I wasn’t sure if it was how grateful I was or if I needed to rest or if I just needed a hug that badly, but I wrapped myself around him like I’d never let go. I was shaking hard enough to make waves in the water. My tears rolled over his shoulder, and he held me tight, murmuring into my ear in Russian. I couldn’t understand a word, but it was the most soothing sound in the world. After a second, I felt him release the side of the boat and wrap his other arm around me. He was treading water to support both of us so he could hold me tighter, and all I could do was press my face into his neck with a silent alive alive alive thank you I’m alive.
Elodie’s voice echoed out over the water. “Stellan!” Then, more quietly to Colette, “Where are they? I swear, if they’re not even here and we had to flirt with those disgusting men for no reason . . .”
“Here,” Stellan croaked. I unwrapped my legs from his waist, realizing what we’d look like, soaking wet and clinging to each other in the shadows. He didn’t loosen his grip on me at all.
Two heads peered over the deck, silhouetted by the deck light. Elodie sniffed, and I could feel her raised eyebrows of scorn from here.
“Can you swim?” Stellan said quietly. I nodded, even though I didn’t really want to let go. He kept an arm around me as we made our way back to the ladder.
Before we climbed up, I turned around one more time. Stellan’s hair was slicked back, throwing the angles of his face into even higher relief. His T-shirt was ripped at the shoulder. I had to restrain myself from throwing my arms around him again, and he opened his mouth like he was about to say something.
Heavy footsteps sounded on the deck. I groped for Stellan again, ready to hide, but Jack’s voice boomed out. “What’s going on? Where’s Avery?”
Stellan let me go like I was burning his hands, and Jack ran across the deck to pull me the rest of the way up.
? ? ?
I’d been in the plush terry-cloth robe for ten minutes, but I hadn’t stopped shivering.
“At first they just said they had to search the boat,” Elodie was explaining. “It wasn’t until we’d talked to them for a while that they told us there had been a vandalism incident at the temple and they’d gotten reports of the suspects being in this area.”
“They were actually police?” My fingernails were a sickly blue, and I tucked my hands under my legs. “It was all because of that brick?”
“It looks that way,” Elodie said. “But we thought they were—”
“So did we,” Stellan said. “And we almost drowned while you asked them which town has the best shellfish.” After they’d gotten us towels and robes, we’d settled in the lower cabin, where we couldn’t be seen through the windows, just in case.
“What happened?” Colette leaned forward, her rosebud mouth a perfect circle of shock. She’d been flitting around the boat like an agitated bird, tucking extra blankets around my legs, trying to get me to eat, making a pot of tea, then another when I said I didn’t like peppermint, even though I really didn’t want anything at all. Now she was sitting next to Stellan, bandaging the scrape on his shoulder.
Stellan met my eyes across the table. I’d felt nothing but numb since we got out of the water, but I suddenly, fiercely wanted to keep what happened between us. I didn’t want Elodie declaring that we’d finally found an excuse to make out. I didn’t want Jack to be jealous and have to pretend he wasn’t. I didn’t want to try to describe what it was like to really, not-exaggerating almost die and have Stellan save my life in a manner so intimate, I actually felt embarrassed looking at him now.
Stellan’s lips parted, and he looked away. “We didn’t drown after all,” he said simply. He took the bandage from Colette and stood up. Her hands dropped to her lap and she started to get up after him, but he turned away without noticing. “And now I’m going to go take a really hot shower. Turns out the Mediterranean is still vraiment cold in June.”
Colette sat back down awkwardly, and I leaned back, only to realize I’d been tucked under Jack’s warm arm the whole time. He wrapped me up in the blanket, pulling me to his chest, and I watched over his shoulder as Stellan disappeared down the hallway.
CHAPTER 16
Elodie and Colette were still sleeping when I woke up the next morning. The last thing I remembered was Colette making me eat soup while I sat in a nest of blankets on her bed. I must have passed out, because I woke up to find the covers tucked around me and Colette and Elodie sharing the next bed over. Two more days, was my first thought. The Saxons had left Beijing yesterday, were passing through London today, then headed to DC. I had two more days until the Circle marriage countdown clock ran out.
I pulled on a sweatshirt and slipped out of the room. Stellan was sitting on one of the bar stools.
He looked up when I came onto the deck, and set a little cup of espresso on the bar. A violent wave of unexpected emotion crashed over me, so strong I stopped still.
I was drowning last night. I was drowning and he saved my life, but all I could think of now was what had happened right after.
We could just have easily have swum straight to the swim ladder. I would have thanked Stellan, then cried on Jack’s shoulder. Stellan would have joked about having to save me and ribbed Elodie and Colette for almost killing the purple-eyed girl.