“Going to Jessica was the cheap trick of a desperate man. One who knew you’d get off the boat one way or another. A man who’d tried everything he could think of to manipulate you into surrender. I left the room that night, because I needed you to be jealous, to be anything if you couldn’t love me. Because I was jealous of everything you fought for. I’m jealous of the fucking ground you walk on.”
This just might have been the most fulfilling fever dream she’d had yet.
Sane enough to remember that auditory hallucinations were a terrible sign, Eugenia looked down at the mud-stained, ugly blue cotton under her crusty furs. She’d lost weight. “I thought I’d die in a nicer dress, wearing the pearls my daddy gave me. I had never taken them off until the day I traded them for scraps, because it was that or pussy. God only knows where they are now.”
“Honey, please look at me…”
Another perfectly shaped rock skipped over chilly waters, Eugenia smiling to beat her record. “Shouldn’t it be lamb? Lamb to the slaughter? Lamb on a spit? You called Brooke lamb.”
Pain, there was so much pain from her ghost’s confession. “I could have told her about Fresh Water, and I didn’t. I needed a living example to open your eyes.”
The tear that fell was warm on her cheek. “I know… but it wouldn’t have mattered which way she went. There is no happy ending anywhere.”
“Eugenia… please.”
Closing her eyes to the sound of a stalwart man begging, she sighed.
But the phantom was relentless. “I would be happy to just be able to see you”—and the voice came closer—“even if you never let me touch you again.”
“If we’d met in some bar before the bombs, if you’d approached with your swagger, your good looks, and your unbearable pretentiousness... I would have thrown my drink in your face.”
There was amusement in the specter’s reply. “I just bet you would have.”
“Do you? Because I’ve thought about it to an unhealthy degree, and I’m not sure why.”
The amused lilt, she’d missed the sound of it. “Because I scare you. Because I’m brazen. Because I’m all the things you want but would never admit.”
“Those things are true, but I think it’s because with just one look, I would have seen exactly what you were capable of. Men like you ended the world.” A deep breath, the hard work of peeling her eyelids open accomplished, she prepared to turn and found nothing there. Cutting a glance to the side, she found his boots… badly in need of a polish. Running her eyes over dirty jeans, a flannel, a man in a coat, until she found the new beard growth on his face. “I know who you are, Kingston.”
Was that relief in his eye? “I know you do.”
“But we’ve never talked about it, not really.” God, she was a mess, covered in dirt, hair all snarls. Running a hand down her tangled mane as if she might knock the dust out, she said, “It’s the eyes, the cheekbones. You’ve got Joan’s good looks, but deep down, you’re all Daddy.”
“Joan would be proud to hear that; it was her one job. Be pretty and raise an heir.” Settling into his stance like a trained politician, the captain added, “Did she ever tell you she was runner-up to Miss America? Born and raised to be a politician's wife.”
“And though Granddaddy might have been Governor, your father—”
“Was a senator.” And the phantom didn’t even have the nerve to look embarrassed.
“Not just any senator. An avid supporter of the crispy, dead president’s untrained private police. The army he marched into cities to murder, arrest, and terrify the people rising up against his regime. A supporter of the war America started. Evil like you.”
“I’m not my father…”
“Keep telling yourself that.”
There was the familiar, irritated squint. “I’m not my father, because I would never settle for the senate when I could have had the oval office.”
Which deserved mockery, considering. “What shape is your office on the ship?”
“Rectangular.”
“Hmm.” That was a little funny. “Your mom is afraid for you. What does it feel like to have a mom who is still alive and able to be afraid for their child? I miss mine. I miss her in a way I don’t know how to describe. Not just because she was hard on me, but because she was great.”
And Eugenia had meant great in the way that artists were great. The way countries were great. Her mom had been a juggernaut that had changed the world for the better. All that surgical knowledge gone forever, thanks to Aaron’s father.
The phantom took a cautious step closer. “Eugenia, what did Joan say to you?”
“She only told me the truth. You can’t have me and keep peace on the ship. And you know it too.” Since this was final confessions and all, she tacked on, “And though I do hate you, I couldn’t see your work fail just because the pair of us were…”
“In love?”
“Call it whatever you want. It doesn’t matter.”
Breathless, he looked torn apart. “It matters to me.”
How many times did she have to tell him? “You don’t get to be happy!”
“Why?”
A sob caught in her throat. “Because I am afraid of Level 9. What it means for the world. What it would do to me to allow it.”
“I know,” he said with such feeling, with so much love in those hazel eyes. “Which is why I am removing your ability to choose. There won’t be guilt because I’m stealing you from the world. Because from this moment forward, I own you. And I’ll remind you of it every day.”
Was he crying? Phantoms didn’t cry. This… this couldn’t be real. “Aaron?”
Gesturing to the dead wood at his back, he waved forward. “Boys, tie her up.”
Chapter Eighteen
How different it was from the first time she’d seen those welcoming lights, their enticing sparkle suckering in wayward strangers. With her head cradled on Aaron’s lap, the vantage was not a tempting glint of civilization from a crumbling stone bridge. She didn’t need to squint to see what was hidden behind the trees.
Eugenia saw the ship clear as day, growing larger as the dinghy that carried her home was oared by strong men.
There was no John running to the shore, abandoning his pack and diving into murky waters.
There was only Aaron, stroking her hair all the hours it took the men to row upstream. There was only fever and raw wrists from fighting rope that bound her weak limbs.
But the ship looked the way she remembered from that first awful encounter.
Pretty, jovial, a beckoning finger in a world of rotting corpses.
A bad place.
Or was it a good place where bad things happened?
It was more than the men on the gangplank. The decks were full. Cheering abounded.
She heard her name shouted in homecoming. As if she belonged. As if she’d been missed.
“Hush now.” Taking her chin, the captain turned her head so she might meet his eyes. So she would see his intention, his smirk… his victory. “You don’t have a choice, remember?”