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Luke barely registered the sound of his own name. He was woken more by the feel of someone gently shaking his shoulder than any noise.

His eyes didn’t want to open. Luke had barely slept the night before, tossing and turning over and over, although he couldn’t remember why at the moment.

Or maybe he had slept. Was it morning?

Luke frowned with his eyes still shut tight. His head was resting on soft fabric, but his pillow was way too firm. Hard, really. Luke pressed his face into it, burrowing in deeper to try to get some sort of give while he mumbled his protest at being woken.

But no, it was still much too hard. Rock solid. The fingers in his hair were nice though.

Wait.

Whose fucking fingers?

Luke twisted onto his back as his eyes flew open. A deep, dark blue gaze was staring down at him in amusement.

The merman. The merman was petting Luke’s hair.

“Colby is stirring.” Syrus held Colby’s baby monitor up to Luke’s face. Sure enough, Colby was babbling incoherently to himself, although he was still lying down and wasn’t calling for Luke yet.

Luke licked dry lips. “Sometimes he does that in the middle of his nap,” he said with a voice still husky from sleep. “He might conk back out.”

The answer came out automatically. Meanwhile, Luke’s brain had finally registered that the rock-hard pillow he was still resting on was actually Syrus’s silk-clad upper thigh. Which meant when Luke had been burrowing his face into his “pillow,” he’d been brushing against…

Luke bolted upright into a seated position. He tried to cover his embarrassment by rubbing his hands roughly over his face. “Um. I can’t believe I fell asleep.”

He really couldn’t. One second he’d been listening to Syrus’s pretty, soothing humming, and the next second he’d been out. No wonder everyone sang lullabies to babies, if that was how damn effective it could be.

“You needed rest.” Syrus had lowered the baby monitor to his lap and was watching Luke closely, as he always seemed to be. Watching closely and apparently petting Luke in his sleep.

Like he’d read Luke’s mind, Syrus’s gaze trailed over Luke’s hairline. “I’m glad you didn’t trim the hair on your head. The length is charming.”

Luke gawked at him. Here Luke had fallen asleep next to the carnivorous merman who kept requesting his blood, and now he was getting compliments on his lack of grooming. He rubbed at his face again, trying to wake his brain up.

He just didn’t understand how he kept letting his guard down like this. The best he could guess was that it was something about Syrus’s manner, the way he acted like Luke was a delightful novelty he enjoyed. It was almost impossible to find it threatening, despite Syrus’s size and occasional sharp teeth.

And it has nothing to do with the way he looks?

Luke’s cheeks heated at the unwelcome thought. There was obviously that too. Luke should never have given Syrus the robe. The midnight-blue silk matched his eyes too well, and the fabric barely reached mid-thigh, which left him looking inherently indecent. And the way Syrus was sitting with an elbow propped on the couch arm, gazing warmly at Luke with his blond waves trailing over broad shoulders, didn’t help one bit.

Basically, Luke’s brain was consistently short-circuiting at the sight of him.

Fish tail, Luke reminded himself. Fish. Tail.

But it wasn’t like Syrus had looked any less handsome as a merman, was the problem. More alarming, sure, but still beautiful. Alarmingly beautiful, one could even say, if one was a little sleep-deprived and apparently slowly losing one’s goddamn mind.

Syrus grinned sharply at Luke’s perusal. “Do you find my hair charming, Luke?” he crooned. “Like your little Colby does?”

Luke decided to pretend he couldn’t hear the question. Colby was still babbling away to himself. Maybe he was up for good, but Luke would still wait until he started calling out. It was his cardinal rule not to interfere with a calm, peaceful toddler unless absolutely necessary, and Luke’s frozen embarrassment probably didn’t count as any sort of emergency.

Syrus seemed to accept that Luke wasn’t going to answer his question, but that didn’t stop him from asking another. “Human males can’t bear spawn.”

Luke blinked at him. That was more of a statement, really, but Syrus seemed to be waiting for a response. “Um, in general, no.”

“Who birthed Colby? Where is she?”

It was strange. Luke got asked that question all the time, usually in various tones of pity or indignation. (“Where’s the mom?”) It never failed to raise his hackles and put him in defensive mode. But Syrus didn’t sound pitying or indignant. He only sounded curious.

And maybe it was the fuzziness of having just woken, but Luke skipped his usual vague mumbling and answered him fully. “Her name’s Gina. We went to high school together.” Luke leaned back against the couch with a sigh. “We were friends, never dated or anything. She moved away, but she used to visit now and again. We had a one-night stand a few years ago. Just to…see, I guess. She got pregnant.”