Ten by Gretchen McNeil Page A

Check. Storm of the century? Check. Certain death at the hand of the rocks on the beach? Check and mate. Just like Nathan’s painfully racist joke last night: This was how horror movies started.
    Up ahead, the walkways turned abruptly. The path was slanted at a precarious angle, and Meg watched T.J. hydroplane a few inches before he caught his balance. “Careful,” he shouted. “It’s a bit—”
    Too late. As soon as Meg’s rain boots hit the slanted planks, they lost their grip on the wood. Meg slid down the walkway, totally out of control, and pitched forward toward the rail. She saw a flash of the hillside barreling toward her and pictured her body careening headfirst down the cliff. She reached her hands out to brace herself against the railing, and prayed the rickety wood would stop her. No such luck. The wooden railing gave way and Meg squeezed her eyes shut. This was it.
    But instead of falling, Meg felt a strong arm around her waist. With a grunt, T.J. hauled her body away from the edge and spun around, pulling them both back to safety. They slid against the large tree that supported the walkway on the inside of the hill, and Meg leaned her body into his as they stood there panting.
    “You okay?” he asked. His arms were still around her waist.
    “Yeah,” Meg said. Her heart pounded in her chest, though whether it was from the near-death experience or from feeling T.J.’s body pressed against her own she wasn’t entirely sure.
    “That was close.” He gazed over her shoulder toward the bend in the path. “Someone should really fix that.”
    Meg didn’t even want to think about what would have happened if T.J. hadn’t been there.
    With his arm still around her, T.J. eased her down to the next platform that wound back around the hillside. Slowly, carefully, they continued on toward the boathouse, until T.J. suddenly paused.
    “Shit,” he said.
    Meg looked up at him. “What?”
    “There were some flashlights by the patio door,” he said. “I forgot to grab them.” He looked down toward the boathouse, then back up to the house past the dangerous bend in the path as if weighing his options. “Shit,” he said again. “We’ll need them. Stay here?”
    Stay on a hillside by herself in the middle of nowhere? After almost plummeting to her death? Um, no. She started to protest, but T.J. didn’t give her the opportunity. Faster than Meg could react, he reached down and gave her a quick kiss on the lips, then whirled around and headed back up the hill.
    Meg felt dizzy. Had he just kissed her? Had T. J. Fletcher just kissed her ?
    Several thoughts filled Meg’s head simultaneously.
    Number one—she was quite possibly going to pass out from joy.
    Number two—had he meant to kiss her? Had it been a mistake? No, that was silly. How could it possibly have been a mistake unless he was trying to lick something off her face?
    Number three—was there any way Minnie might have seen them?
    The last was the most disturbing. Meg blinked through the onslaught of rain and craned her head to try and get a view of the house. She could just make out the line of windows along the enclosed patio, and even then it was just a glimpse of glittering white through the trees. No, she was safe. Unless Minnie had followed them to the boathouse. Meg stepped up to the higher walkway and tried to follow the path back to the house, but the angle of the hillside and the thickening trees made it impossible to see more than a hundred feet behind her.
    Good. If she couldn’t see the house, Minnie couldn’t see her.
    Meg leaned back against a tree for support. The rain was falling in sheets, so fast and so heavy that she couldn’t differentiate the individual drops anymore. Every few seconds the wind would shift, giving Meg a face full of rain. The storm was fierce, unrelenting, and Meg could barely keep her eyes open in the face of its violence.
    She squinted down at the rocks below. The waves crashed against the rocky island so