Find Me (Immersed Book 1)

by Francesca Riley

  “Trust you?” Her voice trembled. “So, you’ve known me for years, and I’ve known you too. You’d talk with me, comfort me, and then – take my memories?”

  Hunter nodded warily. She pulled her hands away and looked him squarely in the face. “You’d show up out of the blue – literally – and spring yourself on me, every time a surprise, and somehow, we’d pick up where we left off, and then, bam! Never knew it happened, thanks for the chat, see you next time to rob a bit more of your life.” Why couldn’t she just surrender to what her heart wanted? She could feel the knife edge they were teetering on slide out from under her, slicing as it went.

  He flinched, reaching helpless hands towards her. “Skye, what choice had I? Please, believe me. I only wanted to help you, to be there for you, but I had to keep you safe, and my people safe. It had to be as though it had never happened. It felt like cutting my own heart out each time.” His voice was ragged and it hurt her to see him like this, but what he’d done was so wrong. Why couldn’t he see that?

  “‘As though it had never happened’?” she echoed. “Hunter, our memories are who we are. You had no right…” she paused to gasp in air – why was there never enough air? “You stole me from me when you took my memories. You robbed me of...of you. How could you do that? How can I ever trust you? You have your own rules, your own reasons for what you do. How could I ever know when I might lose it all again, lose you again, because it seems right to you?”

  She saw the conflict in his face, his desperation to convince her she was wrong, fighting with the knowledge that she was right. And something in his tortured eyes told her there might be more he was keeping from her.

  “Why are you being so stubborn?!” he threw back at her. “I would do anything to protect you. You are everything to me, Skye. What they do leaves no memory behind – and yet you’re remembering them. You are a threat and a prize. They won’t stop. If you don’t come under my protection, the only other way for you to be safe from them is to never come to the sea again.”

  “But aren’t they afraid of you? Don’t you have power over them?”

  “They fear my power, but they know I don’t know how to control it. I won’t tolerate what they do, and they don’t try me because of the day of Calamity. But I don’t know how to wield it. And what if I wasn’t there?” He gripped her shoulders, bending to glare into her eyes. “I can’t live with that risk. I think it would be impossible for you to keep away because...it would just be impossible for you. So you’d come back to the water, and they could...you could...Skye, why won’t you just...” he pulled away, turning to face the horizon, clutching the back of his neck. Then he became still.

  An eerie tension fell as he turned. “I could make you,” he said softly.

  “Make me what?” she asked, a tremor beyond the salty air on her wet skin running over her.

  He drew near, moving with animal grace and looked down at her, his long eyelashes casting a pool of shadow over dark eyes. He held out the gleaming ring of grey shell and without hesitation she took it from him.

  “I could make you...come with me.”

  “You...” a wave of liquid heat coursed through her, welling up from where it simmered just beneath the surface whenever she was with him. Heavy sweetness flooded her, sharp-edged in its urgency. Her head fell back with the force of it, her eyes half closing, thought falling from her mind, lost in a wave of pure feeling. She drew in a shuddering breath, and pleasure filled every part of her along with an aching hunger, a hunger for...

  She raised her head and looked into his beautiful face, his obsidian eyes. Her hunger was for him. She moved towards him in a dream where she was swirling motion sweeping to a concentrated point of focus: Hunter.

  In the clear light his face was alive with emotion, lips parted, his dark eyes liquid as he read her need for him, and still as if dreaming, she saw a hunger that echoed hers in them. But as she reached for him, both hands outstretched, the shell slipped from her hand, striking the rock, bouncing sideways, spinning, falling into the water. A pause as long as a heartbeat hung between them, then Hunter’s fingers laced through hers and he gripped her hands tightly, halting her.

  “Not like this,” he whispered, faint as a bird’s wing, “Skye…not ever like this.”

  He closed his eyes, struggling to master himself, and the waves crashing through Skye subsided, a tide going out. She became aware of her heart hammering.

