Fables & Other Lies

“Penelope.” He sighed, his forehead against mine as he pushed inside me deeper, faster. “Penelope.”

My legs started to shake again, and this time, I came with a scream, saying his name in a chant that I couldn’t imagine ever forgetting.

Chapter Twenty-Four

“Can we just stay here?” I tilted my head to look at River, who was smiling.

“I don’t see why not.” He kissed the top of my head. “As long as you don’t mind the small toilet and lack of shower.”

I sighed heavily. “I can do with the small toilet. The lack of shower, not so much.”

“I thought so.” He chuckled, the sound making me smile wider.

“How do you read my mind?”

“If I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.” He shifted, turning so we were face-to-face. “It only happens when I’m on the property. I can’t go around reading minds when I’m anywhere else.”

“I want to hear the story.” I ran a finger over the side of his face, marking each perfect bone contour. “I’ll believe you.”

“I’m not sure you will.”

“Your mother drowned, didn’t she?” I asked. “Is that what it’s about?”

“In part.” His smile faltered.

“We don’t have to talk about it.”

“I’ve never spoken to anyone about it before.” He reached over and tucked a strand of loose hair behind my ear. “She wanted . . . she needed to get to one of the big islands, to Pan, or the DR or PR or Cuba, but Pan was closest and Pan was where her doctor was, so that was where she needed to be. My father, as you know, isn’t allowed to step foot there. It’s not so much that he doesn’t want to go. He’s tried, but he can’t seem to move past a certain spot.” River chuckled lightly. “A man who owns so much property and has so many investments, hotels, restaurants, nightclubs, and he can’t step foot on the one piece of land that calls to him, that gave birth to him.”

“It’s a little sad when you say it like that,” I whispered.

“Just a little?”

“Well, it’s kind of difficult to feel sad for successful moguls.”

“Your father, by all accounts, was a successful mogul.”

“And I never felt sad for him.” I raised an eyebrow. River smiled.

“My mother was allowed on Pan. She could get through whatever the invisible barriers were with no problem and visited her doctor there and even went out for dinner with friends. She wasn’t a true Caliban, after all.” He took a shaky breath. “She was pregnant with a baby girl. My little sister. That night . . . ” He swallowed. “That night, her contractions were getting stronger and because her delivery with me, just ten years prior, had been so quick, she decided to go to Pan.”

“My God. You were ten when it happened?”

He nodded gravely. “I went with her. I knew my way around the boat, knew how to drive it. I was ten, but I’d grown up on all kinds of boats, sailing, fishing. Besides, my father was away on business and my mother was my . . . well, she was my best friend, really. We did everything together.” He smiled sadly. “She called me her little sidekick and you’d think I’d be jealous about the child she was carrying, but I was excited. Finally, someone to play with, even if she would be an entire decade younger.”

“River.” I swallowed the lump in my throat and continued to listen.

“The fog wasn’t heavy that day. The tree was blooming, the grass was green up until the spot where the grass turned to sand and then ocean water. It was nice out. Until it wasn’t.”

“What happened?”

“From what I remember, which is my ten-year-old memory, the winds suddenly picked up. I remember the fog, which had been clear just a second before, wrapping around us like a thick, dark blanket. I remember my mother screaming, yelling for me to secure my life vest. Hers wouldn’t . . . she tried to put it on, but her belly—it just wouldn’t budge.” He shook his head. “Her body was never found.”

“My God.” I sat up with a gasp.

“When I came to, I was lying on the Devil’s Chair.” He was looking so intently at me, as if he needed me to pay close attention. “He asked me what I wanted. What my wish was. I said my mother, my baby sister. He laughed. Laughed.” River shook his head in disbelief. “Then he told me that dead people couldn’t resuscitate other dead people.”

“What?” I blinked, trying to make sense of the nonsensical.

“So I asked to be brought back. I asked for life. Just life. I thought if I was alive he’d let me bring back my mother.” He swallowed, glancing away, out the window, where the beautiful, clear skies had turned into a sudden torrential downpour. “He didn’t. In exchange for my life, he tied me to him, to this island. To this house. I have bouts of freedom here and there, but I always have to come right back here.”