Page 39 of Shipwrecked

“It was a freak weather event, Seán. And I know everyone’s looking a little scruffy, but we’re all okay.” Except Seán, whose shoulder is still unusable, and Mary, who’s got more wrong with her ankle than a sprain. Jules mentioned Mathieu losing weight, but Jules has dropped the most of anyone. “Given the circumstances,” I add. We could have had fatalities.

Seán picks at his sling. “Even if we get back and it’s ruled an accident, I’m not sure if this is what I want to do with my life. Every course we took was about being responsible for people’s safety, and I thought I understood what that meant. But now I really get it. It’s more pressure than I realised.”

“Seán, these trips are meant to be about making sure nobody goes overboard and teaching them how to snorkel. We’re not survivalists. But yes, I agree, I didn’t realise the true weight of our responsibility until this trip either.” It’s heavy and stifling and makes it hard to breathe. “Wouldn’t it be better to have someone who knows that responsibility doing trips? Better than someone who never learned that lesson. You can think about it all later, once we’re rescued. I’m sure your dad will have good advice.”

I look behind me.

“I’m going to go before Jules slips away from Mary.” I double-check the straps on my life jacket. I hate swimming in them, but it will help preserve my energy. Which, if there’s a current that pulls me away from shore, I’m going to need. I know there’s risk to this, but I’m strong.

“You know the only reason I’m letting you go instead of me is—”

“Even if your shoulder was in good shape, I wouldn’t let you,” I reply. “No more than I’d let Jules make that swim.”

“I’m in charge,” Seán points out.

Our eyes meet.

“I’m in charge of safety,” I say.

“You’re so full of it sometimes.”

“It’s what you hired me for.”

“You can be so stubborn.” Seán shakes his head. “Be careful, alright?”

“Of course.”

I step into the water. “See you in five.”

The beach slopes gently down until I’m past my depth, and then I’m swimming. I pace myself, keeping a close eye on my progress. There’s a slight, constant drag to one side, but I can compensate for it.

Roughly half a kilometre later, I’m at the yacht, my shoulders burning.

The water is clear enough that I can see I was right in my guess. The yacht is lodged into a shelf. I circle. The hull is cracked open. There’s no chance it’ll ever float again. Since it made it through a few days of a storm, I’m guessing—hoping—that it’s stable.

“If you boost me—”

I yelp and jerk around in a slosh of water. Floating an arm’s length away is Jules. Jules. “You cannot be serious,” I growl.

Never has a man looked less repentant.

He turns his attention to the yacht. “Or we can just climb up from the front. Do you think our weight might destabilise it if we do that, Mr Safety Expert?”

Jules swims past me. I follow him, swimming, then climbing up the slick boards, holding the side rail for balance. There’s a tilt to the yacht; only a third of the deck is dry. Jules walks around the cabin, getting to the top part—the back end of the yacht—that is sticking up.

He has one of the life jackets on. His mop of blond hair is stuck to his forehead and temples. He turns that unrepentant look on me as I catch up with him. “We had an agreement,” Jules reminds me.

I catch his arm, get a firm hold of his jaw, and push him with my body into the cabin wall. I bring my mouth down on his, kissing him hard.

Jules gasps in surprise. Hands shoot up to clutch my sides, fingers curling into my wet shirt. I bend my neck to get the angle I want and get my tongue into his mouth.

Jules trembles, the surprised tension sinking out of him. He goes pliant in my arms. He tips back his head to better meet my mouth, murmurs something incomprehensible, and kisses me back. The life jackets act as an infuriating barrier, and I rip through the straps on Jules’s first, then mine, without ever breaking the kiss.

I drop them and press flush against him, grinding my cock into his abdomen. I shove my thigh between his legs. He’s hard too.

When his hands start shaking, I break the kiss, letting him gasp in ragged breaths.

“Such a shorty,” I mutter as I rub against him. “What the fuck am I supposed to do with you?” Seizing him by the hips, I turn him around, crowding him against the wall again, humping him through our shorts. Jules groans as if he’s the one rubbing his cock against an ass.