by Judi Fennell
I don’t know if I was wrong, but as you grew, I could sense something inside of you. A restlessness. You’ve been searching for something, Valerie, and I believe it’s that missing part of you.
I tried to compensate by having the shop and filling it will all sorts of ocean items, but it hasn’t helped. You’re still searching.
I’ve done a lot of research while you’ve been gone, and I believe your father was a member of a race of Mer people. I know it sounds unbelievable, but the legends and myths explain everything I saw so clearly.
You aren’t allergic to the ocean; I think you may actually be a part of it. And as I hung up the phone with you today, when you told me you were moving on again, I knew I had to tell you the truth.
This bottle is from your father. He threw it to me as I ran. It had been filled with oil that he said I was to give to you. I’m sorry, but I spilled it out. I didn’t know what it would do; still don’t. But I couldn’t risk it.
It’s a pretty bottle and something from him. I feel bad that this is all I can give you because he wanted you every bit as much as I did. Perhaps if you travel to the ocean, you’ll find him. I’ve thought about it over the years, but I was too selfish. I didn’t want to lose you.
But after last time, after seeing how unsettled your life is and how unhappy it makes you, I can’t keep you trapped in the middle of the country any longer.
Go, Valerie, if only to find out who you are. I hope you choose to come home to me, but if not, I will understand.
I love you. I always have and I always will. No matter what you find or what you choose, you will always be the light of my life.
Love, Mom
Tears ran down Val’s cheeks. Rod reached out to brush one away. “Do you want to talk about it?”
“It’s all true. I’m a mermaid, or whatever you want to call it. My father—” Her voice hitched. “My father tried to take me from her. She hadn’t known… what he was when she fell in love with him.”
Her father had wanted her. Mom had wanted her, and neither one had tried to work out a reasonable compromise. Somewhere in the warmth of knowing they’d both wanted her was anger that they hadn’t made it work.
But the tail thing would have freaked anyone out. Hell, it had her. Then there was Lance—Dad—not coming clean to Mom.
Val wasn’t going to judge them. She didn’t know the circumstances, and they made no difference now. Nothing couldn’t change the past, and Mom had done what she had out of love.
And now Val knew why.
She also knew—now—that Dad had wanted her. He hadn’t left her by choice.
Rod tilted her chin up. “Not ‘what’ your father was, Valerie. We’re no different from Humans except for our ability to live under the sea. We’ve adapted to it, just as Humans who live in mountain regions are able to breathe thinner air, or people in the Arctic who have more insulation beneath their skin, or those at the equator whose darker skin is able to withstand the sun’s impact. Yes, it’s not something you’re accustomed to, but we—you—aren’t a ‘what.’ You’re a ‘who,’ Valerie. You’re the Mer I’ve been searching for.”
She straightened her back, gently sliding her chin from his grasp. She was Mer, but she was also Human. Two parts of her that had finally gelled, giving her the peace she’d always sought. “I thought you called me a Hybrid.”
“It doesn’t matter. You’re the woman I love, and that’s good enough for me.”
Okay, so that sealed the deal on the peace she’d wanted. She smiled at him. “And I love you, too. So, what do we do now?”
His eyes got serious, and he traced a finger over her tail. “We wait. By tomorrow morning, our legs will have returned and three days after that, as long as we stay out of the water, they’ll stay permanently.”
“But how did I get a tail now? Mom said she hadn’t put any oil on my legs after that time my legs started to change.”
“I think because you didn’t get the full tail when you were a child. Mers, full-blooded ones, are born with tails because we’re born in the water. You were born on land, so your legs didn’t have a chance to become a tail. Then your mother stopped the transformation by pulling you out so quickly and washing away the seawater. Essentially, this is your first change.”
“And you’re saying I can undo it? Just stay out of the water for three days, and it’ll all be over?”
“Technically, two sunsets are the catalyst, but essentially, three days.”
She fingered the note from her mother, thinking of what she’d told her. Who she was.
Who Rod was.
“What if I want to try the Atlantis thing, Rod?”
“What? What are you saying?”
“I’m saying that my mother did what she thought was best by keeping me from the ocean, but she tried to give me that part of myself with the store. Don’t you see? The store wasn’t her dream, it was her gift to me. By writing me this letter,” she held it up, “she set me free. I don’t need to keep the store going to honor her memory. All she wanted was for me to be true to myself.”
Val smiled, not quite believing what she was about to do, but knowing it was the right thing. She’d figure out something to do with Mom’s shop later.
“I’m saying that I’ve tried running away to find happiness, and it doesn’t work. There are things we have to do in life, things that define us, and the throne defines you. You won’t be happy in the sweltering heat of a Kansas summer, in the dusty, dry conditions of a drought, or in the cramped apartment above the store, when you’ve only known the beauty of this world.” She put her palm on his cheek. “I’m saying, Rod, that I’m willing to live with you here so you can be what you were born to be.”
“And what about you, Valerie?”
“What about me? You’re what I want, Rod. Where you are, I want to be.”
