Guess the penis-ogling party is over, girls. Despite glum appearances, Liv knew these women had lucked out. Big time. They’d all go home, see their families, forget about this place—or not—and move on.
Some of the women disappeared to their cabins, while others gathered on the deck to quietly stare at the island, looking confused as hell. Maybe they wondered where they were or why the last week or so felt like a strange dream.
Liv, on the other hand, felt nothing but pain in her chest. She might never see Roen again, and their final words hadn’t been nice ones. She didn’t want it to end like that, but she’d be damned to be talked down to and told “what was best” for her. The final slap was that no one delivered the books Roen mentioned. He didn’t want her help. He didn’t want anything to do with her.
Fine. I’m done begging. I’m done pining for him. And if I go crazy, well, then…that’s that. Of course, it was a fat lie because what came next would be restless nights and days filled with heartache. Being apart from Roen mentally and physically pained her.
Did she believe Roen would find a way to change that? No. Only she could decide when she’d be ready to let go. And that wouldn’t be for a very, very long time. Maybe never. She genuinely loved him.
The ship slowly pulled away from the harbor, and Liv and Dana stood at the railing, gazing out at the island while more and more came into view.
What the hell? Liv could scarcely believe her eyes. These men don’t wear shoes or clothes half the time, yet they have a fancy communication tower? The metal structure was loaded with satellite dishes and stood right next to a giant green water tower. That explains the fantastic water pressure. And on top of all those beautifully modern bungalows peppering the forest, solar panels covered every roof. And that explains all of their electricity.
This place is too damned weird for words.
The boat pulled out of the marina, and Liv turned her back, taking a deep breath and praying she’d be strong enough to get through whatever came next.
One hurdle at a time, Liv, she said in her head, mocking Roen’s deep, cocky tone.
All of a sudden, a woman’s scream filled the air. As Liv turned her head, looking for the source, someone shoved her over the railing into the water.
Oh God. Oh God. There wasn’t enough time to feel the cold water or care about who’d pushed her over. Because when Liv’s head made it to the surface, the scene of horror was worse than anything she could imagine. Hundreds of coalmine black bodies with long tails scaled the sides of the ship, digging their powerful claws right into the steel. From her angle in the water, she couldn’t see what was happening atop, but the bloodcurdling yells were enough.
“Dana!” Liv screamed, and bloody bodies began raining down as mermaids tossed them over.
“Dana!” Liv screamed again. She had no way up to the boat to get Dana. “You fucking bitches! I’ll kill you! You hear me! Don’t you fucking touch her!”
Ohmygod. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. Liv had said those words to herself too many times, and now she knew better. This was happening. It was the island’s doing.
“You can’t have her,” Liv screamed.
“Liv!” Dana’s voice called out from behind her.
Treading water, Liv spun and spotted Dana. A huge, hungry-looking mermaid gripped Dana by a big clump of her long dark hair. It opened its mouth, displaying sharp white teeth, and reached for Dana’s neck.
Liv yelled, “Let her go or I will kill you! Do you hear me? I will hunt you and kill you. I swear it!”
The maid blinked her big yellow eyes at Liv, freezing mid-bite.
“Let her go,” Liv growled protectively.
The maid released its prize and slowly sank into the water, its gaze fixed on Liv the entire way.
Oh shit. Was that thing coming after her now?
Liv didn’t care. As long as Dana got out, that was all that mattered.
“Liv! Liv! Help!” Dana fought to keep her head above water.
Liv swam to Dana and started pulling her toward the pier.
“I saw one of those things coming right at you,” Dana panted. “I pushed you and jumped in, but I hit my arm on the way down. I think I broke it.”
She’d probably hit a damned mermaid. Hope Dana broke its head.
The boom of loud male voices echoed through the air and men started appearing on the dock. However, instead of jumping into the water to help Liv and Dana, they stood there, mouths hanging open, staring at the massacre on the ship.
