by Starla Night
The sun peeked out between clouds. Its light burned a hot, focused ray on the busy street, empty stage, him.
Tourists stopped and looked up at him. They raised their cell phones.
He fought the urge to dart off the back of the stage, clamber over the rock wall, and dive into the ocean.
On the day of the ceremony, many more humans would fill this region. Watching. Staring. Waiting for words that might never come.
Milly took his arm. Accepting and soothing. “You’ve got over a week until the ceremony. You’ll figure it out. You’re a Second Lieutenant now.”
He shook his head.
“If you really can’t do it, then maybe I can talk Elan into it.”
A new fear clenched his stomach. First Lieutenant Elan was here?
Queen Zara was here?
No. He would know.
“Asking Elan was my original plan.” She nuzzled his lips. “Before I met you and everything changed.”
He closed his eyes and lived in her kiss.
Everything had changed for his Milly. Why had it not yet changed for him?
He accepted her comfort and, hand linked with hers, descended the steps into the crowd.
Milly smirked at his inappropriate shorts. “We’ll find you new clothes after lunch.”
Her boss purchased “lunch” from a local restaurant. Milly ordered cold dishes: Chilled seafood stew, brined limpets, and a tasty bowl of frozen mammal milk “ice cream.”
After eating, Nicolette returned to the dive shop. Milly took Uvim “clothes shopping.”
She held up one large, white shirt decorated with blue slashes. “This one is appropriate. It says, ‘I love the Azores.’ Ooh, here’s another one. ‘Faial’ - heart - ‘Love’.”
He relied upon her experienced eye, pulling on the T-shirts at her request. Each one strained across his pectorals. She touched the fabric with an approving hum.
His cock hardened.
“Maybe I can find a shirt that better shows off your biceps.” She turned to browse another aisle.
A shady male stood in her way.
She recoiled into Uvim’s chest. “Vernon.”
“Milly. I’ve finally caught you.” The male snarled. Milly’s soul light darkened. “Leave me alone!”
“Your parents took you in. The way you’ve repaid them is shameful.”
Uvim growled low in his chest.
Vernon stopped and looked for the source of the warning.
Milly’s soul light stabilized. She rested a hand on his forearm. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Ha! How quickly you forget…” His gaze traveled up to Uvim and his accusation trailed off. “What are you?”
Uvim answered. “Hers.”
“What?”
Milly curled Uvim’s arm around her belly. “He’s my future husband. And, right now, my body guard. I asked you to leave me alone.”
He jerked back. Indignant. “How dare you intimidate me?”
“Well, how dare you harass me?”
“I’m not harassing you.” He puffed his chest like a spiked fish. “I felt sorry for you. Your parents gave you too much freedom. You abused their trust.”
Her soul darkened again. “They tried to pass me around to their friends!”
“You came on to me.”
She huffed, frustrated and impotent, a big mass of fear and anger and shame. “Because — because — Just go away!”
“Stop testifying against your parents.”
“They kidnapped—”
“You called them for help. And now they’re suffering for your lies.”
Milly’s light dimmed.
No.
Uvim pulled her behind him and squared to the male. “Go.”
“Hey, back off.” Vernon leaned away from Uvim. “You can’t loom over me like this. Are you threatening me? I’ll call the police.”
“Call.”
“You think I won’t?”
“I hope you will,” Milly said, shaky.
“I will!”
“Ask for Inspector Periera. Tell him how you’ve been coming to my work, approaching my boss, and now following me into a store. He’ll be interested in how you’re trying to influence my witness testimony for the kidnapping of my nephew.”
His anger wavered. “Nephew?”
“They imprisoned him. Just like me.”
“But you—”
“I tried to escape by any means possible. But you said I was there voluntarily.”
“You were!”
“So they got off,” she said. “They were never punished. My obvious ‘delusion’ that my sister was abducted by a huge, tattooed merman was proof I was crazy and my testimony couldn’t stand.”
She hung on Uvim. The huge, tattooed merman. “I’m clearly crazy. And a liar.”
Vernon shook himself. “But you weren’t kidnapped.”
“Because that would mean you failed to see a ‘cry for help’ right in your face,” she sneered. “My case is long over. My dad resisted arrest. I wasn’t a ‘credible’ victim so nothing went to trial. Why are you here?”