  Hunter opened silver-grey eyes. He took a last stumbling half-step towards her, and gently leaned in, pressing his forehead against hers, his deep breaths sweet like summer air.

  Skye’s eyes closed, tears trickled down her cheeks as the feelings of a moment ago were replaced by emptiness, the sharp bite of longing blunted with disappointment that Hunter had stopped; stopped them.

  How long they stood like that she didn’t know, but all the while Hunter’s strong hands kept hers from wrapping around his neck and pulling him to her.

  With his clan, she’d felt a call beyond herself, a general instinctive passion nudged awake. But Hunter was something completely different. It had been as though she and he had called each other, their connection matched and possessing them both. As her racing heart slowed and her breathing softened, she knew he was the stronger of them.

  “I’m so sorry Skye,” a husky croak. “I’m no better than them.”

  “Of course you are.”

  “No, Skye,” he whispered, “I’m not. I... I love you, and still, I nearly took you with me just to keep you in my life, even knowing you would only have a half-life. I could protect you, but you’d lose so much of yourself.” Skye couldn’t speak. Even a half-life with him felt like all she wanted right now. “They’re here because of me,” Hunter continued. “They’re targeting you because of me. And harm has come to others – because of me.”

  “Not because of you, Hunter.”

  “Yes, because of me. I tried, and succeeded, in keeping away from here these last few years, but I returned at last, drawn by the hope of seeing you again. After they endangered you I left again, but still I came back. I’ve stayed when I shouldn’t have. They can’t be far from me, Skye. Where I go, eventually they must follow.”

  He reached into the pocket of his shorts and pulled something out, staring at it glinting in the palm of his hand for a moment. “This belongs to you,” he said softly as he lifted something over her head.

  Skye didn’t even look at it, unable to tear her eyes away from his face. She shook her head, a horrible dread growing, unable to speak, to halt what she saw coming. Learning about her stolen memories had been devastating. But she knew him, she knew his heart. They could work this out. But only if he stayed in her life.

  “I have to go to draw them after me. You can’t keep away from the sea, Skye. This is the only way to keep you safe. I’m sorry. I should never have let it come to this. It ends now. Please forgive me. Skye...I love you.” And he was gone.

  She stared dumbly at the rippling water where he’d been, searching the empty surface. Then she stumbled after him, into the water that covered the lower ledges, slipping and struggling to find footholds on the seaweed-encrusted rock. Throwing herself forward into the water, she squinted through the teal-coloured gloom for Hunter’s long form. He had gone.

  She knew how fast he could move. And he believed he was protecting her, drawing the others away. There was a weird, constant pain in her chest, like a vice made of blades had begun to compress something vital inside. He was really gone.

  Raising her head, she took another deep breath, and sank beneath the surface once more, trying hopelessly to glimpse his shadow; any shadows. But without Hunter, with her heart shattering and shredding her insides, the roar of distant breakers filled her head and her vision darkened. Fear closed in.

  Managing to get her head above water she staggered upright, gasping and choking, shoulder deep now in the sinking tide. The tilting world gradually became level beneath her feet, and the present returned. But the presen
t was worse than her nightmare flashback.

  Trembling, she stood rocked by low waves, trying to work out what came next, the hot pressure behind her eyes the only warmth she could feel. At last, the knowledge that she needed to move sank in, and she turned and pushed through the water for the shore, her leaden limbs feeling like someone else controlled them.

  Reaching her bag, she sank down on the sand next to it, trying not to see Hunter’s smile as he’d thrown it to dry safety for her so recently. He’d not wanted to waste a second of time with her. She closed her eyes as another wave of pain crashed over her. Why hadn’t she said yes to him when she’d had the chance? Doubling over, she pressed her face against her legs and let hot tears come.

  She lost track of time until a sharp wind whipped her hair, the wet strands stinging her cheeks, nudging her to register her surrounds. The weather had turned. Dense cloud was moving swiftly across the sky, and the day was growing late.

  And as she sat blinking at the glowering skyline, a force stronger than sorrow pushed through her pain. Anger.

