F3 Wave!

"Sorry," he said. "I didn't mean . . . just finding you like this . . . the joy in the tragedy."

"I know," Jan whispered. "Just not here." Even when she said it, though, she realized that she didn't mean it. She hadn't stopped him because of the mud. She'd stopped him because she couldn't do it. She'd already had the only man for her. She was grateful to Jomo for saving her, but she wouldn't dishonor the memory of Tim in that way. She no longer wanted anyone but Tim. And the irony of that was that, before she had even realized that, she no longer had Tim.

Jomo carried her over to the base of the cliff, to where the road started up to the top that Jan had been supposed to drive the Jeep up. At the top of the cliff, it was obvious that the cliff face had taken the brunt of the wave, all the worse for anyone who hadn't managed to reach the top of the cliff. The land was wet and washed out for about a quarter of a mile, but Jan could see that there was another hotel resort not far in the distance that looked totally untouched by the tsunami.

Jomo carried her, in a jog, strong enough to easily bear her weight, in that direction. As they drew nearer to it, Jan could see people turning toward them, people who had been milling around outside the hotel building. There were vehicles. Ambulances and trucks. People had plates and glasses in their hands and blankets around their shoulders.

A figure broke out of the crowd and started running toward them.

Jan began to cry. By the time Tim reached them and Jomo was transferring the weight of Jan from his arms to her husband's and looking away from the couple with an expression of slight embarrassment, Jan was sobbing.

"I thought I'd lost you." Variations of this were the first words of both husband and wife.

Others were making their way toward them. Among them was the family of four from the hotel.

The husband of the family, still on a crutch, still with a toddler planted to his pant leg, spoke up. "Your husband saved us. He saw us struggling to get off the deck at the hotel, and he pretty much carried us all—I have no idea how he had the strength—up into the rocks on the north side of the hotel. The water roared right past us. We would never have made it without him."

"Honey, I'm so sorry leaving you with the Jeep like that. I just—"

"Hush, Tim. It's my own damn fault I didn't make it out. You told me what to do and I didn't do it. I'll never be making that mistake again . . . if you keep me."

"Keep you? What the fuck do you mean?"

"Sara told me I didn't deserve you—in the time I spent up there in that tree, thinking I'd die—that you were dead—I realized she was right."

"Sara's a ditz and a bitch to boot," Tim said. "I've never been able to figure out why you picked her to be a bridesmaid in the first place. Let's see if we can get a room in this hotel here and get our honeymoon kick started again—and I'll show you how I'm going to keep you."