Stranded with the Quarterback

by Elana Johnson

  Finally stalling when she couldn’t find another hold, she took a deep breath and tried to calm the adrenaline raging through her. Only then did she realize how far up she’d climbed.

  Looking down, the whole world spun. She slammed her eyes closed and gripped the rocks in front of her.

  Then she screamed.

  “I need you to move your right hand,” Maine said from above her. “Come on, Orchid. I know you can do it.”

  But she couldn’t. She’d already broken down on this stupid wall once, both Maine and Tanner watching her. They’d heard her scream, of course, and they’d both come running. They’d found a way to the top of the bluff, where Maine wanted to build a fire to signal ships, and with their help, she’d managed to move up the wall a little bit more.

  “Just over a bit, sweetheart,” he said. “And then up. There’s a good hold there, and then I’ll be able to get you.” He looked at her earnestly, just out of reach. During her first breakdown, Tanner had offered to go back down and climb up the way she had, with the idea that he could help her back down. But he’d been thwarted in his efforts by a herd of boars—six, he’d yelled up to them—and was currently hiking back up to where Maine laid, one arm over the side of the cliff as he reached for her.

  “I can’t,” she said, weeping again.

  “Orchid, honey,” he said. “Look at me. Look at me.”

  She tilted her head back and looked at him, but every angle besides looking straight ahead made a healthy dose of vertigo hit her.

  “It’s only over a few inches, Orchid,” he said. “Then up about a foot. You have a good spot with your feet right now. You can do this.” His eyes were wide, open, and honest. “Think about Tesla. You’re going to be able to tell her how you scaled this huge bluff to get away from the boar. She’s not going to believe it.”

  Orchid didn’t believe it. She drew in another breath, choosing to listen to Maine’s words You can do this.

  You can do this.

  Slowly, her fingers moved along the rock, going right and then up as Maine directed her. “Right there, sweets. Grab on.” She did, and the hold was good. She felt stretched out, too thin, for too long, and she pushed off with her left foot, realizing too late she had nowhere to put it.

  “Maine,” she cried out, because she couldn’t hang by her fingertips for long.

  “Right there,” he said. “Up a little more, almost on top of the right foot.”

  She found the ledge, which felt like it was about two inches wide, and straightened her leg. Pushing herself up, she was able to move her left hand high enough for him to grab it

  “I got you,” he said triumphantly. “Come on, Orchid. Another step, and you’re up.”

  She looked down, found a spot for her right foot, and took it. Both of his hands clamped around her shoulders and pulled, and a few seconds later, she lay panting on the ground beside him, utterly spent.

  She wasn’t sure how long she’d been climbing, but it felt like a long, long time. She couldn’t get enough air, and she closed her eyes against the hot sun and brilliant blue sky.

  Maine started laughing, but Orchid didn’t think there was a single funny thing about what had just happened.

  She opened her eyes and twisted her head toward him. “Thank you.”

  He grinned at her. “Of course, sweets.” He kissed her, got up, and helped her stand. “Now we just have to get back down.”

  “Tell me there’s a path.”

  “I mean, sort of,” he said. He put his fingers in his mouth and whistled, yelling, “Tanner. We’re coming down. I got her,” immediately afterward. He reached for her hand and squeezed it. “Stay with me, okay?”

  “Okay.” She kept her eyes on the ground, monitoring each step before she took it as they navigated their way back to the sandy ground. The pigs were gone, and the three of them collected the water and went back to their camp.

  Orchid slumped against the tree trunk and drank an entire bottle of water while the men pulled vegetables out of the fire and rotated chickens. Soon enough, it was time to eat.

  Orchid had just finished when Maine said, “Let’s go get more wood. I’ll grab the tarp, and we can go.”

  She didn’t want to go get more wood. She wanted a hot bath. A toothbrush with a lot of toothpaste on it. Air conditioning. And a sink where water came out of a faucet.

  Oh, and she never wanted to see a pig again.

