Chapter 12
Rachel gets up, as if she doesn’t want to be associated with me anymore, and hurries back to where her sister is sitting. She grabs her water bottle and drinks deeply, pretending that was her reason for abandoning me alone on my love seat.
It takes a minute of fractured breathing to realize the others are—either subconsciously or purposefully—turned to Viv, awaiting her response.
I don’t know much about these people yet, but it’s clear there is an undercurrent of power at play among the group.
They follow Viv, their leader, but they take opportunities to quietly undermine her as well: Fiona with the beer, Piper with her attitude.
I think about how quickly Rachel revealed the truth about her sister’s Instagram, how Fiona got conspiratorial with me when talking about some of Empress’s features.
The surface of this group is a shiny oil spill, rainbowed and beautiful, and easy to miss as toxic.
“Sorry,” I finally say, breaking the awkward silence. “I don’t know if something happened between you all. If it’s a sore spot, I apologize.”
Viv sighs, shaking her head. She visibly relaxes, and the rest of the group follows suit. The strain in the room starts to dissipate. “No, it’s okay. You deserve to know.”
“By all means, go ahead,” Piper interjects, taking a long, slurping sip from her drink.
“Tell her the truth. We’re all a family, right, Viv?
” Her knuckles are white against the glass and her face behind the sunglasses has paled a bit.
“But I’m not going to sit around and listen to this shit. I have work to do.”
“Maybe you shouldn’t be chugging vodka then,” Ashley snarks.
Piper ignores her and sweeps away to the stairs, taking her glass with her.
Viv rolls her eyes in exasperation before turning back to me. “Piper and Elena were close. Not as close as Elena and me, but Piper’s taking her quitting hard. Look, we don’t really talk about Elena because our parting was not very amicable.”
Behind Viv, Rachel and Ashley share a glance. Fiona twists her fingers together and stares at the floor, chewing on her bottom lip.
“What happened?” I ask.
Viv finally sits down, taking Rachel’s vacated spot next to me.
“Elena started using Empress’s page to boost her own account.
You know, diverting Empress followers to her page.
That’s a big no-no. We can tag our personal accounts in the photos, but we’re supposed to be selling the lifestyle and experience of the yacht, not our own pages.
Elena was literally asking Empress followers to come to her sex and love page.
” Viv looks down at her hands, head drooping.
“I deleted the posts, of course. But we had a big fight about it. I told her I’d give her another chance if she stopped doing it.
It was a betrayal, you know? But Elena said forget it.
She wanted to move on, without us. Which is fine, but I wish she went about it a different way.
” She raises her gaze to my face, studying it.
“You can relate, I’m sure. A friend doing something shitty and shady behind your back is not cool. ”
I try not to flinch or pull away from her. “That sounds difficult.”
“It was.” Viv sighs. “Elena and I were friends for a long time before I recruited her for Empress. Back in the day, we lived and worked together in New York City. We reconnected recently; I finally convinced her to join us last summer. And then she did that. The whole thing hurt. I don’t know anything about words on your mirror, but I can assure you it was none of us. ”
“You know, your room used to be Elena’s,” Fiona adds. “It could have been left over from her. Something she wrote before leaving. Mirrors have memories. Especially when steamed up.”
Fiona’s right. The words were probably traced by Elena herself before quitting.
A quiet “fuck you.” As for everything else, well…
My mother did say I have a vivid imagination.
It was all too easy for me to picture the mermaids in my book, every detail, every salty strand of hair. I must have overreacted.
“So where is Elena now?” I ask, my collarbone hot with embarrassment.
“No idea—she’s got us and the Empress page blocked.
” Viv’s eyes are bright for a moment, and then she clears her throat and stands up.
“I miss her dearly, but I wish her all the best. Now, come on. We have things to do. Let’s deal with the boring onboarding stuff first. Char, come with me; girls, you have your marching orders. ”
She’s right. We have work to do. I have a new job.
