Free Island Home by Liliana Hart Page A

back, he wondered if he’d ever been anything more to her than a distraction—a way to forget whatever was plaguing her. He’d never had her trust, and he wasn’t sure he’d ever had her love either. Not really. Because one day their senior year she hadn’t been on the ferry to the mainland that took them to school. And when he’d gotten back home that afternoon to check on her, old Jesse had looked at him with no expression whatsoever as he’d told Luke his only daughter had packed her things and stolen off with their boat in the middle of the night.
    And she’d never come back. Not once. Because he’d waited for her. And he’d tried to look for her, even though her own father didn’t lift a finger to try and find her. So Luke had done his damndest to move on but still keep the hole she’d left in his heart open and bleeding, because it was the best kind of reminder that the only person you could really trust was yourself.
    Before he could talk himself out of it, he climbed over the boulders and sat at the edge of the spring, dipping his feet into the water. He hissed as the heat touched his skin, and sweat broke out in beads on his face, dripping down his neck and onto his chest. He knew it would be cooler by the waterfall since the water that flowed from there came from a different spring.
    That’s what made Seeker’s Spring so unusual and magical, at least according to the legends. And why tourists travelled from all over the world to this one spot, overrunning the island with ridiculous hats and rental golf carts, buying plastic bottles filled with spring water to take back home with them just in case they needed another dose to fulfill their wishes.
    Whatever your heart desires…
    A stupid scheme created by someone who cared more about money than the privacy and seclusion the island provided. And here he was, acting no better than a damned tourist out of desperation.
    He treaded across the shallow edges of the pool and then hit the drop off in the center so his full body was submerged. There was no telling what the hell was at the bottom of the pool below him. He wasn’t curious to find out like several of the other locals who believed in the legend.
    He swam the rest of the way to the waterfall until the cold spray splashed in his face, and he tried to maneuver his way around a few of the jagged rocks at the base of the falls—rocks sharp enough to slice a body to ribbons if care wasn’t taken. The sun was trying to come up—the sky lightening briefly to a hazy gray—but the black storm clouds rolling in from the distance assured he wouldn’t have to worry about being seen by any overzealous tourists wanting to see the springs before they officially opened.
    Luke had spent years listening to those who’d claimed to have found their hearts desire from Seeker’s Spring. He still thought it was complete crap, but if there was even a sliver of a chance that it was real, he couldn’t let it slip through his fingers. The stakes were too high this time.
    He knew what he’d done wrong the last time he’d come to the springs. He’d swam to the deepest part of the pool and made his request there, his chest filled with panic as angry tears coursed down his cheeks. He’d begged for Jessie to come back until his voice grew hoarse. He’d held out hope for weeks until old Jesse had told him he’d gotten a letter from his daughter that said she was staying with a relative up north to finish school and that she wanted no contact with anyone from Seeker’s Island—or what she’d called ‘her old life.’ Not even Luke.
    He knew with clarity that was the turning point in his life—when the anger began brewing and bubbling beneath the surface so the people he’d known his whole life started giving him a wide berth whenever they saw him. When they began whispering behind their hands when his drinking didn’t numb the aching hole in his chest like it should have, and instead made him only angrier, so any