Page 76 of Shark Bait

Shark passes me a tissue. “No bet. Do you still want to make music?”

“Nah. Sad birds can’t sing.”

TWENTY-SIX

OH, TO USE A PHONE AGAIN

TROY

A week later, I get internet. The best thing about having a phone with access to internet now?

SOCIAL MEDIA!

Naturally, I spend the entire week gorging on social media like I used to when I was in high school. Which, to be fair, wasn’t that far in the past, but after what I’ve lived through, it feels like an eternity ago.

Browsing in ghost mode means I’ve caught up with my friends and pretty much everyone I’ve ever known. My best friend, Amy, dropped out of college when she found out Jackson knocked her up. He’s denying he’s the daddy, which is such crap, but I imagine he’s doing it for two reasons. One, because his parents would take him out of their will for knocking up a Lannister girl, and two, because he’s riding on a quarterback scholarship, which might get compromised if the school, along with his parents, found out he’s a dad.

Thing is, it’ll get worse for him if the college people find out he first denied he’s a dad even if he changes his mind later. When you face the public, you are no longer allowed to make mistakes. Social sites can be vicious beasts.

Amy stopped posting dramatic content yesterday, so I’m losing interest in social media (thank God), and another week goes by without me visiting social channels, not even to check Denver’s band page.

The band’s called Hazed, and it’s such a cool name befitting of the kind of music he makes. It’s alternative, and original in the way it sounds that I’m surprised he’s so well commercialized. He must have a great marketing manager who understands how to sell Denver’s magical voice.

Hearing him sing the words I wrote on the notepads my parents place randomly everywhere in the house makes me painfully homesick. Listening to how he changed up the words to express his longing, say how much he misses me, leaves me with tears in my eyes, and when I attend my therapy sessions with Dr. Gruber, that’s all I talk about. Denver, Levi, and my parents.

After crying to Dr. Gruber, I always feel better and more upbeat for the people I’m sharing my life with now. Like Val, who took me shopping in the local boutiques and for lunch right after. That lasted for about three days before Alessio intervened, asking us (ordering us) to shop online. We protested, but Alessio is an extremely difficult man, and I’m starting to see why he’s beautiful and yet still single.

While his intention to protect us is valid and admirable, he’s a little overprotective. Shark’s becoming like that too, constantly checking on me and the baby. He bought a monitor that he can put on my belly so he can listen to her inside the womb.

From what I’ve gotten to know about him and the family he’s found with Alessio and Val, they’re like my family in terms of closeness and willingness to help one another. Not having my family around has made me appreciate them more.

There’s another man they mention, though not by name, but I’ve heard enough to know he’s also unrelated and works a dangerous job, possibly in law enforcement, but I’m not sureabout that. They refer to him only as he or him, which gives my imagination free rein to think he’s either a cop or a criminal.

Tonight is a beautiful, hot Italian evening, and Valerina and I have moved from lying on the sand most of the day to lounging by the pool. This past Saturday, she and I planted tall shrubs in the yard, so it’s become our private oasis. She’s on her second virgin margarita and I’m on my second virgin strawberry daiquiri when Shark walks up from the main house. He crouches by my chair, and I sit up so I can kiss him on the lips.

My mouth prickles from the facial hair he hasn’t shaved in weeks. He isn’t recognizable as the man I met on the yacht that day. Shark went from a clean-shaven hairless swimmer type of a guy to a mountain man. He’s wearing earrings and Viking-style jewelry beads in his beard.

I tug a silver bead in his beard. “What’s up?”

“My list is complete,” he says.

I gasp. “Seriously?”

Val swings her feet over the lounge chair and takes off her glasses, her blue eyes as bright as the pool water. “No way.”

“Yes way,” he confirms.

Oh my God, it’s happening. They found Falena. I want to put all this behind me. I’m trying to move on. Alessio’s showing me how to invest. It feels a little bit like I’m in school, but I can’t complain. It’s one of the skills I need to turn my dirty (now clean) millions into ongoing wealth for my baby.

“What now?” I ask.

“Now I hunt.”

Why does this sound so sexy? “You’re leaving?”

“Mmhm.”

“When?”

---