“River,” she blurted. “My mother liked the water.”
And that was the only thing she knew about her mother. Not that he had to know any time soon about her family crisis and sensitive mommy complex.
He stared at her, tensing his strong arms to keep himself afloat. His hair just touched the waves cresting over his shoulders. He was... beautiful. She hadn’t ever thought of a man like that before.
“Archer,” he replied quietly, as if the very sound was a gift.
The name felt like a gift. Strangely, because she’d never thought of a name as something special. It was just a preferred word to call someone. But knowing his name now felt like he’d given her a clam with the most precious of pearls within it.
River reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “I know you broke into my house and all, but would you like to come inside?”
Stupid. She shouldn’t be asking strange men to come inside her home. The sudden bubble of excitement in her chest had nothing to do with him and everything to do with adrenaline. He was probably a serial killer and she was playing right into his charming ploy.
He’d tried to save her life, though. At least, that’s what he claimed. He must be a decent enough person. Right?
He eyed her with a curious expression before nodding. “Yeah. I can come inside for a bit.”
“Good,” she whispered.
Had she lost her mind?
4
Archer pulled himself out of the pool as she scurried back toward the wall of windows leading into the house. A towel, she had shouted over her shoulder before disappearing.
Strange creature. She had no idea just how interesting she was.
When he first touched her, he thought maybe she was a changeling. They frequently didn’t know they were faeries, and there was power inside her. Somewhere deep in the depths of her mind.
But the more she talked, the way she swam... she wasn’t a changeling. This wasn’t a full-blooded faerie by any means.
Maybe she was the descendant of a fae who had left his court a long time ago. Just the barest drop of faerie blood in her to tempt him and create all the questions bubbling just beneath the surface of his mind.
She smelled like sea spray and the sweet scent of seagrass. Her hair was a lovely shade of chocolate, streaked by the sun and touching the tops of her hips. Natural hair. Not full of dyes like the humans so loved to put in their locks.
And her innocence... she wore it like a second skin. Her white undergarments had been entirely transparent, but not once did she seem to notice. She wasn’t trying to seduce him. He could see that in the soft curve of her shoulders and the shy glint in her eyes.
He reached down, adjusted his shorts, and shook his head. Somehow, her innocence was even more captivating than the most seductive of temptresses. One look from her wide, confused eyes and he’d been hard as a rock.
How unfair, considering he didn’t seem to affect her at all.
Was she expecting him to follow her? She didn’t poke her head out of the lovely glass building, and she had invited him in. So he supposed the odd creature just wanted him to... waltz into her house as if he owned the place?
The woman had no sense of self preservation. Not in the slightest.
Sighing, he shook his head and made his way toward the house. If she thought he would keep his hands to himself just because she was innocent, then she had another thing coming. Archer had never been “good” in his entire life. He was the trickster. The fun one. The boy who played in the sea and convinced women to take their tops off because why not?
He liked to look at them. They liked it when he looked at them. It seemed like a win-win situation.
This girl wasn’t the “take your top off” kind of woman. Girl. Teenager? He couldn’t tell. She was a wisp of a human being, but with the lithe grace and thin wrists of a faerie.
She was just strange and odd and unusual. Archer didn’t have other words for her when he didn’t know what she actually was.
Changeling? No. Faerie? Also no.
She was an enigma. Someone he couldn’t pin down and that was thrilling.
He padded across the deck to the house where she’d left a single glass door open. For him, he assumed. And if it wasn’t, then he was still going inside.
A large contemporary kitchen spread out in front of him. Metal stools stood before the island and it was all so pristine and white. Almost unlived in, if he was being honest. Faeries were messy creatures. They enjoyed seeing homes with things everywhere. Pictures, plants, bobbins and baubles that explained who called the inhabitance theirs.
This place was just cold. Not quite clinical, although he’d seen in the inside of human hospitals before and they were just as dreary. More like a showroom. Like they were trying to sell the place.
Faerie Realms, he hoped they weren’t trying to sell. Not when he’d just found the most interesting human he’d ever met. He wanted to peel open her head and see what else she would say if he poked and prodded.
And maybe she’d take her top off if he got her down to the ocean. One could hope.
The amusing woman darted around the room. First to the fridge, then to the cabinets, back to the fridge, all the while muttering to herself.
Archer wasn’t sure if he was supposed to offer to help or just stay out of her way.
Stay out of the way, he decided when she almost dropped a cup.
She glanced up. Those deep blue eyes, like chips of sapphire, widened at the sight of him. “Oh, you came inside.”
He hesitated before asking, “Was I not supposed to?”
“No, that’s fine. I invited you in.” But she was frozen like prey entranced by an angler fish’s light. Staring at him with her mouth slightly open and her fingers loosening on the cup in her hand once again.
Archer leaned forward and took the cup away from her before she broke it. She seemed the type to step in shards of glass, and he couldn’t suffer seeing her bleed.
“Oh,” she whispered, looking down at the cup he set on the table. “Why are you doing that?”
