Chapter 204: Confession

Ten minutes earlier, at the girls' hotel, Audra Sloane was sharing a room with Iris Wexley and another girl from their group.

The evening room check had just finished. Their teacher had gone on to the next door, leaving them with the familiar warning to stay in the hotel and be ready when the staff came around again. For the moment, the room was peaceful. Audra should have been able to relax after an entire day at Bellhaven Marine Park.

Instead, she was trying to decide when to tell Cyrus how she felt.

She had been turning the question over ever since their walk through the aquarium. A crowded exhibit hall was the wrong place, and the rest of the afternoon had offered no better opportunity. She wanted to speak to him when there was no one standing nearby to listen, interrupt, or make either of them self-conscious. Finding a chance to be alone was proving more difficult than she had expected.

Across the room, Iris had been watching her.

Audra noticed the attention. She simply had no idea what Iris wanted, and her own thoughts were rather more distracting.

"Audra, you like Cyrus, don't you?" Iris asked.

The question caught her badly off guard. Audra had expected a remark about the day's trip or the plans for tomorrow, not a direct statement of the thing she'd been trying to keep to herself. She managed to keep her expression mostly steady, although her pulse gave an uncomfortable jump.

"Am I really that obvious?" she asked.

"I'd say you are, yeah."

Iris nodded, looking entirely unsurprised by the admission. Throughout the day's outing, Audra's attention had kept finding its way back to Cyrus. She had looked for him when the group got separated, followed his movements through the exhibits, and seldom seemed to go long without checking where he was. It hadn't required much effort to put those things together.

Audra couldn't argue with that. She had thought she was being fairly discreet, but apparently her idea of discretion needed work.

Iris moved toward the balcony and looked out at the lights beyond the hotel. "So when are you going to tell him?"

"I'm not sure yet. I think it'll be soon."

Her voice lacked its usual composure, and she knew it. She could control the expression on her face, but not the warmth spreading to her ears. The subject was too personal to discuss casually, especially when Iris had brought it up without warning.

Still, Audra saw no reason to deny it. There was nothing shameful about liking Cyrus, and she wasn't going to pretend otherwise merely because someone had noticed.

She had barely settled on that thought when Iris checked her phone and spoke again.

"Want to go out for a little while?"

"You mean right now?"

"Yeah, right now. Owen and Cyrus will probably be going out too."

Audra hesitated before answering. They'd only just finished a room check, and leaving the hotel was hardly what the teachers had instructed them to do. But Cyrus would be there. She couldn't dismiss that part quite so easily.

Iris watched her think it over, then added, "If you want some time alone with him, Owen and I can make that happen. You won't have to figure out how to get everyone else to leave."

Audra glanced toward the window. A meeting away from the academy, without the familiar classmates and routines surrounding them, might be the opportunity she'd been searching for. Once they returned to St. Alder, it would be easy to fall back into the same pattern of seeing Cyrus in class and putting the conversation off.

Perhaps she ought to take the chance while it was here.

"All right, I'll come," she said. "And thanks for helping me."

Iris opened the door almost immediately. "We shouldn't leave together. Someone might notice us. I'll text you when it's time, okay?"

"That works for me," Audra said.

Iris slipped into the hallway and pulled the door shut behind her. The mild expression she'd worn in front of Audra disappeared. She looked down at her phone when a message from Owen arrived.

Owen had no reason to suspect her. The plan she'd discussed with him had been presented as a way to help Cyrus and Audra spend time together. From his perspective, that was what they were arranging. Nothing about the request had needed to sound suspicious.

Iris headed straight for the bridge separating the two hotels. Once she reached the middle, she took out her phone and logged into Owen's account. She sent Cyrus a message arranging to meet him there, then waited a little before sending Audra the same meeting location.

Back in the hotel room, Audra was finding it surprisingly hard to think.

Her heart was beating faster, but her mind had gone almost completely blank. She'd spent so long imagining how she might tell Cyrus that having an actual opportunity made every carefully considered word desert her. She sat with her phone beside her, unable to settle on a single opening line.

The short sound of an incoming message finally brought her back to herself.

Iris had sent the meeting place. Audra read it, stood, and crossed to the door. Her hand closed around the handle, then stopped.