“Liv!” Roen pushed his way through the men, almost knocking one into the water. The man scrambled back, doing everything in his power not to go in.
“Roen!” She struggled to keep her head above water while towing Dana with one arm hooked underneath her shoulder.
“Liv!” Roen yelled again, a look of pure panic on his face. With the shrill cries of the mermaids and the screams of the women, who were being torn to shreds and tossed into the water, he hadn’t heard her.
“Roen!” Liv yelled again.
This time, she caught his attention, and when he spotted her in the water, he took a small breath. For the second time in her life, Roen looked at her like she was his most precious possession, and it made her insides flutter and roll.
A cry from an injured woman with a deep gash in her neck rang out in the water behind her.
Roen ordered three reluctant men into the water and then dove in head first. Faster than her brain could register, Roen’s men were to the woman and Dana, pulling them to safety. No doubt about it, these guys were powerful swimmers. Roen followed and grabbed her arm, wrapping it around his neck. He swam to the pier, towing her on his back.
The rest of the men, who’d remained on the dock, reached down and lifted her out followed by Roen.
She rushed over to Dana, who sat panting, cradling her arm. The injured woman had been laid out on her back, and one of the men removed the cloth around his waist to apply pressure to the bleeding wound.
“Bring her water,” Roen commanded.
Dana glanced at the woman. “Ohmygod. That’s Cindy.” Dana rushed over and kneeled beside the petite woman, brushing her long blonde wet hair from her forehead. “You’re going to be all right,” Dana said. Meanwhile, the bloodcurdling screams continued a hundred meters away.
“Do something,” Liv yelled at the men.
Roen squeezed her shoulder and shook his head remorsefully. “We cannot.”
“What? Yes, you can. Stop them,” Liv argued.
“We are no match for the maids. Even if we were, no one would want to risk killing another man’s mate.”
Liv suddenly understood the sad, horrifying truth of the situation. She closed her eyes and held back her tears.
“Don’t listen,” Dana said to the injured woman. “Just listen to my voice. Nothing else matters.”
The woman passed out.
“Roen,” Liv said, “she’s going to die.”
He nodded. “Let’s get her to the great hall.” He snapped his fingers at one of the men, who scooped the woman into his arms. Like a giant blur, the man was gone.
“Wait!” Dana yelled and went running after them, hugging her injured arm.
Liv was about to follow when Roen gripped her shoulder, looking nervous. “We’ll catch up; you stay with me.” He took Liv’s hand and pulled her along.
Liv instantly felt safer and calmer just from his touch.
“Roen,” she panted, noticing that her clothes dripped with blood-tinged seawater, “what the hell is happening? Why did they attack?”
Not stopping his brisk pace, he said, “Because they can, since they’re able to tolerate sunlight all of a sudden.”
“Why do you think it’s sudden? One of the maids I saw the morning I left here was out in sunlight.”
Roen abruptly halted, and though Liv thought she’d run right into him, he had her by the shoulders before she could blink. “What do you mean, Liv?”
“The mermaid who made me promise ne
ver to tell about the island stood in the sun—the others ran away.”
“Why didn’t you tell me this?” he shouted.
“I don’t know. I thought you knew, and the detail didn’t seem important after watching those things devour a man in front of my face.”
“A non-nocturnal mermaid didn’t seem important?”
Liv pulled her hand from his firm grasp. “Don’t—” she pointed her finger in his face “—you raise your voice to me, Roen. Not ever. Or I swear to God I will hurt you somewhere special.”
“You can’t hurt me. I’m a merman.”
“Oh, for God’s sake, Roen! Stop with the Superman crap!”
“Not Superman. Mer. Man,” he corrected. “Superman is fictional. Mermen are real. Don’t ever forget that,” he growled.
