Chapter Four

Emma

"A re you okay?"

It was the stupidest question I'd ever been asked. Of course I was okay. I just didn't know—

My train of thought cut off like the executioner's axe had dropped on it. For several long moments, I simply could not process anything.

"Emma?"

It was that same face, those same eyes, the green light incoherently bright. Impossibly so as they stared down at me.

It registered that I should have been standing up.

"Anytime you want to get up is fine by me, then we can—"

"Who are you?"

The stranger's beautifully sculpted jaw clacked shut, the tanned skin pulling taut as he clenched his teeth. Jade fire crossed his eyes. "Really? That's not going to work. Get up."

That much I could agree with. I scrambled to my feet, wincing at a sudden stabbing pain in my head. I winced, holding a hand to my temple, but it faded quickly.

"Shall we continue now?" The stranger gestured up the beach.

The beach.

As swiftly as his had slammed shut, my jaw fell open. I was on the beach. Why was I on the beach? How did I get to the beach?

"Emma?"

"Just-just stay away from me!" I shouted, backpedaling, putting some distance between the two of us. "Who are you? Where am I? What beach is this?"

The stranger's frown intensified as he peered down at me from the lofty heights his head occupied. He was easily a foot taller than me. Perhaps more. His hair fell to his shoulders, a messy brown mop that had a few hints of gray scattered around it. Not much, just a dash of salt that paired well with the natural tan of his skin.

Then there were the eyes. Large. Green. Angry.

"Do you not remember?" he snapped impatiently. "How can you seriously expect me to believe you?"

"Believe you?" I shook my head, hair flying. "I don't know you. I don't know how I got here. I was at home. In my kitchen. Peeling potatoes at the sink. Then I—"

I stepped away from him some more, again ignoring the brief pain in my temple. This time, he took a step closer, holding out his hand. "Emma, stop."

"How do you know my name?"

He sighed. "We are not going to play this game."

"What did you do to me?"

" Me ?" This time, the stranger's entire face creased with anger. "Why do you think I had anything to do with this? You're the one playing games."

I ignored the last sentence. It made no sense. "Because you're the only one here. You know my name. It stands to reason you had a hand in this."

"Lady," he growled angrily like the rumble of thunder before the storm arrived, a warning sign I shouldn't ignore. "We've been talking for the past hour as we came down to the beach. Then you just didn't like something, decided you were done, and pretended to pass out. I caught you and laid you down. So, I mean, if you want to be mad at me for saving you from any major trauma when your head would have slammed into the rocks, then go right ahead, but it makes you both insane and a bitch."

He bit off the last word, looking away.

I did the same. Clearly, something had happened. I just didn't know what. So, I stalled by taking in my surroundings.

We were on the beach. Waves crashed against the shoreline not thirty feet away. The saltwater spray in the air had my sinuses clear and sharp with each slow inhale I took as I tried to stall the rising panic inside me.

I found if I moved slowly, the headache didn't bother me. Shuffling to the side, so the broad shoulders of the stranger didn't block my view, I noticed a town in the distance, the buildings butting right up to the sea, where a large boardwalk eventually gave way to piers and docks where a number of large boats were tied up.

"Emma."

"How do you know my name?" I asked. Whoever he was, he wasn't giving off dangerous vibes. Besides, running seemed a surefire way to split my skull in half even if things were fading.

He sighed, throwing up his hands. "We're going to keep doing this, are we? Fine. The answer is you told me your name. Do you expect me to believe you don't remember any of this? Really, Emma? Come on."

"Stop using my name like you know me!" I shouted, nails digging into my palm as I clenched.

Those same broad shoulders rose and fell in a fittingly large sigh of resignation. "What would you like me to call you, then, if not your name? I suspect if I started addressing you as ‘woman,' you'd get mad at me too. So, no matter what, I'm screwed. May as well use your name in that case, right?"

I shot him a glare, but it washed off him like water. "Fine, whatever." I shook my head.

OW.

That was a bad move. The blinding headache receded quickly, but I made a note not to do that again anytime soon.

High above, the cry of a gull broke the silence between us. I gazed out to sea. The ocean wasn't new to me. In fact, I had lived less than an hour or so away from it. But that was the North Atlantic. Things never got warm like this. They never got balmy . I was elsewhere. Farther south. Which meant I'd traveled. Somehow. And why couldn't I remember this man? He was certainly handsome enough to warrant a spot in my memory, with his sculpted shoulders and arms peeking out from under the sleeves of his shirt, not to mention a stomach that appeared as firm as could be when the wind tugged his red and orange flecked shirt tight to his abdomen.

But it wasn't enough. Everything was too strange.

"Home," I murmured.

"What's that?"

"Home," I repeated, louder. "I want to go home, mister. Please. Help me get home."

"I …"

"Then just tell me where I am . I'll figure out the rest if you won't tell me."

"You're near the beach," he said with a shrug.

I willed my eyes to turn into laser beams as I fixed them on his face, the features rugged and windswept but in a handsome way despite the lack of smile lines.

"You don't say," I drawled slowly. "Care to, oh, I don't know, be a little more specific?"

"You're on the beach on the northwest corner of the island?" he said with a careless shrug. "We don't really give it names."

"The island," I repeated, staring out into the endless horizon of blue-green water. "Okay. I'm on an island. That's … that's something. I … what island?"

There was a long pause. "The main one?" The stranger sounded truly regretful.

"The main one? The main what? Is there not a name for it?"

"The Dragon Isles."

I whipped my head back around to stare at him. "The what isles? Did you say Dragon Isles? There's no such place. Where is that?"

He shook his head slowly back and forth. "You really don't remember, do you? You're in the land of dragons, Emma."

I laughed. It was a high, brittle sound. I was on the edge, and I knew it. But he was talking crazy. "Dragons aren't real," I scoffed.

The stranger just cocked his head at me then slowly swung it around to stare inland. A direction I'd so far refused to look.

Slowly, I followed his gaze.

"Oh my god," I whispered.

There were dragons in the air. Several of them. As I watched, one flew almost overhead on its way toward town. It dropped in a smooth dive, ruby-red wings spread wide before it landed gently on the outskirts of the town.

I stared back at the stranger in front of me, slack-jawed. It took me a full thirty seconds before I could speak.

"I'm going insane, aren't I?"