Page 100 of Mark

“I still can’t believe the police were called to the scene. I was so surprised when they showed up,” Clay announces.

Hayden shrugs. “You’re the only one who was surprised then.”

His lips part as he glances down at her. “You’re telling me you expected that?”

Another shrug. “He was acting like a mad man. What did you expect to happen?”

“I didn’t expect to see so many,” Hope declares.

“Me neither,” I admit. “There had to be a good forty police officers. It’s not a big island. I didn’t expect them to have that many.”

Hayden picks up her cocktail, taking a sip. “How is Freya doing? She looked close to crying… Or fainting.”

I grimace. “It was all the blood,” I mutter. “She didn’t expect there to be so much blood.”

“I still can’t believe the guy cut his foot open on a rock,” Hope muses, bringing up the instructor’s injury.

“When he has a six-foot guy on his back, using him as a life jacket, what did you think was going to happen?” Hayden replies.

Max didn’t just get the instructor hurt. Dad had to carry Max out of the water, and because of all the screeching and flapping around, he wasn’t watching where he was going. He stepped on a bottle and ended up falling, smacking his head off a rock. He had to get a couple of stitches.

“I thought she was going to escape on a lifeboat,” Hope teases.

“Nah, she’s put up with worse from her own family,” I reply. “She’s strong. Nothing can beat her. She always gets back up.”

“Really?” Hayden questions.

My back straightens as I narrow my gaze on her. “Of course. She can handle anything.”

She glances at the double sun lounger I’m on, her eyebrow raising. “Really?”

I glance down at Freya, who is curled up on her side. A towel covers her body, and she has one tucked under her head as a pillow. A light snore slips past her lips, and I wince.

“In her defence, it’s been a long day,” I state, feeling defensive on her behalf.

Hayden chuckles. “She was so pale earlier.”

I brush her hair from her face, smiling. “She still didn’t run though.”

“That’s because people either go into flight, fight or freeze mode in traumatic situations. She clearly froze,” Hope points out. “I felt kind of bad for her when Max clung to her.”

I wince at the reminder. Before my dad carried Max out of the sea, he had reached for one of us. We still don’t know if it was me, Hayden or Freya he went for, but since Hayden and Iare used to him, we moved out of the way just in time. Which meant Freya had been pulled under the shallow water. I’m pretty sure she grabbed his balls and twisted before we could help. Max had screamed ‘balls’ at the top of his lungs. When I questioned her about it, she just glared, like I’m the one who accidentally drowned her.

“She muttered something about me paying for her therapist when I helped her out of the water,” I admit.

“She didn’t go back to the room, so that must mean something,” Hope helpfully points out.

I grin, feeling better. “Yeah, there’s that.”

We all turn as the others arrive, and my eyes widen as Malik carries Maya over towards us. As he gently places her down on the sun lounger a few beds away, I can do nothing but gape.

Maddox snorts as he joins us. “That woman has all of them wrapped around her finger,” he states, dropping down into a chair.

“Weren’t you one of the ones who helped carry her back onto the ship?” I ask.

He shrugs. “That’s me. I’m always charming. Since when have you ever seen my dad be nice to anyone other than my mum?”

I tilt my head to the side. “Good point.”