I go back to my room and sit on the bed and wait for a knock on the door.
When her knuckles rasp against the door, it’s with a heavy sigh I answer and fling the door back. She immediately looks around the small space and arches a dark brow at me.
“It was the only room available on such late notice,” I say.
“And why exactly did you buy a ticket?” she says, going over to the desk, running a fingertip over my closed laptop.
“So I could take you back home, where you’re safe,” I reply, and she taps the top of my laptop three times.
“Elliot…I don’t have time for this.” She spins around in the small space and wraps her arms around herself. She doesn’t look at me, instead at the floor. “I had issues dating back home because I thought no one wanted me for me, but the more I thought about it, the more I realize I wouldn’t entertain any of those packs because they weren’t you. I came on this cruise to find a pack and I found men who like me—really fucking like me—and I like them back. I can’t be here and do what I came here to do if you stay.”
She clears her throat, finally looking up at me. “That is, if you’re actually just here for my ‘safety.’” She uses air quotes for the last part. “I won’t beg you to stay. I won’t ask you to choose me, but what I am going to ask is if you don’t want to be with me, you leave the ship and stop breaking my heart.”
“Claire,” I sigh her name as her eyes well up with tears. “I never want to hurt you. Not ever.”
“You being here hurts me, Elliot.”
I rub my hands down my face, feeling like the biggest piece of shit.
“What I feel. How—” Claire doesn’t let me finish my stumbling words.
“Do you feel something for me, Elliot?” I nod and she sighs. “Is it my brothers, my family?”
“No, it’s me. I don’t think I can give you what you need,” I admit, emotion crawling up my throat.
“It’s all in or nothing, Elliot. I’ve finally found what I’m looking for. It’s something I always thought that you would be a part of too,” she says sadly, looking back down at the floor. “Ithought maybe you had come on the ship to admit your feelings for me. If that’s not the case, then I need you to leave. If you care about me in any way, you won’t hurt me by staying and interfering with what I have with Wells and Forest.”
“I don’t?—”
She waves a hand at me, not wanting to hear my excuses, I guess.
“If you decide to stay, then that means you’re all in. No more of this will-they-won’t-they nonsense. If you stay, to me, that means you want to be a part of this, that you choose me.”
“It’s not as simple as choosing you. I’d choose you every time.”
Her breath hitches, her scent drawing me into a haze.
Cinnamon apple cake, my favorite dessert.
“Then choose me. Fuck, I just said that I wouldn’t ask you to do that. You don’t have to give me an answer right now, but the ball is in your court,” she says, heading toward the door to my room, her hand ready to shift the handle. “I don’t know if it matters, but if I could choose I’d choose you every time too, but I also choose them.”
With those parting words she leaves the room and I’ve never felt more lost in my life.
Chapter 19
Claire
My nerves areon fire as I leave Elliot’s room, and I’m doing my best to hold it together.
This is finally it. He’s either going to be a part of my pack, or he’s going to just be my brother’s oldest friend. There can’t be any more in between. My heart can’t take it anymore. It’s even more painful knowing that I’m not completely alone in this feeling, but that Elliot can’t or won’t take the next step.
Either way, I can’t hold on to these feelings for him forever, not if he’s not willing to take the risk on me.
It wouldn’t be fair to me, or Forrest and Wells.
I’m not sure if I’ll get any closure with Elliot. He said he would choose me every time, but he isn’t and it causes an immense wealth of hurt in my chest.
His scent of whiskey and vanilla clings to my skin, and it has me feeling slightly homesick and doesn’t help me come to terms with the fact he’s likely getting off this ship the next chance he gets.