Noah released my arm and I drifted back to the bottom caught in a dizzying game of monkey in the middle. One of the dolphins swam past, a male I hadn’t noticed before, bigger than the rest. He clipped me on the back of the shoulder, not an entirely playful gesture. A few seconds later he came back and bumped me again, this time with bruising force. Then he circled me once, twice. The third time I started to get nervous. His harsh signature was commanding. Threatening.
Noah torpedoed right at him and rammed him in the side with his shoulder, herding the male dolphin away from me. They bumped and prodded, and every time the dolphin tried to cut towards me, Noah cut him off, his agility and precision of movement matching the dolphin’s. This wasn’t a game anymore. At one point Noah hauled off and punched the dolphin in the side of the head. After that the dolphin lost interest and swam idly away, casting us a few backward glances during his retreat. The others seemed to tire of us too, and I watched them go until every last one of them were nothing but a distant impression.
Noah swam over to me and laced his fingers with mine, eyes searching through a veil of feathering hair. He moved closer, cupping my face with his hands. His thumbs caressed my cheeks. I had never wanted something and not wanted something so much at the same time. A kiss would change everything. His lips were so close, a mere wisp away. But I’d made him promise, and I knew he’d keep that promise.
I tucked my fingers under the waistband on the back of Noah’s shorts and with one powerful kick of his legs I was floating. I closed my eyes, enjoying the feel of Noah’s body moving underneath me, thinking I could so go to sleep riding on Noah’s back.
Noah tapped me on the leg, and when I opened my eyes they followed the path of his pointing finger. A shark swam parallel with us some twenty yards away. Eyes captivating in the side-to-side swivel of its triangular head—dark and menacing. The eyes of a predator. Eyes I had seen before in Sol’s face before he had cut me and tossed me overboard.
The shark glided away without the slightest hint he’d even seen us.
A few minutes later we collapsed on the sand, both of us on our backs, faces skyward. After I caught my breath, my head fell to the side.
“You didn’t tell me I would be able to see out there.”
“Yeah, I figured you’d pick that up pretty quick. You’re good with the sound stuff. Better than I am,” he said, begrudgingly offering me the compliment.
“So, there is something I’m better at than you.” I smiled, the feeling of superiority fading in the shadow of my one remaining failure. “I really, really want to swim,” I said, almost a whisper.
“I know.” His fingers curled around mine, an apology in his eyes.
We stared at each other, nothing quiet about the silence that stretched on and on. I’d had a few boyfriends before and I’d never made it a secret that I liked to kiss. My Nana and I had talked about it a lot. Her advice had always been to kiss them first and ask questions later, because there was no sense in wasting time on a boy if his kiss didn’t create fireworks.
I wondered, while lying next to Noah, what she would say if I told her I didn’t even have to kiss him for fireworks to explode. All he had to do was look at me and my breath came fast and shallow. My insides felt like chocolate melting under a hot sun, and the most delicious sensation of awareness traveled its way up and down my entire body. What would she say to that?
I opened my mouth and laughed because I had to let those butterflies escape before they did permanent damage to my heart and stomach.
“What’s so funny?” He smiled back.
I freaking loved his smile. “You, punching that dolphin. Is that even legal?”
“He was testing me, seeing if I was willing to share.”
“Share?”
“Yeah. Males are especially aggressive when it comes to mating, and they’re horny sons of bitches, and not always species discriminate.”
“Ugh.” That put a whole new perspective on things. I wasn’t quite sure how I felt about having a dolphin come on to me.
“Yeah, just be careful and don’t assume you’re safe when you encounter a pod on your own, which eventually you will. And if you ever come across a small group of males, swim like hell.” Noah rolled over on his side and rested his head on his elbow. “Just so you know, I’m not willing to share. I’m also waiting.”
“Waiting for what?”
“For you to ask.”
* * *
When I got home from the most incredible and at the same time the most disappointing day of my life, it was with an utter sense of loss. The crash after a supreme high. Something I didn’t know I held slipped though my fingers today, and I didn’t know how to get it back. Like a parting of two halves, distancing me from all I knew and what I thought I knew, distancing me from my dad.
