“Much better,” Gemma admitted.

“It’s the ocean that does it, you know,” Thea told her. “Something about the transformation heals all your aches and pains.”

“Yeah, I figured that.”

“If you swim every day, you buy yourself some time,” Thea said. “It’ll help keep your body from completely falling apart. But eventually you will have to eat.” She paused, running a hand through her hair. “But if you want to put that off, then I’d suggest you swim as often as you can.”

“Thanks,” Gemma said, genuinely surprised that Thea had offered her any tips.

Thea didn’t say anything to that. She stayed outside a moment longer, then turned and went back into the house.

Gemma knew she should take Thea’s advice, but she didn’t want to just yet. She felt content. Or at least as close to content as she’d felt since coming here. She’d been in so much pain lately that just the absence of pain felt amazing.

She was about to get up and go down to swim when Sawyer wandered out to the balcony. He’d gone shirtless today, opting to walk around in drawstring pants. Not that Gemma minded all that much. Her heart might belong to Alex, but she wasn’t blind.

“Do you care if I join you?” Sawyer asked.

Gemma shrugged. “It’s your house. You can do what you want.”

“Is it my house?” Sawyer sounded perplexed as he sat down next to Gemma, dangling his own legs over the edge of the balcony.

“Yeah, it’s your house.” Gemma gave him an odd look. “At least that’s what you told me the other day.”

“Right, right.” He shook his head as if to clear it. “Of course. It’s my house.” He leaned against the railing, resting his chin on his arms. “It’s just that lately it feels more like Penn’s house.”

“Yeah, I can understand that,” she said. He sighed, and she turned to face him. “Do you even like her?”

“Penn?” Sawyer asked, then nodded quickly. “Yes. Of course I like her. I’m crazy about her. I don’t think I can live without her.”

“Why?” Gemma asked him directly.

“Because…” He furrowed his brow, seemingly finding it difficult to think of a single reason why. “I feel so restless when she’s not around, like I can’t get comfortable.”

Gemma knew that Sawyer didn’t really care about Penn, at least not to the degree that he acted. But she thought he’d at least cite Penn’s beauty or her voice as a reason for being so devoted to her.

She wondered what his absence of reasons meant. Maybe Sawyer didn’t like Penn at all. If Penn took away the siren song, he might even detest her. But Gemma would probably never know how he really felt about Penn.

“I know I love her,” Sawyer said finally. “But when I try to think of why, it’s all a blur. All I can hear is her song.”

“If you try to think, her song drowns it out?” Gemma asked.

“Yeah, kind of.” He nodded. “Sometimes it’s Lexi’s, too, but mostly it’s Penn’s. She sings to me a lot. I don’t think she likes when Lexi does.”

“Why do you say that?” Gemma asked.

“She always tells me not to listen to Lexi’s song,” he said. “And that’s really hard to do, because her song is the most beautiful I’ve ever heard.”

“Yeah, I can agree with that.”

Lexi’s song didn’t have the same power on Gemma that it once had. She still felt compelled to sing along with her, but she had no urge to do her or any of the sirens’ bidding. Still, Lexi had the loveliest singing voice Gemma had ever heard.

“Do you think…” Sawyer’s face scrunched up, as if he were in pain. “Does Penn love me?”

Gemma was shocked that he’d even asked her that question, and she didn’t know how to answer. She briefly considered lying to him, telling him the kinds of things she thought he’d want to hear, but she didn’t see the point.

“What has she told you?” Gemma asked, carefully avoiding answering directly.

“When I tell her I love her, she usually just laughs,” Sawyer said. “She doesn’t really say how she feels about me. She just yells at me a lot and tells me I’m an idiot.”

“No, Penn doesn’t love you,” Gemma told him. “She’s just using you. I don’t know if she even likes you.”

She turned toward him to watch his reaction. His blue eyes stayed locked on the view of the ocean, and he looked hurt but not surprised.

“Yeah. That’s what I thought.” When he spoke again, he sounded disappointed, but more with himself than with Penn’s lack of affection.

“She put a spell on you,” Gemma said, trying to ease his sadness. “She’s a siren, and she’s used her songs to trick you into thinking you feel a certain way about her. But you don’t.”

“No,” Sawyer said quickly. “No, that’s not true. I really love her. It’s not some spell.”

“Well, you can think what you want, but it is a spell.” She turned back to the water.

“You really think Penn’s a siren?” Sawyer asked.

“Yep.”

“Lexi and Thea, too?”

“Yep.”

He thought about it, then asked, “What’s a siren?”

“A siren is sorta like a mermaid, but they can enchant people with their voices, usually men,” Gemma said.