Aliyah's POV
The morning air was damp and cool, the kind that clung to my skin and made the inside of my nose tingle. I woke to the sound of metal clinking, followed by the low scrape of a wrench against something solid.
When I unzipped the tent flap, Asher was crouched beside his bike, sleeves shoved up, hands dark with grease. The sun hadn’t fully broken through the clouds yet, but a soft pale light pooled over him, catching on the line of his jaw.
“Morning,” he said without looking up.
“Morning,” I murmured, stepping out barefoot. The sand was cold under my toes.
I tried to focus on the horizon, to act normal, but a dull cramp tightened low in my stomach. My fingers pressed there automatically. Not sharp enough to double me over, but enough to remind me of the strip hidden in my ba