“You’re going to break the cup.”
“I haven’t broken a cup since I was very little.” A spark glittered in her eyes. Something angry but dulled, dimmed by living with humans her entire life. “I’m not a child.”
He knew the tone of her voice. This was a woman frustrated she was stuck in the role of a child. All he had to do was release her from the bonds of her family and voila. She would be a force to be reckoned with.
He’d seen it before.
Hell, he’d done it before. The last one was back in the Regency era with all those stuffy clothes and pinned up hair. But still, he could replicate the same thing with this young woman who was just on the cusp of being an adult.
Oh, what a fun game she would be. What a distraction she would provide from all the horrible things happening to the ocean he couldn’t stop.
Archer gave her some space to breathe. He leaned against the island, his hands behind his back so he knew his muscles were flexed. “I can see you aren’t a child, River.”
She shivered. Just the smallest movement, but one he could track so easily with his eyes. She liked him saying her name.
Another faerie trait. One he should have caught back in the pool, but he’d been so distracted by her beauty.
Then he saw them. Just the slightest movement as she reached for the cup. Her fingers parted enough for the sun to catch on the most marvelous of additions to her oddities.
Webbed fingers.
Rays of light danced upon them, glimmering in an iridescent glow that made her look even more otherworldly and stunning. The webs were as delicate as a jellyfish, and the light reflected off them like the inside of an abalone shell.
They were beautiful. And he had to touch them.
Archer reached for her hands. He could feel his eyes widening in shock and his hair standing on end, not in disgust but in pure faerie lust. She was stunning. Glorious. A human w
ho shouldn’t have existed in this realm and yet, here she was.
River jerked away from him just before he could catch her hands in his. She tucked them behind her back and took an enormous step away from him.
“I’m sorry,” she said, swallowing hard. “I know they make people uncomfortable.”
“Uncomfortable?” His heart twisted in his chest.
Who had made this beautiful creature believe she was anything but stunning? He could feel the hurt radiating off her.
River curled into herself. Her shoulders scooped forward in defeat. She hung her head, hiding behind the curtain of hair that covered her lovely eyes from his gaze. And worse, so much worse, she tucked her hands far away from him.
She didn’t want him to see the real her. She didn’t want anyone to see her differences, because someone had told her she wasn’t pretty. That she wasn’t perfect and wondrous with the most glorious hands he’d ever seen on a human before.
How dare they?
Anger bubbled in his chest, threatening to spill over into something horrid. He wanted to make the humans regret ever making her feel unworthy.
The ugliness inside him had been a struggle for as long as he could remember. It was a dangerous creature that whispered in his ear tsunamis were necessary and typhoons that ate ships were only helping in the long run.
But he couldn’t listen to that voice. Not when this woman stood before him and needed him.
Only him.
Archer released the tiniest bit of faerie magic. The faucet in the kitchen turned on, just enough to release a stream of his power to trickle into the sink. She didn’t look and thank the heavens she didn’t.
The water would be salted, he knew that from experience. But most water didn’t glow with unnatural turquoise light.
He took a step closer until he could feel her breath fanning across his chest. She was so small. Too small, really.
Archer reached around her back, closing his hands on her wrists. Not pulling them forward, she’d have to do that on her own, but holding onto her so she knew he was in control. Her breasts arched, pressing against his chest in the most delightful of ways.
He could feel her heartbeat thundering against his. “They don’t make me uncomfortable, River. The glimpse I got was beautiful. You are stunning, you know that? Perhaps you don’t. But I will remind you every time I see you if you need me to.”
Her lips parted in a breathless gasp. “I don’t know what to say.”
“You don’t have to say anything.” He leaned closer until his lips were just a hair’s breadth from hers. “Will you show me your hands? Please?”
He didn’t want to force her. She needed to know she could show someone who she was, and they wouldn’t run away from her screaming. He also very much wanted to kiss her. To feel the plush softness of her lips and her gasp against his tongue.
That too would have to be her own doing. Someday, and soon he hoped, she’d kiss him because she wanted to. Not because she was captivated by the strange man who’d come out of the sea.
For a second, he thought she might turn away from him. Or at least tell him no. He had her trapped well and good against the counter.
But then she rotated her wrists in his grip. “Okay,” she said. “If you want to see them, I guess you can have a look.”
She guessed. What a glowing recommendation from the woman who was host to magnificent hands.
Archer released her wrists from his grip and let her step away from him. She held out her hands with her fingers clamped together.
He waited. His breathing ragged, his eyes locked on her hands, as if they held the mystery to who she was. What she was.
River opened her fingers with the speed of a snail moving across the sea floor. Every centimeter revealed more of her marvelous hands. He’d been right, the membranes were delicate and ever so lovely.
The smallest glimpse he’d had would never be enough for him. He wanted to stare at these long fingers for hours.
They were faerie hands. Such delicate, long fingers. Thin and capable of playing any instrument on the planet. Her nails were cropped short, the half moons white as snow against her pearl pink tips.
