jolted me upright, pulse spiking, convinced they were back.
My hands had trembled so badly I’d spilled coffee down the counter twice.
But now… my breath didn’t catch at every noise.
My chest didn’t feel like it was locked in a vice.
I’d even managed to eat a full breakfast yesterday without it turning my stomach.
Maybe my nervous system was finally coming down from the high alert it had been running on, like having Kai near was convincing me I was safe. I was more comfortable, more relaxed. But the undercurrent of fear remained. They said they’d be back.
When Kai finally came out of the bedroom, tanned and tousled from the shower, he looked so at ease it stole my breath.
The sunlight caught in his damp hair, made it glint like streaks of copper, and for half a second I let myself imagine this was normal—him walking in like he belonged here, like this was ours.
The warmth of that thought startled me. Dangerous, to want normal when nothing about this was.
He bent over to kiss my forehead. “Good morning, beautiful.”
“Good morning,” I grinned up. I could see him fidgeting like he was itching to get out the door.
We’d avoided the topic, but I had a sudden strong urge to ask him what was on my mind the minute I woke up.
Before I could stop myself, the words tumbled out.
“The bad guys said they’d give us three days. Today makes five.”
His head snapped up, and I saw a brief flicker of something dark before he snuffed it out with a smile.
“Yeah. I know.”
I searched his face, looking for reassurance. What I got was a half-smile that didn’t reach his eyes. “Who knows? Maybe they forgot about us.”
Forgot. As if men like that ever forgot. But I wanted to believe him. Needed to.
I studied him while he crossed the kitchen, grabbing his cap from the counter. His movements were casual, but his shoulders carried a tightness I’d started to recognize. He was trying to look relaxed for my sake, but it was an act.
“You don’t really think they forgot,” I said softly.
His smile ticked up, but the humor was thin. “Well in this case no news feels like good news. I’ll take what I can get.”
I wanted to push, but the words stuck. It was easier to let him keep pretending.
He must have sensed my hesitation, because his voice gentled. “Don’t worry, babe. We’re working on it. Spence too. We’ll come up with something soon.”
Wondering if he believed what he said, my grip tightened around the mug. “You told Spence?”
“Yeah. Long story, but I kinda had to. He won’t say anything to Waylan or Coulter. You’ve got my word on that. But he knows what’s at stake, and he wants to help.” His voice was steady, like he was laying a brick wall between me and the fear.
As much as telling others terrified me, some of the pressure in my chest eased. I hadn’t realized how much I needed to hear that he wasn’t carrying this alone—that I wasn’t carrying it alone.
“You act like you live here now,” I teased, nodding toward his boots and dry bag by the door.
He smirked, more genuine this time. “Guess I do. You complaining?”
I shook my head. “Not yet.”
“Good,” he said simply, but the way his gaze lingered on me made my stomach flip.
We fell into an easy silence, the kind that was becoming more common between us.
The kind that felt deeper than it should, given we were barely past introductions when all this started.
Trauma had shoved us into intimacy faster than ordinary life ever would’ve, and now it felt impossible to imagine my little house, or my life, without him.
I wrapped my hands tighter around the warm ceramic of my mug and breathed in deep.
My nerves had finally settled enough that the idea of painting didn’t feel impossible anymore.
The urge was back—sharp, insistent—the need to put brush to canvas, to lose myself in color and shape instead of fear. Maybe today, I’d try.
Kai’s keys jingled. He grabbed his wallet from the counter and slung his cap back on his head. “I’ve gotta run. Charter leaves in an hour and I gotta stop to grab lunch on the way.”
“Okay,” I said, wishing I could keep him anchored here. The bungalow felt safer with him in it.
He paused in the doorway, like he’d read my thought. “I’ll be back as fast I can,” he said, shifting a glance at my sketchbook. “Good luck on the turtle.” His smile was small, but real this time.
“I’ll do my best. They’re complicated creatures,” I called after him, surprising myself with the lightness in my voice.
He looked over his shoulder, eyes crinkling. “The best kind.”
Ha. He was a complicated creature. I never knew what he was really thinking.
One thing I did know was that when he was gone, I felt emptier without him. I sat staring at the sketch, my pencil hovering, tip trembling. I took a deep breath and let the faint lines take shape.
The turtle wasn’t much at first, but the details brought it to life. While I sketched the contours of its flippers, my phone dinged. Kai checking in made me smile, even if his reminder to keep the doors locked was unnerving.
I swallowed down the uneasy feeling and turned back to the turtle.
Soon the pencil and sketch pad weren’t enough.
I pulled out my paints, unscrewing jars that had sat untouched for days, the faint chemical tang filling the air.
My brushes felt strange at first, stiff from disuse, but the moment color hit canvas, something in me cracked open.
Cobalt for the strip of sky above the horizon.
Cerulean blue for the sea. A wash of ochre for the shell.
I lost track of time in the rhythm—dip, stroke, rinse, repeat. The tight coil in my chest eased with each layer of color. I wasn’t painting fear. I wasn’t painting loss. I was painting sunlight, simple and ordinary, and it felt like medicine.
My hand slowed eventually, fatigue setting in, but when I stepped back, the canvas glowed. It wasn’t a masterpiece, but it was proof: I wasn’t broken.
I leaned against the counter, brush dangling from my fingers, and for the first time since that awful night, I felt like myself again. Not a victim. An artist.
Minnesota felt far away then, a different life.
Winters where the air froze your nostrils shut, where I huddled by radiators and dreamed of sunlight that lasted longer than an afternoon.
I’d thought the Keys would be freedom. And they were, in a way.
But no postcard had ever shown the kind of danger that could come with paradise.
I rinsed the brushes, lined them up to dry, and dropped into the chair with a sigh. My pulse beat slow, steady. For the first time in days, I was almost calm.
Almost.
Because when a low rumble came from the road outside, my hand jerked, water sloshing from the rinse cup. My pulse spiked like a trap snapping shut. I stared at the window, waiting for... something.
But there was nothing. Just dust in the road. Another false alarm.
The tremor in my hands reminded me that forgetting wasn’t in their nature.
And sooner or later, they’d come to collect.