Filed to story: Watch Out, I’m The Lady Boss (Eleanor & Sebastian) Book PDF Free
I pulled on the dry clothes quickly, then sat back on the straw-strewn ground and leaned towards the opening. The rain showed no sign of letting up.
Even in fresh dry clothes, the damp night air crept relentlessly into my bones. I hugged my arms to myself and rubbed them for warmth.
As I drew my legs back, I accidentally kicked Sebastian.
He didn’t stir.
My thoughts drifted as I studied his face.
It was flushed. His chest rose and fell in an unsteady rhythm.
Sleeping in this stifling hut, he must have felt hot.
Wait. Hot?
At that moment, another gust of cold wind blew through, and my teeth chattered before I could stop them.
I gritted my teeth, shuffled a little closer to him, then leaned in until our faces were only a finger’s width apart. Bending down, I whispered by his ear, “Sebastian?”Nothing.
I tried again a few more times, but he didn’t stir.
Outside, the rain had gone from heavy to torrential, drumming against the bark walls of the hut and pelting my back.
My whole back was soaked through.
But I had no time to change. My eyes stayed fixed on Sebastian.
Something was wrong.
He was never such a deep sleeper, not even with the storm hammering down.
I reached out and touched him, only to recoil at how scaling hot his skin was.
Panic gripped me.
Sebastian had a fever.
I dragged him with difficulty to a haystack further from the door and pulled off his wet shoes.
Then I wrestled his rain-soaked T-shirt over his head and tossed it aside. Digging through the suitcase, I found my largest T-shirt and slipped it on him.
The rain grew fiercer, and the grass curtain at the doorway was no defence at all. I sat with my back to the entrance, shielding him as best I could from the lashing wind and water.
His trousers were drenched too. I unzipped them and tugged them off, rolling them into a heap. He could never fit into mine, so I pulled one of my long skirts over him instead. What he would think when he woke to find himself in it, I didn’t have time to imagine.
Just then, a low groan escaped him. His eyes stayed shut but sweat broke out across his brow, his expression twisted with pain.
I searched his body for injuries I might have missed.
And then I saw it.
His right hand was trembling violently. It was still covered by a diving glove.
I remembered asking him once why he always kept it on. He had said it made work easier. It seemed reasonable enough, so I hadn’t questioned it.
But now…
My breath caught as I reached for his gloved hand. He was unconscious, unable to resist, and I peeled the glove away with ease. When it came free, I clapped a hand over my mouth to stop a cry escaping.
His right hand.
The palm was split by a raw, unhealed gash. The whole hand was swollen, red, eaten away by infection. It was barely recognisable as a hand at all. The wound had been there for days, festering until it rotted like this.
My chest ached with worry, but another question gnawed at me. When had he hurt himself? What could have done this?
I forced myself to think back. And then it struck me. That afternoon when we dived in the deep sea. After the tsunami, when we lost our torches, Sebastian had used his bare hand to feel our way. That must have been it, torn open on coral.
So the mystery was solved, but the realisation brought a flood of guilt. Days had passed before I noticed, and all the while he had kept it hidden.
I understood why. We had no emergency supplies. Later, when we found the suitcase, there had only been a few plasters, no medicine at all. Rather than burden me, he had chosen silence, enduring the itching and the pain alone.
I knew what coral wounds could do if untreated. The agony would flare day and night, unbearable at times, with the risk of infection spreading through the body. It was sheer luck I had discovered it now, before it worsened.
I looked at his face, flushed with fever yet pale from the toll of infection. The thought of him bearing that hand, then still pitching camp, starting fires, gathering food, fetching water, using that same right hand, made something inside me twist.
My chest tightened with emotions I couldn’t name. I poked his cheek gently and whispered, “You really are an idiot.”Carefully, I rinsed his ruined hand with clean water, disinfected it, then bound it with the few plasters I had.
When it was done, I sat hugging my knees, watching him lying there beneath a patchwork of my clothes.
This couldn’t go on. Even dry clothes weren’t enough. His fever, his wound, none of it could wait. When would rescue come?
