Page 145 of Kai
What would he say to you right now?Nix demanded.
Panic is the enemy of success.Kai’s voice replaced Nix’s in my head.Kick, kick, kick. You’ve got strong legs, Cece. You can do it.
But I’m drowning.Couldn’t Nix understand?I’m fated to drown.
What if we are each other’s fate? It was Kai again. What if we can build our destiny together?
Dying was sure a hallucinatory experience. All those nerves firing their last neurons—
Cece, go!Nix ordered, his tone urgent and pissed.Now!
Go where?
Up!Nix shouted as his voice grew even more distant. Go up!
Kick, kick, kick.It was Kai again, using his firm swimming instructor tone. You can do this. I challenge you to kick. Swim toward the surface, Sorceress. Do it for us.
The two pushy males startled me into action. They were the most influential men in my life. In the weirdest way, I wasn’t alone anymore. But… where the hell was up?
I tilted my head every which way and saw nothing but darkness.
Chapter Forty-seven
Cece
I let out the last of my breath and felt the bubbles rising past my face. Following their direction, I scissored my feet. A layer of warmer water suggested I was on the right track, but by now, I had zero air in my lungs, and it was getting hard to think. I focused on one thing. I kicked, and kicked, and kicked some more.
My body felt heavy as lead, my lungs felt as if they were about to burst, and I was tired and slow, but I kept kicking. Time didn’t seem to exist in the underwater realm, and yet my body was racing a countdown to shut down. Dark spots formed at the edges of my vision. Even as I kicked and willed my mouth to stay closed, water rushed in. The Pacific seemed intent on becoming part of me. How much longer before I died?
I punched through yet another layer and speared out of the water like a dolphin. A breeze blew over my wet body as I splashed down and bobbed on the surface.
Air!I inhaled a huge gasp.Oxygen! Victory!
My poor lungs shuddered, my stomach roiled, and my heart drummed in my ears. Hacking and retching, I treaded water while I tried to gain my bearings and figure out what to do next.
Darkness. It was all I could see all around me. My can-do optimism crashed. Not victory, only a lonely reprieve. Fuck, I needed to give myself a motivational talk.
Rain pelted me and the sea. My legs hurt from the effort of keeping my head above water. My hands remained tied behind my back and useless. People in my situation died quickly.
But I’d survived so far, and I couldn’t give up. I’d made a promise to Nix, and he’d demanded I keep it. I also wanted the opportunity to make a bunch of crazier promises to Kai.
Float, Astor. You can do that. You won a challenge. Over ten minutes!
Float. Yes. Right.
I wasn’t sure that ten minutes of floating would win me this battle when I was alone and adrift, but then again, what choice did I have? I leaned back and brought my feet up. To fight my terror, I devised equations to calculate my survival time in the open sea, given my current variables.
Yeah, not helpful.
Panic is the enemy of success.Kai’s serene voice came again, and I could almost feel the support of his hands beneath my back.Clear your mind. Inflate your lungs. Relax. Feel the water. It wants to hug you, if only you’ll let it.
I blinked off the drops of a waning rain shower. The sky cleared above me. The clouds were in retreat. I knew I was still in trouble. I had to get to land or to a boat. Maybe if I rested a little, I could muster some more kicking on the surface this time around.
To float is to surrender. I trusted my body to the ocean.To float is to accept the water’s mercy. I stopped struggling and felt the water’s mercy keenly. Maybe I could just do nothing for a change. Perhaps this was my time to learn how to meditate. I emptied my mind and gave up control of everything.
As I turned inward, the tension in my legs ebbed. I imagined myself sleeping in Kai’s arms. Peace trickled through me. Calm washed over me. My face barely peeked out of the water, and even though my lungs protested with a rattle, I deepened my breaths. I wasinthe water, but I wasn’t drowning anymore.
The quiet murmur of the ripples around my body soothedme. So did the small waves that rocked me gently. It was as if the sea had decided to be kind to me, even though I’d always thought it wanted to kill me.