I missed him. I just didn’t know how to forgive him, not when every day it became clearer what he and my mother had stolen from me. I was beginning to resent her too, this woman I had only met through an old black and white photograph.
The house was quiet and I thought about skipping upstairs to avoid seeing my dad, but I was thirsty and needed a shot of sweet tea from the refrigerator.
My dad was in the kitchen. He sat on a stool at the island reading the paper, an unopened box of donuts in the center of the counter. They’d been there for two days and remained untouched. My eyes skidded over him, blind to the dark circles that shadowed his eyes, the tired lines around his mouth and his generally pale appearance, as if he hadn’t been outside for days. I went straight to the refrigerator and opened the door, then seemed to forget what I wanted. Oh, yeah, I wanted my old dad back. The one that wasn’t a liar and a manipulator. Too bad he no longer existed.
The back of my neck tingled with knowing. It occurred to me then that he might want the same thing, the old Caris back. The Caris that would have been able to talk to him about Noah and what I might feel for him. How I warred with wanting to be with him and at the same time was so afraid of hurting him. Did my dad want the Caris that could leave here and go back home? Was it his plan to dump me here and wash his hands of me once and for all?
“Where have you been?” Paper shuffled behind me. I turned enough to give him a scathing look, like he had no right to ask.
“I’ve been with Noah.” I left it at that, being evasive on purpose.
“That’s good you’re spending time together. How are you?”
It was an innocent enough question, but I knew the meaning behind it.
I slammed the refrigerator door, thirst forgotten.
“Do you mean how am I progressing as an extraordinary being?” I looked up at the ceiling and pretended to go through a mental catalog. “As you can see, I can put my hair in a ponytail.” I pulled my sunglasses off the top of my head and tossed them on the island. “I can breathe water now. So you’re off the hook on that one. No more worrying Caris might drown. And really, you can drop the looks. They’re as fake now as they’ve ever been. Can’t swim yet.” I snagged the box of donuts off the counter. I headed for the stairs and the sanctuary of my room.
“Caris, that’s not what I meant. I’m more interested in how you are. I just want to know you’re all right. And tell you, if you need me, I’m still here.”
I whirled on him, taking satisfaction in the fact that I towered over him on the steps. He stood at the bottom, one foot poised on the first step, hand curled on the banister.
“Need you? I needed you to tell me the truth.”
“How long?” He sounded so lost.
I sucked in a breath, fortifying my determination to not care and looked sideways through the porthole window. The sun was beginning its descent and it promised to be a spectacular sunset. The kind we would ordinarily enjoy together. My anger waned and, just like the sunset, I knew it would be gone soon, but also like the sunset, it wouldn’t go out without one last burst of intensity. I planned on clinging to it every last second. Anger was better than the hurt I knew was coming. The guilt t
hat shimmered just underneath, because if I allowed myself to think about it, my dad had suffered as much as I had. It was still hard to believe this person I had trusted and loved had found it so easy to steal my very identity.
“How long do you need?” he asked again, as if there were a statute of limitations on my anger, on these feeling of betrayal.
I blinked and a tear escaped, and I braced myself against the softening of his eyes because there was a part of me that wanted nothing more than to have him put his arms around me and tell me everything would be all right.
“I don’t know, Daddy.” I spun around and pounded the rest of the way up the stairs, slamming the door shut behind me.
In my room, I tossed the box of donuts on my bed then flipped through my vinyl collection, looking for the saddest, most depressing album I could find. A couple of seconds later, a record spun on the turntable. I plopped down on the bed and ripped open the box of donuts. They weren’t fresh but they were chocolate and they were sweet and I realized how ugly it was to eat and sing and cry at the same time.
