Page 48 of Windlass (Seal Cove #3)

“I—” Her jaw clicked shut. It hadn’t been eight, but it had been a fair number. Four? And that wasn’t counting the smaller, partial times she’d come watching Stevie. Tasting Stevie.

“We’re not blind, love.” Stormy reached over and patted her shoulder. “And honestly it’s about fucking time. Have you two talked about things?”

She still couldn’t speak.

“Angie,” Emilia began again, “we don’t have to—”

“Actually, we kind of do.” Stormy sat fully upright to face Angie. “It’s become a moral obligation for me at this point because I can’t embody the ‘bystander effect’ any longer. No more bullshit. This is the real thing, and I know that scares the hell out of you.”

Angie toyed with a clover flower. Her shoulders moved in a minute shrug, ignoring her brain’s commands.

“And I know you would never play with her on purpose,” Stormy continued in a gentle voice. “So I’m gonna ask: She’s ready. Are you?”

Another minuscule shrug.

“Does she know you’re not sure?” asked Stormy.

Damn Stormy, and damn leisurely day drinking. Her tongue and shoulders were loose. Quietly, Angie said, “It’s not that I’m not sure. It’s . . .”

Her friends waited.

“It’s . . .” She tried again, but there was a weight on her tongue she couldn’t lift.

It’s because I’m worried I’ll destroy us , she might have said, or It’s because I’m worried that if I give in to what I want, I’ll wake up one day next to Stevie, perfect Stevie, and the emptiness will be lying there between us still ready to swallow me whole. She couldn’t say either.

“It’s okay to be scared,” Emilia said softly.

“It’s okay to be scared of yourself, too,” Stormy added. “But Stevie can handle it. She’s tougher than she looks. Just—”

Stormy broke off and assessed Angie. Her ears buzzed their warning as the edges of the world grew white.

“Breathe, baby.” Stormy moved to crouch in front of her, shielding her from view of the rest of their party. “Breathe.”

She breathed. Salt air and cut grass and something herbal she couldn’t identify amid the overwhelming scent of pine eased her lungs. The panic attack temporarily subsided.

“I can’t—I can’t lose her. I can’t.”

“Oh honey,” said Stormy. Angie’s eyes welled with tears at the care in her voice. “You sweet, sweet thing.”

Stormy’s body language suggested she wanted to bundle Angie into a tight hug, but instead she held one of her hands loosely.

The salt air had made their skin slightly sticky.

Angie didn’t mind the sensation. She turned their linked hands over, playing with Stormy’s painted fingernails.

Stormy’s hands were like her: soft, strong, and warm.

She wished she could curl up in those cupped palms.

“Tell me why you think you’ll lose her,” said Stormy.

Angie scoffed. “You know why.”

“Tell me again.”

“I run? Cheat on her? Lie to her? Emotionally manipulate her?”

“You haven’t cheated on anyone in years.”

“But I have cheated,” said Angie.

“Twice.” Stormy tapped her thumb against Angie’s hand two times for emphasis. “If I’m being honest, both times were with people you didn’t really care about and who deserved to lose you.”

“But what if—” Lana’s words rang in her head. “What if I run?”

“What usually makes you feel like you need to run?” Emilia asked.

“Happiness,” said Stormy, at the same time as Angie said, “Feeling trapped.”

Angie looked at Stormy. Happiness? That’s what Stormy thought she was afraid of?

“It’s not—I’m not afraid of happiness. I’m not capable of happiness , and I’m afraid she’ll ruin herself trying to fix something that can’t be fixed.”

“You’re not broken, Angela.” Stormy rarely sounded so serious.

“Aren’t I?”

Stormy squeezed her hand. “No more than anyone else.”

“But I can’t—” She breathed in, then out. “She deserves someone whole.”

Now Stormy scoffed. “Put that nonsense back in the trash. She wants you .”

“Well, she’s an idiot, then.”

“You’re both idiots. It’s one of the reasons we love you.” Stormy kissed her forehead tenderly. Her dark eyes warned Angie she wasn’t going to like what came next.

Angie’s bones vibrated with premonition.

“Listen to me, Angie. You can’t let the selfish actions of one man dictate the rest of your life. Don’t give him that power. Don’t give any of them that power.”

Something in her chest imploded. She stared mutely at Stormy, seeking shelter in that familiar gaze. Emilia sat by silently, offering comfort with her presence.

“Stevie knows you,” Stormy continued in a firm, quiet voice. “No, sometimes love isn’t enough, but are you really going to walk away from the possibility of something incredible just because it might not work out?”

