Chapter 13

C HAPTER 13

I sit up quickly and blink away the black spots in my vision. Lying down was a bad idea; if I do it again, I'm afraid I won't get back up. A warm rush of blood trails down my arm. I lift my hand and my head spins when I see blood dripping off my fingertips.

I push myself into a standing position and sway on my feet. The world glitches, a slow-motion catastrophe. I shake my head and time trips over itself to catch up. Henry is in front of me, peeling off his soaking-wet shirt and pressing it to my arm. I blink and he's gone. Comet is running frenzied circles around me until Victoria pulls him away. I open my mouth to yell at her but I can't hear anything except waves crashing against rocks. My head aches, my throat burns, and my soaking-wet clothes are plastered to my freezing body.

The shirt does nothing to stem the flow of blood. I drop it.

Instead, I tear a clump of crimson-stained moss from the ground and hold it against my wound.

I step forward on wobbly legs and almost trip over a rock. The rugged shoreline stretches for miles in either direction. In land, however, the moss becomes tall grass and eventually a dense forest that slopes upward into a mountain.

I don't see a single sign of human life.

(Devastating. I was hoping we'd washed up on the shores of Majorca.)

I pull the moss away from my cut and nearly faint. We need to get out of here immediately.

Reggie is on his knees trying to start a fire with damp moss and a cigarette lighter. I stumble over to him. "When are we getting rescued?" I ask.

"I'm working on it," he says.

"Will it be soon?"

"We're with His Majesty and the two people next in line for the throne. What do you think?" he snaps.

I think the sky is empty, the island is deserted, and that moss is never going to ignite.

"I think I'm in trouble." Since we're not on the verge of being rescued, I need to figure this out myself. Theo told me to find Winston, so I trudge to where he's lying near the edge of the cliff. His eyes are screwed shut and his teeth are clamped hard on a stick.

Victoria is transporting handfuls of clothing up the cliff from the rescued luggage down below, and Naomi and Henry are using wet pants to tightly wrap Winston's broken leg. A first aid kit lies on the ground next to him.

"No one was going to tell me about this?" I motion to the kit with my injured arm. A wave of nausea rolls through me.

Naomi looks up from the bodyguard and gasps. "Oh my gosh, Wren. Sit down! Your cut didn't look this bad in the water." Her eyes fly to Henry's. "Where's Brooke?"

"Reggie sent her to look for firewood."

Naomi swears. "This is bad. She looks awful."

"Funny, because I've never felt better." My lips and fingertips tingle numbly. I breathe slowly through my mouth to avoid blacking out. I don't know if it's dehydration or a panic attack or blood loss or all of the above.

"Stop joking. It takes too much energy."

"My sarcasm fuels me." The spongy moss reminds me of a bed. I allow myself to lie down with the help of Naomi's insistent hands. I feel a tongue on my ankle.

"Actually, you lose a liter of blood every time you say something snarky," Naomi says.

"She'd already be dead." Theo's voice cuts through the din. His face hovers above mine. Icy water drips from his hair into my eyes, but I can't look away. He looks pissed. (American version.) "Why hasn't she been stitched up yet?"

"We're working on it," Henry says. I glance at him. He's attempting to thread a needle with an unsteady hand, and my stomach churns. I close my eyes.

"Work faster," Theo orders. "You all right, Wheeler?"

"Mm-hmm."

"I'm going to need more than an ‘mm-hmm' to know you're okay," he says, his voice at point-blank range. I open my eyes and find myself staring directly into his. I could kiss him, if the thought of moving didn't make me want to die.

My eyelids feel heavy.

He places his hand on my cheek. "Don't check out on me now."

I inhale something sharp and painful. (I didn't realize pain could be a smell.) My eyes water as they fly open, and my brain catches up with reality.

Theo is crouched next to me, a pinch between his brows. "Tell me you're okay." It's a command if I've ever heard one.

"Did you lick my ankle?"

"That was me," Henry says gravely.

Theo's eyes widen in alarm until he looks down and sees Comet at my feet. His gaze returns to mine, and I use the very last ounce of energy in my body to wink. He pushes up to his feet, but not before giving his brother a hard shove. "She's fine."

A ringing endorsement. I'm too tired to say it.

"How's Winston?" he asks.

Winston's eyes are still closed. He gives the King an unenthusiastic thumbs-up. Naomi and Victoria are hovering by his side.

"We gave him some painkillers from the first aid kit and did our best to stabilize his leg, He's going to be okay. We're all going to be okay," Naomi says.

"Let me know if you need anything. I have to go." Theo turns to his brother. "Henry," he says in a steely voice.

"I'll try not to make it worse," Henry says.

A beat passes. "If anything happens to her—"

"No dead Yanks on my watch. I've got it," Henry says.

"I'm serious," Theo says, and then he gazes down at me. "Go easy on him." He stalks away, leaving all of my focus to land on the needle in Henry's hand.

"You might want to turn your head," Henry says as he takes Theo's place by my side. He pinches my cut between two fingers and Naomi and Victoria both inhale sharply. Naomi covers her eyes with her hands.

