“I was just asking Bianca if she minded my holding on to her arm as I walked. My leg is playing up a bit.”
“I don’t mind.” I smiled weakly and offered Steve my arm while I avoided Jakob’s intense gaze.
“Are you okay, Bianca?” Jakob gave me a look of concern, and I nodded uncertainly. I wanted to tell him what Steve had said. I wanted to hear his response, but I was scared. What if Steve had been telling the truth? Would he try to kill both of us, then?
“We’ll have to start another fire.” Jakob stared at me thoughtfully. “You think you can go and fish by yourself?” He stood there and nodded toward the ocean. “Then we can grill the fish right away.”
“What about the bones?” Steve questioned.
“Bones won’t kill you.”
“But you wish they would, don’t you,” Steve mumbled under his breath, and my breath caught. Something had definitely changed since the last time we’d all been together. The two men weren’t even pretending to like each other now.
“Bianca, come with me. I need your help gathering wood.” Jakob waved me over to him.
“Be careful, Bianca,” Steve whispered. “I know about your mother. I know about David.”
“What?” I gasped as I looked back at him.
“Be careful,” he mouthed as Jakob grabbed my arm. “You can’t trust him,” he whispered into my ear as I walked away.
“Let’s go.” Jakob pulled me along with him, and I shook him off me.
“Don’t touch me! What did you do to him?”
“I didn’t touch him, Bianca.”
“I don’t believe you.”
“I didn’t touch him.” His eyes bored into mine. “I’m telling you I don’t know where he went, and I don’t know why he came back.”
“You tried to kill him.”
“He told you that?” His eyes narrowed.
“Yes.” I nodded. “He told me he knows David as well.”
“David Bradley?”
“Who else?” I gulped. “I’m only going to ask you this one more time, Jakob. Do you know David more than you’ve let on?”
He paused then, and I saw him thinking hard. “Yes, I do.”
“Oh.” I felt the blood drain from my face. I hadn’t expected this answer.
“I can’t tell you now.” He grabbed my hands. “I need you to trust me. I will explain everything to you once we make it off of the island.”
I didn’t want to trust him. I was so angry that he’d kept something else from me. Yet, I didn’t hate him. “Answer me this,” I asked him softly, my eyes flashing. “Did something happen between you and Steve yesterday?”
“I didn’t try to kill him.”
“Do you know who he is?”
“I don’t know who he is.” He looked me in the eye. “I can tell you honestly that I have never seen that man before in my life.”
“Jakob—” I swallowed hard and stared at him for a few seconds before asking him the question that was on my mind. “Can I trust you?”
“Yes, you can trust me.” He grabbed my hand. “I promise that I didn’t try to kill Steve yesterday.”
“I didn’t date David because I liked him. In fact, I orchestrated our meeting.” I was hesitant to say much more, for fear that Jakob was going to judge me. “I wanted to meet and date Mattias, that was the initial plan, but you’d think that man was the head of the KGB. No one knows anything about him.”
“Oh?” His eyes narrowed.
“I wanted help. The Bradleys have access to information that I don’t.”
“Why are you telling me this now?”
“I think Steve knows something.” I took a deep breath. “I think that Steve knows the truth about what happened. He says he wants to tell me something about what happened.”
“I don’t understand what you’re talking about.” He rubbed his temples and stared back at Steve. “Do you think Steve knows David and Mattias are working together?”
“No, but . . .” I paused and looked at him. “What did you say?”
“Huh?” He frowned and took a step toward me.
“Nothing.” I shook my head. “We should be careful with Steve.” I attempted a smile, even though my brain was screaming at me. Why had he said David and Mattias were working together? I’d not mentioned anything that suggested that. What was it that he knew about David that he wasn’t telling me? I could feel my heart racing as another thought hit me. Did he know Mattias Bradley as well? I knew that I needed to speak to Steve and find out exactly what he knew. “Let’s go back to him now, so we can keep an eye on him.”
“I don’t trust him.” Jakob’s eyes narrowed. “I think we should go into the jungle.”
“Now?” I shivered at the thought of going into the jungle with Jakob.
“We need to make sure we’re safe.”
“I think it’s smarter to be closer to him, so we can keep an eye on him.” I offered him another weak smile. Please agree with me, my brain was screaming at him.
“Yeah, I guess that’s true.” He nodded and then sighed. “I just want you all to myself. I can take care of you better, then.”
“I know.” I looked away and tried not to throw up. My brain kept replaying what he’d just said. He’d asked me if I thought Steve knew that David and his brother, Mattias, were working together. Why had he said that? As far as I knew, David was not working with Mattias. As far as I knew, David was still my friend, and he was slightly afraid of his older brother. Why had Jakob said they were working together? What did he know? I stared at his bulging biceps and swallowed hard. What if the man I had given myself to was the man I should be running from? “You go ahead and see if you can find some wood in the jungle for a fire; I just want to wash my face off in the ocean.”
“You can do that later. I want us to go and get this wood together.” He stood resolute. “I’m not leaving the beach without you.”
“Okay, fine. I’m coming.” I took a deep breath and looked back at Steve, who was standing by the water, staring at us. “Let’s go and get this wood.”
“I’m going to ask you something, Bianca, and I want to make sure that you don’t take offense, okay?