Page 28 of Voyage with the Reclusive Billionaire

She balks at me, eyes wide. “Fucking hell, do you know nothing?”

“I didn’t before I got on this goddamn ship,” I snap back, but instantly regret the words, the tone. “I’m sorry,” I add quickly. “I’m just…”

“Lost.” Sylvie scoots closer and wraps an arm around me. “Look,” she says, “Feel free to tell me to fuck off. But I’m going to give you my number, and when all this is through, you’re welcome to call me whenever you’d like. I feel like maybe you need a friend who can help you, Eliza. And has at least some idea of what you’re going through. I can be that for you.”

I stare at her for a long moment, fighting tears, before nodding. “Okay,” I whisper. “I’d like that.”

She smiles. “Me, too.”

“But Sylvie?”

“Yeah?”

“I’m going to need you to tell me everything about who I am, right the fuck now.”

And so she did.

She explained about my inherent power. About how it passed through the ages, and about how it typically served its bearer a true purpose in life and would skip generations who would never require it (explaining why my mother or father might not have known of their heritage) until it found someone who would, once again, need it. I realized that I knew that I did need it. I knew what its purpose was in my life.

If I could figure out how to purposefully use my magic, I could help Corvan. If I could just make Savannah and Jade forget…

Then Corvan and I would have nothing to worry about.

“Can you teach me?” I ask Sylvie after she finally gets through all the basics. “How to wield it?”

She stares at me for a while. “It’s going to be different from mine. But… from what I have been reading, I think I know enough to try to help you, at least. Just don’t get mad if it doesn’t work, okay?”

I throw my arms around her and laugh with relief, with happiness, with every pent-up emotion I’d felt since she stopped me earlier. And, meaning it more than I ever have in my entire life, I whisper, “Thank you.”

Chapter thirteen

Corvan

The sun has long since set when Eliza slips into my room, smelling like warm skin and salt and her.

She drops onto the bed beside me with hardly a thought and levels me with a stare, eyes lit with something like… hope. Determination.

“What exactly did I miss out on?” I ask her. “I take it you had fun?”

She ignores both questions and says instead, “You called me your girlfriend earlier. And when Sylvie called me your girlfriend, you didn’t correct her. Why?”

“Don’t feel the need to beat around the bush, do you?” I tease.

Eliza gives me a small smile. Then she says, “This is me beating around the bush.”

What the fuck did they talk about? “Call it wishful thinking,” I answer, trying to keep my confusion out of my voice.

“Why didn’t you correct her, though?”

“Are you upset about this? I’m sorry, okay? I thought you and I were on the same page about our feelings, and I didn’t realize it would bother you. I thought—”

“ —Why didn’t you correct her,” Eliza pushes again, sliding closer to me, “And tell her I was your mate?”

I swear even the earth stops moving the second those words leave her mouth.

I’m quiet for a long moment. Trying to gauge her reaction to this, trying to figure out the right thing to say, how to get her to believe my apology when I would do fucking anything to get her to forgive me. Eventually, I just come right out and ask, “How did she know?”

“She said it was obvious. That it was written all over us. And yet you didn’t tell me.”

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