  At herself, at Hunter. At herself for falling so absolutely, against everything she held to. Her reward was exactly what she’d tried to avoid.

  At Hunter, because she loved him. And because once again, he was making decisions for her. Decisions that hurt her. That surely weren’t his to make alone, if he loved her as he said he did? And how could he be unable to live without her one moment, and utterly abandon her the next? He was as changeable as she was.

  The fresh tears that stung her hot eyes were rage-fuelled. They dried fast, as burning determination not to suffer for her mistakes more than she already was filled her. Life went on. She was expected at Bliss to put the finishing touches to the mural. The Lauders had so much on their plates. They needed to see her happy, not broken.

  Conscious that her fury-laced determination to be strong battled gnawing pain inside her, she stood. As she did, something swung against her chest. She caught it in her hand, and raising it, stared dully at two white shells threaded on a fine chain hanging around her neck. Her mother’s lost necklace. But there was no room in her fractured thoughts to process this right now.

  Forcing herself to keep moving, she pulled her towel from her bag and scrubbed at her face before clumsily drying herself off. She pulled on her jeans and T-shirt, automatically making a mental note to bring a sundress to slip on over her wet swimsuit next time. But there wouldn’t be a next time. A sob caught in her chest. She drew a choked breath, mastering herself, until numbness eased the ache.

  After hesitating the barest moment, she tucked her mother’s necklace beneath her T-shirt. She would think about it later. Smoothing her damp hair with her fingers as best she could, she took one last searching look at the achingly empty sea before crossing the quiet beach to the steps.

  After changing at the apartment and bathing her swollen eyes with cold water, leaving her beach things to sort out later she trudged to the café, ignoring the sea.

  Outside Bliss she hesitated, trying to regroup, nursing the simmering heat of her anger that was keeping her functioning. The al fresco tables were empty in the cold wind, but it looked busy inside.

  Entering quietly to avoid unwelcome attention, she retrieved her paints from a small cupboard beneath the window seat, and worked silently on her mural. In the curves of the fictitious waves, she had painted shadowy figures, schools of silver fish flickering about them. A world she’d barely glimpsed; a world that called to her beyond what she’d known with Hunter.

  Stroking her brush over two shadows embracing as they slipped through azure water, she resisted stabbing pain, dropping her head low over her paintbrush, bracing her hand on the floor where she knelt. Breathing shallowly, she willed the numbness to sink in again. It wouldn’t. Fury at being brought to this swept through her again and she embraced it, holding pain at bay with a whispered stream of invectives against what had slipped away from her. Or had swum away at full speed. She’d heard that love and hate were closely joined. Perhaps it was true.

  The brewing squall had darkened the late afternoon by the time she finished at Bliss, and heavy raindrops began to fall as she walked back to The Towers. She barely noticed.

  Inside the dim apartment, flattened boxes were stacked along the wall ready for the move. Drawn to the window, she looked out across the rain-filled vista, her thoughts circling near to Hunter and determinedly away again. At last her rain-wet clothes nudged her to activity. Despite the dark, rough vista, and her insistence that she now despised at least one of its inhabitants, she couldn’t bear to shut out the sea. Leaving the drapes open and the shadowed lounge unlit, she went into the bathroom.

  Carelessly tugging off her T-shirt, her mother’s necklace, caught up with it, clattered onto the tiles. Scooping up the white shells on the delicate chain, Skye felt her eyes prickle. She couldn’t believe she’d got it back. Losing it had hurt so much. Did Hunter know what he’d given back to her? But her flare of gratitude checked.

  How had he known it was hers? Had he seen it around her neck that day in the channel? He’d given it back to her today with no explanation. Her earlier sense that he was keeping something from her returned with foreboding. Hunter and his secrets: so much for wanting her to know everything. Welcome anger surged again.

  Stalking to the bedroom, Skye dragged out her travel bag, and retrieved her mother’s sketchbook. She nudged the book’s loose paper wrapper open a little and pooled the necklace down into it. Knowing she was pushing away something significant, she tucked the package carefully back into the bag and returned to the shower.

