“Yeah.”
Luke picks up my backpack and hands it to me. “Let’s do it.” His face flushes over the accidental innuendo. “That’s not what I meant,” he says, and I can’t stifle a laugh.
I like that I don’t have to wonder what he’s thinking or feeling. He isn’t playing games. He isn’t trying to get me drunk. He isn’t hiding a beautiful French girlfriend.
He isn’t hidinganything. Every thought he has falls right out of his mouth, and that’s actually kind of refreshing. And funny.
With a warm jolt of surprise, I realize Ireallywant to kiss Luke again.
10 HOURS EARLIER
GENESIS
Across the fire pit, Holden is whispering with Penelope, Domenica, and Rog. I can only hear every other word, but that’s more than enough to lift the mystery from his escape plan.
Wait until everyone’s asleep. Disable the guards on duty. Run.
His plan is disastrously simplistic and dangerous, but I can’t blame them for considering it. We have to dosomething. And my plan has failed.
“He’s going to get them killed,” Indiana says as he sinks onto the mat next to me and hands me a bottle of water.
“I don’t know.” I unscrew the lid and drink until my stomach feels a little less empty. “Maybe Holden’s onto something.”
“No,” Indiana says. “He’s not.”
I set the bottle down and turn to face him fully. “Silvana is going to let Álvaro chop me into pieces so my dad can hear me scream over the phone,” I tell him.
Indiana’s jaw clenches. He takes my hand. “Genesis, I won’t—”
“You can’t stop it. And my dad won’t be able to stand it. He’ll cave, and a lot of people will die. Then he’ll go to prison. But if I run, Silvana will have no way to convince my dad to cooperate.”
“Holden’s plan doesn’t sound any smarter when it comes out of your mouth, G.” He rubs my knuckle with his thumb. “We won’t all make it out of here if we try to run, and the terrorists will still have their bombs. Theywillfind another way into the US. If you run, you’ll only be delaying the inevitable.”
“Damn it.” I give him a small shove, but his chest is tantalizingly unyielding. “Why do you have to poke holes in my plan?”
He laughs. “It’s Holden’s plan, and you were never going to go through with it.”
“How do you know that?”
Indiana leans in, and I’m caught in his hazel gaze. “I know because you are the moon, not the tide.” His lips brush the corner of my mouth with each syllable, and anticipation blazes through me. I’ve never wanted anything in my life like I want to kiss him. “You don’t roll with the flow, Genesis, youcreatethe current. And Holden is nothing but a boat bobbing on the waves.”
Indiana takes my hand. His lips meet mine, and his other hand slides into my hair. His tongue traces my lower lip. I groan and my arms wind around his neck.
His kiss trails along my jaw toward my ear, and I let my head fall back. “Why did you wait so long?” I whisper.
“Because you should never rush a good thing,” he murmurs against my skin. “And no matter what is going on around us, this is averygood thing.”
9.5 HOURS EARLIER
MADDIE
The radio spits static again, and this time we hardly glance at it. It’s been doing that for the past couple of hours, and though the indication of how close we must be to Silvana’s base camp was exhilarating at first, now it’s a terrifying and exhausting reminder of just how dangerous my quest for revenge really is.
We could both die tomorrow.
“Hey, Maddie,” Luke calls as he comes back from the stream with fresh water. “I have a surprise, while we wait for this to boil.”
Luke takes Moisés’s knife and splits two bananas along the inner curve, still in their peel. He sets each one on the grill, then pries the fruit open and stuffs them with bits torn from our last two giant marshmallows.