“How could I forget when you guys are the reason my sister’s life almost ended three minutes ago? Or when I got kidnapped from my home? Or held against my will and had my neck almost snapped by one of you? Trust me, I know. So you’ll have to excuse me, Mr. High and Mighty Merman, but I’ve been a little busy trying to survive, not go crazy, and protect my sister. So don’t you dare blame me for this massacre because I failed to mention that one of your horrifying women went for a morning swim in sunlight.”
Roen’s harsh expression melted away, and he looked down at the ground. “My apologies. I’m upset, not to mention worried.” He raised his head and looked at her with those stunning green eyes. “I needed to know you were safe and far away from here, given what comes next. Now, I’m not sure what I’ll do.”
Now Liv felt bad. “What comes next?”
He bit his full, sensual bottom lip. “I will answer your question—I promise—but let’s check on the woman and Dana first. Then we may speak.”
“Yes. You’re right.” What the hell was she thinking?
They continued on the trail that wove between pine trees with trunks five feet in diameter, and Liv immediately noticed something different about the air.
“Roen,” she said, barely keeping up with his pace, “what the hell is that?”
“What?”
“The temperature is getting warmer.”
“And?”
“The air on this island always gets colder the closer you get to the mountain.” It made sense if Crazy Dirt—aka the island—directed her heat to shield herself from the outside world.
Roen slowed for a moment, then returned to his brisk pace. “I don’t foking know, though you’re right, something’s off.”
That was not the answer she expected to hear from Roen.
When they reached the mouth of the cavern—aka the “great” hall—Liv expected to see the woman fully recuperated, but one of Roen’s men shoved past them from behind with a bottle in his hand. The moment he reached her body on the floor, he poured the liquid into her mouth. “Drink it down,” he said softly. “Everything will be fine.”
Roen stood frozen in the jagged stone doorway, tightly gripping Liv’s hand.
The man holding the woman’s head looked up at Roen and shook his head in grief. “It’s too late. She’s dead.”
Dana, who’d been standing and watching, began to cry.
“Why didn’t you give her water from the…” Roen’s words died. “Goddammit.”
Liv’s eyes followed Roen’s gaze and noticed the empty pool of water. The night before it had been full and glowing with an eerie green light.
“Where’d it all go?” she said.
Roen released her hand and rubbed his face, groaning.
“Roen?”
“There’s no more sacred water,” he said.
“I see that. Why? Is the island dead?” Roen had once told her that the island was like a fearful child. And that child kept having nightmares about the landlovers coming to take away all of her water. Unfortunately, that water was like her blood, so while she could give away some, she couldn’t live without it altogether.
Roen closed his eyes and tilted his face toward the soaring ceiling. After several moments, he shook his head. “She is angry, not dead.”
“Are you sure?” Liv asked.
“Yes, I can hear her heartbeat and feel her bitterness in the air.”
“Oh. She’s bitter?” Liv yelled at Roen. “She tried to kill Dana and me, and about fifty women just became a mermaid banquet!”
Roen released a frustrated breath. “There is no turning back now. We must see this through to the end as our scriptures state.”
Liv wasn’t familiar with their scriptures, but it didn’t take a genius to know that some sort of doom-related milestone had been reached. “That sounds bad.”
“At least this will all come to an end one way or another.”
Liv searched in his eyes for an answer that wasn’t there. “Even us?”
“You and I never had a chance to begin with.” He brushed his thumb over her bottom lip and his eyes filled with deep sorrow. “Even if it’s what my heart has always wanted.”
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Later that morning, after the island’s healer, Holden, confirmed Dana had a fractured arm and gave her a few drops of water, which worked immediately—Guess she’s not “defective”—Roen and a few of his men brought them back to his home. His mansion, built in a log-cabin style resembling something one might find in Aspen, sat atop a forested hill with large panoramic windows and a pitched roof. Inside, however, was anything but rustic. The smooth white walls, large oil paintings, and modern furniture with crisp fabrics and sharp angles made the home feel more like a posh New York penthouse. Not that she’d ever been in one, but who didn’t watch House Hunters?
