Chapter Thirteen #3
“You have this…this amazing life.” Phylis tried to steady her voice, but it didn’t seem possible as the words she had thought but promised herself she would never say tripped from her tongue.
“I would love the life you have—never working? Never worrying about the next contract, no responsibility for dozens of other peoples’ lives, safety, security, joy, a hot meal whenever you want one… and you’re walking away from it.”
You’re walking away from me.
It was the stupidest thing, Phylis realized bitterly as she concentrated on not allowing her eyes to prickle with tears. She had been happy, so happy with her life before she had literally run into this man in an alleyway.
She had loved the Dreamer. She had loved the sea. She had loved her crew, and the life her father had given her.
And now…now all she wanted was to stay on land with this idiot.
It didn’t make sense.
And it hurt. It hurt deep in her gut that he couldn’t see that.
Michael hesitated before stepping forward and lifting a hand to cup her cheek. “It’s…my life, Phylis. It’s not nearly as exciting as yours.”
“Oh, so you want my life and I want yours?” Phylis dashed away furious tears as she laughed dryly. “Why don’t you become the captain of the Dreamer and I stay with your family?”
“Don’t be silly.”
“I’m not being silly,” she said sharply, twisting her head away from the comfort of his hand.
“You are walking away from something that most of us could only ever dream of, and you don’t even know what you are walking toward!
Most people choose to immigrate because they want to build something of their own for the very first time, but you—you have everything you could ever want!
A home, a family, a title in the future. It’s a job for life with purpose—”
“And I don’t want it,” Michael said simply, his throat bobbing as his jaw tightened. “I don’t want it, Phylis. I want…more.”
‘More’? More what?
More hard work? More stress and strain? More sunburn on his brow and bruises along his arms?
Phylis turned away from the vexatious man and wondered if she should just walk away from this incensing conversation, this incensing idiot.
If she had not been able to articulate this to him now, she never would.
“Phylis—”
“You have an amazing life,” she said quietly, smiling wryly up at him and fighting the urge to kiss him.
Make him stay.
Because that was what this was really about, wasn’t it? She might not have been able to admit it to him, but Phylis knew the truth.
It hurt, that he could know her, warm to her, invite her into his family and his life…then walk away from her.
Which was ridiculous. She would need to be in the Netherlands in a few weeks for a contract that had been signed before she had even met him. She had become so caught up in getting angry at the man for leaving her that Phylis had quite forgotten that eventually, she would be the one leaving him.
“Phylis,” said Michael again, his voice low and tender.
Oh, there was the devil to pay: if he was going to talk to her like that, she was going to melt into his arms like a fool!
“Michael,” she said forbiddingly, turning back to him and hating how charismatic the fool was.
His lopsided smile made her stomach lurch. “You’re not saying anything to me that I haven’t already thought before, you know. Haven’t already wrestled with.”
“And yet you will leave,” she said quietly.
It was not a question, and Michael obviously understood that.
He blew out a low exhale, then nodded briefly.
“I will leave. I am going to immigrate, Phylis. I am going to seek adventure, seek an opportunity to make a name for myself as myself, not my father’s son or my uncles’ nephew. To be…me. Only me.”
“And so you will walk away from a family who loves you,” Phylis said, her voice faltering, “and a…a friend who…”
She swallowed hard as a strange, pinched sort of look flickered across Michael’s face. Was it pain? Was it affection? It was gone so quickly, she could hardly tell.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “I’ll walk away from all of it. Just like you will sail away from all of this, this city that you so clearly love, and your…your friend.”
The moment elongated out between them, sparkling with possibilities Phylis didn’t truly understand. It was as though there were a million paths before them, a million choices, a million decisions that could create a million futures.
She could launch herself into his arms and kiss him. She could slap him. She could laugh at him. She could encourage him. She could wheedle and hope to persuade him. She could tell his family. She could—
But right here, right now, Phylis knew what she had to do.
And it would hurt. It would hurt.
“In that case,” she said quietly, “if I am going to leave London, and you are going to leave London, and presumably on different ships—”
Michael’s chuckle was dry. “Presumably.”
“—then I suggest we…we try to appreciate the time we have together,” Phylis said bracingly, forcing a smile that she did not feel. “As friends.”
Was that a flicker of disappointment?
If it was, it was gone before she could capture it.
“As friends,” Michael repeated gravely with a smile that made her heart sparkle. “As friends.”