Chapter 13

Chapter Thirteen

Two weeks into the journey and I had too much time on my hands. I avoided much of the crew and the other passengers, mostly for their sake. If I didn’t talk to them, it was less likely they’d do something that Kicks, Death, or I found offensive. Still, it didn’t make for a good journey. The only time I saw Kicks was right before I fell asleep, and sometimes not even then if he was on wheel duty, like tonight.

I had the cabin to myself and still couldn’t sleep. It was hard when as soon as I closed my eyes, I saw that robed creature staring at me from the beach. Was it another ghost that came to haunt me, this one with a flair for theatrics?

My stomach growled and I got up, making my way to the kitchen. There wouldn’t be much, but anything would be better than jerky at this point.

When I walked in, Gus was there. He was a sailor I tended to avoid. He usually smelled as if he wasn’t a fan of showering, but mostly I disliked the way he stared at me.

“How are you doing tonight?” he asked.

“Good. Just looking for a snack,” I said, the words polite enough, but my tone was chilly to say the least.

“I’ve got something you can snack on.” He smiled, as if his words were oh so clever.

“I’m not interested. Don’t make me prove it.”

“Why? You think you’re so tough you could prove anything to me?” He closed the gap between us, leaning in as I backed away, and not for my sake.

Killing someone on this boat, in the middle of this ocean? I might not have sailed this course before, but I’d been down this road. Next thing he’d be on the floor, all dead and gray, and they’d be throwing Kicks and me overboard.

“Leave her be,” Captain Rod said, walking in.

Gus backed away immediately. “I didn’t mean her no harm. I was just playing around. Girl can’t take a joke.”

“I don’t care what you meant. Leave her be.”

Gus’ eyes shot to me. “I wouldn’t have bothered if I wasn’t bored and on a boat miles from shore.”

“I wouldn’t have bothered, period.”

He sneered but headed out.

Rod stared him down as he walked past. “I better not hear of this happening again,” he said. Rod was half Gus’ size, but there was something steely in his gaze that made me believe he’d take Gus out at the knees in a second.

Gus must’ve believed it too, because he didn’t so much as meet his stare.

Rod slid into the booth, picking up a deck of cards on the table and shuffling.

“Thank you,” I said.

“No need to thank me. I did it for me, not you. He might be sour, but he’s a good sailor. I don’t want to lose him until I can find a replacement, and those sure aren’t easy to come by these days.”

Was he suggesting that I would’ve killed Gus? No one would think that by looking at me. He couldn’t know , could he? No. He probably thought Kicks would find out and he’d kill Gus. For some reason, that was grating on me tonight.

“That wasn’t anything worthy of mentioning to Kicks. I could’ve handled it.”

Rod glanced up, his eyes the color of a stormy sea. “That was what concerned me.”

My stomach suddenly felt like I’d swallowed a boulder. He had meant me. How? Had word spread so far that even humans knew about me now?

“I…” There was nothing I could say that would make this normal.

“Care for a whiskey?” He reached behind his head, grabbing a bottle and a couple of glasses from the shelf behind the booth, and poured two shots.

I slid into the other side, taking his offer.

“I’ve walked the world a long time and seen more than I care to share.” He picked up his pack of cigarettes, lighting one.

He saw me. Not what I appeared to be but what I truly was. I’d known something was different with this man but hadn’t been able to put my finger on it. Now I was sure of it.

He pushed a plate of cookies across the table. “Care for one? I keep a stash in my cabin for this point in the trip.”

“You sure you want to eat and drink with me?” I asked.

“If you were looking to kill me, you would’ve done it already.” He nodded toward the cookies. “They’re good, and there won’t be any left by tomorrow.”

I grabbed one.

“My missus always sends me off with them. Become a bit of a tradition, and now I won’t sail without them.”

“The missus” sure could bake. She could give Evangeline a run for her money.

“I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one with some secrets around here,” I said, a couple of bites in and the whiskey giving a boost to my tongue.

“No denying that.” He picked up his pack of cards, shuffling them so adeptly I wasn’t sure if he was secretly a card sharp. “You play?”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Friendly game of gin.”

“I’m in.”

He was about to deal when he put his hand on the cookie plate and said, “Hold your drink for a second.”

I did, and a second later the boat rocked enough that the plate of cookies would’ve taken a nosedive. As a sailor, he probably knew the signs before a large swell came. But how? He wasn’t even facing the window.

“It’ll stop soon,” he said, laying out more cards.

Just as he said, the boat seemed to settle down.

“How did you know that was going to happen?”

“We’ve all got our secrets,” he said, giving me a smile.

I wasn’t going to ask, but damned if I didn’t want to know.

“Go ahead, you can ask,” he said.

Could I? Would he look for answers in return? Appeasing my curiosity wasn’t worth the potential cost, not when I had to make it to Scotland and we had days to go.

“No. I don’t want to pry,” I said.

“My great-grandmother was a siren of the sea.”

A year ago, my knee-jerk reaction would’ve been that he was insane. Now? I completely believed him.

“I don’t know that much, but don’t they typically lure sailors in and then kill them?”

“Yes, but you never met my great-great-grandpa. He was something to behold.”

Meeting him? It wasn’t that shocking. “You speak as if you knew him.”

“I did. He only died a couple of years ago. He wasn’t immortal like a siren, but he lived a hell of a long time.”

“So that’s how you…” I shouldn’t be bringing this back to me. Nothing good would come from that, other than our getting tossed off the boat.

“How I knew you were different? Yep. Same with your man, Kicks. Although I think you’re the more ferocious of the two. Can’t quite put my finger on why, but just got that sense, and I never ignore it.”

“I don’t mean any harm.”

“Nah, I don’t think you do, or you wouldn’t be on this boat.”

“Since we’re already having a weird conversation anyway, did you happen to see someone in a dark cloak on the beach the day we left?”

He laughed. “Yeah. Of course I did. Can’t tell you who it was, but he wasn’t of this world. Sure seemed fixated on you, though.”

“So you’ve seen others ? Like, things not from this world?”

“Yes, but I try to stay under the radar. No good comes from catching their notice.” He gave me a knowing look, since clearly I already had.

“And what do you do if you have?”

“From the stories I’ve heard? You give them whatever they ask for.”

He grabbed the bottle, refilling my glass. I didn’t fight him and threw it back as soon as he did. After this conversation, I needed another. I now had two beings from the beyond watching me. One had already been too many.