The funny part was, Roen had called the place “pedestrian.” It was a reminder he’d once lived in a different world where money was no object. Private planes, expensive suits, and chauffeurs. He’d sacrificed it all for her and to help these people. He was a natural-born protector, and it was what she loved about him.
Since the attack on the boat, however, Roen seemed nervous and unsettled, not at all like the protector Roen she knew. “Don’t you let anyone foking near her,” he’d yelled at the guards before leaving, “or I swear I will rip out your hearts.”
She wondered if the man might actually be cracking. Good. He can join me.
Now, what did he plan to do regarding her and Dana? She suspected he hadn’t made up his mind.
Or doesn’t know. Leaving by boat was too risky, and flying out, considering the island’s “air control” capabilities, wasn’t a winner either. They might find themselves getting cooked right out of the sky.
The only thing Liv knew for certain? Roen wouldn’t throw in the towel when he wanted something. Right now, he wanted her gone. Far the hell away from him. Maybe even more so now that things had heated up.
Island vs. Mermen. Sounded like a damned B-movie. And a slaughter waiting to happen. Roen mentioned once that the island could read their hearts. So without secrecy, how would they ever get the upper hand in a fight? Their giant muscles would be useless, like bringing a maraca to a gun fight.
The only real option might be to stand against La Gran Perra, refuse to do her evil bidding, and weather any punishment she doled out. A battle of the wills between two species that excelled at digging in and taking heads.
That did not sound enjoyable.
Which brought Liv to her second mind-boggling question: If pushed to fight team merman, what would be the island’s weapon?
Love. Love is her biggest weapon. Plain and simple. These men loved those…things in the water and Crazy Dirt used them as leverage. Exactly why Roen’s move to “cure” the maids was key.
I can help with that. She could figure out how the island triggered the transformation.
Yay. Something to do aside from feeling scared or horny.
With Dana still sleeping, Liv took a shower to rinse away the sheen of dried salt and blood from her skin and then changed into a black stretchy dress she’d found in the closet. There were stacks in every size along wi
th black leather sandals, too. Guess they buy in bulk, a thought that mildly disturbed her, knowing they were for the comfort of the female “guests.”
She went downstairs and wandered through Roen’s modern palace, still finding it hard to believe this kind of luxury existed out in the middle of the North Pacific while remaining hidden from the world.
Liv passed the doorway of the formal dining room with seating for fifty plus, and then walked along a brightly lit hallway lined with life-sized oil paintings. Her first time inside this house, she’d been so frightened by the situation she hadn’t taken time to appreciate the art.
She strolled along slowly, noting each painting and their historical significance—battles; a mermaid dying on a rock while her human-looking lover wept; a commanding man with long hair, summoning waves with a trident on a stormy night.
One in particular, an abstract of shadows swimming in the ocean away from the island, caught her attention. With the bold brushstrokes and colors, she couldn’t be sure, but the silhouettes seemed masculine.
Liv stepped back, focusing on the textures of the picture. Yes, the shadows in the water were men, and the figures standing in the shadows of the trees, watching the men swim away, were women. With legs.
Liv made a mental note to ask Roen about the painting and then continued to the end of the hallway toward a set of bright blue double doors painted with tribal mermaid symbols.
She knocked and cautiously poked her head inside when no one answered.
“Wow.” Roen said he’d been spending his time reading and had more to do. Now she understood why. This wasn’t a room but the Merman National Library.
Or is it an aquarium? At the entrance stood a floor-to-ceiling saltwater fish tank, like something found at Sea World, holding several spotted sharks four feet long. Brightly colored fish—blue and orange, black and red—darted in and out between the crevices of black lava rocks placed in the corners. She’d never seen such an enormous tank in someone’s home.
Funny, I thought Roen hated fish. Maybe he wanted to make an effort to change. Yeah, she could see him doing that. The man refused to be a slave to anything, including his fears.
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