Blueisland (Watermagic Series, #4) (3 page)

But h
e wasn’t the guy for me. Was I leading him on somehow? I hoped he didn’t think anything was going to happen between us because I accepted his date to the prom.

I stood there for a minute thinking about what he said while h
e ordered sodas at the bar for us. He handed me the glass a little clumsily as we sat down on the plush sofa. “I’m so pissed off at my mom,” he said suddenly.

“Why’s that?” I shifted my position uncomfortably. I didn’t like thinking about mothers now that mine was dead.
And even at that, I was surprised at his sudden intensity. I wasn’t used to people opening up about their feelings so quickly, if ever.

“She called the
swim team coach and told him I can’t participate at the special end of the year meet.”

I unzipped my backpack and reached inside for my vodka bottle
as I glanced around the room for narcs or teachers on staff. They were all in a social huddle talking and joking with each other. The students purposely asked the younger, less strict faculty to chaperone us. “Why doesn’t your mother want you in the meet?” I asked now looking over at Savannah who was raking in the money from all her wins. I wished I could join the game. Family issues weren’t my thing.

“She put me on restriction when sh
e caught me making out with Liddy Devonshire in her bedroom.” He laughed and leaned back, crossing his leg over his knee.

“You’re dating Liddy
?” I knew all about her. She was his original prom date who dumped him, the girl with a big ass that made all the guys excited when they looked at her. I don’t know why guys think it is appealing to talk about other girls they’ve been with. It’s a huge turn off. And Liddy was way too hot for Donny. I could have seen that relationship in middle school, but not now.

“Not anymore.” H
e smiled. “If I was, I wouldn’t be here with you.”

I was relieved the subject had at least moved away from mothers
, but the other stuff confused me. My mind twisted up with thoughts as I unscrewed the lid to the vodka bottle and poured some into my soda. “Why did you stop dating?” Why the hell did I just ask that? Stupid.

H
e looked uncomfortable with the question, but when I held up the bottle to offer him some he smirked and shook his head somewhat amused. “We weren’t in a relationship and now she’s going out with Jake Stevenson.”

My body tensed.
“Jake’s a prick,” I said shifting in my seat.

“No kidding.” He frowned. I wasn’t sure, but it looked like he start
ed to perspire on his forehead.

I followed
Donny’s eyes as he looked over at the other kids. Jake had his hand on Savannah’s shoulder as she cut the deck for the next round. I cringed. Heat rose up from my chest to my cheeks. “You want it, girl. You want it,” I imagined him saying. I wanted to jump up and sock him in the face, but I knew that would not be smart.

As upset as I felt,
I imagined that Savannah loved getting attention from that ass. Like everyone else, she thought he was hot. Savannah hadn’t seen his bad side like I had. If Savannah’s date hadn’t gotten sick at the prom and went home, maybe Jake would have laid off. If he got too friendly, I’d have to step in.

With that thought,
I looked over at Liddy to see if she was angry that Jake was flirting with Savannah, but from a distance, it appeared as if she was busy trying to talk to the new French girls I heard about, Brigitte Couture and Marine Thibault. Oh my—those vixens weren’t even normal.

Though I kept glancing over at
Jake to make sure he didn’t get too friendly with Savannah, the French girls caught my focus over everyone else. I had never seen them close up. They were gazing out into the room in no particular direction, seemingly uninterested in Liddy’s chatter. From where I was at, the rumors were right—they looked like divine creatures with jewels and sparkling trinkets in their long hair. Their bodies were sleek and perfect. And their faces were as stunning as movie stars or super models, but they had a dangerous air that got me wondering about them.

Donny
shook his head in bewilderment. “I love swimming and I don’t think it’s fair that my mom would punish me for doing something so normal like kissing a girl.” His Adam’s apple lifted in his throat.

Oh
boy—back to his mother again. “You’re right.” I responded, not knowing what to say. I was squinting to get a clearer look at the pearl ensemble in Brigitte’s long shiny black hair, but I could not get my focus. I rubbed my eyes. Everything about her looked exotic.

“My mom is so annoying too,
” he continued, biting his already chewed up nails.

“What do you mean?” I cringed as I took a drink of my
soda and tried to ignore what he was saying. Crap, I wanted this conversation to end. I felt my palms sweating. That was really bothering me.

“S
he’s always singing these dumb country western songs around the house. She thinks she’s going to be the next big star.”

I turned to him
, stretching my arms over my head. “Maybe she’ll audition for American Idol?” The more I looked at him, the more his face started to blur. Maybe I was drunk.

Donny
’s face lit up. “That is exactly what she’s trying to do! She’s so pathetic.” He ran his fingers over the gelled part of his hair and then put his hand on my knee. “When I was little, she used to tuck me in at night and sing country western songs to me! She never hugged or kissed me or even said prayers. She just sang like a geek!”

“Okay. I like geeks,” I said trying to subdue the irritation rising up in me. I guess
Donny wasn’t as shy as I thought. At the dance, he was more reserved.

His
face twisted a little. “After Dad left us, Mom got this really horrible boyfriend. She said she liked him because he was so good looking. I thought that was an imprudent reason to like someone.” He rubbed his eyes. “He got cruel one day and threw her on the ground…”

“Okay!” I looked at him
with a blaze of hatred in my eyes. My stomach felt nauseous. I thought I might just puke right on him. “I don’t want to know about it.”

“What’s wrong?” he asked, putting his
hand on my shoulder. “She dumped him. It’s not like he hurt her that bad.”

“It’s nothing,” I responded, shaking my head and moving away. I just couldn’t stop thinking about Mom and
her freak boyfriend drowning her in the bathtub. It felt like a blanket was smothering me all of the sudden. “I gotta get some air.” I stood up.