For a second, thoughts crowded in too quickly to separate. She might see Cyrus alone. She might finally ask him the question she'd been saving. Things between them might be different by the time she returned. She couldn't decide which possibility made her more nervous.

Audra breathed out slowly and opened the door.

She got out of the hotel without difficulty. The night air was cold enough to make her catch her breath when she stepped outside, but it also helped clear her head. She started toward the bridge, keeping her pace steady while she tried to put her thoughts in order.

She was sure Cyrus liked her.

They'd grown comfortable around each other, and their conversations had an ease she didn't share with most people. He'd paid attention to things about her around her birthday, details she hadn't expected him to remember. And there was that artwork he'd kept, a piece that resembled her closely enough to be impossible for her to ignore.

She had noticed those things one at a time. Looking at them together, she couldn't imagine they meant nothing. Surely affection was the most natural explanation.

If she waited, perhaps Cyrus would eventually speak first. She could picture that happening. Yet the thought of continuing to wait, while opportunities passed and the days went on as usual, had become increasingly frustrating.

Maybe he was hesitating because of their different family circumstances. Maybe his missing memories and the ring he always wore made him feel he couldn't start anything new. Audra didn't know which, if either, was true. She only knew those things wouldn't stop her from wanting to be with him.

He didn't need to have everything figured out. If he liked her, they could deal with the rest together.

Another gust crossed the road as Audra approached the bridge. Two figures came into view ahead, standing near the railing.

Cyrus was with Iris.

At first Audra assumed they were waiting for her and Owen. Iris seemed to be keeping Cyrus occupied in conversation. Then Cyrus stepped closer to her and said something Audra couldn't hear over the wind and passing traffic.

The distance between them suddenly bothered her. She felt a brief, unwelcome sting of jealousy before she could talk herself out of it. Neither of them was doing anything inappropriate. They were simply standing close enough to speak, and there was no reason to make more of it.

By the time Audra reached them, the feeling had faded.

Iris stepped aside, leaving the space in front of Cyrus open. As they passed, Audra caught an expression on Iris's face that she couldn't interpret. Her eyes held a tension that hadn't been there in the hotel room, though she still managed a small nod.

Audra returned it with a steady look. She had made her decision, and she wasn't going to retreat because her nerves had returned.

Traffic passed across the bridge now and then, but no driver paid much attention to the two students standing near the railing. Iris continued away, leaving Cyrus and Audra facing each other beneath the open sky.

Cyrus watched her approach with a little more caution than he might have shown earlier in the day. One unexpected meeting on this bridge had already been enough. Now another person had arrived, and Audra looked unusually determined. He had no idea what she intended to say.

Still, she clearly had something on her mind. Interrupting her or demanding an explanation would accomplish nothing, so he stayed where he was and waited.

Moonlight caught the side of Audra's face. She looked composed enough at first glance, but the wind kept lifting the loose strands of hair by her ears, and when she raised a hand to tuck them back, her fingers trembled. She pressed her lips together, trying to gather the courage she'd felt while walking over.

"I wanted to talk to you," she began.

A gust swept across the bridge, and she had to push another strand of hair away before continuing. Her heartbeat was loud enough to distract her, but Cyrus hadn't moved. He was listening.

"Cyrus, would you want to be with me?"

He looked genuinely puzzled. "What do you mean by that?"

Audra took the question seriously. She didn't want him to mistake her meaning, or think she was asking for the same friendship they already had.

"I know there are parts of your past you can't remember," she said. "You still wear that ring, and I know it's connected to something important to you. Even when you can't clearly remember the person from back then, you haven't wanted to let that memory go."

Cyrus stared at her, surprised by the direction the conversation had taken.

Audra held his attention and continued, her voice gentler now.

"But memories can't love you back the way I can. We could make new memories together, things that belong to us, right here and now. Memories we wouldn't have to lose."

She let herself say the part she'd been carrying all day.

"I like you, Cyrus. I want to be with you. Would you be willing to give us a chance?"

He hadn't expected a confession. The surprise was clear on his face, and Audra watched him with an openness she rarely allowed herself. She'd said everything she came to say. Whatever happened next depended on his answer.

The wait stretched unbearably. Her heart was beating so hard that it seemed to drown out the traffic, and she watched his mouth, afraid she might miss even the beginning of his reply. When his lips finally started to part, she held her breath.