It’s time to let go of Sage and everything that happened with the book; it’s time to make money and get a real career going.
There was no woman in the water. There were no words etched on my mirror.
There are definitely no lingering suspicions about these people I now share a yacht with.
There can’t be.
* * *
It’s almost five o’clock by the time Viv finally releases me from onboarding.
My brain is humming. Viv set me up with Empress’s logins, made me read through Royal Yachts’ marketing plan; gotten me on a Zoom call with their accountant to set up direct deposit; and connected me with Royal Yachts’ administrative assistant—who had already canceled my flight home and the crappy motel I booked now taking care of all the loose ends I needed to tie up back in Milwaukee.
Afterward, Viv took me through some of the recent posts for Empress, pointing out how each one has to highlight some amazing feature or asset of the yacht.
“I need you back on the main deck at around seven for those golden-hour shots,” Viv reminds me as she pats my shoulder, closing her laptop. “Remember, I’ll be helping you out for the first week or two. Then the training wheels come off. Don’t worry, you’ll be great.”
I am less confident about my abilities, but it’s a relief to get a break.
Viv heads to her room on the upper level, leaving me alone, unsure of what to do.
My stomach groans. The berries and cheese plates came out again for lunch, but Viv didn’t say anything about dinner. Maybe I can find Rachel, the apparent resident chef. The food thing on Empress is strange—why are there no snacks? No stocked cabinets? Why can only Rachel cook?
There’s a tapping on the glass behind me.
Choking, remembering the drumming on the hull early this morning, I spin around on the glass stool.
Piper. She’s rapping one knuckle against the glass, creating a low clunking sound. When she sees she’s caught my attention, she beckons me.
I don’t need to be asked twice. Piper is still a mystery, a slightly intimidating one, if I’m being honest, and I’m dying to talk to her alone.
The deck is hot from the burning sun, and I’ve left my flip-flops inside near the couch. Great. The humidity is gross again today; even on the water, the air is slimy and charged, like an electric eel.
Piper stands in front of me like the modern version of Aphrodite. Her golden tresses cascade over her shoulders, delicately framing her breasts, which are on full display in the tiny black bikini she wears.
I try to keep from staring at her body like a creep; it’s not that she’s attractive and I’m into hot people—it’s that she’s got the kind of physique I’ve never seen on anyone who isn’t a professional athlete.
Her legs are long and muscled, her abs are as sharp as diamonds, and her biceps gently swell out from her arms.
Piper must be used to people fawning over her because she says, “I surf. Used to be professionally, when I was nineteen and stronger, but now it’s for fun.”
She’s wearing her big black sunglasses and when I try to look into her eyes, I only see my reflection instead, which is jarring. Compared to her, I look like a child who’s been locked in an attic for several years.
“Surfing, wow. How’d you end up here, then?” I ask.
“Oh, you know, trying to make something of my life,” Piper says breezily.
Then she pauses, assessing me. “My father was a professional surfer too. World-famous, actually. He was pretty pissed when I quit. I wanted to do it for fun, not compete anymore. But Dad didn’t like that.
He canceled my credit card, so I needed a new way to make money.
I’ve always had a love for fashion, and when I met Viv, she had all these connections to make me a full-fledged fashion influencer. ”
“Viv seems good at that,” I murmur. “Networking.”
A ripple of emotion crosses Piper’s face, but it’s gone before I can identify it.
“She sure is.” Piper lifts her hands into the air, a mimicry of a shrug.
“Unfortunately, my father is still pissed at me despite my fabulous success. We’re not talking.
Who knew he wouldn’t be proud to have a famous influencer daughter? ”
Sarcasm festers in her words, and I can tell this is a touchy subject for her. I don’t know what else to say. I have so many questions. But there’s also something about her that scares the hell out of me, and I’m not trying to press on the bruise of her relationship with her father.
“Come on, new girl,” Piper chirps before I can come up with a response. She turns away and strides to the end of the deck. “Let’s go swimming.”