I glared out at the downpour, nerves raw. The forest was silent but for the pounding rain on leaves and branches. Not a bird’s cry, not a breath of wind.
Then I heard it. A strange sound cutting through the storm. A deep, mechanical roar, steady and thudding.
Propellers?
I shot to my feet and ran outside,
Rain lashed my face as I burst from the hut. Through the sheets of water I saw a helicopter circling above, its blades chopping the air, the searchlight sweeping over the treetops.
It hovered, dipping lower as if to land, then pulled back again, struggling against the storm. My stomach lurched at the thought it might give up and vanish into the night.
I flung my arms in the air and shouted until my throat burned. My voice was nothing against the roar. The rain blurred everything, and in the dark I stumbled, crashing to the ground. Pain ripped up my leg as a jagged rock split my shin. Blood welled hot and fast, but I hardly noticed. I forced myself up and kept running, slipping, skidding, pushing forward.
Branches whipped at me as I fought through the trees, yelling like a madwoman. The helicopter’s light swept close, then swung away, missing me. They couldn’t see me, not hidden in the forest.
I had to reach the beach.
I ran as hard as my legs would carry me, barefoot now, my shoes lost somewhere behind. The ground was a confused jumble of mud and roots and stone. I fell again and again, palms torn open, knees scraped raw. I didn’t stop.
The helicopter was still there. That was all that mattered.
At last the trees broke and I stumbled onto the beach. The searchlight flared across the sand. I grabbed the nearest fallen bough, hoisted it high and waved it like a flag. My arms shook with the effort, rain blinding me, but I wouldn’t stop.
The light swept across me, straight into my face, so bright I had to screw my eyes shut. I kept waving. My whole body was shaking, my teeth chattering, but I clung to that branch and swung it until my shoulders screamed.
The roar grew louder. The air churned and whipped around me, almost knocking me from my feet.
I staggered, the gale from the rotor blades pressing down, but I knew then. They were coming closer. Not leaving.
The helicopter was touching down.
“How’s he?”Yvaine rolled her eyes at me while she pared an apple with a knife.
“Shouldn’t you be more worried about yourself? Doc said your fever nearly fried your brain.”
“I’m fine now,” I said, though my voice was still hoarse.
It had been three days since the rescue.
The helicopter that landed on the island hadn’t been a rescue helicopter at all. It was a team of location scouts from a TV production crew, searching for a spot to film a survival reality show.
The sudden storm had blown them off their course and straight onto the island.
But as the saying goes, misfortune can be a blessing in disguise. Thanks to that storm, they had stumbled on an ideal location that wasn’t even on their list.
With their help, Sebastian and I were flown out and sent straight to the nearest hospital.
I drifted in and out of consciousness on the journey, too feverish to keep track of anything. The next thing I remembered was Yvaine sitting at my bedside, her eyes red from crying.
There was an IV needle taped to the back of my hand, and every muscle ached from the fever.
But what about Sebastian? His fever had been worse than mine, and his right hand was a wreck. Was he all right? Had he woken up? Was anyone looking after him?
“He’s fine,” Yvaine said when I wouldn’t stop asking.
“He… left.”
“When?” I tried to sit up, but Yvaine pushed me back down.
“He woke up the day before, still running a fever. He came here, saw you, then discharged himself. He’s probably back in Skyline now.”
“How was he?”Yvaine shrugged.
“Looked the same, Same formidable, scary CEO energy. We didn’t talk much.”
“His hand?”
“Bandaged, that’s all I know.”
“He shouldn’t have rushed out,” I muttered.
“He needs rest.”
“What’s with you?” Yvaine asked.
“Suddenly you care so much about him? Had a change of heart?”
I looked away, I didn’t answer because, deep down, I didn’t know myself.
The days on that island had changed something between Sebastian and me, though I couldn’t say exactly what.
Besides, there was still that woman.
“Was Lea with him?” I asked.
“Who?”
“Lea. Blonde, stunning. She was with him on the cruise ship.”
“Was she?” Yvaine frowned.
“He didn’t say anything about her when he gave me that ticket.”