Page 126 of Bewitched By the Sea Monster
As Jackson yelped and leapt back, swiping the water from his face, Alistair bellowed in pain.
I turned to him, just as his head disappeared beneath the surface, and saw the hooked rune above his left eye light up an angry red.
Alistair stayed near the ship,even after his entertaining duties had ended, and everyone on board turned to the lunch spread that was set out for us. I couldn’t see him—the goggles were collected at the end of his show—but I heard him.
“I wish I could do something.”
“Is there good food?”
“Have some chips. For me.”
“You are alright. Right?”
“I hope you can hear me.”
His voice comforted me. Gave me something good to cling to.
Jackson kept me by his side and spent the duration of the trip chatting with Kian and some of the others. Never with Rune, though, much to his chagrin.
I, however, had watched Rune most of the ride back. He was suave with the way he avoided conversation with anyone who wasn’t in his “inner circle.” He talkedtopeople, sure. Had spent 75 percent of the tour providing entertainment, making toasts, and telling stories. His enigmatic personality was a beacon of energy and light. Everyone gravitated toward him and listened. But he never talkedwithpeople. If someone tried to rope him into actual conversation, he’d smile and laugh and smoothly, oh-so-smoothly, navigate himself away.
A five-minute conversation with Rune might’ve been the key to changing your life, according to Jackson. Butgetting that five-minute conversation was as tricky and impossible as finding Willy Wonka’s golden ticket inside a random chocolate bar.
We arrived back at our cottage late afternoon—although all hours of the day looked the same behind the dense wall of fog—and Jackson’s mood had turned vinegary.
Unfortunately for him, my mood had gonemoreacidic. Because my jaw ached something fierce—it’d hurt to eat earlier, when every bite drove white-hot needles into the side of my face—and my heart, which had taken so many batterings since arriving on this isle, wouldn’t stop bleeding. It was drowning me. This sorrow. Guilt.Dread. My head was barely above it all, and I didn’t have the strength to keep swimming.
If this went on until tomorrow, it would destroy me.
I had to plug the flood of emotions.
And the biggest source of hemorrhaging was the gorgeous, god-like man before me, who was currently kicking off his shoes and stomping into our bedroom.
I rolled my tongue around, trying to wrangle the words, before saying, “Can we talk now, Jackson? Please?”
“About?”
“Us.”
He paused, midway through rooting through our little closet, where he’d hung most of his clothes.
“I don’t want to argue anymore, Jackson,” I said.
“Good.” He pulled a pair of jeans off a hanger. “Neither do I. You should get some more ice for your jaw, babe. It’s all red.” He slapped his jeans against his thigh. “Iamsorry.”
“I know. And I’m not mad, Jackson. Honest.”
I’m tired.
And sad.
And scared.
“But we do still need to talk,” I finished.
His irritation clawed at me, but he was outwardly the picture of calm as he closed the closet and draped his clothes over his arm.
“I—we—” The words stuck their thorny edges into my throat. The more I tried to clear them, the more they stabbed their spikes into me.
