Chapter Eleven
Cole
BEEP… BEEP… BEEP…
I know it’s not real, but the beeping won’t stop.
The last five hours in the hospital were a blur. There were machines, all kinds of wires, and Nurse Patty, with her lingering scent of bleach. All of it has faded away, except that sound, ghost-drilling into my skull.
BEEP… BEEP… BEEP…
My own personal haunting. Hours and hours of IV fluids, steroids, oxygen, and a monitor that screamed every time my heart did something it wasn’t supposed to.
I stumble out of the Uber in front of the Hotel Bellwether, eyeing it suspiciously. I almost died on its beach, so I feel like that earns me a complaint. Twenty-six years old, and I got EpiPenned on a public livestream in front of God knows how many people.
Yeah, that’s as embarrassing as it sounds.
The Pacific air hits my skin, and my lungs expand on instinct. I take the breath slowly. Then another. Half grateful, half suspicious. I still feel off. As if someone reshuffled my ribs like a deck of cards and didn’t bother putting them back in order.
I’ve never second-guessed my instincts. Until now.
I shoulder my bag and walk past the famous love fountain. The Bellwether looks even more majestic at night with golden light illuminating the grand staircase. Down by the shore, a bonfire glows: voices, laughter, and the smell of woodsmoke threading up through the dark.
Normal people. Having a normal night.
I exhale slowly. Must be nice.
I move through the familiar lobby on autopilot, but my brain refuses to shift gears, replaying it all.
The moment my throat closed. The cold pull of the current.
The way the world went quiet and blue before everything cut to black.
All of that I can tuck away, file it under occupational hazard, and keep moving.
But her voice?
That I can’t let go of.
Breathe. Please. Come back to me.
I watched the livestream footage from the hospital bed. 100% foolish. I knew it was stupid when I pressed play. Watching yourself go limp in the shallows is not an experience I’d recommend.
My vision went fuzzy when it happened, so seeing it through the camera lens was hard to watch. I was a man-shaped lump of dead weight, getting my heart pumped by Sienna as the tide rolled in.
And then Ivy stormed into the frame.
The panic on her face when she saw me like that won’t leave my head.
She bolted, EpiPen already in her mind. She knew what I needed, where to find it, and how to use it. When she dropped to her knees, there was no fear. Only determination.
Right before she saved my life, she said, I watched a video.
When? For who? Did she watch that video for me?
I check my phone and there's no new texts from Ivy. She sent three while I was still wired up in that bed:
Are you alive?
Need me to bring you anything?
Tell me when you’re out, please.
And what did I do? One-word replies. Like I was going for a fucking award for Most Emotionally Unavailable.
Yup.
Nah.
Sure.
I stare at those three words now and wince. It’s not that I didn’t want to say more. It’s that I didn’t trust what more would’ve looked like coming from me, in that bed, thinking about her.
She didn’t come to the hospital. Why would she?
The event didn’t stop because I did. The livestream rolled right into Flipper she was gripping it like she was the only thing keeping me tethered to the earth.
All I know is—
I need to see her.
I move down the hallway one foot in front of the other, not entirely sure what I’m going to say when I find her. Thank you feels too small. I’m sorry feels too loaded. I woke up and your hand was in mine and I haven’t stopped thinking about it for five straight hours, is definitely not happening.
Somewhere in the middle, I guess? I’ll figure it out when I get there.
I shove the door to our shared room open, already bracing for her sharp tongue and sharper glare, and that intoxicating apple shampoo scent of hers.
But the room is dark.
My gut twists, a vicious lurch, because the air in here feels wrong without her filling it.
I check my phone. 11:07 p.m.
The event wrapped hours ago. She should be here doing her Ivy routines: auditing my toiletries, acting as the shoe police, or folding my underwear.
Where is she?
Daniel.
The name slithers in, unwanted, and I shove it back out.
No. I’m not doing that. I don’t even know why I care.
That’s the part that’s messing with me. Not Daniel, not things he said to make her smile, but the fact that I noticed at all.