  Instead, she got up and followed Maine down the path that led to the chicken meadow.

  Chapter Twelve

  Maine sat on the bluffs, able to see for seemingly ever. The first time he and Orchid had climbed to the top of the bluffs—without an angry boar snarling at their heels—he’d found the spot picturesque, calming, and beautiful.

  It was still all of those things—except for calming. He’d spent hours and hours up here over the past four days, the absence of a rescue ship debilitating in a very real away.

  Smoke lifted into the sky, as he and Tanner spent their time down on the sand cutting as much greenery as they could and hauling it to the top of the rocks. He had a three hundred and sixty degree view of the world here, and surely someone would be able to see the thick, white smoke as it billowed into the sky.

  “Please,” he whispered, his stomach cramping. He wasn’t used to a dominantly vegetable and fruit diet, and while Orchid had taken over cooking the chickens he and Tanner caught so they weren’t half-baked, he felt hungry almost all of the time.

  At the same time, part of him didn’t want to go back to real life. Practice schedules and paying bills and pretending to be the perfect role model on camera. Not that he wasn’t a good role model. He knew he was.

  But he sure had liked being real with Orchid for the past week. Footsteps sounded behind him, and he turned to see the woman cresting the bluff, her eyes trained on the ground so she didn’t slip.

  He smiled, everything in him rejoicing to see her. She was absolutely stunning, and his pulse picked up when she lifted her gaze to meet his. Even from thirty feet away, he could sense her anxiety and see the worry in her eyes.

  Maine got to his feet and brushed off his shorts before approaching her. “Hey, gorgeous.” His feelings for her were strong, and he sighed into their kiss.

  She kissed him back in a pleasant, needful way, and he wanted to shelter her from everything that could make her scared or unhappy. He wondered what that meant. Wondered if he was in love with her.

  Maine had never been in love with a woman before, and he honestly didn’t know how it felt. But with Orchid…well, he didn’t know.

  “Tanner’s freaking out a little,” Orchid said as she laid her cheek against his chest.

  “What is it this time?” Maine asked.

  “He’s convinced no one will ever find us,” she said.

  “I don’t see how they can’t,” he said. “My parents won’t stop looking. Will yours?”

  She shook her head. “I’m sure Eden’s spearheaded the rescue efforts.” She stepped back and smiled up at him. “And your coach probably has every resource available at his command. Holden does, I know that.”

  “So they’re just looking still,” Maine said, facing the ocean again. “I didn’t think we went that far off-course, but who knows with the storm and the tsunami.” He couldn’t believe he’d weathered both things, but he had. They had.

  Orchid took his hand and squeezed. “Maybe today will be the day.” She’d said that before—every day, actually—but Maine just nodded, like he always did.

  “Maybe.” He settled back onto the rocks, and Orchid sat beside him. He always wanted her there, and he leaned over and placed a kiss in her hair. “When I get back, the first thing I’m going to do is eat three hamburgers.”

  She giggled, which sent a shot of joy through Maine. “Yesterday it was five,” she said. “And they had cheese and bacon on them.”

  “Hmm,” he said, not amending what he’d said. “What about you?”

  “Shower,” she said. �
��I can’t wait to stand in hot water and wash this trip off of my skin.”

  “All of it?” he asked, putting his arm around her.

  “The killing chickens part,” she said. “Sleeping with a spear nearby, just in case. That part. Pulling up vegetables and getting insects.” She shivered, and Maine swept his lips along her ear to her neck. “But maybe not all of it.”

  “Not me, right?” he asked, his voice throaty and low.

  “Definitely not you.” She turned toward him and claimed his mouth. Maine let her kiss him for a few moments, and then he drew everything out of her he wanted.

  He pulled away breathless, his chest laboring, and said, “When we get back to Getaway Bay, I’m going to take you on a real date.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” she said. “These secret bluff meetings are pretty hot.”

  He chuckled, shook his head, and looked out at the water again. So much water. Not enough hope to keep from getting drowned in the sheer enormity of it.

