Page 172 of Haunt Me

“Didn’t I?” I look down. My shirt is plastered to my skin. “Crap.” Still, I don’t let her go.

I lift her against me, so that the next wave won’t go over her head, and she laughs when it leaves her cold and breathless. She is sitting on my thigh, and I’m not going anywhere.

I hold her firmly as her body shakes, but she is laughing, and I am not. I can’t feel anything else right now but worry about her getting in too deep, drowning while the other girls are better swimmers, or her heart not being able to handle the cold. Then I think about her being in danger and Theo or another guy getting to her first, before I can be there for her… I think about losing her.

Meanwhile, she is having the time of her life, screaming in laughter, dipping into the cold ocean with her friends, something most girls have done several times over by the time they are twenty-one; and here I am, holding her tightly against me. I am literally holding her back.

I can’t let her enjoy it.

Maybe she was right.

Maybe it’s not a good idea to be around her right now.

Maybe I can’t let her breathe, just becauseIcan’t. And that’s unfair.

“You always look out for me, Isaiah,” Eden smiles, lifting up her face to mine. Her lips are so kissable with the water dripping from them that I turn my head away. “Thank you.”

“Don’tfreakingthank me,” I say bitterly, hating myself more than I ever have before. “And call me Zay, would you?”

“I would not,” she says. “You know why.”

Now I am shaking so badly I can barely keep myself upright in the water.

“Let’s go, you two,” Ari tells us, “out! You’re not used to the cold like us Greek girls. Come on!”

She and Katia are running out of the water, reaching out their hands to Eden, but that’s not happening. I sweep her up in my arms, lifting her body clean above the waves as she screeches at the cold mist of seawater on her skin, and I run over the waves to the shore. I grab the towel from Theo’s stupid hands and drape it around Eden’s shoulders myself. As if I’d let him put it on my girl himself.

Except, she is not my girl. But she laughs up at me as if she is, and right now, I don’t remember what’s dream and what’s reality.

Wes and Ollie have jumped into the ocean too behind me, except they had the presence of mind to take off their shirts and shoes first. Only I wasn’t jumping in because I’m cool like them. Oh no.

I was not being cool, not even in the slightest. I was being desperate.

I came here to see Eden and it wasn’t nearly enough. Two lifetimes wouldn’t be enough, but I’ll never get them, will I? The best I can hope at this point would be to be friend-zoned from here to kingdom come, and I honestly think I might die of disgust if that were to happen. Yeah, desperate doesn’t begin to cover it.

Eden is struggling back into her clothes, her skin damp and cool, and this is the worst possible moment for me to have to go. But I do have to go. I’m out of time.

And as my security guards come to collect me—I am majorly out of schedule—I look longingly at Eden. She just waves at me, and then she is gone, running up and down the dark beach with Ari, their arms wrapped around each other’s’ waists, trying to warm up. I want to lie down on the beach and never get up.

Instead, I order my feet to start walking towards my driver.

“You are holding your breath,” Spencer’s voice calls after me. He runs from the water to catch up with me, towel draped over his bare chest.

“Am not,” I reply like a child.

“You are. You are holding your breath for her to tell you she’s going to come to your next show. And the one after that. And the one after that.”

I try to look unbothered. “It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch to ho—” I stop myself before saying the word ‘hope’. “To guess that since she came all the way to Europe, she might stay a few days longer and fit in a show or two.”

Wes laughs and shakes his head, spraying me with droplets like a dog. “I knew it! You are an open book, Zay, for all your black clothes and mysterious looks on the stage.”

“You take that back right now.” I stop walking. “I amnotan open book!”

“Not to mention an imbecile.” He just keeps going.

“In English, please?”

“ThatwasEnglish, my half-witted friend. It means incredibly stupid.”

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