Page 54 of The Captain
When it was done, or at least done for now, I wiped my eyes on his shoulder and sniffed like a child. “Sorry.”
“Don’t be,” he said, the gentlest I’d ever heard him. “You can put that word on the shelf with your semicolons.”
I barked a laugh. It startled both of us. “Who told you I hate semicolons?”
“You,” he said. “Every time you talk.”
I smacked his chest and he caught my hand and put it to his mouth and bit my knuckles, soft. A small, stupid joy moved through me.
“I’ll help,” he said again, more serious. “Even if you change your mind about me. Even if you decide this was a bad idea. I’ll help because the water owes you better than it’s given. And because when you stand in a circle of strangers and make a whale keep breathing, it makes me want to be a better animal.”
“Don’t get poetic,” I warned, but my voice was warm.
“Too late,” he said.
We lay there listening to the fan and the night insects and my own breath finally behaving. I thought about the little Kogia in the pen and the big bottlenose in the surf and the tiny daydreamI’d had this morning about coffee on this porch with this man I barely know. It scared me. It steadied me.
“How long are you even in Charleston?” I asked, staring at the ceiling like it might have answers.
His thumb drew slow circles on my hip. “Don’t know. I was supposed to be in and out. Liaise, keep the peace, disappear.” A beat. “Today changed some math. I’m rethinking a lot.”
“Don’t do that for me,” I said, because I needed to hear myself say it.
“Not for you,” he said. “For me. But I want you in the equation.”
The tiny daydream I’d been trying to starve stretched and yawned. “Then give me your last name.”
He huffed a quiet laugh. “Persistent.”
“Occupational hazard. I like labels on the right jars.”
“It isn’t a big thing,” he said. “I was going to tell you. Now I kind of like watching you try to solve me.”
“You enjoy the suspense,” I said.
“A little,” he admitted, mouth tipping. “Only because I know you’ll make me pay for it.”
“Tomorrow then?” I asked.
“Tomorrow,” he agreed, and kissed the corner of my mouth like he meant it.
He pulled the sheet over us and tucked it at my hip. His hand slid back to the base of my skull, steady and warm. The fan hummed. The swing creaked once on the porch and fell quiet. I let my eyes close.
Tomorrow at 1400 I’d face the Navy. Tonight I let a good weight anchor me. Outside, the ocean kept its secrets. Inside, I finally let myself rest.
23
JACOB
The morning after leaving Camille’s bungalow, I drove to Dominion Hall, the Jeep’s tires humming over Charleston’s uneven streets. The air was thick with salt and heat, the city waking up slow under a sky still brushed with dawn.
I was still in yesterday’s clothes. The glow from yesterday, from Lily’s words, still burned steady in my chest, but it was tangled now with a gnawing need for answers.
I’d left Camille’s place with her laughter in my ears, her body warm against mine, but the questions about Dominion Hall, the Navy, and Caleb had piled higher overnight. I needed Marcus to lay it out, no more cryptic bullshit.
Dominion Hall loomed ahead, its stone walls heavy with ivy, the kind of place that looked like it held secrets older than the city itself. I parked in the lot, and headed for the main entrance. The air inside was cool, smelling of polished wood and something sharp, like gun oil. A butler nodded me toward a hallway, his eyes flicking over me like he knew more than he said. I’d been here before, but today it felt different—familiar ina way that prickled my neck, like I’d seen these walls in a dream I couldn’t place.
Marcus was in a study at the end of the hall, sprawled in a leather chair, his wetsuit swapped for jeans and a black polo that looked too clean for a guy who’d been diving yesterday. He grinned when he saw me, that smartass glint in his eyes, but I wasn’t here for jokes. I shut the door behind me, the click loud in the quiet room.
