Page 11 of Voyage with the Reclusive Billionaire

“Well?” Corey asks. “Are you ready?”

I shake my head and wipe my sweaty palms on the front of my denim shorts. “You first.”

“You two can go together,” the attendant offers helpfully.

But I just shake my head. “I want to see how he does first.”

Corey cocks an eyebrow. “Why? You scared?”

I nod aggressively. “Definitely. Because if you fall, do you know what that means for me?” I don’t give him time to answer before saying firmly, “It means death, Cor. Death.”

He laughs, eyes sparking with delight. “I’m Cor now, am I?”

My cheeks flush. “It’s easy to say,” I mutter, embarrassed. “Now go. Let me have the first laugh, at the very least.”

Corey’s eyes scan over me, something almost like possession but maybe a little closer to protectiveness in his eyes. His words are soft, though, not nearly as strong as the emotions I sense from him. “I won’t let you fall, Eliza.” My name on his tongue is a sweet caress. “You know that.”

I think about the cliff’s edge I almost stepped off of. How he was right there beside me, pulling me up so impossibly fast that my stomach had barely even had time to drop.

I nod. “Okay,” I whisper. “But I will never speak to you again if I break a tooth.”

He grins, then nods solemnly. “Sounds fair.”

The attendant offers to help get him on the board, but Corey shakes his head and says, “I’m good. I’ve surfed before.”

I gape. “You’ve surfed before?”

He laughs and nods. “Both in the ocean and on a simulation like this, actually.”

I narrow my eyes. “You asshole! You just wanted to show off.”

A smug grin takes up residence on his face as he shrugs. “So what if I did? Maybe I just want to impress my new friend.”

I roll my eyes even as my heart squeezes in my chest. “Impress away, then,” I grumble.

Corey gets on the board and adjusts his body with the water like he’s done it dozens of times before. Hundreds.

I wonder if he will ever stop amazing me. And then I remember that I’ve only known him a few days, and that I’ll only know him a few more, and there’s not really enough time in that brief window to learn everything about him and stop being surprised by those things.

Corey holds out his hands. Intimidation mixed with adrenaline and anxiety has my gut twisting, but the second I look into his eyes those feelings drift away. I see how confident he is on that board. It’s almost unnatural how perfectly he manages to balance upon it. There’s a certain… almost ethereal sort of grace to his movements. They don’t look real. More like the sort of thing I’d expect to see from a fictional vampire.

In a blink, I’m taking Corey’s hands in mine. He twines our fingers together and holds firm, a steady weight against my palms that keeps my heart beating evenly.

Another blink, and I’m on the board, water splashing against my calves and ankles, but that’s all. I remain on the board as water races beneath us—all because of Corey’s support.

I realize then that I’m not sure that I care who he is. I don’t care about why Ryker thought he looked familiar last night, or about what he’s done that’s made him so damn cagey.

I don’t care, because I know it won’t change anything.

It won’t make me care about him any less. I won’t stop liking him because of a name or a rumor or whatever the fuck it is that happened.

At his core, I know who he is.

And that’s enough for me to know how I feel about him.

Chapter six

Corvan

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