Then there were the webs. The webs as delicate as any fish fin flowing through the sea. The webbings were thin and yet would propel her through the water with unnatural speed.
He was captivated. Ensorcelled by her. His heart beat only for the strange woman with webbed fingers who lived by the sea.
The romance of it was almost too much for him to bear. He was but one man, and his only true love had ever been the ocean. But he was willing to try for this strange creature sent by fate.
“May I?” he asked, reaching for her hands and trying to ignore that his own were shaking.
“If you must.” Her voice shook, but he didn’t think it was with fear this time. Instead, she seemed to be holding her breath along with him.
If this was the connection she needed, then he’d be all too happy to give it to her. Archer stroked his fingertips first up her wrists, to her palms. He felt the soft skin, not impeded by calluses or hard work that destroyed so many human hands.
Then, when he couldn’t handle the suspense any longer, he touched the webs between her fingers.
Velvet soft and thicker than he expected, the webs were clearly meant for swimming. He’d only seen them on a few faeries, although they also had a lot more physical differences than this woman. Which made little sense. These were faerie features.
Why did she have them?
He looked up and grinned into her startled expression. “They’re lovely, River. Why would you ever hide these?”
“Because they’re weird,” she muttered.
“They’re different from other humans, I suppose. But that doesn’t make them any less beautiful.”
She narrowed her eyes and furrowed her brow. “Other humans?”
He’d said too much. In his complete obsession, he’d forgotten she wasn’t a faerie like him. She wasn’t even a changeling who didn’t know where she’d come from. He would have known.
Archer dropped her hands and cleared his throat. “A figure of speech.”
“Was it?” The peculiar expression on her face shifted into something that looked a lot more like curiosity. Something he didn’t know how to deal with.
“I-” He opened his mouth to tell her who he was, only to hear the front door open.
She didn’t live here alone then. Interesting. He wondered who she kept within these glass walls. A lover? A husband? He didn’t know what he’d do if he found out she was attached.
Probably drag the man deep beneath the waves and hold her while she mourned. The loss of a single human to keep himself entertained wasn’t that big a price to pay. There were so many of them.
River’s face turned white. “You have to go.”
“Why? Who’s here?” He leaned around her, hoping to glimpse the person she hid from his gaze.
She planted her hands on his chest and shoved with surprising strength. Or maybe it was just the feeling of her webbed fingers on his skin that made him stumble. “It’s my father, and he cannot know you’re here.”
Ah, she was afraid of her father’s opinion. He supposed that made sense. A shirtless, unknown man standing in his kitchen would make any man angry. Especially with a daughter as beautiful and otherworldly as the creature Archer had found.
He allowed her to shove him back to the door, but then caught himself on the door jamb. “Wait.”
“You have to go now,” she hissed.
“Can I see you again?” Archer blurted, hoping the father might hear him. Just to cause what mischief he could.
She blinked up at him, eyes wide and deep as the ocean abyss. “I guess so?” It was a question out of her mouth, not a definite.
Archer needed a definite. He swooped down and pressed a kiss against her velvet soft cheek. “I will find you again soon, River. The greatest storm couldn’t keep me away now that I’ve found you.”
He left her standing in the doorway with her mouth wide open and her eyes glazed. Good. She should feel as though he’d left a hole in her life.
Archer wasn’t certain why he was so captivated by this creature, or why he wanted to return the moment he stepped foot on the stairs leading down into the ocean.
But he fully intended to return. Soon.
5
She had just shoved the strange man out of her house before her father strode into the kitchen. He didn’t even look outside. If he had, he would have seen Archer’s retreating back.
“Sorry honey, change of plans!” her father shouted as he dropped everything on the kitchen island and then raced toward his bedroom. “We need to go shopping!”
River wasn’t breathing right. Her lungs sucked in air too fast, and her thoughts raced through her head at a speed that was frightening.
She’d let a strange man into their house. A man she had never met, who she knew nothing about other than his name and didn’t know if he had been there to steal from them or... worse.
Then she’d let that same man touch her. Willingly. She’d let his breath fan over her lips and she’d wanted to kiss him.
Kiss him.
She’d never wanted to kiss anyone in her life. Of course she’d done it. Everyone in high school had been kissing each other and experimenting with their bodies. She hadn’t wanted to miss out even though it made little sense and didn’t seem appealing to her in the slightest.
Pressing her lips against a boy’s, who smelled awful and had wandering hands, only made her feel ill. Why would she want to entertain them?
But this one... This one she wanted to kiss. She had loved the feeling of his muscles shifting underneath her hands as she squeezed to move him away. He’d touched her wrists, her hands, and he hadn’t recoiled in horror.
In fact, he’d said they were beautiful. That she was beautiful and somehow those words meant more than just her father saying them.
“River?” Dad called from the back of the house. “You’re coming with me, so get clothes on!”
Clothes? She was wearing clothes.
King of the Sea Page 3