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The words die in my throat. I stare up at Javier, who is smiling down at me.

“This is not the first time I have heard you sing, Aleks.” His voice is soft.

“What?” My body goes still, even as the gentle push and pull of the water caresses my scaled tail. He can’t mean that. It must be a mistake.

“Years ago, I was going for a run beyond the colony. It was during the dinner hour, so I assumed it was safe. I heard you, in a cenote, and I barely managed to stop from running to you by holding onto vines and roots.” A shadow crosses his dark eyes. “You were a child, Aleks. A child. And I believed I had killed you.”

There’s a quiet buzzing in the back of my head. I wet my lips as I try to piece his words together. “But I didn’t die.”

“No, sireno. You did not die.”

All this time, I’ve told myself a story about why my favorite coach walked away from our team and from the colony. In the story, I’m somehow at fault, for not working hard enough or not giving enough of myself to the sport.

In the end, I was right. He did leave because of me, but not for any of the reasons I could have imagined.

Above me, Javier looks at me with the same kindness he’s always shown, but now the softness is touched with devotion and wanting.

“You’re,” I begin, terrified to say the words out loud.

“Your mate, if you will have me.”

Everything stills. Time oozes and my heartbeat slows to a thump, thump, thump in the back of my throat. Everything is blue and green and the shadow of stones and dusk light and Javier, and I don’t think anything has ever been so beautiful.

Mate. Mate. Mate.

“Mate?” My voice shakes.

He nods, and his eyes are wet, tears making new, salty tracks down his wet cheeks. “Mate,” he replies.

The sob in my chest builds until I can’t contain it, and I make a choked, wounded sound. Javier’s face creases with concern, and I see it all there, I feel his fear, and his worry, the careful way he is holding himself back until he knows, until he knows I want him, that I want this as much as he does.

“This is why,” I manage to form the words. “You left because—oh, gods, I was a kid, and you, Javier, you must have been so pissed—”

“I did not know back then.” There’s an urgency in his eyes, like he’s pleading with me to understand. “I thought you died. I thought I had killed you, Aleks. I thought you were dead, and I left. I was a coward, but I did not want to see someone die so young.”

“I’ve been such an asshole to you.” I reach for him, webbed fingers brushing over his beard.

His chuckle is wet. “You did not know, sireno.”

“When did you find out?”

Turning into my touch, he kisses my fingertips. “Only a few weeks ago. The articles. As soon as I knew I had to see you. And I know I should have told you sooner, but I did not know how.”

Things start to click into place. Javier on my doorstep, Javier standing beside me, Javier at the party with possessive hunger and rage in his eyes as he watched me with the polar bear shifter. They way my heartbeat slowed when I was near him.

Fate was supposed to be a distant, faraway thing, sometimes striking without pattern or reason. It upended conscious choices and interfered. For so long I’ve seen the force of fate as a swift current to be fought against. I fought for my freedom. I fought for my body. I fought for my name and for my return to artistic swimming.

But now the Fates have changed their tune, handing me something—someone—I already want. Someone who I trust, and who sees me and treasures the pieces of myself I’ve shown to him.

After all the shit life has thrown at me, could I be so lucky?

Chapter 15

Mine, as I am Yours

Javier

I watch Aleks’ face. I do not want to miss a single thing.