  Hours later—Maine wasn’t even sure when—Orchid stood up and said, “Maine. There’s a boat.”

  He’d laid back and closed his eyes, grateful for the tarp they’d erected into a lean-to on top of the rocks. It provided some shade and relief from the sun. Now that they had their food, water, and shelter situation worked out, they were literally marking minutes, and there was no better place for that than on the bluffs.

  “Put more fronds on,” she said, her voice panicked. “I fell asleep and the fire’s almost out.”

  Maine recognized the urgency in her voice, though he was still trying to throw off the grogginess of sleep. “A boat.”

  “There’s a boat,” she said, a manic laugh following it. She tossed a couple of palm fronds on their fire, nearly putting it out.

  “Don’t smother it,” Maine said, trying to help with the fire and search for the boat at the same time. He couldn’t, so he focused on helping Orchid first. If there really was a boat, he’d have plenty of time to watch it approach the island.

  He peeled back one of the fronds and lifted the other one, blowing on the embers at the bottom of the pile. They’d both fallen asleep at some point, and a stab of guilt touched his heart. Why hadn’t he made sure the fire would last before lying down?

  “How long have you been awake?” he asked.

  “Five minutes,” she said. “Maybe.” She blew on the other side of the frond, and the flame ignited. “I’d just sat up and stretched. I stood up and took a few steps, just sort of casually looking. That’s when I saw it.”

  She paused in the work of getting the fire raging again and looked out over the water. “It’s still there.”

  Maine looked too, almost dreading it. What if she was wrong? What if her eyes were playing tricks on her? He’d stared at whitecaps plenty of times, imagining them to swell into yachts that would steam forward and rescue him.

  But he didn’t have to stare at something and allow it to morph into something it wasn’t this time. He sucked in a breath. “There’s a ship.”

  “I know.” Orchid laughed again, this time the sound much more sane, and returned to the palm frond.

  He lowered the second one, and it caught the fire pretty quickly. Thick smoke billowed into the air, and he straightened to watch the boat. After only a few minutes, it was pretty obvious that they’d seen the smoke and were coming straight for them.

  Whooping, he grabbed onto Orchid and lifted her off her feet. Spinning, they laughed and laughed. He set her down and said, “Let’s get out of here.”

  “What about the fire?” she asked.

  “It’ll burn itself out,” he said, reaching for the tarp. He’d cut two sticks and stuck them between cracks in the rocks to keep the tarp up. Orchid had gathered loose rocks to hold down the back of the lean-to, but Maine removed them easily and balled the tarp under one arm while he reached for Orchid with the other. “Let’s go, sweets.”

  He wanted to run down, but the path was treacherous, and he couldn’t leave Orchid behind. It was about a forty-minute climb up and a thirty-minute jaunt down. By the time he and Orchid arrived at their camp, the ship had stopped.

  It loomed large on the horizon, the best, brightest thing Maine had ever seen. Two lifeboats were in the water, rowing toward them, and Tanner stood in the surf about waist-deep.

  Maine couldn’t move toward the water’s edge, the scene before him so surreal. Orchid had her pack. He had the clothes on his back. But for some reason, he wanted to climb into their tree house and get a few potatoes. A carrot. Maybe the spear he slept with. Something.

  He couldn’t leave everything behind, could he?

  They’d killed two chickens that morning they hadn’t eaten yet. It felt like such a waste. The boats came closer and closer, reaching Tanner, who climbed right in.

  Orchid started for the shoreline, waving her arms as if the boats would leave without them.

  Panic hit him in the chest, and he ran after Orchid, grabbing her arm and turning her toward him. “Things are about to change again,” he said. “Promise me you’ll call me.”

  “What?” She tore her eyes from the ship and looked at him, clearly confused.

  “I’m going to have to be Maine Fitzgerald,” he said, trying to make her understand. She’d see him differently, and if there was one person he didn’t want to view him as the calm, cool quarterback, it was Orchid. “Please,” he said. “What’s your number? I’ll call you.”

