AFTERWARD, THEY LAY together on his narrow bunk. Ethan’s cabin was tiny but he was lucky not to have to share it with anyone. The Mistral was packed with babies and young children, heavily pregnant women, and the old and disabled. He’d been thinking of giving up his room and sleeping in the hold or some other out-of-the-way place. He was glad that he hadn’t.
Ethan’s face was pressed into Cariad’s frizzy black hair as he curled around her, sleepily musing on how he’d forgotten the softness of a woman’s skin.
“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Cariad said. “I was certain you were dead. I came looking for you, you know, and I couldn’t find you.”
Her words sparked Ethan from his doze. “You came looking for me? When? And how did you know where to look?”
Cariad explained that she’d been tracking his