It was the right decision. She knew because it settled around her with all the comfort of home.
She reached for his hand, entwining her fingers with his. “Since I met you, I’ve found peace. Sure, we’ve had the adrenaline rush of the chase and the accident, and fighting Drake, but not once have I thought of seeking out something more exciting, something different. Something else. Even with the birds and the tail and the craziness, I’ve felt a part of it. Here, in the water, with you, is where I’m supposed to be.”
He tucked their hands beneath his chin, his lips brushing her knuckles first. “Valerie, I can’t ask you to do this.”
“You’re not asking. I’m offering. Besides,” she tapped his lips with a finger she freed from his grasp, “it’s not every day a girl becomes a princess and gets to go to a legendary kingdom. With her Prince Charming on her arm.”
“Prince Charming?” He arched an eyebrow, the corner of his mouth quirking up with it.
“Wait.” She rolled her eyes. “Let me rephrase that. You don’t need to get a big head. The tail’s big enough.”
“That’s not the only thing that is.” He ran his tongue across her palm.
“Oh, puh-lease.” She laughed, pulling her hand away. Now was not the appropriate time nor place. “But I love you anyway.”
“That’s all I need, Valerie. Anything else is just foam on the waves.”
“Foam on the waves? Don’t you mean icing on the cake?”
He shrugged. “Icing, foam… does it matter?”
“No. It doesn’t. What matters is that I’ve finally found what I’ve been searching for my whole life.” She dropped onto the floor, angling for the opening to take her back to the sea. “Now let’s go home so we can live happily ever after.”
“Um… about that.”
She stopped in mid-shuffle. “What?”
“The ever-after part? You do remember it’s forever, right? Immortality comes with the throne. For my wife, as well.”
“So I’ll be stuck with
you for the rest of Time?”
“If we decide to keep our tails, yes.”
“And if we don’t?”
He tapped the end of her nose. “Then we get a normal Human life span.”
“Together.”
“Unless you get tired of me.”
Like that would happen. But, forever…
“You know what, Rod? I think I can handle forever as long as I’ve got you.”
“Oh, you’ve got me, Valerie.” He slipped over the lip of the platform. “Hook, line, and sinker.”
Chapter 44
Nine days later
Rod was having that dream again.
Only this time, he knew without opening his eyes that it was no dream.
As the sweet smell of the hibiscus blossoms filled the air, a smile worked its way from beneath his sleep to spread across his face, as warm as the sun that shone across his body through the window frame. The gentle ebb and flow of the waves outside the grass hut nudged him closer to wakefulness.
The warm body in his arms did the rest.
He awoke to find Valerie staring at him with eyes as blue as the tropical sky above their private island.
“About time you woke up, Your Highness. I’ve been up for hours.” Valerie’s eyes twinkled as brightly as the strand of diamonds at her throat, his wedding gift to her, and the only thing she’d worn in the five days since. Well, that and a coating of the oil from the enameled magnum-sized bottle the gods had given them for their honeymoon.
He wrapped his arms around her and pulled her even tighter against him, nudging one leg between hers. “Oh, I’m up, Valerie.” He slid his hands down her back to cup the delicious curves he found there.
She sighed and laced her fingers through his hair, pulling his lips to hers. “You definitely are.” She smiled as she pressed against him. “Now what are we going to do about it?”
“How about this?” He rolled onto his back and brought her on top of him.
“That works.”
It certainly did. Especially when she stretched, rubbing her toes against his shins and her breasts against his chest.
But that was as much teasing as he could take. No matter how many times they’d made love since their night at Reel’s home, the minute he touched her, he wanted her. Hades, the minute he looked at her, he wanted her.
Thank the gods they and The Council had rethought that stipulation about not diluting the bloodline.
Not that it mattered. He would have overruled them anyway, statutes be damned. Nothing was going to keep them apart.
Interestingly enough, Zeus had seemed more than willing to accept Rod’s stipulations when he’d gone before the gods to make his claim and request answers as to why he hadn’t gotten a tail when he’d first re-entered the water.
Typically, they’d spoken more in parables than cold, hard fact, but they did say that because he’d brought her back and fulfilled The Prophecy, he got to keep the throne, the tail and, most importantly, Valerie. They hadn’t explained exactly how having Valerie back would save the world, but it was enough for him that she’d saved his.
Gripping her waist, Rod lifted Valerie above him, taking her sweet nipple into his mouth, whirling his tongue around it until it was a rigid peak, and tasted a hint of the pineapple he’d licked off it last night at dinner. And yesterday morning at breakfast—or had that been mango?
She gripped his hair and rocked forward with a groan. He didn’t care which fruit it was; she tasted delicious even without it.
“Mmmm, that feels good.” Her voice was rough.
He’d show her good. He’d be finesse personified.
He slid his tongue to her other nipple.
She moaned.
Success.
Doubly so when she slipped her legs to either side of his chest and her warm, wet core glided along his skin. Gods, he could smell her above the pineapple and mango and hibiscus, and his cock hardened almost unbearably.
