feet don’t hit ground. Instead, the water buoys me up and flips me around. White foam engulfs me, and beyond that is darkness.
Up. Which way is up?
The moon will show me the way. I arch my neck, wildly searching for a ray of light. Nothing. I can’t see more than six inches in front of me. I claw forward and kick my feet. If my pathetic maneuvering changes my position, I don’t notice.
I need a breath. My lungs begin to burn. I imagine them expanding like overfilled balloons, stretching bigger and bigger until pop!
I’m going to die here. After all Logan’s done for me, I’m going to drown, tucked into the river’s watery sheets like a long forgotten doll.
Suddenly a vise clamps onto my feet and jerks. My body sails through the water, twisting and turning as it fights the current’s pull. And then, air. Sweet, beautiful air. I take a deep breath. And then another. But the vise isn’t finished. It claps across my chest and pins my arms to my sides.
I thrash against the hold, grappling, kicking, squirming. Anything to get free.
“Calm down!” Logan yells in my ear. “You’ll drown us both!”
He repeats this twice before the words sink in. I let my limbs go limp, although I’m still sputtering for breath.
“You okay?” he says.
“Yeah,” I gasp.
Something sharp jabs me in the middle of my back. His hip bone. He’s on his side, balancing me against his body. And then we’re moving, slicing through the waves, as he swims with one arm and two legs.
The glass and steel building is already a craggy rock in the distance, and if my pursuers stand on the roof, watching us, they’re nothing but a blur of dots. I think I hear the faint echo of the alarm, but all around us is water. Nothing but water.
Logan Russell is dragging me to shore. Saving my life, in every sense of the word.
That’s my last coherent thought before I pass out.
When I wake, I’m in a boat, shaded from the sun by a blanket rigged up by a couple of sticks. A backpack lies under my head, and Logan is in front of me, pulling the oars with powerful, rhythmic strokes.
His shirt is off. For more than a moment, I stare. His muscles glisten under a sheen of sweat and sunblock. A thick white cream is smeared across his nose, obstructing my perfect view of his face. A sudden urge to wipe the stuff away washes over me. I’m reminded of the times I used to sneak into his swim practices. He always had time to help a teammate with his stroke, always left the best swim lane for someone else, even if he was the first one in the pool. That’s Logan—generous to a fault. That’s why it killed me when he stopped talking to me. It was so uncharacteristic.
He glances up now, and I drop my eyes. My stomach darts around like a hummingbird, and I’m intensely aware that each pull of the oar brings his knuckles inches from my knees. It’s almost painful the way the heat threatens to dance across my body before fading away as he pulls the oar back into himself.
Oh, we’ve touched. In the last twenty-four hours, I’ve touched him more than any other boy in my life. But those circumstances were extenuating. Now that we’re not breaking out of detainment, now that I’m no longer under the influence of Dr. Bellows’ fumes, we’re back to the girl and boy we used to be—the ones who barely spoke, much less came within an arm’s length of each other.
“How long did I sleep?” I ask in order to fill the silence.
“A few hours. I didn’t want to wake you. You looked like you needed your rest.”
His words are neutral, but his gaze is too direct. In the harsh sunlight, he must see the stamp Limbo leaves on all its inmates. The pale, ashen skin. Bruises like thumbprints under my eyes. Hair that hasn’t been washed in days.
So. Not. Attractive.
Flushing, I study the scenery as it whizzes by. The raging current has turned into the placid waters of a lazy river. Gone is the imposing cliff, with the metallic spirals and jagged towers rising above it, architectural feats dreamed up by Eden City’s most enterprising minds. We’ve even passed the suburbs surrounding the city, with their residential homes and athletic fields.
Instead, I see color. Brilliant reds, sunset oranges, emerald greens. Every color reflected in Jessa’s falling leaves, and