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I let my jaw open a fraction, but her words kept coming.
“Delicious devils, but a pain to catch and reel in. I carved out steak after steak, enough marlin to fill up an entire deep freezer and then the neighbor’s after. I didn’t stop until the only thing left was the very tip of its tail, and thenthat,I stuffed.”
She illustrated her story by pointing to a trophy mounted on the wall beside us, my eyes following the gesture of her hand. The fin spanned nearly half the wall. Pretty impressive for one mermaid to catch.
As she took in a deep breath, her chest puffed in triumph.
My jaw tensed as I weighed the significance of her tale. One wrong move, and she wouldn’t hesitate to dismantle me limb from limb. Then maybe, if I was lucky, my tail would keep the marlin’s company on her wall.
I fought back a chuckle. She expected me to feel threatened, but I couldn’t help my amusement. It would take more than one crazed mermaid to sunder me from my tail.
Mermaids truly were ruthless, but how long had this one been living on land? She looked younger under the glass, her red hair chopped much shorter than it was now.
My eyes trailed down the long waves resting against her shoulders, and I let myself admire how the light deepened some parts and gave others the impression of being made of molten liquid.
I had known a mermaid with hair a similar color once, though time and the pain of loss had muddled my memories. I cast the nagging prickle of remembrance from my mind as I glanced back at the marlin’s tail.
“So you plan on mounting me, eh?” I flashed another grin. “I’m flattered.”
She stifled a snort. Getting to her feet, she returned the glass to the shelf, and my eyes snapped back in time to watch her movement.
“I just wanted you to know what I can do with a knife if it came to it.”
“Mm… Consider it noted.”
Legs looked good on her. Long and shapely, the blue denim fabric of her shorts clung to the ample swell of her hips. I swallowed hard against the sting of sand in my throat. My mouth suddenly felt drier than ever.
Mermaids. There was no doubt they were built to mess with my head. I knew better than to trust their honeyed voices, the tantalizing sway of their curves, or the playful way their hair flared around them with careless abandon. Every bit was fake and calculated, and I was rarely fuck-strated enough to deal with the whaleshit that came after they got what they wanted from me.
I’d let their delicate grace enchant me once—just once. Long ago, but not again. Not ever again.
I forced my eyes to rip away from her thighs long enough to focus down on my bindings. “Well, I’ll be sure to duck out if I see you pull a knife. What is this on top of me, by the way? It’s like I’m being keelhauled.”
“Oh, right.” Her threatening aura all but crumbled as she hurried to seize the end of whatever was crushing my shoulders. Closer to me now than she had ever been before, it was impossible not to notice the way she sucked in her lower lip as she went to work hauling the mass from my chest.
As the layer peeled away, I gasped in a deep breath, my lungs feeling practically weightless in an instant. My chest rose and fell in a steady rhythm while I greedily took in breath after breath.
“It’s a weighted blanket,” she panted, dropping it in a heap beside her. “You were freezing when I found you, so I brought you in and turned the heater on, but your teeth wouldn’t stop chattering, so…”
Her voice trailed. She stood up beside me, but her eyes no longer met mine, and silence drifted about the room.
Taking in one more deep breath, I fought up on my elbows. Thinner coverings fell around me as I folded forward, and heat bombarded my bare chest. I turned toward the source, deciding that the square box next to me must have been the heater she spoke of.
“I see. Thanks, uh—” I hesitated, suddenly wondering if I owed her some sort of life debt. “Shouldn’t I know the name of my captor? I’m Leander.”
Her eyes darted to mine but diverted away in a blink. She didn’t respond.
“I’m not sure, but I don’t think we’ve met before. I never forget a mermaid—”
All the color drained from her face in an instant. Her body jerked, a gasp breaking over my words.
“I-I’m not a mermaid,” she bleated, her words far too forceful to be convincing.
“You… aren’t?” My chin slanted, sending matted pieces of hair tickling my eyelashes. Scanning from her huge, deep-set eyes to the innate pouting of her rosy lips, my eyes narrowed in suspicion. Even her flaming hair had an otherworldly glimmer to it, and I let myself imagine what it might look like fanned out and weightless underneath the waves.
“Wait.” I snapped forward. More coverings fell around me as I scrutinized her features further.
Playful gray eyes that tempted me to them. The soft curves of her heart-shaped face.
