Azure (Drowning In You) (16 page)

No, she shouldn’t.

“So what are we doing tomorrow?” She nudged Kirsten. “Hey, are you awake?”

“We could rent a car and drive south, to Paleochora. There’s a ruined castle and nice beaches.”

“Barbarossa destroyed the castle,” Markus said. “Not much to see.”

“But the guide says the drive is scenic. And the food is good.”

Kai had said he’d cook for her tonight. Olivia bit her lip and closed her eyes. She should stop thinking about him. Kirsten was right; she was in too deep already. Time to surface and swim to shore.

“Sounds great,” she said, taking a big gulp of beer. “I’m in.” She was not going down to the beach no matter what.

Later that night, she retreated to her room and grabbed the novel she’d started when she’d arrived. Vampires, werewolves. Safe, because she didn’t believe in these creatures. They didn’t exist.

Mermaids, either.

Although, one should allow for a possibility of things unknown.

She fell on her bed, opening the novel.
No, not really.
Her whole supernatural first-hand experience — or second hand in this case — was a ghost seen by Peter, a friend in second grade. He’d sworn he’d seen it, but so what? He’d been into all sorts of weird stuff. He’d believe in mermaids, no sweat.

But not her. She was a rational human being. A failure in many things, true, but a down-to-earth person.

Impulsive, though. Not thinking things through. Self-centered. Dammit, was Justin right in all he’d said about her?

Had she been too rash in hanging up on him like that? In deciding it was over? She let the open book fall on her stomach. She thought about Justin, tried to see past his hurtful words, to remember what it was like to be with him. She remembered walking with him in the parks, talking. They’d mostly talked about him and his family, but maybe that was because she didn’t want to talk about hers. Didn’t want to recall the events that had led her there.

Like Kai.
He didn’t want to talk about his past, either. How could she blame him?

Rubbing her chest, she forced her mind back to Justin. They’d biked, met with friends for dinner, gone to the movies.

Had never talked about important stuff. Yeah, it was her fault, too, but he’d never pressed her. For which she’d been grateful at the time.

But how had he thought to propose to her when he barely knew her? Hell, Kai knew more important stuff about her than Justin did.

Back to Kai.

He’d heard about the source of her pain and had held her and soothed her, but she didn’t know that much about him.

About Kai.

She knew his father came from this Cretan family, the Atis, who apparently had ties to mermaids and magic.

Right.

His mother was American. He’d been to college in
New York
. He lived now on
Crete
, having dropped out of college. The locals thought he was a merman and hated him for it.

He was cute and really nice and hot and clever and funny and... Had she mentioned hot?

Oh god.

She rolled on her side, pillowing her head on her arm, letting the novel fall on the mattress. Out there heaved the sea, and Kai sat staring at the waves.

She couldn’t go back to Justin; there was nothing to go back to. He hadn’t hurt her feelings; maybe because there hadn’t been any to hurt. They were done.

And she couldn’t go to Kai, because they had barely started something and it was already complicated.

Her heart heavy, she picked up the novel once more, determined to follow Marisa, the kick-ass heroine, all the way to the book’s happy end.

***

The drive to Paleochora was as majestic as Kirsten had promised. In their rented car, they crossed
Crete
vertically from north to south coast, a relatively straight line. They rolled through rugged mountains covered in vegetation, bare rocks of many colors, gorges where streams sparkled, tiny hamlets and quaint little houses with chocolate tiled roofs.

Kirsten was driving and of course that gave Markus the opportunity to crack countless, tasteless jokes about women drivers. It earned him quite an earful from both girls, and at some point Olivia, who sat in the back, managed to grab him in a chokehold, while Kirsten made faces at him.

“I surrender,” he gasped, tapping the seat. “Women rule. Please spare my worthless life.”

“Damn, Markus, I hate it when you give up so easily.” Olivia let him go and fell in the back seat. She sighed and edged to the right. To her left, cragged cliffs dropped down to a narrow gorge. A flock of wild pigeons flew up from its depths, like a fast-moving cloud, and faded into the sky.

Beautiful.

Which made her think of Kai and caused her to catch her breath.

Stop it.

Paleochora was a tiny town, built on a narrow strip of land stretching into the sea, the steep mountains at its back. It had two long beaches, one of black sand on the
Cretan
Sea
, and one of golden sand on the
Libyan
Sea
. Hard to believe that beyond the blue horizon lay
Africa
.

Many things here were hard to believe.

They parked among the hundreds of other cars. Some guys were windsurfing. There were cafes and tavernas and the sand was strewn with sun-baked bodies. So unlike the quiet beaches Kai had shown her.

Frowning, she got out of the car, determined to push him out of her mind. Markus got them the last free umbrella on the beach, paying also for deck chairs, and they spread their towels and lay down among all the other roasting bodies.

