“Jonas?” I head to the porch and peer around.
Still no Jonas. Not on the porch, not in the pool off the porch, not on the lush winding stairway down around the boulders and limestone to the beach, and not on the beach either.
I head back to the villa.
He probably went to get us breakfast. Even though breakfast has been delivered every single day.
Maybe a run.
Yes.
Maybe he went for a run and he’ll be back soon.
That’s what I tell myself as I prep hot water for his morning green tea—body is a temple and all that, he said sheepishly Friday morning when I offered him something to drink when he showed up to check on me after we’d hung out all day Thursday.
I grab the ginger ale for me.
My nerves are making a reappearance.
It’s silly.
We’re friends. We agreed we’d stay friends. That neither of us is inanyposition to start a relationship.
That last night was something that just felt so natural as the next step for friends who’ve been through a lot and both needed to move on.
But he’s still not back an hour later.
Or an hour after that.
I throw on clothes and head to the small restaurant that I initially avoided for not wanting to see other people, but where I actually had dinner with Jonas two nights ago, and I ask the hostess if she’s seen my friend.
There’s a small staff here. Jonas kept assuring me that they were very discreet and wouldn’t say anything to anyone.
She tells me she has not and asks if I want food.
I don’t have his phone number.
I don’t even have pictures of us together.
My insistence. He didn’t argue. Neither of us needs to be seen with new people right now, and I wantzeroreason for the press or social media oranyoneto take more interest in me.
By mid-afternoon, I’m starting to panic.
What if he went swimming and got caught in a riptide? What if he tripped on a path while he was running and chickens that aren’t supposed to be on the island pecked him to death? What if one of the other guests that he insisted were people just like us who wanted privacy and would leave us alone are secret Razzle Dazzle fans and they kidnapped him to act out weird fantasies?
“He’s checked out of his resort,” my massage therapist tells me when she arrives mid-afternoon, as she has every afternoon since Thursday.
Theo went above and beyond with this resort upgrade.
Which is not my primary concern at the moment. “Hewhat?”
“Head down, please. Your shoulders are very tight.”
“He checked out?”
“I’m not supposed to disclose personal information of guests, but he wasn’t a guesthere. And you were friends. I see you’re worried. He’s safe. My sister checked him out herself very early this morning at her resort and saw him off on the cart to the airstrip.”
Heat stings my eyes.
