Liv nods. She stares into the darkness, her eyebrows drawn in thought. “Do you think it’s about us?” she asks after a moment.

“Yes.”

“You do?”

I shrug. “You’re part of me, Olivia. Anything that involves you is always about us.”

Liv’s mouth curves into a smile. She brushes her thumb over my bottom lip. Maybe the sand came from me? I don’t know, and the way she’s staring at me, it’s all I can do to keep my breathing even.

“I like it when you call me love,” she says.

“What? I’ve never called you that.” Lie. I do it all the time. “Oh, you mean earlier? I said Liv. You just have terrible hearing.”

She jabs me in the ribs.

“Ouch!”

“What was that?” Liv says. “I couldn’t hear you.” She digs her fingers into my side again.

“You asked for it now.” I twist away, pulling her with me, and the battle begins. We roll over each other, tumbling, wrestling, tangling in the sand until my hands find her hands and my lips find her lips and then we slow. We slow and slow and slow until we move together as one.

Chapter 2

 2 

What do you think they’re talking about?” I ask as I circle back to Perry.

We’re on sentry duty on the eastern post. Our lookout spot is under the shade of an oak tree at the top of a knoll. The warm spring morning has given way to a hot afternoon. I’ve created a small track of trampled grass around the tree, where Perry sits. My gaze moves to the woodland to the south. Liv and Vale are out there somewhere.

Perry plucks a blade of grass from his mouth. “You know that’s the twentieth time you’ve asked me that.”

“I didn’t know that. Should I stop?”

“Not if you’re trying to drive me mad.” Perry puts the blade of grass between his teeth and gives me a wide grin. “You’re close.”

“It would help if you said something besides I don’t know. Give me something, Per. Anything at all.” I point to the ground. “What do you think they’re saying this very second?”

“This very second?”

“Yes. Right now.”

Perry’s gaze moves across the green hills to the south. “I think it’s the second before one of them says something. Maybe they’re taking a moment to think. Maybe they’re breathing—I hope they’re doing that.”

I lift my hands. “Never mind.” I go back to pacing circles around the oak tree until my thoughts overflow again. “But maybe he isn’t going to do what we all think he’s going to do.”