If only Kai would walk up the beach, his dark hair falling in his eyes, the water sparkling on his skin...

“Are you here, Liv?” Kirsten waved a hand in front of her face. “You’re a thousand miles away today.”

“Thinking.”

“You look tired.”

“I didn’t sleep so well.” There were dreams, she now recalled, in shades of blue, and mermaids swam, their long, serpentine bodies slithering around her, closing on her like a net.

“You can nap.”

“Wait a minute...” Olivia looked around at the packed beach as if seeing it for the first time. “Are we here because I look tired?” Normally Markus and Kirsten would have gone for hikes in gorges and on mountain tops. They were related to goats, Olivia was sure.

Kirsten shrugged, looking only slightly guilty. “We enjoy a quiet day on the beach, too, once in a while.”

“No, guys, you shouldn’t have done that. I can hike, you know.”

Markus pulled his towel over his face. “It wasn’t for you, it’s for me. Kirsten wore me out last night. I need my rest.”

With a snort, Kirsten threw her hat at him, which he dodged. “Shut up.”

They read their books, dozed, waded into the water and even started a splashing match. Kirsten insisted they had to make a sand castle, because she hadn’t made one since she was little, and Olivia who barely remembered ever making one was happy to help.

Early afternoon came and went, and hunger pushed them to find a taverna for a late lunch. Their trusted German guide book mentioned a couple of good places. They walked in the sweltering heat, winding through the narrow streets of the town, stone-built houses with wide porches and tall trees flanking them. They chose a seafood restaurant and sat in the shade. The song of the cicadas was deafening.

Not enough to drown out her thoughts, unfortunately.

The afternoon passed in a haze. The effort it took to concentrate on the here and now, to laugh along to jokes and smile when she caught Kirsten’s or Markus’ gaze on her was exhausting.

It wasn’t fair. She wanted to have fun with her friends. She wanted to give them an honest smile and show them how much she loved them for being with her.

She missed Kai. Dammit, how was that possible?

It was the mystery surrounding him. That had to be why. If only she could find out why the locals thought he was a merman, maybe she’d be able to put her mind to rest.

She pretended to doze on the way back to their hotel, curled on the back seat. Faking it was too damn hard. Always had been.

The sun was setting when they reached the hotel and by the time she had showered and changed, night had fallen.

She hurried down to the empty, dark beach. The only lights on were at the beach bar and she walked under the thatch roof.

Matt smiled at her. “Hi. What will it be?”

She glanced around. Two more customers sat at the bar, another two at a table. “A beer.”

He passed her a local brew. “There you go,
luv
.”

“Have you seen Kai today?”

“Yup, he worked until four, like every day.”

She nodded and sipped her beer. “I think I’ll walk on the beach.” She took her bottle and hopped off her stool. She just wanted to see Kai.

From a distance. Only from a distance
, she told herself, because he was like a drug and she couldn’t get close or she’d be hooked again.

“You really like him, don’t you?”

She paused with her back to Matt, her heart picking up speed. “Yeah.”

“It’s this family,” he muttered. “This magic.”

“I don’t believe in magic, Matt.”

“Well, maybe you don’t have to believe it for it to be true. That’s what Professor Skinny says, anyway.”

She turned around. “Professor Skinny?”

“Well, Professor Skein, actually, but he’s really skinny, so...” Matt shrugged.

“Who is he?”

“A professor from
Cambridge
. Used to be famous for his folklore studies in the
Aegean
, digging up old legends and rituals.”

“Used to?”

“You see, one day he began believing this stuff. Satyrs, fairies, mermaids, you name it. Lost his credibility, then left
England
and moved here. He lives in the area. Took a Cretan wife, too.” He snorted. “We all do, once we’ve been here for a while.”

“All do what, take a Cretan wife?”

“That, too. I meant, we all start to believe.”

“In mermaids?” she asked, trying to keep her voice light.

He wiped a wet rag over the bar. “Maybe.”

Oh man.
Maybe you had to start believing in order to be able to live among these people, or risk going off the deep end. “You don’t think Kai is a merman, too, do you?”

“Merman. That’s a good word.” He nodded. “Sea people, they call them here. I don’t know what to believe, to tell you the truth.”

“I think you do believe. Why?”

“Uh, the man swims like a fish. He can swim through storm and tempest, I swear. He swims throughout winter, the whole year round, in the worst weather you’ve ever seen. It’s mind blowing.”

“Still sounds like a human to me. Unless there’s more you’re not telling me.”

He shook his head. “Go and see the professor, if you’re interested in the legends.”

“Where can I find him?”

“He lives up the road, in a tiny village called Platani. Twenty minutes walk.”