The fact that I’ve been lying in a hospital bed thinking about Ivy Ellison instead of, I don’t know, my own mortality.
I just had a near-death experience, and somehow Ivy is the only thing stuck in my head. It doesn’t make any sense, but there it is.
Ivy. Ivy. Ivy.
My thoughts keep circling her name. I need to find her. To fix whatever this is.
So where the hell is she?
The production office, obviously. She’s always three moves ahead, always working with no pause button. My bag hits the floor with a thud, and I whirl toward the door, ready to hunt her down. But my hand hovers over the handle.
Wait, you know her better than that. She’s not working, she’s thinking.
“Pool,” I mutter, backtracking into the hallway. I jab the elevator button and my pulse kicks up into something I don’t have a name for yet.
I don’t know what this is. I don’t know what I’m going to say. I just know that she’s somewhere in this hotel and—
I need her.
The elevator opens. I step in.
***
The pool deck is dimly lit with Edison lights.
Dark shadows to encourage dirty behavior.
A sliver of amber speckles the surface—the kind of lighting that makes bad decisions feel inevitable.
The ocean beyond the railing is hidden tonight, nothing but sound.
Rolling dark, with the occasional crash of a wave breaking.
The hot tub is at full capacity. Drinks hovering in the steam.
An intimate tangle of shoulders and laughter.
A leg that definitely belongs to a different body than the one it’s draped over.
Flipper & Flirt is in full effect. Good for them.
If you’re gonna let your ass hang out, better to do it in a hot tub full of strangers than a hospital gown.
But the pool?
Empty. Well, almost.
She’s here.
Watching her thighs piston through the water is a thing of beauty and a direct assault on my senses. She’s doing what she does: being powerful and passionate. She has no idea I’m standing here, gawking like a teenage boy. My skin is on fire, and my mind is a mess.
She hits the wall, flips in a blur of precision, and my self-control waivers.
Fuck waiting. Fuck hesitation. If she’s gonna destroy me, I might as well dive headfirst into it.
I toe off my shoes, strip my shirt over my head, and kick my pants off like they’re on fire.
Boxers only.
I jump—
The moment I submerge, my mind catches up.
Shit. This is a horrible plan.
I break the surface right as she does.
She rips her goggles off, chest heaving as she sucks in air. Droplets stream down her face, hair clinging to her head like she just walked out of a storm. Her lashes are dark and spiked, her lips parted, slick and tempting as hell.
Jesus. She’s a goddamn revelation.
So gorgeous it hurts.
Her gaze locks onto mine. The shock lasts for barely a heartbeat before she’s doing that familiar, sharp narrowing.
“Seriously?” she pants, treading in place.
I’ve got a thousand things trying to come out at once. Thank you. I’m fine. You saved me.
The truth gets caught somewhere in my throat, wires crossing.
“THHHGGGLLLOOUURRRPPPP.”
I clamp my jaw shut.
Fuck.
Her expression shifts for a moment. Concern. Real concern.
“Hey. Are you okay?” she asks, moving a little closer.
“Yeah, I’m fine. Just—” I try to grind the gravel out of my throat. “Just the aftermath of adrenaline. Vocal cords pissed off. Standard shit.”
“You’re not fine. You almost died. And now you sound like a garbage disposal chewing on a fork.”
There she is.
“Funny, Stopwatch. Last time I checked, you weren’t a doctor.”
She splashes toward me, frustration flashing now that she’s decided I’m not actively dying. “You scared the absolute hell out of everyone today.”
“Everyone?” I lean in, the water swirling between our chests. “Or you?”
“You waded into the ocean after I told you to stay put,” she snaps, her voice pitching higher. “Again! Let me guess, you didn’t hear me?”
“I heard you, Ivy.”
“Great. So you admit you were being reckless. Ya know, I spent half the night filing incident reports because of you. My hand still hurts from documenting your stupidity.”
“I got the shot, didn’t I?”