"Naomi, can you go find Wren's sister?"

"I'll be right back," she says.

"Take your time," he mutters as she runs toward the forest. He lifts the needle again, but even I can see Victoria flinch in my periphery. "You've got to go, Tor."

She stands with a huff and whistles for Comet to follow her.

When we're alone, Henry takes a steadying breath. "You ready, darling?"

I'm so thrown by the word "darling" that I forget to anticipate the pain, and before I know it, he's made the first stitch. The tug of needle and thread is sickening.

"Victoria wants to push me over the cliff."

"Hmmm?"

"I bet the Firm would be chuffed if you let her do it."

" Ah. "

"She'd take your crown as the most beloved royal, for sure. They'd be grateful for the person who solves this problem for them." I'm rambling, but I can either talk, or pass out from pain.

"A bit of a stupid thing to say to the person who has a needle in your arm, innit?"

"I liked it better when you called me ‘darling.'"

"Bite this and stop talking." He places a stick between my teeth.

Time crawls like molasses, until I feel one final tug, followed by a pinch. "Done."

I spit out the stick. "Thank you."

He cleans up his supplies and closes the first aid kit. "With any luck, someone who knows what they're doing will fix it soon."

"I think our luck ran out the moment the plane went down," I say.

His gaze travels to the bodyguard a few paces away from us. "Winston's asleep."

I watch the bodyguard's chest move up and down. "I hope he's not in pain." Sleep sounds ideal. I want to sleep until we're rescued.

We lapse into a long stretch of silence. Henry sits with his arms on his knees, staring out at the ocean while I lie on my back and look at the empty skies. I feel strangely untethered, like if no one is watching, I might dissolve entirely.

Every time Henry shifts, I expect him to leave, and I'm newly shocked each time he doesn't. "You don't have to wait with me."

"I'm afraid I do," he says.

"You don't even know me."

"Doesn't matter."

I want to know a lot more about that, but when I push myself into a sitting position, I'm distracted by my view of Theo, who's aggressively sorting through the salvaged luggage down on the beach below. When he doesn't find what he's looking for, he pushes his hands through his hair. A wave crashes into the rocks, covering him with ocean spray.

Muscles ripple across his shoulders as he lifts his arms above his head and dives into the water. "He's not—" I cut myself off, because he is. I watch in horror as he swims toward the flaming wreckage. "What is he doing?"

"Looking for something."

"It's dangerous! It's reckless, and—"

Henry places his hand on my arm. "He'll be safe."

"I'm going to get him. He's being stupid." I stand up and my vision goes temporarily black.

Henry catches me when I stumble sideways. "You're not getting in the water."

I pull myself out of his arms and sit back down. I hate that he's right. "I've only been around the royals for a day and I'm already sick of being told what to do."

In the distance, Theo drags himself out of the water and stops to catch his breath. He shakes out his arms and dives back in. Even now, his gravitational pull is so strong that I'm tempted to jump in after him.

"Theo's trying to do what's best for you," Henry says.

"What's best for me is getting off this island," I grumble, trying to ignore my burning thirst.

"Once we're rescued and back in London, you should let him."

My pride bristles, and I can't help but roll my eyes. "Of course he knows best, because he's a man, and I'm just a silly eighteen-year-old girl."

Henry picks up a rock and chucks it off the cliff. "I'm not saying that. I'm saying that you might consider the possibility that the person who was born for the throne knows more about the dangers of proximity to the royal family than you do."

"I get that it sucks to be written about in tabloids—"

"You don't," Henry cuts me off. "And that's not your fault, because there's no way you could understand."

My stomach squirms. "What happened to ‘it's not so bad'?" I use air quotes to remind him of what he said about royal life back in the hotel room.

He picks up another rock and tosses it between his hands, as if weighing his reply. "My brother and I both understand the drawbacks of our life, but I believe in the monarchy as an institution in a way he never has. At least not since—" He abruptly cuts himself off.

"Since what?" I press. It's annoying to realize there's still so much about Theo I don't know.

He sighs. "That's a story he should tell you himself."

"Cop-out!" I shout.

"It bloody well is, I won't deny it!" He laughs. "The point I'm trying to make is that being a royal is complicated, but most of the time, I like it. I don't know if you've noticed, but the world is kind of shite right now—"

I bark a laugh; it feels like the understatement of the century.

"—but my family is a unifying force for our nation," Henry continues, ramping up his passion as he goes. "The monarchy connects us to our past. It's good for the economy, good for tourism, good for charity work, and more politically stable than other forms of government."

I roll my eyes. "What's so complicated about that?"

"The point is, we have the power to do a lot of good. Right now, my brother is trying to use the power of the monarchy to protect you from the dangers of it."

"You make it sound like you're radioactive."

" We are, " he says, with a conviction that feels like a premonition.

I wrap my arms around my knees and watch Theo's head bobbing in the water. "If Theo's trying to do what's best for me, who's trying to do what's best for him?"

"Everyone is doing what they think is best for the Crown."

"I'm talking about Theo. "

Henry chucks the rock into the water. "I think you know the answer to that."