THE YACHT WENT back to port around one. My head was clear after the fresh air and almost kissing Emanuel. It was even clearer after Becky confirmed what I already knew, but the question was, how did she?
We were already connected and the dent hadn’t even taken place.
Then again, what if it had and he just didn’t want anything to do with me.
We would be like the first nonfunctioning dent in the history of Paegeia, or maybe the others weren’t normal. Maybe they had it wrong.
The way George had hated Becky in the beginning and looking at him now, he was like her shadow. It wasn’t natural and I didn’t want that.
The minute I thought that, the image of a peeping Tom-Blake jumped into my mind. I gasped. Oh crap! Did he just felt my insecurities?
I didn’t like this one bit and I didn’t know how I could shut him out, the way he shut me out.
“You okay?” Emanuel asked as I walked up the dock back to the house.
“I’m fine, it’s just Becky said something and I have no idea what she meant by it.” He frowned slightly and looked to the ground. He knew something? “What is it?”
His eyes met mine but he looked a bit confused. “Nothing.”
“Emanuel, please. It feels like everybody is hiding something from me.”
“In what way?”
“It’s hard to explain, it’s just a feeling.”
“Go to bed, sleep…” He smiled. “I’m sure tomorrow Becky will be herself again and then you’ll ask her.”
I smiled and nodded. “Sure.” It felt that they all knew how Blake was connected to me but for some reason they didn’t want to tell me about it.
I fell asleep around three. I couldn’t stop thinking about all of the things that had happened to me over the past couple of weeks. I still couldn’t believe that the Council would force someone like me to do things their way. It made me felt like a robot and not the daughter of King Albert and Queen Catherine.
As I lay in bed, my dreams were messed up like always.
Emanuel crept into it, wanting to fight Blake for my affection, I didn’t want him to and Blake didn’t want me like that. It was a trio of people not wanting to be with one another and I’d never felt so alone in my entire life. It was the loneliness that actually woke me up.
I went to sit on the porch with a cup of coffee and watched the sun rise over the ocean.
It was gorgeous as a soft orange glow lit up the water. A couple of minutes later I saw someone running down the long dock toward the house. He was wearing a shoulder-cut hoody and only when he came near did I realize it was Emanuel.
He didn’t stop to wave or maybe he didn’t see me sitting here, whatever the reason, I was glad that he didn’t.
It was a hopeless case anyway and knowing that he actually did care about me but didn’t want to pursue it because of my stupid dragon— yes, stupid dragon, I thought out loud and hoped that he’d heard that—made it worse.
I looked at my cup of coffee and smelled the strong aroma, my mind became clearer as I didn’t want to think about any of this anymore.
I took a sip and leaned back on the chair. The summer morning was refreshing, not cold but not hot either. I took another sip and let the sweet, roasted taste dance on my tongue before I swallowed. When my coffee was done I got up and poured myself another cup. It was so nice to have a coffee machine inside the room. During my third cup someone came slumping into my room.
“Elena?” Becky yelled. “Ow!” she said and I giggled softly.
“Out here, there’s coffee in the machine.”
She didn’t say anything back but emerged from the patio door about five minutes later with a cup of coffee in her hands and a blanket wrapped around her body. She sat in the chair next to me and pulled her legs up as she took a sip.
“Mmmm, this is good,” she said softly. “I’m never going to drink ever again.”
I smiled at her. “About last night, you said something before you passed out.”
She gave me a side glance, a confused expression plastered on her face. “I was drunk, what did I say?”
“About George feeling your emotions and that you and I have that in common.” Okay so that wasn’t her exact words, but that was the message I got.
Her eyes widened and her body grew stiff for only a second and then it relaxed again. “I don’t know what you are saying.”
“Becky come on,” I said. “I saw it, you know exactly what I mean.”
“Elena, I was drunk. Please just let it go.”
“I can’t, because I need to know what it is we have in common Becky.”
She grunted softly and closed her eyes as she looked up. “Can you please just give me five minutes to properly wake up?”
“Fine,” I said and slumped back into my own chair. I started to pray that it wasn’t the thing that I’d been thinking of for the past however many hours. But I knew it was hopeless. Blake wasn’t just hearing my thoughts, he was somehow feeling my emotions too. I wasn’t ready for it.
“Me and my big mouth…”
I looked at Becky and waited for her to carry on.
“Sammy lied about Sir Robert phoning Queen Margerite about the party, okay. Well not technically, she was bummed out because you didn’t invite us, but it wasn’t the reason Sir Robert phoned Queen Margerite.” She looked at me with thin lips.
“Okay, then how did you find out about me?”
“Blake came back.”
My head snapped to her. “He came back?”
“He’s gone again, but he told Sir Robert about you.”
“How did he know, Becky?” I knew that answer but I wanted her to confirm it or tell me it wasn’t like that.
