Heart Bones - Colleen Hoover Page 0,63

stop.

But he does, thanks to the sound of an engine in the distance.

He immediately pulls away when we both hear it. There’s a truck down the beach headed in this direction.

Samson lifts the straps of my bikini and reties them around my neck. I groan, and maybe even pout. We make our way back to the shore, even though the truck turned around and headed back in the other direction before it reached us.

We’re both quiet as we pack up our things into the golf cart. The sun is beginning to set on the other side of the peninsula, casting a red and purple glow across the sky. The wind from the ocean has picked up and I look over at Samson for a moment. He’s facing the breeze, his eyes closed. There’s a calmness about him right now, and that calmness spreads to me.

His moods are contagious. I’m glad he seems to only have one or two. I’ve never felt as stable as I have since I started spending all my hours with him.

“Have you ever closed your eyes and just listened to the ocean?” he asks. He opens his eyes and turns to face me.

“No.”

He faces the water again and closes his eyes. “Try it.”

I close my eyes and blow out a breath. Samson’s hand finds mine and we just stand there together, in silence, facing the water.

I listen for what he’s hearing.

Seagulls.

Waves.

Peace.

Hope.

I don’t know how long we stand here because I become consumed by the meditation. I don’t know that I’ve ever stood in one spot with my eyes closed and just let go of my thoughts.

I let them go. All of them.

Eventually, it’s like the world grows completely silent.

I’m pulled out of that silence when I feel Samson kiss the back of my head. I open my eyes and inhale a deep breath.

And that’s the end of that. Dinner, a make-out session, and a stress reliever. What a date.

“Where’s your dog?” he asks as we start to climb into the golf cart.

I look around, but don’t see Pepper Jack Cheese anywhere. I call for him, but he doesn’t come running. My heart picks up a little and that doesn’t go unnoticed.

Samson calls for him.

I start to get worried because we’re a long way from our houses, and if we don’t find him, he may not be able to make his way back.

“Maybe he’s behind the dunes,” Samson suggests. We both make our way over to the high rows of sand. Samson grabs my hands and helps me up the dune. When we reach the top and look on the other side of it, I’m immediately relieved to see P.J.

“Oh, thank God,” I say, scaling down the other side of the dune.

“What’s he doing?” Samson asks, walking behind me. P.J. is about ten feet away, digging furiously in the ground.

“Maybe he found some crabs.”

When we reach him, I freeze. Whatever he found, it’s not a crab. It looks like... “Samson?” I whisper. “What is that?”

Samson drops to his knees and starts wiping dust off what looks like bones in the shape of a hand.

I pull P.J. away, but he fights to get out of my grip. Samson is now digging, moving sand away, revealing more and more of what is obviously a human arm.

“Oh, my God,” I whisper. I cover my mouth with my hand. P.J. slips out of my grip and gets away from me. He rushes back to Samson’s side, but Samson pushes him away.

“Sit,” he commands the dog.

P.J. sits, but whimpers.

I lower myself to my knees next to Samson and watch as he continues to uncover more of the bones.

“Maybe you shouldn’t touch it,” I suggest.

Samson says nothing. He just keeps digging until he reaches the shoulder joint of the skeleton. There’s still a shirt attached to it. It’s a red-checkered shirt, faded and torn. Samson touches a piece of it and it falls apart in his hands.

“Do you think it’s an entire body?”

Samson still doesn’t answer me. He just falls back onto his haunches and stares at the ground.

“I’ll go get my phone and call the police.” I start to get up, but Samson grabs my wrist. I look at him and his eyes are pleading.

“Don’t.”

“What?” I shake my head. “We have to report this.”

“Don’t, Beyah,” he says again. I’ve never seen his expression so unyielding. “This is the guy I was telling you about. Rake. I recognize his shirt.” He looks back down at what he’s just uncovered. “The police will just