Cora Carmack - Finding It

He looked then at the restaurant, and I saw the confirmation on his face.

Fan-fucking-tastic.

“We’re lost.”

“We’re not … well …” He consulted his map again, twisting it in few different directions and said, “We might be a little lost.”

“This is your idea of adventure? I thought soldiers were supposed to be good at navigation.”

“I have a solution,” he said.

My backpack was starting to look like a very tempting chair, but I convinced myself to stay standing. I placed my hands on my hips and said, “Let’s hear it.”

He crossed to me with the map in his hand, and came close enough that he could probably smell the sweat trickling down my back. I should have been self-conscious, but when I craned my head back to meet his gaze, his smile tore through my thoughts like a tornado, and left them scattered and in pieces. He leaned in, and my heart jumped.

He reached out an arm, and dropped the map in a trash bin just behind me. He stayed there, our chests less than an inch away from touching and said in a low, deep voice, “Problem solved.”

THAT’S YOUR SOLUTION to getting us lost?”

He shrugged. “If we’re not trying to get to any particular place, we can’t ever really be lost. We’re just exploring.”

“But we need to find a place to stay and put our things and—”

“Later. It’s still early, Kelsey. We’ve got all day.”

He might be patient, but I wasn’t. I was just about to demand that we find a place to stay or get a cab when his hand touched my elbow and skimmed down to my wrist.

“Trust me,” he said.

I shivered.

I did trust him … which made abso-fucking-lutely zero sense. My memory of the night before was a black hole. I should be wary of him. I sure as hell shouldn’t be alone with him now, not without knowing what happened last night. But with his hand circled around my wrist, he could have led me anywhere.

And now I was supposed to go off with him, no plan, no map, no idea where we were heading? It was the opening plot of a horror movie. I might have been in Hostel , the reality TV version.

I made myself say, “Tell me what happened first.”

His hand slid down from my wrist, and he caught my fingers between his.

“I wouldn’t hurt you, Kelsey. And I wouldn’t let anyone else either.”

“So, someone drugged me. Then what?”

“I don’t know that for sure. I just know you were fine. Feisty and ready to take my head off. Then we—”

“We what?”

His eyes dropped to my lips, and he shook his head.

“We were talking, and it was like you were drunk out of nowhere. You were babbling and slurring your words, and you couldn’t stand up straight.”

“So you took me to a hotel?”

“I didn’t want to leave you in a hostel, not when you’d be passed out cold and sharing a room with a dozen people. I took you to my hotel room, then I got another one for me.”

“That’s it?”

“I suppose I could also talk about you calling me a pansy for not taking your clothes off.”

“I did WHAT?”

He chuckled and bent, scooping up my backpack. He threw my bag over his shoulder along with his. Then he tugged on my hand, and started pulling me down the street.

I could have dug in my heels and refused. Or maybe I couldn’t have. Not where he was concerned.

“HOLD ON. You can’t say something like that and not elaborate.”

He smiled. “You can when it’s a bribe. I’ll tell you later. After I’ve shown you my kind of adventure.”

My mind steered straight into the gutter every time he mentioned an adventure. It was inevitable with a guy who looked like him.

He took a random turn, and pulled me along.

I said, “For the record, I think this no-map thing is a terrible idea.”

“Noted.”

“Things could go incredibly wrong.”

“Or incredibly right.”

I dragged my feet a little as we walked, but I was more intrigued than I let on. With him carrying my backpack and our fingers laced together, I was fine with wherever we went.

We walked a few blocks before happening upon a metro stop. He glanced at me over his shoulder, and then pulled me toward the stairs.

“Oh, so now we don’t have to walk to have an adventure?”

He shot me a look, and I said, “Fine. I get it. Trust you .”

We descended the stairs, and I expected something dark, dank, with that lovely decay-meets-urine smell that seemed to hang around most subway stations. Shockingly, the station was shiny, clean, and modern. Hunt pulled me over to a large map of the metro stops. He dropped both our bags on the ground, stepped in front of me, and said, “Close your eyes.”

I tried not to look skeptical.

One thing I’d learned in life: the phrase “Close your eyes” was usually either followed by something very good (i.e., kissing) or very bad (i.e., murder, pranks, or something gross placed in your hand).

I was really hoping this would fall more on the kissing side of the spectrum. His hands squeezed my shoulders in encouragement, and I let my eyelids fall. The anticipation coated my skin, a thin frost that had me shivering. One hand left my shoulder, and I felt him walk around to stand at my back. His breath touched my neck, and the heat melted the frost. I had to concentrate to keep from falling back into him.

“Don’t open your eyes,” he spoke into my ear.

I couldn’t manage to piece together words myself, so I nodded, and his cheek grazed mine.

“Ready?”

That was all the warning I got before he took hold of my shoulders and began to spin me.

“Are you kidding me?”

“Keep your eyes closed!”

He spun me three times, then stilled my body with his hands.

“Point,” he said.

“Where?”

“Anywhere.”

I threw my hand up and he said, “Open your eyes.”

He reached around me and placed his finger on the metro stop closest to where I’d pointed. Malostranská. “That’s where we’re going,” he said.

“Really?”

He picked up our bags and said, “Really.”

“What if it’s a terrible neighborhood? It could be dangerous.”

“I told you I would never let anything bad happen to you.”

“Some things in the world are outside even your control.”

His shoulders tensed, and his gaze darkened. “I know that. Believe me … I know.”

A haunted expression stole over his face, filled with ghosts and shadows. It was the kind of look that told me more about him than any words he could ever say. He meant it when he said he would protect me. It was written as plainly across his face as whatever tragedy tore through his memories because of my words.

I couldn’t look at that face and not trust him.

I laced my fingers with his and said, “I’m in.”

When he smiled, it was almost like those ghosts had never been there.

We bought our metro passes, and together figured out which train to take. The metro platform looked like something out of a science fiction novel. Everything I’d seen of Prague before this looked like I’d stepped into the past, but this was the opposite. The walls and ceilings were composed of gold, silver, and green tiles with hundreds of small domes that formed one long tube. A thin, bright line ran the length of the curved ceiling, casting the whole tunnel in an eerie glow.

The train was quiet as it sped into the station, but my hair tossed in the wind it created. The train car we entered was already pretty full, and new riders streamed in front of and behind us. I was still searching for a place to sit or stand or even grab hold when the train started moving. I teetered sideways into my neighbor, then felt Hunt grip my arm and pull me back toward him.