Chapter 5

Sunrise—it was the first sunrise she’d watched since the one on the lifeboat. Marissa couldn’t find names for all the shades of blue and orange, nor for the way the ocean seemed to grow larger and larger until the rim of the sun finally limited the end of the world.

Linda was sleeping, still, and Marissa’s gaze traveled from the simple miracle of the sunrise to the beauty of the woman next to her.

In the early light of dawn, she could study Linda at last, memorizing the sweep of her thick, dark eyelashes and the relaxed curve of her full, rose-tinted lips. She slept in a tangle of sheet, one side of her body completely exposed, from the long, tanned, smooth leg, to the deep curve of her hip, to the narrow sweep of her waist. A bare arm wrapped itself around a pillow, which hid breasts Marissa now knew were firm and rounded. The long arm led her gaze to the broad, muscled shoulders, brushed with the orange of the sunrise.

Linda was beautiful. Separately and whole, she was more beautiful than Marissa had realized. Baggy shorts and boxy shirts hadn’t hidden her strength and stature but they had disguised an artist’s fantasy of the perfect female form. Sand and sweat had masked the smooth clarity of her skin and after showers Linda had always been at least partially dressed when she emerged from the bathroom.

Somehow, Linda’s surface to bones-deep beauty had escaped her. Marissa wasn’t sure why. If she’d realized she might not have flirted so much, might not have really believed that anything could happen between a goddess-model and an overweight, underfit computer nerd. But something had. Something meaningful, caught between the words and moans, had happened.

The tint of Linda’s shoulders lost some of the orange blush as the sunlight steadied into its yellow glory. Marissa resisted the urge to wake Linda with a kiss and soft brush of fingertips where they had been so wanted last night. Yes, Linda was beautiful, but Marissa was missing the laughter in the expressive topaz-brown eyes—the laughter and her own reflection there.

Ten minutes ticked slowly by. The sun gained its foothold in the sky and the ever-changing light illuminated new angles and curves in Linda’s face. The moment grew and the feeling that she might never experience anything so peaceful and magical again became painful. There was no such still place in reality. Marissa knew that the moment would end.

She began her journey home today.

She couldn’t go wherever Linda was going—she had a life and a company and friends. And she knew that this moment in the sun would not last forever. It lived until Linda stirred, until someone’s stomach growled and the need for change, to move forward in the day, arose.

The voice of inner pragmatism reminded her that she could not stop time. She didn’t try to argue with that reality. The only thing she could control was how this moment ended.