“Because … your parents said…”
“My parents asked you to intimidate me? Get rid of me?” She poked the man in the center of his dark chest. “You tell them I’m not going anywhere.”
“This is another lie.” Vernon stumbled back, palms out, defensive. “I helped you. You should just … be ashamed.”
He ducked out of the shop. A bell attached to the door jangled.
“Wish granted,” Milly murmured. “I am ashamed.”
He pulled her into his arms. “No, Milly.”
“It’s okay.” She melted in his embrace. “Thank you.”
They stood silently in the middle of the shop giving and receiving comfort.
Finally, she stepped back. Her smile did not reach its usual strength. “All done here? Those look good.”
“You are sad.”
“Yeah. It’s fine. Well, not fine, but I’ll explain in the car.”
She carried his new shirts and shorts to the front of the shop, gave the attendant colored papers, and they walked back to her sedan. Her silence was watchful as though expecting an enemy around every corner.
Her attitude had been guarded at her house the first day during her meeting with Brody. She had relaxed around Uvim. This morning, at the Sea Festival stage, she had smiled at strangers and cameras.
Now, she looked at everyone with mistrust.
Uvim wished to find the man Vernon and drag him to the police station by the throat. He should face human justice for his criminal actions.
They reached the dive shop. She opened her trunk to store the bag of purchases. The pressure plates filled her trunk full.
She sighed. “These have cursed me since the beginning! I’m sorry I ever asked for them.” Then, she darkened and, as she drew out her cell phone and typed, muttered, “I’m sorry I ever asked for anything.”
He rubbed her back.
“Brody’s still out with the tour.” She stretched with a big yawn. “He knows where to find me. Let’s go home.”
Uvim entered her hot car and buckled his own belt. As she backed onto the crowded street, he spoke. “Explain.”
“I keep asking the wrong people for help,” Milly said. “You’d think I’d learn my lesson but I don’t.”
“Your lesson?”
“I asked my parents for help to escape my strict aunt. I walked into their prison. Later, Zara couldn’t get travel visas for Elan and Zain to escape your city’s undersea war, so I reached out to my parents. They’d skipped the country to escape my father’s brief ‘resisting arrest’ sentence. They manipulated me again. Baby Zain paid the price.”
“Human justice did not prevail.”
“The police couldn’t prove I’d been imprisoned. And friends like Vernon swore I’d been a happy guest.” She snorted. “Because all my parents’ ‘happy guests’ don’t brush their teeth or shower for wee
ks.”
He had brushed teeth and showered daily. He’d enjoyed those activities almost as much as he enjoyed pleasuring Milly.
“Anyway, Vernon was the last person they pushed me on. After they’d locked me in the dark all those weeks, I broke. I could not survive another day in the darkness. Every second I thought I’d suffocate. Starve to death. Commit suicide. I thought I was going to die.”
Uvim’s chest squeezed. His hands opened and closed. His heart burned. He could not travel in time and rescue her. No wonder she was still so injured by the shock waves from her past.
“He’s right that I came on to him. I did. I would have done anything to escape the engine room.”
He said the only thing he could. “You survived.”
“Yeah.” She shook her head. “I don’t know why my parents pushed me on a guy like Vernon. He’s not into underage girls. Maybe they owed him money. He has a vested interest in them not going to jail. He’ll probably never see a payment.
“After Vernon refused my ‘offer,’ he let me use his hotel stationary to write a letter, and he even mailed it. Zara got the letter, rescued me. Then, she got involved with Elan and caught up the undersea war. Let’s just say that both Vernon and probably Zara believed, at least at one time, that helping me was the worst thing they ever did.”
Her soul light darkened.
He repeated his words to reach her. “You survived, Milly.”
“I broke,” she contracted. “And now, I know my limit. If I don’t get in trouble, then I don’t have to ask for help.”
“You needed help,” he insisted. “You could not free yourself.”
“Couldn’t I?” She sighed. “I don’t know. I thought I couldn’t. You have a lot of feelings at seventeen that are different when you’re twenty. That’s why I refused to commit my heart to you for so long. But … you are the reason I could face him today. I backed into you.”
“I will always ‘have your back.’”
She laughed. “Good. I meant more generally though. You’ve given me more confidence. Belief in myself. Not only can I survive, but I can also reach for my dreams and create the life I’ve always wanted.”
