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Panic raced through my veins, pushing me to swim harder as I struggled to keep both of our heads above water. The current did most of the work, guiding us into the mouth of the cave as the nightmarish sounds of the ship breaking in half ricocheted off the stone walls.
Finding a foothold in the side of the inlet, I pushed our upper bodies out of the water and dropped the man onto his back on the pebbled beach. I didn’t know what I’d expected to find, but when I finally gazed down at the stranger’s face, mine contorted into a silent wail.
He was dead.
And he was the most beautiful corpse I’d ever seen.
Even with nothing more than the ambient firelight reflecting off the water, I could tell that the smooth skin covering his high cheekbones and square jaw was drained of all color.
That his full, unbreathing lips were as purple as a deep bruise.
That his closed eyelids, rimmed in thick black lashes, didn’t so much as flutter.
And that the water streaming down the side of his face was red instead of clear.
“No!” I shouted, giving his shoulder a shove. “No! Wake up!”
I slammed my fists down on his unbreathing chest. “Wake up! Please!”
Again and again, I pounded on the hard muscle above his cold, dead heart. A strike for every person I’d lost. For every person I’d been too late or too weak or too afraid to save.
Ma.
Odin.
Sheila.
Da.
Him.
“Why?” I screamed, my voice cracking along with my mind as I grabbed his jacket with both hands. “Why are you doing this to me?”
I didn’t know who I was yelling at, and I didn’t know what else to do, but I knew that accepting another loss simply wasn’t an option. So, in a sudden act of desperation, I threw myself forward, slammed my mouth over his, and blew.
The moment our lips touched, a warm, giddy golden glow seeped into the marrow of my bones. It spread through my body, lighting everything in its path. It turned me on, made me hum. I felt like a neon sign that had been plugged in for the very first time. My fragile, forgotten, hollow soul now sang with life, radiating heat and vibrant color.
I exhaled every bit of my wonder and confusion and pain and need through our sealed lips, and as soon as the pilot’s lungs expanded under my fisted hands, he jerked away from me, rolling onto his side and heaving a bellyful of seawater onto the pebbled ground.
I laughed in relief as he coughed and gasped, a tingly rush of joy dancing over my damp skin. His life felt like a gift from God, just for me—a consolation after so much death.
Until I noticed that the jacket of his uniform was hanging halfway off, and underneath, staining the crisp blue-and-white striped shirt below, was a massive puddle of blood.
Dread slithered up my spine and coiled around my heart.
Not because of the blood.
But because of the stripes.
I’d been watching the Irish military on the news for the last year while they battled England for control of Northern Ireland, and none of their uniforms had ever looked like that. Especially not their fighter pilots. They wore dark green jumpsuits. Always.
This man wasn’t my salvation. My glimmer of sunshine in the midst of a storm.
He was the goddamn lightning.
I recoiled from him so fast that I lost my foothold and slipped back into the inlet. Swimming backward to get away from him, I didn’t stop until my shoulder hit the opposite wall.
What had I done?
