Wanderlust by Skye Warren Page A

survive—just not me.
    “ Evie,” he said in a
cajoling tone. “It’s amazing. Trust me.”
    “ I don’t trust you,” I
said automatically, knowing it to be a lie.
    “ It feels like
flying.”
    “ Not very well, I guess,
since you fall.”
    “ Yeah, but first you
soar.”
    Just enjoy this. “I can’t swim.”
    He was surprised. “Not at
all?”
    “ I have some vague
memories of swimming at the Y as a kid. Nothing recent.”
    “ Well, I’m glad you told
me that before I pushed you.”
    My eyes widened. “You’re not
serious.”
    He shrugged. Damn, he had a good poker
face. I couldn’t tell if he’d been joking.
    “ Look,” he said. “You
don’t have to do it if you don’t want to, but it’d be fun. I think
you’d like it.”
    His straightforward words cut through
the fear that held me back. Yes, it would be fun. Yes, I’d like it.
This was exactly the kind of thing I’d wanted to do but never had
the means or the courage to actually do. Now, with Hunter, anything
was possible.
    “ Let’s do this,” I said,
feeling terrified and wondrous. “Count of three?”
    He thought for a second. “Let me go
down first. It’ll be easier for me to help you if you need me to if
I’m not also under water.”
    “ Okay. Right.” God, this
was crazy. I was
crazy.
    “ Just hold your breath
before you go under, and then kick your way to the top. I’ll take
it from there.”
    I nodded, unable to speak.
    He leaned forward, almost
there.
    “ Wait.”
    He looked back. “Cold
feet?”
    “ No, just…is this
legal?”
    He laughed. “Fuck no.”
    Then he jumped, sending a shout that
echoed through the trees around us. He disappeared into the mist,
and then I heard a splash directly beneath us. A few seconds later,
his head emerged farther away from the falls, hair darkened by the
water and glistening.
    “ Come on, sunshine.” The
words were indistinct, but I could read them on his
lips.
    Oh shit. No, no, no. What if I died?
What if we were caught? Which was a stupid thing to worry about,
all things considered, but my good-girl tendencies had been well
drilled into me.
    But the thing that decided
me was that I couldn’t not do it. I couldn’t walk away from this challenge,
from this chance to finally live.
    To soar.
    I jumped.
    I understood what he’d
meant about flying. It felt like the air caught me and lifted me
even as I drew ever closer to the shore. My vision was suffused
with white spray, as if I were bursting through a cloud. The water
came up impossibly fast and yet slow enough to watch with wonder. I
sucked in a breath and plunged under water. For a second, I
panicked— can’t breathe, can’t
move . But then I righted myself and found
my bearings. A few strong kicks carried me to the
surface.
    Hunter was right there waiting for me.
He must have swum closer to me while I’d fallen. He grabbed me to
him, laughing.
    “ You did it, sunshine. I’m
so proud of you.”
    I wiped the water from my eyes,
laughing too. “You didn’t think I would.”
    “ Nope, not even a little.
You proved me wrong, though.”
    I looked around, awareness returning
to me. “We’re…”
    “ Underneath the falls,” he
confirmed.
    I wasn’t sure where exactly I’d
fallen—maybe directly in the stream—but he’d drifted us behind the
falls. There was a large cavern here between the curtain of water
and the rockface that held them up. A steady stream of water
pattered on my face, loose spray from the falls.
    I became aware of his body, too. The
weight of him, the heft as he supported me in the water. The hands
that clasped my waist. Neither of us had removed our clothing and
though my light sundress was comfortable enough for swimming, he
was wearing jeans and a T-shirt.
    “ You’re a little bit
crazy, you know that?”
    He grinned. “Just a little? I’ll have
to work harder.”
    His words tumbled into place in my
mind, solving a riddle I already understood. He wanted to be this
way, crazy and mean and