Page 1 of Sunburned

Prologue

The shivers that racked my body were not from cold, but shock.

I wasn’t cold. Far from it. This was St. Barth’s in March—sunny and dry, a gentle swell from the east. Great visibility beneath the clear water, the current not too strong. Perfect conditions for diving.

My hands trembled as I wrapped my towel tighter around my waist and gripped the railing of the yacht, my eyes fixed on the Search and Rescue boat tied to the mooring ball closest to the giant rock that marked the edge of the reef. The others huddled in pairs, watching the surface of the water for signs, their heads bent together, murmuring, crying. I did not know them well enough to share in their grief, if that’s what it was.

We didn’t know. We didn’t know yet. But we would soon. There was only so much time a person could stay down there before the tank ran out. The window was closing, if it hadn’t already.

My hair dripped seawater, cool against my sun-warmed skin. A bird glided on the breeze, then plunged to the water, coming up with a silver fish wriggling in its beak.

This wasn’t my first encounter with earth-shattering tragedy, but that didn’t make it any less shocking. Though the out-of-bodysensation may have been familiar, it was not comforting watching myself from above, both here and not here, feeling and unfeeling, the scene vivid and distant. Surreal.

A disturbance on the surface drew my eye to the water near the back of the rescue boat. A head bobbing in the waves, black against the reflection of the sun on the sea, and then another. Three more at once. The five who’d gone down. They were struggling with something odd-shaped and heavy, a silver tank still strapped to its back.

I leaned over the railing and hurled into the glinting water.

Part I

Chapter 1

I’d said no. Of course I’d said no.

I’d never wanted to see Tyson Dale again, much less spend his birthday with him at his compound in St. Barth’s. And yet here I was on the tarmac at Miami Executive Airport, his sleek jet looming above me in the noonday sun like a dog sent to fetch a toy for its master.

It did not escape me that I was the toy.

The driver had only just popped the trunk of the chauffeured Suburban that Tyson had dispatched to collect me from my house this morning when a uniformed attendant appeared and took possession of my roller bag. “Is this everything, Ms. Collet?”

I’d been sure I’d grossly overpacked for what was to be only a five-day trip, but his question made me wonder whether I should have brought more. Regardless, it was too late now. “That’s it. Thank you,” I said.

Though I’d already hugged them goodbye, my ten-year-old boys bounded out of the SUV like a pair of puppies, salivating over the sight of the aircraft, and I suddenly understood why they had insisted on accompanying me to the airfield.

“Can we go on it, Mom?”

“Please?”

“Pleeease, Mom?” they pleaded in unison.

Their identical faces were like mine, sharp-featured with a straight nose, though their lips were wide while mine were bow-shaped, their eyes brown to my blue. They countered their indistinguishable appearance with opposite style, Benji the more clean-cut of the two, his nearly black hair spiky and short, while Alex’s long, straight mop fell in his dark eyes, but their mannerisms mirrored each other’s, and they often spoke as one, as they did now.

“Pleeease?” their voices chorused again.

They’d shot up so much this year that I didn’t have to bend to look them in the eye as I placed a hand on each of their shoulders, shaking my head. “We talked about this.”

But the pretty stewardess at the bottom of the airstair had different ideas. “We have plenty of time until wheels up if they’d like to explore the plane,” she said, smiling sweetly at the boys.

They whooped and high-fived, sprinting up the stairs before I could so much as protest, the stewardess on their heels. “Is it okay if I give them juice? It’s fresh-squeezed mango, pineapple, and orange. Tyson’s children’s favorite.”

Tyson’s children.I was startled to hear the words come out of her mouth, but of course he was the father of two sons by his ex-wife and a daughter by another woman. A lot had happened in the decade since we’d last seen each other. Well, a lot had happened to him.

Less had happened to me.

“Sure,” I acquiesced, forcing a smile.

“You were right,” Rosa said, getting out of the car to stand beside me in the shadow of the jet. “We should’ve asked for more money.”

“Told you.”

---