Page 3 of Sunny Undone

She’s wearing ugly khaki shorts and hiking boots and a dark, loose shirt tied in a knot at her middle. She’s carrying a flashlight, and it’s not the kind on her phone but a bona fide portable flashlight that she’s waving like she’s trying to land a plane.

As she gets closer, I can see there is mud and water splashed all the way up her legs.

“What the hell are you doing?” I say as she gets close.

“Get me out of here, please?” Her words are breathless, like she’s been running for a while. She’s not conventionally attractive, compared to some of the club girls. They have lithe bodies and pneumatic tits and wear clothes that show every curve. But she does have thick, plump lips. Her skin is clear and her eyes bright, even with the limited make-up she seems to be wearing.

At first, I thought she was some tourist who’d wandered off the trail, but now that I’ve got a closer look, I think again. Then, I remember it’s dark. Late. There are no tour companies dragging women into the Everglades at this time of night.

A battered satchel hangs across her body over her left shoulder, and there’s a compass around her neck. Her light brown hair sits in two thick braids, and freckles dust her cheeks and nose. A pair of slightly oversized glasses slide down her face, and she shoves them back into place with an impatient middle finger, like she’s flipping me the bird.

Her nose twitches, as if helping to get them higher on her face. It’s cute.

Dangerously cute.

“Quick,” she says. “Please.”

“This isn’t one of those scams, is it? Like, I stop for the girl in shorts, and four men jump out of the bushes to beat me down.”

She wrinkles her nose. “God, no. But please, we need to go.”

I glance up and down the empty road. “Didn’t anybody ever tell you it’s a bad idea to climb onto a strange man’s motorcycle?”

Her eyes narrow. “It’s not like you’re luring me into a van to show me puppies.”

“Wait,” I ask. “Are you the weirdo? You’re not some female serial killer, are you?”

She looks down at her hiking boots and shorts. “Hardly. Statistically, I’m the one at risk here. Please, I’m being hunted. Can we go?”

“‘Hunted’ feels a little dramatic, don’t you⁠—”

Then, I see it. A bobbing light deep in the trees. Something crashes. A tree branch.

The woman spins toward the sound, and every trace of irritation disappears from her face, replaced with pure terror.

“Please,” she begs. “I’m not going to kill you. Just get me out of here.”

I have no idea what the fuck is going on, but I’m a sucker for a damsel in distress, and it’s gonna make a great fucking story at church in the morning. Plus, there’s something a little rogue Indiana Jones meets Lara Croft about all this.

Maybe this is the adventure I need.

So, I slide forward a little on the seat. “Climb on.”

2

DELLA

I’m on a motorcycle.

Without leathers.

Or a helmet.

With a man I don’t know. Granted, he’s an exceptionally attractive man with a broad chest, thick biceps, and a lot of tattoos. But none of that provides any input into an assessment of whether he is a good person or not.

It’s like I’ve forgotten every single piece of advice I’ve accumulated in my thirty years on the planet. My parents were the safety police. I wasn’t allowed on monkey bars because my dad, a now-famous cardiac surgeon, once did a rotation in pediatric surgery and said he saw too many torn shoulders and broken wrists from playground equipment. Contact sports carried the same fear. I allowed my parents to convince me I was going to break a leg on a volleyball jump, dislocate a finger in a basketball game, or take a puck to the face in hockey and smash out all my teeth.

Even Marco Polo was a no-no because my father heard of a child who smashed his orbital bone on a low diving board.