Free The Day Of The Wave by Becky Wicks Page A

shelf by the towels. I don't know if they've been blown there or placed there, but I like them.
    I follow him back out onto the balcony. This time my heart doesn't jolt when I first see the ocean but I'm still trying to keep how much I hate it off my face. I can deal with it. I have to. It's why I'm here, isn't it? To face it; to see if it helps. 
    'I'll go back and get your stuff,' Ben says now. 
    'On the scooter?'
    'Yes ma'am, how else?'
    I shrug and he does that comical thing with his eyebrows again. 'I'll be five minutes, you want a beer while you wait?'
    'I don't drink.'
    'You do now, you're on a beach! It's essential.' He runs down the steps to the villa next door and comes back ten seconds later with two cold Chang beers. They remind me of the Scot in his tourist T-shirt and I grit my teeth. 
    I don't know if he's the one who took my purse, of course. I'd prefer to give him the benefit of the doubt, seeing as he was so nice, but I had to tell the police he was sitting next to me, and that he's gone to Phi Phi. Who knows if they'll care enough to go check him out? They seemed to be pretty pre-occupied with peeling some purple mangosteen and watching a Thai TV show when I was filling out my report. One even had his boots up on the desk. I sat there thinking how different our countries are. Would an English policeman have sat there with his feet up, watching Eastenders, peeling fruit, while someone was literally in the middle of reporting a criminal incident? The thought made me laugh.
    A girl I got talking to at the police station, who'd lost an engagement ring, asked me why I didn't seem too upset. I didn't really have an answer. Of course I'm annoyed, but losing a purse is no tragedy. I've lost more than that before. I really could have done with the photo though; I take that one everywhere. 
    Ben flips the top off one of the beers and hands it to me. 'I'll have mine when I get back. An incentive to be fast,' he says, walking back into my room and putting it my own little fridge. I watch his muscles flex again as he moves.
    'Be safe,' I tell his bare chest as he heads back out. I mask another flurry of panic that surges through me at the thought that he might not come back again, for whatever reason. He can tell, I know he can.
    'Izzy, I'm always safe and so are you while you're here.' He puts a hand to my shoulder, forcing my gaze up to his. That smell again, pure man. The blue of his eyes, so ridiculously blue. 'Trust me.' 
     

BEN

    Just the smallest bit of her beer has gone when I get back with her bag. The afternoon sun is glinting off her hair, which she's taken out of its band. She's staring at the ocean like she's challenging it to come at her, or apologize. I can't decide. 
    'Thank you so much for doing that, and for organizing all this,' she says now, standing up and taking the case as I go to wheel it inside. She takes over, lifts it onto the bed, opens it up and gets out her iPad and charger. I watch as she plugs it in by the bed. 
    'It's not a problem. There's no WIFI in the rooms though, sorry,' I say. 'We can get you a SIM card for that tomorrow.'
    'It's alright, I only have one article to submit while I'm away.' She walks back to the suitcase and pulls a hairbrush out. I feel like I'm watching a ghost go about her daily routine, trapped in time; only Izzy never really died. The insanity of it all just won't leave me.
    'Article?' I say, realizing what she just said. I walk to her fridge and get the beer out, flip the lid and throw it into the basket on the floor. 'So you're a writer? Like you said you'd be?'
    She smiles, runs the brush through her hair. 'Did I say I'd be a writer?'
    'You said a lot of things. I could hardly get a word in.'
    She flicks her hairband at me and I dart to miss it, then pick it up from the floor. 'Feisty. Just like I remember,' I say, flinging it back at her. 'So where do you work?'
    'London. The very prestigious Sweet Eats Magazine. You won't have heard of