“I can imagine he doesn’t really want that to get out amongst the crew. I didn’t want to say it in front of Stassia and Auralie, but I don’t know. I just…felt like you should know.”
Something inside my chest pinches as soon as the words leave my mouth. I feel conniving and manipulative, exactly how Dane described Weston to me all that time ago, and I don’t want to be like Weston. We are the same, though, having to make moves to get what we want. The fundamental difference is I’m not harming anyone else with mine.
He is.
It hurts watching pain flash across Sig’s face. I’ve actually come to like her, and even though she is crucial to my plan to get back to Dane, I deep down don’t want to hurt her. Sometimes I think I’ll actually miss her when I leave, but I push those thoughts away the second they come up. I don’t need any distractions.
She clears her throat, breaking my train of thought. “Let’s just keep searching. We’ll talk to Cap tomorrow. Like you said, please just keep it to yourself. For now.”
I nod, the feeling of success making my limbs feel lighter, but there’s something tugging at me, and I can’t explain it.
Is this the right choice? If it is, then why do I feel bad about it at all?
We head back to the ship shortly after, having covered our small patch of search area unsuccessfully. I’m thankful for a calm night without the island attacking because there were no distractions stopping me from telling Sig. She was quiet the rest of the night, and I know she was thinking about what this means for everyone on board.
Unlike last shift, Weston isn’t on deck when we ascend the gangway, and I’m grateful not to have to put up with his moodtonight. We each go our separate ways once we’re below deck, the quiet of the ship so different from the constant bustle I’m getting used to. Weston had ordered smaller search areas and earlier return times after the incident with Dane, so the sky is still dark and the hour still too early for anyone else to be awake.
The room is dark and quiet when I enter, the only sound the quiet repetitive lap of the waves on the side of the ship. Weston’s prone form is hanging off the side of the bed, face down, so all I can see is the steady rise and fall of his bare shoulders.
He’s asleep, thank the gods.
Now that things are moving forward exactly how I want them to, I need to fall in line with getting Weston to trust me, which means giving back my dagger. I reach back and pull it from my waistband with a twinge of sadness at handing it right back to the enemy.
It’s necessary. I’ll get it back.
I walk to his side of the bed and set it down on his bedside table lightly, so as not to wake him. Just before I turn around, my eyes snag on his face, relaxed in sleep, and I can’t help but pause.
His hair is tousled, even more than normal, his lips slightly parted. He lays so far away from my side that his arm hangs over the side of the bed. For someone who is so deceitful, so power hungry, and such an asshole, he sure doesn’t look like it when he sleeps.
Breaking out of whatever trance had pulled me in, I walk back to my side, kick my boots off, and change into my shirt. I curl onto my side, my heavy eyelids fluttering closed the second my head touches the pillow, but they fly back open a second later when Weston lets out a long slow breath, as if he’d been holding it.
Maybe he had been waiting up for me after all.
CHAPTER TWENTY
Early afternoon sun shines through the windows, illuminating Weston’s room before I wake, the anticipation of finding Sig and telling Weston the development rushing through my veins. The other side of the bed is already empty. I don’t know how long he has been gone, despite possibly being awake all night waiting for me to return. I wish he wouldn’t have, because I don’t need to be wondering if there are other reasons besides not trusting me to return.
Sig is walking down the hallway toward me as soon as I emerge from the room.
“Hungry?” she says as she turns down the steps to the second floor.
“Starving,” I say and take the steps close behind.
We walk through the doorway into the seemingly empty mess, and I startle when I see Weston sitting alone at a corner table, the plate in front of him almost empty.
“Oh good, you’re here Cap,” Sig says.
This is it.
My stomach tumbles as the moment I’ve been waiting for approaches. Telling Sig made me nervous, but once it finallyhappened, it felt easy. Telling Weston feels different, like he will be able to see through my motives the second I utter the words.
I still have to try.
Following closely behind Sig, we fill some plates, then weave through the mess toward Weston’s table.
“What’s up, Sig?” he says, as she drops into the seat in front of him. I slide in next to her, trying not to look as anxious as I feel.
“We need to talk to you,” she says.