  She turned the water up as hot as she could bear, inviting the sensation to wash away everything: pain, confusion, grief, her mother. Hunter. Hunter.

  Hunter. With a howl of bewildered anguish, she surrendered for a moment. Hot tears under streaming hot water didn’t count.

  She had dressed, and was roughly towel drying her hair when she caught the sound of the apartment phone ringing. Her first impulse was to ignore it: let the answer phone pick it up. But the ringing persisted. Returning to the shadowed lounge, the little red light blinked on and off in time with the ringer, drawing her to the phone.

  “Lauder residence,” she said dully into the receiver. There was silence for a heartbeat.

  “Skye? Sweetheart, is that you?”

  “Dad…is that you?”

  “Yes, it’s me.” His voice cracked and he cleared his throat. Skye’s heart began to patter apprehensively. “Sorry. I’m all right,” he said. “Just a bit…emotional. Uh – it was ten years ago today that your mother... That she –” He broke off.

  Guilt reared up inside her, and the old, familiar pain of losing her mother tore at her already raw heart. “Oh, Dad,” she whispered. “I’m so sorry.” Sorry she’d forgotten. Sorry for being such a self-absorbed jerk.

  “It’s okay. Just missing you.” He cleared his throat again. “Good holiday over there? Back on your home ground, eh?” His effort at normal conversation was painful, but Skye did her best to go along.

  “Sure Dad, it’s great. The Lauders are, well, the Lauders, you know,” she attempted to joke, and was rewarded with an almost-chuckle.

  “That’s good. Good to hear. I know you’ll be okay with them.” There was a short silence, then he spoke again. “Skye, do you remember...when you were little... Do you remember the mermaid weather days?”

  Skye turned to look at the rain lashing the glass, imagined the distant pounding surf. Mermaid weather. “I remember.”

  “Do you ever – Skye, do you still see them there?”

  Emotion exploded inside her, her father’s unexpected words dragging what she’d lost into the stark light. Agony crashed through her. Memories of her mother laughing with her in shadow-filled breakers. Hunter rising through sparkling water, his eyes on hers. She bit down on her lip, trying not to speak, but her aching heart couldn’t hold it back. Her eyes closed, tears spilling down her cheeks.

  “Yes,” she whi
spered, “yes, I see them,” and she turned from the Bay, holding the receiver away as she drew ragged breaths. When she held it to her ear again, her father’s voice was faint through the phone.

  “Skye, I swear, I didn’t mean her to…you don’t know what it’s been like to live…to live with this. If I could do it over. If only I’d understood.”

  “Dad?” she wiped her face with her sleeve. An indefinable fear crept through her chest.

  “It was my fault – I never meant, never –” he broke off.

  Her heart thudded. “Dad? Are you…what are you telling me? I don’t understand.”

  “Please forgive me. I love you.”

  “I love you too, Dad” she replied awkwardly. They never said they loved each other. This was weird. In the background she thought she caught the faint chink of glass on crystal. It was almost reassuring.

  “I don’t know what to do. I wish – I… I have to go. I miss you.” His voice became a hoarse whisper. “Goodbye sweetheart.” The phone clicked in her ear.

  She shivered in the gloom, listening to the disconnected signal.

  34. Missing Pieces

  Clutching the beeping receiver, Skye turned and gazed blankly at the rain-streaked window. She was pretty sure she’d heard the clink of bottle and tumbler just before. So – it was just drink. Of course it was. Her father had been maudlin with drink so many times she’d lost count.

  Slowly, she hung up the phone, cutting off the beeps, feeling as though she were severing more than a phone connection. As if she’d stepped to the edge of something high and dangerous.

  They’d barely been apart. Maybe it was the distance making it feel different this time? She hadn’t called home since she’d first arrived here. Hadn’t called to see if he was back from his trip, or even if he’d taken it at all. It had never crossed her mind he might be lonely, not to mention forgetting the anniversary of her mother leaving their lives. Guilt twisted viciously inside.