Chapter 22

C HAPTER 22

The tranquil blue-green water is the temperature of a steaming shower at the end of a long day. Hot enough to turn my skin scarlet, on just the right side of scalding. It feels so amazing that I sink my uninjured arm in up to my shoulder, and my sore muscles turn to goo. Bliss.

"Wren?" Brooke's voice floats through the trees.

"Get over here!" I call.

Henry reaches me first and sees me soaking my arm in the water. "What's that smell?"

"Forget about the smell and feel this water."

"One does not simply forget about the smell of swamp arse."

I laugh. "You will when you feel it."

Victoria dips her hand into the spring and her eyes widen in surprise. "What is it?"

"A hydrothermal spring," Brooke says as she joins us. "The groundwater is geothermically heated by shallow bodies of magma."

"How do you know that?" Victoria asks.

Brooke shrugs. "Everybody knows that."

"I can assure you they don't," Theo says. He pulls his shirt off in one fluid motion and catches me watching.

I quickly pull my gaze away and glance at the sky. The setting sun has already dipped below the treetops, and it'll be dark before long. Comet's already resting under a tree, we're all exhausted, and as much as she's trying to hide it, Victoria looks like she needs a break.

"We should stay here for the night," I say.

"Smashing. I'm getting in." Henry toes off his shoes and flips into the water. When he springs back up, he flings his hair out of his eyes, showering me with water drops. "What's everyone waiting for? Get in! It feels amazing."

Brooke, Victoria, and Theo waste no time stripping down and sinking into the warm water, but I drag my feet, avoiding the inevitable.

After a moment of soaking in the hot spring, Theo turns and rests his chin on the back of his hands. His eyes glint in the golden light. "Forget how to swim?" he teases, a sharp contrast to his wistful expression.

The memory of us skinny-dipping under a midnight Grecian sky is dizzying. I swallow a painful lump in my throat and spin my finger in a circle.

"I already know you're wearing princess knickers; I heard Naomi yelling about it after she was stung," he says. My mouth falls open as he laughs and turns around.

"No one will be seeing my knickers!" I unbutton my shirt and hang it on a tree branch, keeping my pants on, and make my way over to the hot spring.

"You shouldn't get in," Brooke says.

"Why not?"

"This water is probably teeming with bacteria. Your cut could get infected."

I glance at my arm and am startled to see that the skin around my sutures is growing redder and puffier by the hour. "It's not that bad!" I protest.

"It looks a bit minging," Henry agrees.

"You're the one who did the stitching," I point out, before my eyes stray longingly to the water.

"I wouldn't risk it," Theo says regretfully.

My heart sinks. The idea of not getting in makes me want to cry.

I glance at Victoria for a fourth opinion. "What do you think?"

She shrugs. "It's your life."

I sigh heavily. If she thinks I should do it, it's probably a bad idea.

I blink back tears, embarrassed to be getting so emotional over a hot spring. "Fine. I'll keep the stitches dry, even though I'm pretty sure rich people would pay thousands of dollars at a wellness spa for this kind of shit and call it a healing soak," I grumble.

I sink in until the water hits my waist, but the bottom is steep and slick, and gravity drags me deeper. I grit my teeth and hold my arm nearly straight in the air. Only a few seconds later, the muscles are burning, then shaking, then screaming in pain.

I've never been a quitter, but not even my pride can keep my arm in the air for another painful second. I drop it with a frustrated whimper.

"Come here. I'll do it for you," Henry says.

"You'll hold my arm in the air?" I ask doubtfully.

"Sure. Or you can put it around my shoulders. I'd be honored."

"No thanks." I pull myself out of the hot spring and into the chilly air, my wet pants plastered to my legs. Goose bumps travel across my skin. "Enjoy your bacteria bath," I say dryly as I pull my blouse over my wet skin.

"You can start a fire if you're cold," Brooke offers.

"Reggie let us take the lighter?" Henry asks in surprise.

" Winston and Naomi let us take the lighter. I was going to steal it if they didn't," Victoria says with a satisfied smirk.

"Do you think they'll be okay without it?"

