The Island Of Bears: A BBW Paranormal Romance (16 page)

Ashley broke into a grin again with her teeth glinting in the silvery light.

Hannah appeared to give her a smile back, although I couldn’t see her face very well.  “That’s a good girl. Now, I have more details to discuss with Richard, so why don’t you run along back to our cabin, and I’ll meet you back there before midnight.”

Ashley nodded and ran off, laughing.

Once she was a good distance away, Hannah turned and spoke to Richard, Dylan, and Marcus. “For all her many deficits, she actually has a very good sense of direction, so I know she’ll make it back to the cabin just fine. However, she’s really not a very strong swimmer, so she might have some trouble in the ocean, but I really don’t care if she genuinely drowns before they get to her. Once we’ve accomplished our plan to take over this village, I won’t need her anymore, anyway.”

With sudden tears prickling my eyelids, which were tears of sadness for Ashley blended with something like tears of panic for Holden and everyone else,  I decided I didn’t need to hear any more. I just needed to get out of the jungle and to Holden, to tell him everything.

But at that moment, right as I began turning to head back to the village, I made a mistake. I’d forgotten to be completely stealthy and quiet, and I’d stepped on a branch, cracking it.

Hannah immediately began looking all around the jungle. “Did you guys hear that? What was that?”

Richard shrugged. “Probably just some damn bird. You said yourself that Holden’s not sending any patrols back here tonight.”

“Yeah, but we can’t be too careful. We need to investigate whatever made that branch-cracking sound. Let’s go look over in the direction it came from.”

Even before she had finished speaking, I was already creeping away from the copse of palms I’d been standing behind, making my way over to a dirt track that led deeper into the jungle. I knew once I reached it, I’d be able to walk near-soundlessly.

The cover of so many palms nearby helped me make my exit, as did Hannah and the three men moving very slowly themselves, listening. By the time they made it to the cluster of palms I’d been standing behind, I was already padding down the dirt track, hidden by tall, massive hibiscus bushes the size of cars.

I silently prayed that the three men wouldn’t be curious enough about the sound they’d heard to shift into their wolf forms, because if they did, and if they picked up my scent, as I was sure they would, it would be all over for me.

Hardly even daring to breathe, I tiptoed at least a mile down the dirt track before the way became so clogged with branches and overgrowth that I couldn’t go any further. I stopped to rest, straining my ears for any sounds, but the roar of the surf in the distance was all I heard. It seemed that the three men hadn’t shifted, very fortunately for me, and I’d managed to shake them and Hannah off.

Now more or less safe, my first thought was to call Holden, but when I pulled my phone out of my bag, to my extreme dismay, I saw that my phone only had one percent of battery life left. Not wanting the phone to shut off completely, I debated whether sending a text or placing a call would use less of the battery. But during these few seconds, it dropped to zero percent and then shut off completely anyway.

I stuffed it back in my bag with a sigh. “Goddammit. And goddamn me.”

I’d been meaning to charge the phone that morning but had just forgotten. Now, I knew the only way I was going to be able to tell Holden was the old-fashioned way, meaning face-to-face.

Not knowing if the wolf shifters were still in the jungle, waiting for a call from Hannah at midnight or something, I decided that it was probably best that I not go down the same path I’d just taken deeper into the jungle. It would only lead me back to Hannah’s original meeting spot, where the wolves still might be.

So, realizing I’d have to pick my way through the jungle and back to the village without benefit of any kind of a trail, I set off. But, unlike Ashley’s, my own sense of direction, especially in the dark, wasn’t so great. Which wasn’t to say that it was terrible, but I certainly could have used a compass.

After a while, I wasn’t entirely positive that I was going west-ish anymore, as I should have been. In fact, based on the position of the moon, I figured I almost had to be going dead north, even deeper into the jungle, toward the now-filled-in crater that had used to be Black Lake. Somehow, I’d gotten very turned around, to say the least.

After another hour or so of hiking around the darkened jungle, which, I had to admit, was more than a bit spooky, I realized that I
still
wasn’t any closer to the village. I’d been heading west finally, or at least I’d thought I’d been, but I’d somehow wound up going even further north, though north-east maybe,
around
the lake. Or at least, this is what it seemed that I’d done, although I wasn’t even sure of anything at this point.

Miles beyond frustrated, I stopped walking, knowing I was running out of time. It had to be close to ten or so at this point, meaning that I only had two hours to thwart Hannah’s plan.

Once I’d spent about a minute straining my ears to hear the ocean, which was far away now, I reoriented myself, heading for the village. This time, I stayed the course. After maybe an hour or two of hiking as quietly as I could, not encountering Hannah or any of her three friends along the way, I finally exited the jungle, and right behind Holden’s cabin, no less.

Knowing it was nearing midnight at this point and time was very quickly running out, I didn’t even knock. I just threw open his front door and barged right in, startling Holden, who was sitting in his living room with what appeared to be a glass of whiskey. Not wasting a second, I spilled the whole story of what I’d overheard in the jungle, from the moment I’d first come upon Hannah’s group to the moment she’d sent Ashley away.

Once I’d finished, I paused for breath, expecting Holden to react in alarm, or maybe even express gratitude that I’d prevented Hannah from carrying out her plan.

But Holden didn’t react in either of these ways.

With his expression unreadable, he set his glass of whiskey on an end table, stood, and looked me right in the eyes. “Get out. Now.”

*

I stared at Holden, incredulous. “But—”

“You have got to be kidding me. You don’t trust me to simply be very platonic, very casual friends with Hannah, so now you’re making up wild accusations to try to separate us. I swear... This is Black Lake and the Forms all over again. I ask you to trust me, and you won’t or can’t, so you take matters into your own hands, and you blow up a lake, or in this case, concoct some crazy scheme to try to make Hannah look bad.”