* * *
Three donuts later, I lay on my side, staring at the picture of my mother. I had always wondered who had taken the picture. Who she would smile at like that, as though they held her whole world in the palm of their hand. Even though I still kind of hated him, I hoped it was my dad. My mom may have been a princess after all. She’d had a fairytale life. One of the Grimm kind, complete with a villain and a tragic ending and a prince charming who’d been left with another man’s child to raise as his own. A child who wasn’t normal and never would be. Why had he done it? Did he love her that much?
He’d left about an hour ago. I’d heard his car pulling from the driveway and it just made me cry harder. He hadn’t yelled up the stairs to tell me where he was going or when he’d be back. He’d just left me alone. I had been lying up here, wallowing alone for too long.
I made myself get up and go to the bathroom and wash my face. The moon hung half full and bright in a midnight blue sky, casting enough light the figure emerging from the surf was unmistakable. Or so I thought.
Noah.
My heart did its usual flip-flop. Somehow it kept forgetting we were just friends. My legs forgot too. They were running too fast toward him to be just friends. Only when I got to the beach, heart racing and chest heaving with effort, I stopped short.
It wasn’t Noah.
Silver eyes flashed at me through the darkness with surprise or recognition, I couldn’t tell which. Maybe some of both. I stood immobile, as did he, as though he hadn’t expected to see me, this man who’d raped my mother. It hadn’t occurred to me he might come find me. Here he stood, and even if I wanted to deny it, it was unmistakable. This man was my father. I felt it, an odd sense of knowing. Neither of us spoke. Even though I had seen him before, now that I knew who he was, what he had done, I half expected to see a monster. He wasn’t a monster. Quite the opposite. If I passed this man on the street he would have garnered a second look. He was as compelling as he’d been that night on the docks.
The breeze blew stronger than usual, the sky dark over the horizon. Waves rolled in quick succession, one after another, resembling the erratic beat of my heart.
“You look so much like her,” he said in a voice filled with awe. “Except for the eyes. She had the loveliest brown eyes. Unusual for a breather.”
It was an odd sensation, standing here under his perusal, knowing how his cruel acts had irrevocably changed the course of my life as well as my dad’s. But then a deeper part nagged at me. I was only here because of his cruel acts. And he had given me his eyes. I didn’t want his eyes. I didn’t want anything from him.
“Why are you here?” I was thankful for the steadiness of my voice. Maybe he couldn’t hear the way my heart was beating too fast. He wore a pearl around his neck, the color of a cold winter day. His chest glistened with moisture, the rise and fall of it nearly matching my own. He was a big man, all sinew muscle, raw and uncivilized. It was as if he had been formed and dropped from the storm clouds themselves. Dull gray eyes, like tarnished silver. Hair that clung to his shoulders in wet clumps. The pattern on his arm electrifying in the dark, like lightning emblazoned on his skin.
“Caris, despite what you may have heard, I am not a monster.”
Oh, but he was. In this fairy tale he was. A monster that had remembered my name. My lip curled in disgust. “Are you saying you didn’t rape my mother?”
His head jerked back as though I had hit him. The air around us sizzled like crackling grease. Thunder rolled long and low, shuddering through me, shaking me all the way to my core. Dark clouds billowed, building higher and higher, turning the sky dark and ominous.
“I hurt Rena.” His voice sliced through the wind. “I am sorry for that. If I could take back that whole summer I would. I paid for what I did. I still pay.” Anguish churned in his eyes, defiance in the rigid set of his shoulders. The sky lit up behind him on a strobe of lightning. Fat drops of rain plopped into the sand.
“No. My mom paid for what you did. My dad paid.” Maybe my dad most of all. I wasn’t yet ready to appreciate what he had done by giving up so much of his life for me. So much anger it weighed me down, held me captive just like the stupid charm meant to protect me from this man. And for now I would stay gladly tied. My anger was all I had that felt real. This moment certainly didn’t. It was like being in Athen Kelley’s presence turned me into someone else. Someone I didn’t know at all.
“I’m sorry. I didn’t come here to upset you. I needed to see for myself if it was true, that you are mine.” His words sent panic streaking through my body. My legs and arms felt weak with it.