  Shouting came from the boats, and Orchid turned toward them. “You promised me a date,” she said. “You better call me.” Then she ran down the beach again, yelling as she splashed into the water.

  Maine looked back at the tree house. The remains of the fire where they’d cooked their meals for the past seven days. “Good-bye, island,” he whispered, unsure as to why he felt a connection to this place.

  Then he turned and jogged toward the water’s edge too.

  “I’m fine,” he said for the twentieth time in as many minutes. But his coach was on the ship, and he’d brought three team doctors with him. One for each person, though Holden Holstein and his wife, Orchid’s sister, were on the ship too, and they’d bustled off with Orchid and a doctor of their own.

  “Dehydrated,” one of the doctors in the room said. “Blood pressure elevated. He’s lost some muscle mass.”

  Maine wanted to roll his eyes. He wondered if they had cheeseburgers on this boat. He hoped Orchid would get her hot shower—and that he could too. Getting poked and touched wasn’t his idea of a fun time aboard a cruise ship, though this appeared to be more of a rescue vessel than anything else.

  “Talk to me, Fitzgerald,” Coach Bloom said. “What have you been eating? Not enough water?”

  “I’m fine,” Maine said again, appreciating his coach but not in the mood for this conversation. “I’m tired. No, the island didn’t have steak and shrimp. We killed a couple of chickens each day. There was fruit, and an old garden someone planted.”

  “A garden?” Coach looked at one of the doctors. “People live there?”

  “No.” Maine shook his head and put on his media face. The one his public relations director had trained him to use. “It was an island where coast watchers lived during World War Two.”

  His coach looked like he’d been hit with a two-by-four. Maine knew exactly how he felt, especially as he got dressed in the suit his coach had brought for him. As he downed the protein drinks one after the other to get the doctors off his case. And when they pulled up to the docks in Getaway Bay to a mob of people, Maine actually did want to return to the island.

  Instead, he put on his quarterback face and waved to the crowd. He caught sight of Orchid being escorted off the ship with her family, her head bent away from the cameras.

  He wished he had that luxury. He wished he had her phone number. He wished not every question was being shouted at him, because there were two other people stranded with him on that island and their lives were just as important as his.

  Chapter Thirteen<
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  Orchid felt so much better after a good meal and a shower. Seeing all the people, all the cameras, hearing all the questions being yelled at the yacht sent her into shut-down mode. But she couldn’t go there yet.

  Her parents were here, and they had Tesla in the car with them. Eden had insisted she and Holden and Doctor Gimball be allowed on the rescue ship, and Eden herself had navigated them around to various islands. No one knew the islands better than Eden, and a rush of gratitude for her sister overcame Orchid again.

  With Holden and Eden between her and everyone else, they managed to make a relatively quick and clean getaway from the ship. She glanced over her shoulder once to see a man wearing a suit and waving at the crowd.

  It took her a long, drawn-out moment to realize it was Maine. But he didn’t look like the Maine she knew, and all at once, his words on the beach made sense.

  Things are about to change again.

  I’m going to have to be Maine Fitzgerald.

  She hadn’t understood what he meant. But she did now.

  They were from two different worlds. He couldn’t be the Maine she knew. Her Maine Fitzgerald wasn’t this polished, political man, and she barely recognized him in that suit, that fake smile on his face.

  “They’re right over there,” Eden said, leading Orchid through the parking lot now, away from the crowds. Away from Maine.

  Orchid followed, because the desperation to see her daughter and reassure Tesla that she was okay moved through her with the force of gravity. The back door on the SUV opened, and her towheaded little girl spilled out of it. “Mama!” She ran toward Orchid, who swept her daughter into her arms, tears flowing freely down her face.

  “Hey, baby,” she said, pushing Tesla’s hair out of her face. “I’m okay. I promise. I’m fine.” Eden had said she knew about the tsunami, the storm, and Orchid being lost out at sea.