Total pages in book: 90
Estimated words: 86826 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 434(@200wpm)___ 347(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 86826 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 434(@200wpm)___ 347(@250wpm)___ 289(@300wpm)
Her smile deepened. “You’re with her,” Kylie whispered.
It was an odd thing to say given the circumstances. What was she saying? “Kylie…,” I said. “You’re—”
Then she put her fingers on my lips before pushing the blankets back and sliding gracefully out of bed. “Come on,” she said over her shoulder. “Let’s go watch the sunrise.”
I followed her out through the open doors of the bedroom and onto the deck of the yacht I named after her. The ocean stretched around us, the world still basking in that blue-gray hush that comes before dawn. Then the sunrise began.
The Bahamas has the best sunrises. It’s why I chose to come here every year with her.
Kylie stepped beside the railing barefoot, one hand resting against the wood while the breeze blew strands of hair around her face. I looked at her and felt it all over again. That overwhelming love that rearranges your entire life around another person without you even realizing it’s happening.
I moved closer behind her instinctively, my chest brushing softly against her back. “I love you,” I said quietly against her hair and into her right ear.
She smiled toward the horizon. “I know.”
She turned slowly to face me then, sunlight beginning to catch warm amber inside her eyes.
“I love you more than anything,” I whispered. Emotion climbed unexpectedly into my throat.
Kylie lifted her hand and touched my cheek. “I know, Julian.”
I reached for her, wanting to pull her into me, needing to touch her… but she stepped back with a playful smile. “Wait.”
I blinked. “What?”
“I have a surprise for you.”
“A surprise? I don’t need any surprises. I have you.”
“No, Julian. You’ll want this one. I promise.” Her smile turned mischievous now, younger somehow. “Cover your eyes.”
“Kylie…”
“Julian.”
I smiled helplessly and finally lifted both hands over my eyes. “Happy?”
“Are you actually covering them?”
“Yes.”
“No peeking.”
“I’m not peeking, babe. I promise.”
Then her voice lowered theatrically. “Abracadabra…”
I smiled.
“… and voila.”
She tapped my shoulder. “Open them,” she insisted.
I lowered my hands slowly.
At first, I didn’t understand what I was supposed to be seeing. Just the shoreline in the distance, white sand glowing beneath the rising sun, palm trees swaying in the breeze.
Then Kylie stepped beside me and pointed toward the beach. “There,” she whispered.
And I saw what she was pointing at… Harper, standing barefoot at the edge of the water on the beach. The tide caressed her ankles. She wore a loose white dress, and she was beaming. She looked stunning standing there. Harper lifted her face toward the sunrise and smiled, completely unaware we were watching her.
My body began trembling. I looked back at Kylie as she watched me carefully.
She looked both hopeful and hopeless, an understanding that she possessed that I yet did not.
“I brought her here,” she whispered.
“Kylie… What… Why are you doing this?”
Her fingers slid softly through mine.
“For you, Julian. She’s here for you.”
I felt a tear form in my eye. I blinked to fight it off and as my eyes opened up, both Kylie and Harper were gone and I was alone.
I wake abruptly, disoriented and very on edge. For several long seconds, nothing makes sense.
My heart pounds unevenly and with increasing speed while fragments of the dream cling stubbornly. I can still feel the warmth of the Bahamas against my skin, Kylie’s laughter drifting across the yacht deck, Harper standing barefoot on the shoreline bathed in morning light. I can still see all of it with terrifying clarity.
What really sends chills down my spine is how it unfolded… Kylie smiling at me as she said, I brought Harper here… for you.
I suck in a breath and stare upward into darkness, trying to orient myself while panic and peace collide violently within me. It’s the strangest sensation, being both comforted and unsettled at once, as though my mind and body cannot agree on whether the dream was a gift or a punishment.
Slowly, the room around me comes into focus. My bedroom in Manhattan. Harper asleep in the bed beside me, her mouth parted slightly. The bedside clock says it’s nearing five a.m.
Reality slowly takes over piece by piece. I sit up slowly, pressing a hand against my face as I try to steady myself, but even now I can still hear Kylie’s voice so clearly it seems impossible she isn’t here.
You’re not with me. You’re with her.
Jesus Christ. It felt and seemed so real. Was it?
I carefully swing my legs over the edge of the bed so as not to wake Harper, and sit with my elbows braced against my knees, staring blankly at the floor. My pulse slows, but the dream refuses to loosen its grip.
There had been an eerie peace in Kylie’s demeanor. And somehow that unsettles me more than the grief ever has.
I stand, then cross the room barefoot before pushing open the glass doors leading onto the small terrace connected to my bedroom. It’s unusually warm for January—at most in the lower fifties—and I need this fresh air.