House of Royale (Secret Keepers #4)(18)
Lexen nodded. “Okay, so it’s late afternoon now, and we have to be at the helicopter by 3:00 A.M. Might be best if everyone rests now.”
I was tired, for no other reason than my entire world had been turned upside down today.
“Aliens are real,” I murmured, chuckling to myself.
“Insane, right?” Maya chuckled with me. “When my parents first told me, I seriously wondered if I’d heard them correctly or if maybe I was losing my mind.”
Emma, who was midway through a yawn, rubbed at her eyes. “I was pretty sure it was a dream. That maybe I’d died in the fire with my parents and everything after that was some weird afterlife.” Lexen’s face went scary when she mentioned dying, and it was very clear he did not want to even think about that possibility.
Callie broke the heavy air of Emma’s sad confession. “I’ve known since I was small. It was lucky my mom didn’t let me go anywhere except fight class, because it wasn’t until I was like ten that I learned that not everyone was aware of the aliens walking amongst us. I’d have probably started blabbing about it to anyone who would listen if I’d been in school.”
I waved my hand at her. “All little kids believe in aliens and ghosts and monsters. No one would have thought anything of it.”
She shook her head. “I find that so weird. It shows how little I know about kids and friendships. I never had any friends until I met Daniel. He’s my first best friend, and now there are all the rest of you guys as well. It’s helping me understand human nature a lot more.”
She probably didn’t know then that a true friendship, unconditional in its love and loyalty, was one of the rarest things to find. And the most precious.
My room consisted of a bed, two side tables, and two lamps. The lamps were nice, with pale blue covers and dangling gems all around, but otherwise there was nothing distinct or interesting to look at. I was supposed to be sleeping. The early morning start would be here before I knew it. But I couldn’t shut my mind off. No matter what I tried, there was no way to stop thinking about everything I’d learned today.
Especially Xander.
He was like me. I had finally found another person—alien—who felt the same way about the water that I did. His people actually lived under there. I expected envy to hit me hard, bitterness that I wasn’t Royale enough to be able to live under the water. But there was only overwhelming gratitude. Because of Daelighters, I got to be more than human, experience more than regular humans could dream of. I’d always loved my differences.
The voice of hope inside of me would not shut up. You can fit in with them. Whatever had happened when the four of us secret keepers touched was cemented deep inside of me. The connection. The bond.
I must have drifted off at some point, my sleep solid but short. The clock read 1:30 A.M. when I opened my eyes again, and I knew there was no way I was going back to sleep anytime soon.
Since I needed to pee, I got out of bed and silently moved about the quiet house, using the closest bathroom. When I was done, I wandered into the “surveillance” area. No one else was awake yet, and I decided it would be easiest to just wait for everyone here. Settling back, I watched the different images flash by. It was hard to make things out clearly with the dark and grainy night vision of the cameras, but I just searched until I found one near the beach. Seeing my water would have to be enough for now.
“What are you doing up?”
I jumped at least a foot, landing rather ungracefully in the chair and spinning around to Xander. “Couldn’t sleep,” I said, pressing a hand to my chest. I could feel my heart beating against it. “Why are you up?”
I hadn’t turned any lights on, and it was only when he stepped closer and the illumination of the screens washed over him that I realized he was wearing nothing but a pair of board shorts. “Need to swim,” he said, sounding less like his usual belligerent self. “Too long out of the water and I start to go a little stir-crazy.”
Oh yeah, I got that.
He turned then, like he was just going to walk out, and I tried hard to ignore the bereft feeling inside of me.
He paused, his voice gruff as he said, “Do you want to swim as well?”
I was up and at his side so quickly that my head actually spun. “Yes, thank you,” I said somewhat breathlessly. “I need to swim.”
His face was mysterious, shadows washing over the hard planes. I couldn’t tell what he was thinking, but it felt like there was less animosity between us. It was almost comfortable standing here with him. Not waiting for him to change his mind, I ditched the sweats he’d lent me, draping them over a nearby chair, and then clad just in the underwear and midriff shirt again, followed him out of the room and into the elevator.
When we got outside, Xander took a few moments checking around the front of the house before he’d let me leave, and I waited, hopping from foot to foot. When we finally started to move, the low, warm breeze brought the scent of salt and water, and whatever tension I’d been holding inside eased as soon as my feet hit the sand.
“We don’t have sand in Overworld,” Xander said quietly, both of us staring out across the dark water. “It’s one of my favorite human things.”
I didn’t know what to say to that. It was one of my favorite human things as well, which no doubt would only annoy him. I chose to stay silent. The water called us down, and I let out a low breath as it swirled around my feet. It was a few degrees cooler than the air; the perfect temperature in my opinion.