By the time she made it to the opening of the cove, her pulse hammered so loudly in her ears that she could hardly make out the sounds of those crashing waves anymore.
She skidded to a halt beneath the heavy beam that supported the threshold of the cove’s entrance. Her mind, still reeling from the changes wrought by the bond, couldn’t seem to fix on the mind she knew was close. Emory’s swirling thoughts protected her, but she wasn’t used to navigating them yet, particularly when under stress. The more she tried to focus, the harder it became — like trying to swim against a current.
Even the snatches of thoughts shecouldget were useless. The bond might have made it easier for her to detect minds under water, but it hadn’t given her the ability to understand the language merfolk used.
Clementine’s gaze swept over the wide rock shelf that acted as the cove’s dock. The sun had long since set, leaving her to see by nothing but the dull orange glow of the single lightbulb fastened to the beam over her head. The puddle of light it cast extended only a few feet. The rest of the cove’s entrance was illuminated by the silver glow of the moon, but even that struggled to make it to the water in front of her.
It glinted off of the bulbous body of her submersible and the lapping waves that surged over the lip of the rock shelf, but that was it. Everything beyond her was swathed in shadow.
There was only one foreign mind in the cove itself. The others — two? three? — were trailing behind.
Knowing there was someone in the water she couldn’t see sent a shiver of dread down her spine. It was something she’d never felt when Emory watched her. She knew he was a predator, but there had never, not once, been an inkling that she was truly in danger.
She’d been so determined to make a friend, to be a little reckless, that she hadn’t thought twice about pursuing him as pursued her.
Clementine tried to summon that same reckless bravery, but she couldn’t. Before, she didn’t have anything to lose. She could protect herself just fine, and if he didn’t want to be her friend, it wasn’t the worst thing. She would have had other opportunities. Probably.
But now she hadeverythingto lose. Even though she was confident that she could get the pod to leave them alone, it didn’t stop her gorge from rising at the thought of something,anythinghappening to Emory.
Nothing is going to happen to him,she promised herself. Her nails dug into the rough wood of a beam as she took one halting step onto the rock shelf.We didn’t wait this long to find one another only to have some assholes ruin everything.
She wouldn’t let them. She would be brave, be firm, and tell them to get off their fucking property.
Squaring her shoulders, Clementine called out, “Hello? I know you’re there.”
Her voice echoed against the cavernous walls of the cove’s entrance. She was pleased it didn’t sound nearly as shaken as she felt.
Unfortunately, there was no answer.
Dark waves rippled in the shadows, making it impossible for her to guess what was water and what might be a black fin cutting through the surf. Gritting her teeth, she imagined moving with the current of Emory’s mind rather than against it as she attempted to pinpoint the general direction of the intruder.
To her relief, that seemed to do the trick. Her magic glided through the current easily when she wasn’t trying to force it out of the way.
In an instant, she locked onto the intruder’s position. Clementine stepped to one side so that the water was to her right and the heavy chain bolted to the wall was to her left. Her eyes trained on the submersible docked at the far end of the rock shelf.
A hand was the first thing she saw. Any hope that their visitors might not be part of the pod vanished when she saw the familiar coloration and curved claws skimming over the side of the submersible.
The hand was quickly followed by an arm, corded with lean muscle, and then a face. It peered around the side of the vehicle, the white mask effect of his facial markings appearing almost ghoulish in the darkness.
The merman’s features were narrow, his brows heavy, and his lips curled in a smile that showed off all his sharp teeth.
It took all the steel in her spine to hold her in place as he pulled himself around the submersible, that smile only growing wider the longer he looked at her. His hair was shorter than Emory’s and hung in a loose, scraggly braid over his shoulder. His build was much leaner than her mate’s, though she guessed he made up for that in the length of his tail.
He appeared gaunt, with hardly any of the dense padding Emory boasted, but she could see the strength in his wide shoulders when he pulled himself across the wet rock. Even if she’d been inclined to a physical altercation, she doubted she could take him. He might be thin, but there was no doubt he still had at least a hundred pounds on her.
Keeping the entrance to the cove blocked with her body, Clementine oriented herself so he was directly in her eyeline. “I’m sorry, but I’m not accepting any visitors at the moment. You’ll have to go.”
She hardly expected him to heed her warning, but it was awfully annoying when it actually made his smilebigger.“Cute little thing,” he purred. “A bit small, but you’ll do fine.”
Her stomach rolled. The way he looked at her was some perverse mirror image of the desire she saw in Emory’s eyes. Rather than making her feel like somethingmore,something gorgeous and sensual and confident, the look in the stranger’s eyes made her feel like less. Less respected. Less confident. Less human.
He judged her like he was picking out a cow at an auction. The selection wasn’t great, but he’d work with the best of the lot.
Fuck that.
Clementine hadn’t exactly been polite, but any small shred of civility that might have lingered vanished in an instant.
Not even pretending that she didn’t know exactly what he meant, she flatly replied, “I’m taken. Now leave.”
