Chapter 554
Chapter 554:
“What?” he asked.
“Were you some kind of scout before p>
Ashton shook his head. “No, I just learned a little, once p>
I had a hundred more questions: why did he learn such things, and when? Then I thought of his parents, who had shipped him abroad when he was a boy—not out of care, but to wash their hands of him. Maybe his life had been harder than I realized.
Lea’s words from the ball came back to me. She had said that she and Ashton had known each other a long time, that they were the same kind of people. Did he learn these skills with her? Had they survived something like this together before?
I closed my eyes, inhaled deeply, and forced the thoughts away. Right now, survival mattered more than digging into the past.
Something glinted on the ground. I dropped to one knee, brushing the soil aside with one hand and probing with the other.
Ashton came over to see. Beneath the dirt, a white surface emerged, smooth and rectangular. A cabin door. My fingers were already on the handle. I looked up at him, eyes bright with hope. “You still have the key, right?” Yesterday, before we dove, I’d locked the cabin door. Ashton had been carrying the key.
I could have smacked myself for that bit of brilliance.
What had I been thinking, locking the cabin door on a deserted stretch of sea where you hardly ever saw an animal, let alone a stranger?
The cabin itself was oddly positioned, half its bulk sunk deep into the soil, so it could not be shifted. The only way in was through this door.
Through the glass in the frame, I had glimpsed two familiar wheels. My suitcase. My very own little suitcase. All I had to do was get this door open.
“No,” Ashton said quietly, and for once, there was regret in his voice. “I lost it underwater last night p>
He admitted it like a soldier taking punishment, stiff-backed and without excuses.
Anyone else would have been furious with him. That key could mean the difference between surviving comfortably and barely scraping by. But I was still rational enough to think clearly.
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If Ashton had lost the key, it was surely when he was fighting to keep me alive under the waves. He would never admit it, but I knew it.
“Never mind,” I said. “Let’s just figure out how to open this door.” I eyed the lock.
“How do we break in p>
“I’ll take care of it,” Ashton replied.
He left me waiting while he went off. When he finally returned, he was holding a massive rock.
I craned my neck and squinted to be sure. Yes, it was a boulder-sized stone.
I stepped back to give him space to strike.
He positioned the rock with precision, not swinging wildly, but aiming with care. Clearly, he had been trained. The glass shattered quickly.
My heart leapt. Even Ashton’s lips curved into the faintest smile.
I rushed forward, but he stopped me with a hand around my waist. “Wait.” He reached through the broken glass. The edges were still razor-sharp, and a careless move could have left a scar. But he was quick, and with a twist, the lock gave way.
He ducked inside first, and a moment later, came out carrying a suitcase.
Relief washed over me. I rushed to check mine.