“But that’s not at all what I’m—”

“I think this is the nail in the coffin for us, Haley. See, I’m not hung up on trust just to give you a hard time. On this island, and in this village, trust in each other isn’t just a luxury. With danger everywhere a good majority of the time, we
need
to be able to trust each other in order to stay alive, and thrive as a group. When I choose a mate, I need to be able to trust that person completely, and I need them to trust me just the same. It’s  become more than clear to me that that person isn’t you.

You couldn’t even trust me to have a female friend. A female friend who, I might add, I’ve assured you I want nothing to do with on a romantic level. Who, I might also add, I’ve only spent time with in public. Not that it would have been wrong of me to spend time in private with her, as you and I have no longer been a couple these past several weeks, but like I told you, I want nothing to do with Hannah on that level.

I’ve only wanted to spend time with her as a casual friend. As abrasive as she can be at times, she also can have a very unique, witty sense of humor, and forgive me for wanting a few laughs while I nursed my heartache about how you went behind my back with the lake and the Forms.”

Suddenly more angry than hurt, I took a step closer to him, hands on hips. “I am
not
lying to you. Everything I’ve told you is the truth. Despite what you think, I
do
trust you now. I made a decision to trust you, and I’ve already put that trust into action. When I saw you on your porch talking to Hannah tonight, I—”

“Let me guess. You pulled out some sort of mobile sonar device so you could try to hear us better?”

“Hilarious, Holden, but actually, no. I walked away. That’s all I did, and I did it immediately, too. I did that because I trust you now. And yes, it’s still a pretty new trust, because I just decided to give you my full trust yesterday, but I’m committed to it. But now it’s clear that
you’re
the one who can’t trust
me
, even though every single thing I’ve told you is the truth.”

He scoffed, folding his arms across his chiseled chest. “And can you blame me? Can you blame me for not trusting you? You completely went behind my back and blew up a lake, Haley. You went after the Forms yourself with a laser gun, putting yourself and everyone else in this village in very serious danger. Despite the fact that I’d told you repeatedly that I’d handle things myself, and in a way where everyone could stay safe. So, can you blame me for not trusting you right now, tonight?”

I sighed, struggling to maintain eye contact with him. “No, I can’t blame you. I realize what a colossal breach of trust I committed that night. But....” I paused to take a deep breath, thinking. “If you ever want to get back together with me, like I want to get back together with you, you’re going to have to get past that breach of trust, and you’re going to have to give me a second chance.

You’re going to somehow have to make a decision to trust me again, or you’re going to have to make a decision to let me go once and for all. Maybe this is part of what you’ve been struggling with... Why you’ve wanted so much space. Maybe it hasn’t just been that I haven’t trusted you, maybe part of it has been that you just can’t figure out how you can ever trust
me
again.

Which I more than understand, but if you
do
want get to that place where you can trust me again, believe me on this, it’s going to have to be a conscious decision that you make. Because if you
don’t
make that decision—if you just wait and wait for a feeling of trust in me to suddenly magically wash over you or something—well, it probably never will, and we’ll just grow farther and farther apart in the meantime, while I give you more space.

So....” I paused for another deep breath. “Can you make that decision right now, Holden, considering many lives are at stake, especially Ashley’s? Can you decide to trust me, and believe me about everything I told you?”

He turned his gaze away from me, to the side and to the floor, and after a few long moments, it didn’t seem like he was going to answer me.

With my anger flaring once again, I balled my fists, determined not to say something I might regret. “Fine. I can see you’ve made your decision, and it’s
not
one to trust me. But someone’s still gotta save Ashley from drowning out in the ocean, so I hope you’ll excuse me while I try to do just that, alone, right this second.”

With that, I turned and stalked out of his cabin, wondering if I had time to run and wake Cora and Amy at their own cabins, maybe even convincing their husbands to help me save Ashley, too. Like Ashley, I wasn’t that strong of a swimmer, and at night, in the pitch-black waves, I knew I might not be that useful as a rescue swimmer. Still, if nobody else would, I was going to try. I could hardly stand to think about Ashley far out in the dark waves, choking and gasping for air while waiting for help that never arrived.

Once I’d cleared Holden’s porch steps, I broke into a sprint, heading toward the ocean. I figured I’d scope things out and try to see if Hannah and Ashley were on the beach, or if Ashley was in the ocean already. If she wasn’t, I’d punch Hannah’s lights out if I had to in order to stop her from sending Ashley into the water.

If Ashley was already in, but not too far out yet, I’d swim out to rescue her myself. But if she
was
far out, I’d run screaming for Amy, Cora, their husbands, or anyone else who was a strong swimmer. At the same time, I’d be shouting about the imminent wolf attack as well, trying to give everyone at least some advance warning. I wasn’t sure at all that I’d be able to pull off everything I intended to, but I was sure going to try. I figured a girl who’d blown up a lake and had killed several Forms at least had a good shot.

Before I’d sprinted even twenty feet or so away from Holden’s cabin, I heard his voice behind me.

“Wait for me, you little freak.”

I whipped around, gasping. “Holden!”

“I’ve made a decision to trust you again, and we’ll talk more about things later. But right now, I think we probably don’t have a lot of time.”

Just then, we heard a loud cry coming from the direction of the ocean. The cry had sounded like someone trying to yell the word
help
. Ashley was already in. Not a moment after her cry, Holden and I heard a different voice, shouting.

“No, you damned dummy! Farther out! I haven’t even told you to start pretending yet; the wolves won’t be here for another three minutes! Just wait!”

Hannah was somewhere along the darkened shore, though we couldn’t see her, and whether she realized it or not, it seemed that Ashley, wherever she was, was already drowning for real.