A severed claw thudded onto the blanket next to her. The carcass surfaced in front of Pike.
Uneaten.
Marlowe’s mouth slowly soured. “So…no lobster.”
Pike’s lips curled back in a thin, mocking snarl. Bulrushes parted in front of her and knobby, webbed fingers sank into the mudbank. Red-edged fins sprang up, cutting a jagged line down the corded muscle of her back.
Even in the cool night breeze, sweat beaded underneath Marlowe’s sweater.
Sludge spattered her face as Pike lunged.
Marlowe swore and swept her knife up to her chest, pivoting to the side as the sodden blanket caught around her legs. Flesh met flesh instead of steel, and long fingers wrapped around her wrist, digging in. Her knife sliced through mud and disappeared as Pike dragged her back,woolen blanket pricking at her, skin slick with lake water, spines and claws digging in.
Marlowe was done negotiating with the damn thing.
Clawing at the creature’s face with her other hand, Marlowe caught skin. Pike snapped at her left hand and needle teeth tore through layers of flesh and muscle. Marlowe hissed and fought for leverage, feet flailing against fish-gut muck, hand dribbling blood across Pike’s chin.
Marlowe bared her gritted teeth, eyes burning, stomach hot, cunt drenched even though,god, she was regretting coming back. “You’re a cunt just like her,” she spat.
Pike released her hand. Leaning in, the full length of her muscled torso stretched over her and the heavy weight of her tail pinned Marlowe’s legs to the bank. Mud crept up Marlowe’s legs and turned her thighs sticky.
Pike cocked her head, gray tendrils tracing her round jaw and feathering out to brush against her lips. Deep, rasping breaths forced from Marlowe’s lungs.Her bitten hand burned.
Her cunt throbbed.
Guttural vibrations hummed in Pike’s chest, pulsing deeper, heavy, louder until Marlowe’s body shook, heart stuttering. Pike’s tendrils laved along her jaw, trailing pondweed in a thick line across her throat. Seeking, they probed her bitten lips.
Marlowe yanked against her grip, teeth gritted. The muck sucked her in, as hungry as the creature holding her there, unblinking, tendrils prying at the side of her mouth.
Her limbs ached. Deadened. Her mark pulsed with heavy, slow warmth.
The heady rush ofneedfrom earlier had faded, and Marlowe was very aware when she finally let a tendril snake deep past her parted lips. She swallowed once, her throat working against the slick, fleshy strand.
Pike hummed, lowering her head and nudging against her cheek, tendrils delicately tracing her face.
Should’ve thrown the damn lobster and ran.
But pain melted into warmth, and her arms were so heavy, and each slide of Pike’s sinuous tail sent another jolt through Marlowe’s buzzing nerves.
She moved to pull against Pike’s grip again, wanting to touch her.
Nothing.
Cold pitted Marlowe’s stomach.
Focusing, shoving away the relaxed, cottony feeling weighing her down, she slightly bent the fingers of her right hand. Her unbitten, marked hand. Her left hand still welled with blood.
Marlowe strained her neck, willing herself to look, to move, to do anything but lie there frozen. The exertion forced a panicked hiss of air through her tight lungs.
She’d felt this aching, immovable pressure once before, in the boat when Pike’s teeth dragged a line across her lip. It had hardly been a scratch. Pike had left a ragged wound in her left hand this time.
Marlowe whimpered, her mouth heavy like rocks were wedged inside her jaw.
Pike cocked her head.
Marlowe viciously berated herself for thinking stolen lobster was sufficient, for even considering the fact that if Pike got her hands on her again, she might not let her go this time.
She steadied her breathing. Her throat still worked as she swallowed thickly. If she was lucky,if, by some good will the universe stored for her, Pike’s venom didn’t leave her gasping for air, she might have a chance.