"The fire was pretty big by the time we left. Reggie would be an idiot if he let it die," she says.

I personally think Reggie's an idiot even if he doesn't let the fire die, but that's beside the point. I find the lighter in Theo's backpack and scan the ground for kindling. Brooke shouts instructions from the hot spring, but by the time the sky is painted tangerine, I still haven't managed to light anything for longer than a few seconds. I press my cheek to the ground and blow gently on the kindling under the log-cabin structure. It catches, but the dried leaves burn up in a bright flame and turn to ash and smoke before igniting the wood. I refuse to look at the water, but I can feel Theo watching me.

I push my knotted hair behind my ears and try again. My fingers fumble over the lighter as a strong breeze whistles through the trees, stirring up ripples in the water and extinguishing my flame.

I let out a frustrated groan. "Why is this so hard?" I throw the lighter. It lands unceremoniously in the grass, and I don't feel any better for having hurled it out of my hands. I have wood, and I have a lighter, but I don't have fire. At this point, not even the laws of physics are on my side. "The universe hates me. It is conspiring against me."

"To what end?" Theo's gravelly voice floats over on the breeze.

"To annoy me." I spit the words, refusing to look at him. I feel wretched. I look wretched. My stitches burn and my cheeks sting with the first sign of sunburn. I'm hungry, I'm tired, I'm dirty, and with every passing hour in which we don't see a rescue plane or boat, it feels more and more like we might never get off this island.

I hear footsteps approach. Theo retrieves the lighter and then crouches next to me. "Can I help?"

"No," I say flatly. My throat burns with the effort of holding back tears. I clench my jaw and wait for him to stop staring at me. The only thing that will increase my humiliation is if I start bawling because I can't start a fucking campfire.

"Need my help?" Henry calls from the water. "I'm better at it than him!"

Theo ignores his brother. "Talk to me, Wheeler," he prods, his infuriating gentleness making me want to scream.

"Stop being nice to me," I whisper-hiss so the others don't hear us.

"Why?"

Because if anything happens to your sister, it will be my fault, and neither of us will be able to untangle our relationship from yet another tragedy.

The guilt is suffocating.

I finally turn to look at Theo and am startled to find him so close. His eyes bore into mine.

"Because it's painful," I tell him.

"Any luck with the fire?" Victoria calls in a mocking voice from the water, and whatever is left of my sanity crumbles.

"Why does your sister hate me?" I snap at Theo.

"She's a teenager whose mum just died; she hates everyone."

"She doesn't hate Naomi."

"That's because she's not threatened by her."

I'm dumbstruck. "Why on earth does she feel threatened by me ?"

His face is pained. "Because her entire world has been turned upside down, twice —and then you come along, bringing all the media attention in the world with you. I'm sure it reminds her of our parents."

"And that's my fault?"

"No!" He pushes his hands through his hair, looking desperate. "I'm not explaining this right. But life was just settling down. The royal tour in Canada was supposed to prove that we're okay, that our family is strong and capable of leading the monarchy. It was the last chance before the coronation to get the public on my side… but then I looked up at the sunken gardens in High Park, and there you were…" He trails off, looking lost in his own thoughts, and it's not hard to imagine that he's thinking about paparazzi ambushes and car chases and emergency meetings with the Firm.

"And life was chaos again?" I ask, hoping he'll deny it.

He exhales. "Yeah."

My chest collapses, but I refuse to cry. "That's what she thinks? Or that's what you think?"

He winces. "It's not your fault—"

"I get it." I cut him off before I have to hear him let me down gently. I don't want to hear again that he cares about me, because now I know that it's not enough.

Fate was never going to put me in a royal ball gown.

"Maybe we'd both be better off if we'd never met," I say.

Theo winces. "I don't know how to do this."

"Neither do I." For the first time since Italy, I feel like I could use a drink. I walk away, and with a glance back at Theo, I open his backpack and rummage through the first aid supplies and spare clothes until I find a small bottle of booze like the one that Brooke slipped to Winston.

"Wren!" Henry swims to the bank of the hot spring, wet curls plastered across his grinning face. "Come settle a debate between Brooke and me. And bring the whisky with you."