“But Stevie—”

“You’re already in it, girl. Do you think calling it off before you hurt her is going to make her feel good ? No. It’s going to hurt her even more because she’ll think you didn’t care enough about her to try.”

“But the people I love leave me .” The words ripped out of her, hoarse and raw. Only Stormy could get her to talk like this, peeling her layer by layer, and she hated it.

“Incorrect, muffin.” Stormy did hug her, now, wrapping her up as tightly as swaddling. The vibration in her bones grew stronger until she shook with ugly, muffled sobs. “I’m here. We’re here. We’re not going anywhere.”

“You’ve mentioned emptiness in the past,” Emilia said.

Had she? Angie sobbed through a few more rough shaking breaths, then wiped her face, emerging from Stormy’s cleavage, and stared at Emilia.

“You’re not the only one with a void,” Emilia said in response to Angie’s unspoken question. Bluntly, she continued. “I tried to kill myself. Have I ever told you that?”

Angie shook her head as the pain of that statement twisted her gut.

She knew Emilia had been depressed, but the details remained obscure.

The very idea of Emilia hurting herself like that, permanently , scraped her raw.

The set expression of Emilia’s jaw said thinking about that time was painful for her, too.

“I spent a few months at an in-patient facility getting better. When I met Morgan, I was grieving my father, but I no longer had suicidal ideation. My situation is different from yours, and I’m not trying to minimize or compare, but that feeling, that hole , I get.

I remember it. It’s still one of the things that scares me most. And Ange .

. . It isn’t something that someone else is supposed to fill. It’s depression, or trauma.”

“Tough talk from Russo,” Stormy said, but her tone was gentle. “She’s not wrong.”

“Have you considered that therapy might help you sort through some of this so that you can see what’s real and what your mind is telling you is real because, as Stormy put it, the selfish actions of your family left serious psychological damage?” asked Emilia.

Angie couldn’t hear this. Bile burned in the back of her throat.

Slowly, like sliding off a tight boot, she left her body behind and floated somewhere else.

“Going away” she called it in her mind. It was quiet there.

Not peaceful exactly, but quiet. She didn’t need to think.

She just needed a moment to breathe or to not breathe, seeking peace at the bottom of her breath.

Three figures sat on a picnic blanket beneath her as she floated up, their concerns no longer hers.

“And that,” Emilia said, forcing Angie back into her body with a light hand on her shoulder, “is called dissociation. I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to push you that far.”

“It’s okay,” Angie managed. Her skin itched as it adjusted to her presence.

Some of the quiet she’d sought remained, though.

Emilia’s direct, blunt assessment had lanced a pocket of something rancid she hadn’t realized was lodged beneath her breastbone.

Suddenly she felt like she could breathe, her lungs unfettered.

There had been a truth in Emilia’s words her body recognized.

Her mind protested for nothing was that simple, but the weight of that truth muffled the chorus of dissenters.

It isn’t something that someone else is supposed to fill.

What would fill it if not the bodies of those whose paths had aligned with hers? What else could she shovel in to feed the engine? Surely not something as banal as self-love.

If so, she was screwed.

The three of them sat in silence, listening to the birds and the sounds of Morgan and Stevie bickering good-naturedly. Angie was startled to find that it was okay now. She was still in one piece, sitting with her friends on a warm summer day by the ocean.

“What do I do?” Angie asked. “About Stevie.”

“Up to you,” said Stormy, “but I think you should try.”

Try. As if it were that simple. As if she had control of her emotions, as if—

As if Emilia was right and she needed therapy. Fuck her sideways and upside down; she couldn’t afford therapy.

A problem for later. She needed to pull herself together before Stevie came over and realized she was upset.

“It’s not that easy for me,” she admitted.

“If only you were in love with someone patient and kind,” said Stormy. “Oh, wait.”

In love .

Because she was—of course she was. She’d known that for ages. She just hadn’t had someone else say it to her so unavoidably, so, so . . .

Fuck . Yes, she was in love with Stevie Ward. Yes, she wanted to be with her.

Her eyes slid away from Stormy’s face to where Morgan had Stevie in a friendly headlock, Stevie flailing and laughing too hard to fight back in earnest. She was in love with that absolutely ridiculous, shockingly sexy, patient, kind, nerdy, perfect woman.

“How long have you known what was going on?” she asked her friends.

Stormy and Emilia looked at each other, then predictably and only mildly humiliatingly, burst into laughter loud enough to catch the attention of the others. Angie hid her face in her hands to conceal her blush.

They’d known all along.

They’d known, and they hadn’t reacted as she’d feared, with judgment and unrealistic expectations.

They’d reacted with love.