“Don’t say that. I’m not yours and I never will be. I want you to leave and I don’t want you to come back.” I had to send him away. I was afraid if I didn’t, he would steal all that was left of me and I wouldn’t recognize myself anymore. He stepped toward me and my body tensed, telling me to run.
“I never dreamed this. I never dared to hope you could be mine.” His voice faltered and something shifted in his eyes, a spark of light stealing over the dullness. Why was he looking at me like that? I stumbled back, truly afraid now.
“Stop saying that.” The words burst out of me on a half-sob, half-scream. “I don’t want you here. Go.”
“I’m sorry, Caris.” He reached for me and I thought I would die if he touched me.
Please stop. Please stop saying my name.
“Forgive me.” His words reverberated in my head. I couldn’t even tell if he’d spoken them aloud. I heard them everywhere. They swirled on the wind, soaked right into my skin and sang in my blood. I covered my ears, but I still heard them.
I turned my back on him and let the wind wrap around me like a shield. My cheeks were wet again, salty tears burning their way down my face. I couldn’t believe I was crying over this man. He didn’t deserve it. I wiped my face with the back of my hands, prepared to do battle for myself, but when I turned back around he was gone.
I searched the churning water, searched until the waves calmed, and the sky cleared, and the wind gentled to a slight breeze.
No, it wasn’t possible.
I thought of the day on the boat, when Sol had come onboard in a fog so thick the whole world had been shut out. Even though my feet were planted firmly in the sand, I felt tossed around, as if I were out there at the mercy of the fickle ocean, helpless. My mind searched for an anchor. Noah. It was always Noah. I closed my eyes and fought the desire to sing to him. I recognized it now and buried the urge. It wasn’t easy. I wanted him here, and a selfish part of me needed him here. It would be so easy to succumb to the power of it.
Looking into my father’s eyes had been like looking into his soul. A tortured soul tarnished by guilt. And whether my mother had meant to or not, she had driven him to that dark place, and until I learned to control my Song, I couldn’t risk doing that to Noah.
I had also seen something else in his eyes as he had loo
ked at me. The hope of the one thing he had lost forever.
Redemption.
Twenty
Noah
“So, what’s the plan?” Jeb tossed a handful of live fish in the tank. They huddled together in a tight ball, moving in perfect symmetry. Ellie responded with guarded curiosity. Then, as if deciding she was hungry, she broke into hunting mode, chasing the fish around the tank. She snagged a couple of them between her teeth and gulped them down; all the proof I needed that she was ready. Now I just had to figure out how I was going to go about getting her out of here. I had never done a prison break before.
“The simpler the better.” I looked over at Jeb. “How about we just walk out of here? I mean, what does she weigh? Five hundred?”
Jeb shrugged. “Give or take fifty. And getting heavier.”
“Doable.” It wouldn’t be easy making the hundred-yard walk carrying a five hundred pound dolphin, but it was the easiest thing I could think of.
“Do you think she’ll let you do that? Just pick her up and carry her?”
“I don’t see why not. If I can’t convince her, I’m pretty sure Caris can.”
Sometimes Jeb was scary when he smiled. There was such a thing as too many bright teeth. “Y’all are a match made in heaven.”
“Shut up.”
“I understand, Noah. I know whipped when I see it.” He slapped me on the back. “Come on, my throat turned to sandpaper half an hour ago. I’ll get you an Icee.”
We barely made it through the gate before we passed a group of girls, all bright eyes and smiles and exposed skin. One of them caught Jeb’s eye, offering a suggestive smile that Jeb found impossible to ignore. Another one sided up to me and opened her mouth to say something, but I looked away before she could utter a sound.
I appreciated the opposite sex as much as the next guy, probably more so being as I lived in an area where girls walked around nearly naked most of the time, in the summer months for sure. And maybe there were a couple of cute ones in that last bunch, but Jeb was right. Only one girl could turn my head right now.
Waterborn (The Emerald Series Book 1) Page 19