“Just . . . don’t take advantage of her,” I said.
Stellan held up his hands in surrender or exasperation or both and settled down on a lounge chair two down from mine. After a few minutes, he gestured to the bracelet on my arm. I handed it over, and he spun it to a new word, paused when nothing happened, then tried a few more before handing it back to me.
I slipped it on my arm. “Three days,” I said under my breath.
Stellan looked out at the water. “That bracelet is somewhere. We’ll find it.”
“Maybe,” I said bitterly. “If I’m still allowed to, between the Saxons and Jack.” I didn’t really mean to, but I found myself telling Stellan about Jack wanting to bring my family into our search. “Being able to follow these clues myself is the only thing I still had a choice in, and if it were up to Jack, even that wouldn’t be my decision anymore.”
Stellan hauled himself to sitting. “You always have a choice.”
I fiddled with the hem of my dress. “I don’t think you’ve been paying very close attention. I’m so important in every aspect of what we’re doing, but it’s becoming obvious that none of it is my choice. I have literally three days until the Saxons marry me off. I’m just a particularly valuable puppet.”
Stellan swung his legs around and perched on the edge of the chaise, facing me. “Lots of people in your shoes would already be on the beach in Indonesia. Refusing to run away is a choice. It’s a brave one.”
Suddenly, I couldn’t sit still. “Why do you say stuff like that?” I paced the deck, my bare feet slapping the smooth, cool wood, remembering what Jack said had first attracted him to me. He saw me at school, looking like I didn’t care. Doing what I wanted, even if it wasn’t what everyone normally did. He didn’t realize I was doing it because I didn’t have another option.
“I’m only here because I have to be. It’s not exactly something to be proud of.”
I could feel Stellan’s eyes on me. “So you care about people and get stronger in response to difficult circumstances,” he said. “Those are good things.”
The ropes anchoring the boat next to us—the Konstantinos, according to the name emblazoned on its side—creaked against the dock.
Then a strange sound came from outside. A kind of a gruff growl. Stellan jumped up and hurried into the cabin. Just as quickly, he reemerged. “Hide,” he mouthed at the same time I heard a strange voice call out, “Astynomía. Police.”
Stellan dragged me behind the bar. We crouched side by side under the bar top.
“Why would the police be here?” I whispered.
“I don’t think they would,” he said, confirming my fears. What if Jack was right, and the Order had come to kidnap me?
The voices were closer now. I heard Colette speaking in French, then Elodie chimed in using English, obviously for my benefit.
“I think you have the wrong boat,” she said sweetly.
“We have orders. We must make a search,” the man said. A low bark accompanied the statement. Dogs. Even if the men didn’t find us, dogs would in seconds.
I leaned close to Stellan. “The water,” I breathed. Stellan nodded, then pointed at the bracelet on my arm. I slipped it off, and he stashed it inside an empty ice bucket, covering it with cocktail napkins and stuffing it under the bar.
While Colette and Elodie led the men around inside—stalling, thank God—I stayed low and slipped over the boat’s dive deck, clinging to the metal ladder.
The water was freezing. I bit back a gasp as my sundress billowed around my waist. I was about to remind Stellan he didn’t need to hide, but he’d already lowered himself after me and flicked his fingers toward the dinghy tied to the side of the yacht.
There wasn’t much sunlight left, and down here it felt even darker than on the deck. We approached the dinghy, making for the narrow crevice between the smaller boat and the larger one—this was as hidden as we were going to get. I pushed myself back into it. Stellan glided silently behind me.
I realized immediately this wasn’t the best hiding place. The “police” only had to lean over the edge behind the bar to see us. The Konstantinos wasn’t more than ten feet away. Maybe we should get around the other side of it. It’d involve being exposed for a few seconds, but—
The water around us went from dusky to fully lit. Someone had flipped the floodlights on the deck. We were still in relative shadow, but the ripples from our swim fanned out, crystal clear in the reflections.