“He said that he could feel you being trapped, told us they took your Cammy away and that you wanted to come home but they wouldn’t let you.”
I closed my eyes as she said those words. “You want to tell me that Blake dented and that he’s somehow connected to me now?”
“No, he hasn’t dented yet, but he is connected to you somehow, Elena.”
I shook my head, put my cup down and buried my face in between my knees as a nauseated feeling entered my gut.
“Hey, it’s not so bad.” Becky stroked my back.
I looked at her. “Are you insane? You and George love each other Becky, he would die for you. Blake wants nothing to do with me.” Tears glistened inside my eyes. “If he can feel my emotions, hear my thoughts, know that they took away my Cammy, he knows everything else. I have no secrets from him.” I thought about my father. Oh, shit.
“Wait, he can hear your thoughts?”
I nodded. “I heard him yesterday before the livaworm accident. It is why the jet ski threw us off.”
“Okay, when you put it like that, it’s not a good thing. Can’t you block him or something?”
I started to laugh sarcastically. “Block him? I don’t even know how it works. How can I block something like that?”
“Just calm down, Elena.”
“Why did you lie to me, Becky? Did you ever think that I wouldn’t find out about this?”
She looked guilty. “No, I wanted to tell you but Sir Robert asked us to keep it quiet. What did Blake say?”
“I have feelings for Emanuel okay.”
She smiled.
“It’s not like that, it can never be like that and I told you about that last night too.”
She flinched and raised her lip again. “You did?”
I nodded. “He likes me too but because of this stupid dent thing he doesn’t want to end up with a broken heart.” I huffed. “As if that would ever happen. Blake is so the last person I …”
“Don’t think about it, Elena.” She said. “Yeah, you think twice about things now, don’t you?” She sighed.
I nodded.
“Well, at least you hear him too.”
I gave her a sideways, confused glance.
“You heard him, Elena, maybe that’s how it works.”
“I don’t think so Becky. I just think he slipped up, or wanted me to hear that.”
“Calm down please, and don’t let this bother you too much. It’s something we can’t do shit about. I think that is why people think a dent is so great, but it’s not always like that. We will never be able to keep secrets from our dragons. George even knew about his stupid welcoming party.”
“He did?”
“Yeah, he spun a lot of bullshit saying it was because I shooed him away before we got ready, but I know the truth.”
“That really does suck. The only problem is mine hasn’t dented yet. How does that happen?”
She shrugged.
“C’mon Becky. You must have something.”
“I don’t Elena. I guess it is their choice after all.”
“If that’s the case, I might as well set him free because he will never choose me.”
Her eyes grew and it turned into a scolding look. “Don’t ever say that again. You can’t free him, Elena. He’s your dent.”
“It means nothing to me, Becky.”
“It does to everyone else. Don’t even think it.” She sounded pissed off and I wanted to say something but I kept my mouth shut.
Soon, Sammy slouched into the room too and we both yelled that we were on the balcony. She came out with a cup of coffee too and a huge shirt that I think belonged to Dean with a pair of quarter slacks and bunny slippers.
“Never again,” she said and sat on the floor with crossed legs. I didn’t look at her, I couldn’t as Sammy had never lied to me before. “Did I miss something?”
“Elena knows, because your stupid brother couldn’t keep his thoughts to himself.”
Sammy gasped. “You heard him. What did he say?”
I gave her a disappointed look. “You lied to me Sammy.”
Her eyes fell to the ground and she took a deep breath through her nose. “I had no choice, I’m sorry. My father begged us not to tell you Elena, because you’re going through so much.”
“Still. If I’d known Blake was in my head, I could have really tried not to think some things Sammy.”
“Like what?”
“It doesn’t matter what. He’s not my dragon yet, he can use it against me.”
“He would never do that. Seriously, Elena, he might be pissed but to go out of his way with whatever you think would be worth his time, then you don’t know him at all.”
“I don’t. The Blake I know is mean and cruel.” I got up and walked back into my room.
“Just leave it, Sammy. Let her deal with it her own way. There is nothing any of us can say to make her feel better about this stupid connection we share with our dragons, Okay.”
“You guys have no idea how amazing it is.”
“Amazing?” Becky said. I’d almost reached the bathroom and I could still hear them as if they were speaking right next to me. “We can never plan a surprise party or anything like that. There are just some things that we as humans would like to keep to ourselves, and we can’t. It’s not fair. I know exactly why Elena acts the way she does. Your brother despises her.”
“It’s because of who she is to him. He doesn’t want…”
“Exactly my point. He’ll do anything to hurt her, and it’s unfair that he has the leverage he does.”
When I opened the shower taps, their voices muffled out. I closed my eyes and wished to be far away from this place, from who I was and what I was supposed to do. I wished that he was never mine to claim and I really did wish that I could free him. I didn’t want a dragon to be mine if he didn’t want to be.
Please, I’m begging you, stay out of my head.
