Page 69 of Corrupted Lies

Chapter

Sixteen

October 20th

2:20 P.M.

“There doesn’t seem to be any animals on the island,” Alannah said as Jake held out his hand and helped her climb up and over a fallen tree trunk blocking their path.

“Birds, probably rats, snakes, insects?—”

“Okay, okay, okay,” Alannah cut him off, shuddering and scrunching up her face, making him laugh.

“I know, you're not a fan of bugs.”

“Or snakes, or rats,” she added.

“Spiders are your least favorite if I remember correctly,” he teased. It was strange, but ever since he and Alannah had had sex, things felt even easier between them. It had always been easy with her, they’d gotten along from that very first day, and she knew him in a way that not even Jax and his stepbrothers knew.

But now it had changed again.

There was a lightness inside him that hadn't been there before. She always brought light into his life, helped keep theanger and darkness at bay, but this light wasn't just in his life it was inside him somehow.

Like she had transferred a little flame of it to him.

Now that flame sat inside him, and it was growing. The anger had abated even more, and even though he was afraid that he would fail her and not get her off the island, there was peace there as well.

It was weird but in a good way.

However, he was doing his best not to examine it too deeply. They were still trapped there, and even if they got off the island and got back home, that wouldn't eliminate the danger his family faced. The future was uncertain, but in the utter peace and quiet of the island, that didn't seem to matter. Here was for living in the moment, and what happened after that would happen whether he spent his time worrying about it or not.

“Did you see one? A spider?” Alannah shrieked, abruptly yanking backward and almost sending them falling down to the ground.

Laughing, he managed to keep their balance and jumped down the other side of the large tree trunk and then lifted her down beside him. When he went to keep walking, Jake found himself held in place by the expression on Alannah’s face.

“What?” he asked self-consciously.

“You never laugh like that at home. You're always so in control, or being all grumpy, but here … you're different. Freer. Lighter.”

Maybe she wasn't the only one who needed to learn how to set themselves free from the bonds of the past. Jake knew he was always going to feel some measure of anger at his father for not making any attempts to change his lifestyle when he became a single dad, and to all the relatives who made him and Jax feel like a burden. There would always be anger about his dad being set up as a traitor, and everything that was done to his stepmom.

But he was starting to realize that the anger didn't have to rule him.

There was a way for that side of him to coexist with a side of himself that found moments of joy, not just found them but actually went looking for and embraced them.

Anger didn't have to be his defining characteristic.

“I feel different,” he admitted. “Lighter. Freer.”

“It’s this place,” she said, looking around them at the beautiful scenery. “There’s something about it that just allows you to let go.”

“It’s because there’s nothing else, we’ve been stripped down of all the things that we’re usually surrounded with, left naked and bare to the truths we run from.”

A blush crept up Alannah’s cheeks, and because he knew her so well, Jake knew exactly where her mind had gone. His best friend was unlocking a side of herself she hadn't even known existed. A side of her that was made for him. She loved his dominance last night, loved her punishment, loved being called a good girl, loved letting him take control so she felt safe to let go and feel rather than think.

Every moment he spent with her like that was taking his feelings for her and twisting them a little more. What were they going to look like by the time he found a way to get them off the island and back home?

If they did get back home, would the spell be broken?

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