Page 106 of No One Aboard
“Not that,” Francis interrupted. “Tell me what youwant. Your wildest dreams.”
“Okay. Uh, I want to work with animals. Maybe be a scientist and learn how to protect coral reefs.”
Francis set his cup down hard enough to clang against the plate. His tea sloshed a bit over the side, but he didn’t seem to notice. Or care. “Rylan, I want to know what keeps you up at night. What you burn to achieve or possess. What you would do anything to get. That’s what makes a man or a woman. That’s what makes a Cameron.”
Lila fluffed up her bangs. “Rylan, darling, we mean yourpassions. We know you love ocean animals, but—”
“But hobbies don’t always make careers,” Francis stated. “Unless you’re willing to do whatever it takes.”
Rylan had looked between them, his perfect birthday tea party dissipating like water down the drain. “It’s not like I’m going into acting like you, Mom. Or business like you, Dad. What I want isn’t like that. It’s more...” He wanted to give voice to the wordchill, a word that seemed never to have entered his parents’ vocabularies.
That hadn’t stopped Tia, though. “Chill out, guys,” she instructed them, pinching a tiny cucumber sandwich between her fingers. She swallowed it in one bite, and Rylan wondered for the thousandth time why neither of his parents interrogated Tia. God knewshewould have an answer.
Francis pressed on, unperturbed. “When I was your age, I had nothing. I was put on a ship with boys who had everything. They didn’t even have to fight for it. No one was going to hand me a life like that, so I made one. Now you will be weaned off my success in order to make your own. So answer me, Rylan. What would you do anything for?”
Getting out of this conversation.“I—I don’t know, Dad.” He wanted to melt into his chair.
“It’s time to know,” Francis snapped, his voice serrated.
Rylan froze up, muscles stiff and disobedient.
“Leave him alone.” Tia slammed her fist on the table. The teacups rattled on their plates.
“Tia!” Lila rushed to dab at a blot of tea that marred the pristine table.
“This doesn’t concern you, Tia.” Francis’s eyes bored into Rylan.
He squirmed, tears pricking. An awful feeling slithered on the back of his neck.
“Bullshit.” Tia stood, banging the table. Rylan’s honeysuckle tea shuddered. He couldn’t bring himself to drink anymore. “You’re obsessed with him. It’s grooming and it’s manipulative.”
“Sit down, young lady,” Francis ordered, and she shook her head before he could get the words fully out.
“Are you so invested in getting us to respect you for the money you made because you know we’ll never respect you for the person you are?”
The air left Rylan’s lungs, and he groped to grab Tia’s hand and pull her down before she could keep talking.
But he couldn’t reach her.
“Well guess what,Dad?” she continued. Rylan felt faint. “We’re almost adults. And if you think we’re sticking around after all the shit you’ve pulled, then you’re even stupider than—”
Francis flipped the table, casually with a flick of his wrists, but the damage was catastrophic. Ceramic and silver poured into Rylan’s lap and shattered on the deck. The tea burned his skin and he leaped backward only to slip on the deck and fell onto his knees. Shards embedded in his hands and legs.
Francis crossed to Tia and slapped her hard across the face. Rylan had never seen him go that far before. But he’d never seen Tia fight him like that either. She stumbled, and he grabbed her shoulder and Rylan’s, pinching them hard. Rylan could still feel the pressure.
“You have no idea what I’ve done,” he had told them, relaxed. “And you have no idea what you’re capable of because of me.”
Rylan shook violently, fighting off vomit. Tia lifted her face, hair hiding one eye.
“I think I’m starting to get a clue.” She lunged forward without warning. She hit Francis at his waist, which hinged. He stumbled backward, enough time for Tia to stand and push him with all of her force backward over the railing. Into the sea.
Francis had narrowly avoided being crushed to death by his own ship. He hadn’t had a life jacket on, and he told Lila and Rylan later that it had, ironically, saved his life. He’d been able to dive as deep as he could manage until the ship had passed. When he swam back up to the surface, Alejandro had already ordered a man-overboard rescue.
Later, Rylan would wonder if his twin had meant to kill Francis just like he wondered now as he and Lila stared through the sheets of rain at Tia Cameron and the man who’d just plummeted overboard.
Why am I the one you’re always pushing, Dad?Rylan had sobbed to Francis after his father had been pulled back onboard. Tia had been locked in her cabin, Lila had gone to lie down, leaving Rylan on the deck with his father, shivering under a towel.
Why are you trying to force this with me, this killer instinct? Why not Tia? Because she’s a girl? Because she’s ninety seconds younger?
