Deception Island by Brynn Kelly Read Free Book Online Page A

alive, either .
    She followed him, stamping until her feet throbbed. The roar of the ocean receded. Something touched her bare neck. She gasped and froze.
    He turned. “What is it?” Concern flecked his tone.
    She slapped at her skin. It was wet. She exhaled. “Nothing.” Spooked by a drop of rain. More drops rattled on the broad leaves around them.
    He grabbed her shoulder and coaxed her around. “Give me the light.”
    He eased his fingers under the collar of her jumpsuit, brushing her nape, then scooped his palm around her upper back. She shivered. Light spilled over her shoulder as he searched. He circled his hand to her upper chest, brushing the tops of her breasts, and released her. She stumbled to reclaim her balance.
    â€œAll clear.”
    â€œWhat should I be scared of? What’s the most dangerous thing out here?”
    â€œHumans.” He returned the flashlight and turned back to the jungle. “Me, in particular.”
    â€œThat’s a given.” Humans she could deal with. “I mean, what animals, what insects?”
    â€œSnakes, mostly,” he shouted, walking again. “Only half a dozen species will kill you, most of them in the water—cobras, kraits, sea snakes, coral snakes, vipers... If a krait gets you, you have about a fifty-fifty chance—but by the time you get the first symptoms you’re dead. And there’s scorpion fish and stone fish. The sharks you’ve already met. In these jungles a bunch of spiders will give you a painful bite but probably won’t kill you. Same with the scorpions—the sting hurts, but you’ll live.” He looked up into the canopy. “And the slow loris can give you a poisonous nip.”
    â€œThe what?” She followed his gaze. “You’re making that one up.”
    â€œLooks like a sloth, but smaller. It probably won’t kill you, unless the bite gets infected.”
    â€œGood to know.”
    â€œThe biggest killer’s the mosquito. They kill more people than the others combined.” He held out a hand to help her navigate a boggy patch. She ignored it. “Malaria, dengue fever, Japanese Encephalitis... Don’t worry, princess, we have spray.”
    Lightning strobed. Thunder snapped through the sky and shook the ground. Rain pelted her through the thinning canopy. Jack moved faster, crashing through the undergrowth like an elephant, ducking under branches, stopping occasionally to hold them back for her. A large hulk loomed ahead—a rusty tin shed, rain shelling its roof. Their accommodation? Jack charged into a thicket of scrub, and she tumbled through behind him, into air. A path. That was an improvement.
    â€œNearly there, princess.”
    After another hundred feet the path widened into a grassy clearing. Lightning illuminated a wooden cabin with a thatched roof. Jack crossed the lawn and took the steps to the veranda in a single stride. A lizard the size of her arm scampered out of his path and disappeared into the darkness. She shuddered.
    â€œStay here,” he said as she reached the veranda. He dropped the bags on the doorstep and jogged out into the rain.
    She wiped her face with her sleeve, though it was just as wet. They were beside the sea again, but the waves on this side of the island lapped rather than crashed. Two arms of dark land circled a patch of still blackness. A lagoon. She inhaled the fresh, fertile scent of jungle and sea. Rain splattered all around. She’d been in worse prisons, and this one had a guard who was a step up from the correctional officers she was used to—in so many ways.
    A motor shuddered to life, a hundred feet away or more. An outboard engine? But he said there’d be no escape until the ransom was paid. A light flickered on above her head, and a yellow glow spilled from a window. A generator. Not a boat. Her shoulders slumped.
    Jack returned, walking as calmly as if it were a sunny day. Rain slicked