To Hades with finesse. He grasped her backside, kneading her cheeks and spread her legs wider over him. Valerie tossed her head back, arching her neck, and Rod released her breast to flick his tongue over her fluttering pulse at the base of her throat, then up to the soft spot beneath her ear, sliding her down his body.
“Make love to me, Rod.” Valerie took the words from him and thrust her tongue into his mouth as he thrust inside her.
He couldn’t remember what life had been like before her.
And when Valerie teased him again with her tongue, he really couldn’t remember. His body overrode his mind, banishing those—and any other—thoughts. All that mattered was here and now. Them. Together.
Rod lifted her off him so that their bodies barely touched. Barely… but still.
He circled his hips slowly. Achingly. The tip of his cock just brushing her swollen flesh.
Valerie whimpered into his mouth and pressed down, taking him inside her, and her slick wet heat drove him to the brink.
He arched beneath her, and she welcomed him in, smiling against his lips. Two weeks ago, he’d never known this could be, this all-encompassing feeling, and now… now he’d been willing to throw away a kingdom for her.
He still would.
Because without her, none of it mattered.
Rod slid out again, only to thrust back in, tangling one hand in her hair to angle her head just right, the other pressing her against him, into him. Him into her.
She’d insisted he couldn’t give up the kingdom and had chosen, instead, to renounce her way of life.
But love and marriage were two-way streets, and Rod wasn’t going to allow her to do that either. And he’d tell her that right after…
The tiny moans in the back of her throat got to him. He couldn’t take the way she shifted against him, the way her fingernails raked his skin, the way her breath sent shivers down his spine, the fire her touch ignited in him, the tidal wave of longing and love sweeping over him; he had to do something.
So he did.
He flipped her over on the soft bed, white filmy sheets sliding against their skin with a caress that was almost as good as hers. He rose above her, staring into those blue eyes, now whirling like turbulent seas, and pressed a kiss on her heart.
“Rod—” Her eyes closed and she arched into him, and Rod could no more resist than he could stop breathing.
So he didn’t.
Once more he claimed her body, claimed her heart, and gave over his own. Once more he took her with every ounce of feeling in him, showing her how important she was to him, how he needed her for the rest of their days, and how he’d bound himself to her forever.
How she was more important to him than any throne, any world, except the one they created for, by, and between themselves.
As the first tremors of orgasm raced through him, as he surged into her with that endless, pounding rhythm as old and as unrelenting as the waves upon the shores, Rod knew that only Immortality would grant him enough time to show her how much he loved her.
And because of her, because of her accepting him and his world, he—they—now had that time.
A light breeze whispered through the opening of the hut, drifting sand across the plank floor and rustling the edges of the light sheet Rod had pulled over them. Val’s head rested in the crook of his arm, her hand swirling tiny circles on his chest. She could stay here for the rest of her life.
And she would, that was the amazing thing. Three days left before the tax deadline for saving the store, then there’d be nothing else to tie her to land.
Or to Mom…
Val sighed. Giving up the store was what she wanted, right? She didn’t need it to remember Mom. She didn’t need it financially, and she certainly didn’t need it emotionally, so she could let it go.
Right?
“That was an awfully big sigh,” Rod whis
pered against her temple. “Did I do something wrong?”
“Funny.” As if he had any worries on that front.
“Then what is it?” He raised her chin with his finger. Gorgeous green eyes searched hers with a trace of worry. “You’re not regretting this, are you?”
“No. I was just thinking about the store.”
“Ah.” Rod propped himself up on his elbow and brushed the curls away from her face. “About that. I have an idea.”
Oh, she knew all about his idea. He’d practically tossed one of the diamond bottles to Livingston to deliver to Mr. Hill before Val had made him see reason.
“Rod, we’ve already decided that the Castor and Pollux Diamonds should remain here. They’re treasures in your world—our world. Humans can’t find them, or it’d raise more questions than saving the store is worth.” She rested her bent arm beneath her head.
He smiled then, that sexy-as-hell, lopsided grin that deepened his dimple and turned her on. How was that even possible with what they’d just done? And before dawn? And in the middle of the night beneath the full moon…
“I wasn’t talking about the diamonds, Valerie.”
“Oh?”
“No.” He leaned forward and kissed the tip of her nose. “I happen to have a storage room in my home that’s full of useless junk Angel’s been dying to get her hands on. I’ve been holding off for some reason, and it finally dawned on me what that reason is.”
“Useless junk?” She propped herself up on her elbow as well. “How is that going to help?”
Rod adjusted the lay of the sheet over her: he slid it down to her hip. Well, where it just covered her hip. “Let me rephrase that. It’s useless to Mers, but Humans, on the other fin…”
He hadn’t removed his fingers, and it was getting harder to concentrate on what he was saying. “Um… yes?”
He moved closer, and his hand slipped around to just above her butt, sending delicious tingles all over her as he, unerringly, found where he knew her birthmark to be, even though it was no longer visible, and traced the pattern on her skin. With his fingers this time. Last night, it’d been his tongue.