“
Can I come too?” he asked with concern in his voice.

“No.” I looked at him directly in his puppy
dog eyes. “I need some time alone.” With that, I walked out of the room as calmly as I could and headed for the deck. I wanted out of this life. Maybe if I died, I could join my mom.

The hall that led outside was dimly lit and relatively quiet.
With the back of my hand, I wiped the tears out of my eyes and tried to pull myself together. I could hear the muffled sounds of kids in other rooms laughing or talking. Someone was playing a Duran Duran song: “Hungry like a Wolf.” Oh, brother.

But then I heard
something. The hardly audible sounds were coming from behind a slightly open door. “That’s good,” the girl panted. “You’re a master…”

I couldn’t help but look in.
To my utter shock, it was blond, beautiful Emily Monroe. Her prom queen crown was on its side on the floor next to her sequined pumps. Her dress was hiked up and a guy with long dark hair had his hand in her panties. He glanced down at his designer wristwatch. I couldn’t see his face, but his body looked sexy as hell. I didn’t know who he was, but he seemed familiar. His dress shirt was torn open.

Emily
looked like she was in so much pleasure as he did things I had never experienced. I wondered what it felt like to be touched that way. The guys I had been with were self-centered and awkward.

So many feelings rushed through me.
I could have sworn that guy reminded me of the one from the ocean and my dreams. I remembered how good he had made me feel in those nighttime fantasies. No other guy compared. Embarrassed and jealous, I hurried back down the hall just as Emily cried out, “Marcel…” Her breath was getting caught in her throat. “…you are the hottest guy alive.”

I waited at the hall door for a minute trying to catch my breath.
Marcel? Who was Marcel? In a moment, I would walk back down the hall, past their room, and out onto the deck like I hadn’t seen a thing.

But before I could start walking, the
guy stepped out of the room. I only glimpsed the side of his face before his long hair whipped around and covered his profile. He wore slacks with some sort of tuxedo shirt reminiscent of another century. It was ripped in the front like Emily tried to pull it off him. From the brief peek I had, it looked like he had a rockin’ chest. The way he strutted revealed a confident demeanor.

Marcel must have been one of the French exchange students. They dressed like that, kind of crazy like rock stars with a touch of eighteenth century couture.
This was probably the one that was rarely at school. The bad boy who was in jail. Marcel Paradis. That’s his name. Right.

He looked back over his shoulder.
But when he saw me, our blue eyes met. Heat rose up from my groin into my chest.

“What’s wrong with you?” he asked in a cocky voice. “Got a staring problem?”

“You’re nothing much to look at,” I snapped and then bit down on my lower lip. What a jerk.

“Damn!
Don’t do that with you lip,” he scoffed, glancing down through his black heavy eyelashes at my mouth.

Then it got strange.
His head jerked up and his fingers curled before his chest. And just like that he fainted on the floor. Totally passed out!

I couldn’t believe it. What the hell?

But before I could figure out what to do, his thick lashes flew open. For a moment his insane blue eyes stared up at the ceiling, wide and intense. Then, he scrambled to his feet. “Stay away from me,” he said, searching my eyes. His tan, olive skin had paled and a purple vein in his neck lifted up underneath his skin.

My face flamed. “My pleasure, asshole.”
My knees felt weak like they were going to buckle beneath me. I held my hand against the wall to steady myself.

He just scoffed and
rushed up the stairs, out the door, and onto the deck.

I was a bit shocked and not thinking straight.
How could I have missed this jerk at school? It was probably because I had been absent so much with my mom’s funeral arrangements, depression leave, and my general lost mindset. But now I remembered who he was. He was Brigitte’s boyfriend! Boy did she have bad taste.

Oh, man
, I wouldn’t mess with her. Emily was a fool. Brigitte could kick her ass and then some. French girls were tough like that. Something about her seemed deadly kind of like those sexy assassin types in movies that have great manners, but then sniper someone through a window from another building. She just had that kind of air about her.

That dude
looked so much like the guy in the ocean. At that recognition, I rolled my eyes. Of course, he wasn’t the guy I saw. Even if he didn’t drown, he couldn’t climb up onto a yacht from the water below. He would need some kind of ladder or help from the deck. But if it was the same guy somehow, this dude really got around with the girls. And just my luck stumbling in on him twice. Serendipity? Ha! My ass.

Marcel Paradis
was a prick and I wanted to tell him off good. I jogged to catch up with him, but when I stepped outside into the night air, he was gone.

I looked around. H
e was nowhere to be seen. He must have taken the back route into the main room where everyone was hanging out and playing cards. It was a good thing because I would have just made a fool of myself cursing him out.

A lump grew in my throat.
I felt so out of whack that I started pacing right there on the deck. I was so sick of people. They were so mean. I didn’t do a damn thing to Marcel Paradis and he treated me like trash. Life was hell. Was he going to start calling me names and making fun of me at school now like Jake Stevenson did? I just couldn’t take that. Not from him especially. Oh, what was I thinking?

Only recently, the doctor said I suffered from anxiety
and clinical depression. Whatever! I wasn’t going to take his stupid pills. My eyes kept drifting out to the ocean.

That’s when
I noticed the sound of a woman’s voice coming from a radio in one of the rooms below. She sounded like she was complaining about her man on some psychology AM radio show. Thoughts of my mother rushed back into my mind.

Steve, my mom’s
alcoholic boyfriend, was choking her, holding her down in the bathtub. Her face was pale. Her eyes bulging under the water. Her arms and legs flailing to and fro. Desperate. Bubbles and bile coming out of her throat. The last thoughts of how she ruined her life by choosing a scumbag. How she destroyed my life.

“Stop, stop!” I said to myself. If only my mind would still.