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I can’t believe the ILF is led by a woman who looks like she belongs on a Milan runway. She doesn’t just walk down the curved stairway—she breezes her way down like fog rolling into a meadow. In heels.
On the next level, two women push wide strollers, each one holding four toddlers. Marta waves and smiles at them, and they grin back at her. A man pushing a cart with a stainless coffeepot and several stacks of paper cups touches the brim of his baseball hat as we pass him.
This place is like a small city. I’m floored by the complete confidence of everyone, just living life like they’re not belowground in the capital city of a totalitarian regime.
“Here we are.” Marta stops beside a door. “I’ll have someone on top of getting your briefings done as quickly as possible.”
“Thank you.”
She smiles, a sly glint in her eyes. “Now I’m off to see about pulling off an art heist.”
The wide legs of her flowy pants swing as she floats away, leaving me feeling a little more grounded and hopeful than I did before talking to her.
34
“We’re okay. We still have a long way to go, but we aren’t fighting each other anymore, and we’re all focused on making things better. We do have people who want to evacuate back to the mainland when you can get a boat here.” – Island Seven Council Leader Chance Rowe, in a radio message to Island Four
Amira
When I open the door to my room the next morning, Evander tumbles in, making me step back to avoid falling on him.
From the way he’s lying on his back and squinting at the light, I think he was asleep with his back to my door. He’s wearing the same gray T-shirt, black sweats, and tennis shoes he had on yesterday.
“What the hell are you doing here?” I grumble.
He puts a hand over his wound site and scrambles to his feet. “Waiting for you.”
I scowl at him. “Was I unclear yesterday?”
Standing at his full height, he locks his eyes onto mine. He’s got the determined expression I remember well from all the times he needed to stop walking and rest, but refused to say so.
“Are you still in love with him?”
“What? You mean Donovan?”
He nods, his dark, intense gaze sending a shiver dancing down my spine. I don’t miss the possessiveness in it, and my body ignites, not caring how angry I am at him.
“No. Not that it’s any of your business.”
His expression relaxes slightly. “I wasn’t going to bring you here. I need you to know that. You’ve got feelings for me, and I’ve sure as fuck got feelings for you. When you look at me like you are right now, it kills me inside. There’s got to be a way we can get past this.”
I turn and walk farther into the room, not trusting myself to be so close to him. I want to jump into his arms and punch his face in equal measure. For such an even-keeled guy, he drives me to the edge of my sanity.
“That’s all you’ve got?” I put my hands on my head and look up at the ceiling. “After everything we’ve been through, you tell me you have feelings for me and expect me to forgive you?”
He starts to take a step farther into the room, then stops, looking at me. “Can I close the door?”
Fuck. I wish I had a baseball bat to destroy the bunk beds in this room with. He betrayed me, but he’s also asking if he can close my door. And if I said no, he wouldn’t do it.
I shrug and say, “I don’t care.”
He shuts it, then comes closer to me. My heart races so wildly I’m lightheaded. He wasn’t supposed to do this. He was supposed to stay mad and keep fuming until I’m gone.
“I hated not telling you. Every day we got closer, it got harder. But don’t act like I was marching you toward an execution. You’re safe here. We need your help, if you’re willing.”
“Willing to help the people who put me in a cage? Hard pass.”
A storm clouds his expression. “Gabriel was demoted and moved to a new base for that. I tried so fucking hard to get to you, Amira. I would never let someone do that to you and not try to stop them.”
