*Shelby*The jet skis motor filled my ears, and the cool breeze whipped against my face. I felt the sunlight on my eyes before I opened them. One side of my body was cold from being wet and exposed to the wind, and the other side of my body was warm against Michael. It took me a few seconds to remember exactly where I was.I came to just as Michael pulled the jet ski up to the side of the boat; the crew was waiting on the swim deck. One of the pool boys grabbed my arms to hoist me back onto the yacht. He settled me down on the swim deck, and I watched the blood pooling around my injured foot.Michael was at my side in seconds. He ripped his shirt off and wrapped it around my foot, securing it by tying the sleeves together in a makeshift tourniquet.“Is that okay? It needs to be tight enough to stop the bleeding but not to the point of pain,” Michael said, concern knitting his brows together.“No, it’s okay,” I answered, holding myself up on my elbows trying to
*Shelby*On our last day at sea, the water was extremely choppy and made us all a little seasick. I spent most of the day by the pool, watching the water slosh from one side of the deck to the other. The motion of the pool matched the motion of my stomach, and I wasn’t the only one walking around the decks with a slightly green hue on my face.We were all overjoyed when the yacht docked at Michael’s beach house in the Bahamas that next morning. The sun was rising over the top of the mansion and made the white stone glow as if it was an answer to all of our prayers. The swaying palm trees colored the pictures of my memories of this place as if they had turned slightly gray with time, but as I stared out at the land from the deck, everything came back to me in the perfect colors.“Shelby, this place is absolutely unreal. You really stayed here before?” Lin asked me, coming to stand next to me on the deck as the crew dropped the anchor. “It does seem unreal, doe
*Shelby*The sun started setting as Lin, Aubrey, and I finally got up from our lounge chairs under the beach cabana. We’d spent the entire afternoon talking about old times, drinking cocktails, and eating our body weight in fresh fruit.“I don’t know how we’re possibly going to fit another bite of food in after that lunch,” Aubrey said, rubbing her stomach.“Oh, I promise you’ll be able to find the room as soon as we sit down for dinner. I’ve discovered you actually have a second stomach on vacation. It’s always right there, ready to go just when you think you’ll never be able to eat again,” I said.Lin and Aubrey laughed at my comment, and we all linked arms with each other as we made our way back up to the mansion. Our feet continued to sink into the dry sand as we walked, making the journey back feel so much harder than our walk down to the cabana.“Where have you three pretty ladies been all afternoon?” Giani asked, sitting next to the pool with a glass of
*Shelby*I woke up late the next morning, having fallen asleep in Michael’s arms after we showered together. I still felt some sand between the strands of my hair, but last night was so magical that I didn’t mind it. That was until I heard Michael speaking on the phone in the bathroom.“It’s a party, Calvin. Bring whomever you want.”I snuck up to him and snatched him at the waist, startling him.“I have to go. See you tonight,” he said to the phone, setting it on the counter by the sink, and hugging me.“What party are you talking about?” I asked, ruffling his hair to see if it was in the same situation as mine. No sand there, though.“I thought it would be a good idea to have some of my colleagues and friends over. I want everyone to know about our official engagement. The people I like, anyway.” Michael kissed me on the forehead. “If it’s alright with you, of course.”“How formal will it be?” I said. “I should let Aubrey and Lin know as soon as possible. They’ll kil
*Shelby*When my body collided against the dock’s wooden beams, I was sure I’d broken something. But that was nothing compared to the pain of being dragged over them by this masked man. The rough planks scraped my legs as I tried to stand and get myself free from his grip.“Stop! What are you doing?” I screamed, and the man turned toward me and smacked me in the head, quickly inserting a piece of cloth into my mouth and tying the ends to the back of my head.My head began to throb in the place he’d hit me, and I felt him reaching around my body with a prickly material.It was rope, the one used to tie up the boats. With a strong twist that pressed my hands together, he had me tied up. He then pushed me back to the ground, tying up my legs.I wiggled and thrashed around, trying to make it hard for him to move me, but it was useless. He was so much stronger than me.As if I weighed no more than a sack of clothes, he slung me over his shoulders and roughly tossed me onto a boa
*Michael*A splash of cold water suddenly brought me to my senses again, and I was flooded with the memory of what had happened before I got hit in the head.I’d gone down to the boathouse because a waiter told me there was some issue with the electricity powering the speakers, and I had been attacked out of nowhere. It took me one or two seconds to gather my wits as I processed what had happened, and terror crept into me when I realized the situation before me.I was in the middle of the ocean, and Shelby was there, too. I felt a sickening sensation in the pit of my stomach knowing she had somehow ended up here because of me. Standing in front of us, near the bow, I saw none other than Blaine, looking at me with an amused look on his face.“What the f*ck is going on?” I said, tugging at my tied arms and legs. The look on Shelby’s horrified face told me enough, but my suspicions were suddenly confirmed when I saw what was lying at Blaine’s feet.
*Shelby*I shook violently as I scrambled to look over the side of the boat, only to see the water gurgling in the place where Blaine and Michael had fallen in.“MICHAEL!” I screamed, still trying to loosen the ropes tying my hands together. The desperation with which I twisted and pulled worked, and I managed to set them free. I quickly untied my legs and was about to jump in the water when I heard splashes and froze. If that was Blaine…In a split second, I saw that it was Michael’s arm that appeared on the side of the boat, holding on to the metal rail. “Michael!” I screamed again, reaching out to him. Pulling at his soaking shirt, I helped him up, and he collapsed on the boat. Pinkish stains covered his formerly white shirt, and I patted him frantically as he coughed and spit water.“Did he shoot you!? Are you alright?!” I cried out, mumbling more questions until he finally shook his head.He took several deep breaths as he struggled to si
*Shelby*Officer Walker drove us back to the house, which was also surrounded by police cars. As soon as we stopped at the entrance, Lin and Aubrey ran out, still in the clothes they had been wearing to the party.“Shelby!” Aubrey cried out, running up to the car and grabbing me the second I opened the door. I was so happy to see them, and it wasn’t until they were all over me that it seemed like an enormous weight had been lifted from my shoulders. She and Shelby hugged me, and we became a tangled mass of arms and hair, bawling our eyes out. When we’d calmed down a bit, they started firing a barrage of questions at me. “We went looking for you…”“And no one could find Michael…”“Then the police came!”“What happened?”Jerrick stepped between us and gave me a one-armed hug. “We’re all so grateful you’re okay,” he said. “But Shelby needs to go change. We should let her breathe a little.”Michael joined us too, and together all of us w