Mistletoe In Paradise
Prologue
Fourteen-year-old Hannah Banfield stood at the very edge of a cliff. Not a mental cliff, which would have been less terrifying. Nope, she was stupid enough to be standing on an actual rocky bluff, toes hanging off as she stared down at the Caribbean blue-green sea swirling hundreds of thousands of feet below her.
“Twenty,” came the amused male voice at her side. “It’s twenty feet.”
She slid her gaze to James Webber, ancient and full of wisdom at age fifteen. “We’re going to die.”
Tall, gangly, his messy dark brown hair weeks past needing a cut, he flashed her his crooked smile. His board shorts hung nearly to his knees, one of which was scraped and bleeding from when she’d accidentally tripped him on the hike up here. “We’re not going to die,” he said.
“How do you know?”
“Because I won’t let it happen.”
She closed her eyes and drew in a deep breath at his low but firm tone of confidence, letting it fill her. When the humid, salty sea breeze warmed her, she opened her eyes and stalled by looking around her at the small private island where their families always spent at least one day of their Christmas getaway. She took in the bright white sand, palm trees, and lush green bluffs, all of which was just about as far away from her snowy mountain view at home in the California Sierras as she could get.
James nudged her. “You know how I know we’re going to live? Because Jason did. Look.”
They both eyed James’s brother in the water below, waving wildly up at them. A year older than James, Jason was their fearless leader, and as such, he’d jumped first.
Their moms were BFFs. The women had grown up together, but as adults now lived on opposite coasts in the United States. Since Hannah’s stepdad, Harry, was a year-round captain of a charter yacht, the two families booked the ship for the week before Christmas every year to be together. They had what is called a bareboat charter, meaning they did all the work of the crew to make it affordable, not that any of them had ever minded. Well, except maybe her mom, who didn’t like to cook and clean off the boat, much less on it.
For James and Jason, the annual trip was a chance to get away from the cold New York winters. But for Hannah, it was so much more. The week-and-a-half-long cruise from Miami to St. Thomas and back was a place where she could be a kid, since her life in Real World was very different from that in Vacation World. For this one week she got to be . . . well, free. Happy. Plus, she considered the Webber brothers her two closest friends, trusting them more than anyone else.
“You’ve got this, Hannah Banana,” James said softly.
He might be the wildest, most adventurous person she knew, but he’d never put her in danger. So she drew a deep breath and stared down at the water one last time. She wanted to do this, wanted so much to show that she could be spontaneous and fun, too, though she wasn’t. Were there sharks in the Caribbean Sea? There were, right? She swallowed hard. “I don’t think I can,” she whispered.
“Hey. Hey, it’s okay.” His bigger, warmer hand slid into hers and squeezed. “But you know I’ve got you, though, right?”
She looked into his warm blue-green eyes, the same color as the sea below, and just like that, she believed. He alwayshad her. Maybe all of the other people in her life had let her down, but never him. Not once.
So she gave a slow nod.
Smart enough not to give her another second to think about it, he simply jumped, tugging her with him into the balmy Caribbean air.