Full Steam Ahead (Sea Swept #1) by Valerie Chase Page B

 
    “Whatever you’re thinking up there.” He points at his temple. “You’re making yourself sick.”  
    “So you’re a mind reader now too?”  
    Jace ignores that. “Think about something else. Like the modern art you love so much. What’s your favorite piece?”  
    No one has asked me that before. Not my parents. Not Hunter. But the answer comes easily to me. “It’s a work by Georgia O’Keefe. It has an odd name— Jack-in-Pulpit Abstraction No.5 —but I love it.” The print is still on my wall.  
    “Then focus on that.”  
    I throw him a doubtful look, but visualize the O’Keefe piece, recalling the lovely strokes of color and how the oil paint melded from green to purple to white and that surprisingly stroke of pink. Sooner than I’d have thought possible, my stomach is calm again.  
    “It worked,” I say in surprise. “How did you …”
    “I was in elementary school and we went to a museum once, the Umlauf sculpture garden in Austin. They have all these stone and bronze sculptures, a lot of them of people. After that, whenever things got bad for me growing up, I would imagine I was one of those sculptures.”
    Made of stone, so that he couldn’t get hurt? I wonder what in Jace’s past made him need the mental trick, but I can’t ask, because then I’d owe him my own explanations.  
    Silently, we listen to the celebratory cheers of the passengers at the ball.
    It strikes me again that Jace probably saved my life. I want to kiss him. Or for him to kiss me. A New Year’s kiss, sweet and glittering. But he turned me down last night, and I can’t bring myself to so much as look at him.
    “So what’s going on with you?” Jace finally asks.
    I shrug and fiddle with a napkin. “Just … you know. Upset about the break-up.” Somewhere in the mass of people, Hunter is likely making out with Kelsey, but I realize I don’t care anymore.
    “You’ve been upset for months. Way before you and Hunter broke up.”
    “That’s not true.”
    Jace leans toward me, forcing me to look up at him. He’s scowling. “You can’t admit that something’s not perfect, can you?” he says. “You’d pretend until the earth broke apart that you’re fine.”
    “Why do you care?” I shoot back. “You wouldn’t even hook up with me last night.” As soon as I say it I feel my face flush red. Jace sits back a little.
    “Georgia, I didn’t sleep with you last night because … Look, you were beyond drunk. I don’t take advantage of girls like that.”
    Something inside me softens, because that was the answer I’d wanted to hear. But I can’t help remembering how after taking me to our room, he went back to the party. “So who was the lucky girl? The one you slept with instead of me.”
    His brows rise. “You really do think I hop into bed with every girl who gives me the eye, don’t you?” A grin starts to play around his lips. “And does that mean you’re jealous?”
    I wish I’d kept my mouth shut. “Forget it. Doesn’t matter. Can you let me out now? I want to go sleep.”
    He shakes his head. “You aren’t getting out of this conversation that easily.”
    “Move. Please.” But he doesn’t, just sits there grinning at me cockily. I feel steadier now, though, so I take a last sip of water, then contort myself so I slide under the table and then out around his legs.  
    Standing, I brush myself off and glance triumphantly at Jace. He makes no move to stop me, and his grin is gone.
    “All right,” he says quietly. “If you want so badly to get away from me, go.”
    That makes me pause, because it wasn’t him I wanted to get away from so much as the line of conversation. Did I hurt his feelings? Until this trip I never thought Jace cared for anything but a good time, but I’m starting to realize that there is more to him than he lets on.  
    “Thank you,” I say. “For … the pizza. And for pulling me back. I think I was … a little off-balance.”
    His gaze flicks up to