He understood.
And he also realized the root of her refusal to ask for help. “You believe asking for help injures.”
“Well, everyone says I should have dealt with my parents myself. Like an adult.” She stopped at a sign and waited for the slow, endless traffic clogging the small roads. “Although, Zara confronted them ‘like an adult’ and they tried to kill her. Twice.”
“Why were you not also in danger? Had you confronted them, would they not also have tried to kill you?”
“Um, well, I don’t know.” She dropped silent as she drove past the lockbox. Youths played in the grass and sand. “I never thought of that.”
He reflected on what she had told him about his silence. That perhaps his silence had been a strength.
“Asking for help is not weakness, Milly.”
“I know…” But her tone disagreed.
“When danger threatens, you must ask for help. Perhaps you will not receive it. But a responsible adult asks.”
“Thanks. That means a lot from you.” She drove up her road and turned into the driveway.
“Me?”
“Yeah. You’re the most dutiful, responsible guy I’ve ever…”
She stopped the car in front of her house.
The door hung open.
He unbuckled his seatbelt and exited the car. There was someone at her house. He would protect Milly. Uvim strode to the door.
Her car door slammed behind him. “Wait, Uvim!”
A shadow figure exited the house and stepped into the light.
Queen Zara.
He stumbled to a stop.
Her powerful soul light burned in her commanding chest. Her brown gaze crackled with fury. She held up a crumpled piece of paper like an accusation.
His stomach lurched.
“You,” she accused, uncoiling her rage like a weapon, and shook the crumpled paper at Uvim. “I ordered you to stay away.”
He snapped to attention.
“How dare you disobey? How dare you endanger my little sister?”
The queen was right. He had disobeyed her and endangered Milly.
“Go back to your city this instant.”
Milly walked up behind him and wrapped her fingers around his numb forearm. “I’m his bride.”
Queen Zara shook her head. “Never.”
“Zara—”
“No.” Queen Zara ignored Milly and focused her fury on Uvim. “You betrayed me. You nearly killed me. You, of all the mer, should feel ashamed for daring to come to the surface.”
“Zara, you’re making a mistake.”
“No, I’m saving you from making one.”
“But—”
“Never surface again. If you do, I will exile you for all eternity.”
Bitter blackness squeezed his chest. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t speak.
“You’re misunderstanding,” Milly insisted, trying to step between them. “Let him explain.”
Queen Zara flushed.
Milly prodded Uvim. “Explain.”
He opened his mouth.
No words came.
“There’s nothing to explain. I will never forgive you.” Queen Zara damned him. “You will never, ever have a bride.”
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Uvim’s spine straightened as if it were made of rulers. Milly couldn’t see soul lights but Zara’s accusations destroyed him inside. Her duty-bound warrior was being ripped apart by the person he respected more than anyone else in the world.
Her sister.
“Leave now,” Zara ordered, so angry that she was shaking. “Slink back to your city and die.”
He turned on his heels.
Milly rested her palm in the center of his chest. “Wait.”
He jolted to a stop. Not daring to look at her, he kept his gaze over her shoulder, on the sea in the far distance.
If Milly had a healing power, please let it heal his shattered heart.
She understood Zara’s anger. They’d only had each other. Zara remembered their traumatic early childhood. Failing to protect Milly from their parents had kicked her in the heart. Now, she went a little crazy over Milly’s safety.
But Milly was an adult now.
“Get out!” Zara shouted.
“What the heck, Zara?” Milly tried her old tricks to reel her sister back from the brink. “Do you expect him to walk to the beach?”
“I don’t care!” She brandished a crumpled paper. “Every instant he’s here you’re in danger.”
“What are you talking about?”
Zara thrust the paper at her.
Milly smoothed the computer printout, keeping one hand still on Uvim to ensure he didn’t obey Zara’s order and leave. She read the warning message. “We’re watching. Monster, go back to hell. Ignore us and we’ll blow you out of the water. The Sea Festival is only the beginning.”
Uvim rested on his heels. A new watchfulness animated his taut gaze. He was still hurting from Zara’s accusations but could not turn off his protective instincts.
“It’s a ploy to scare us away,” Milly protested. “An empty threat.”
“Oh, they’re watching.” Zara stabbed the paper. “This got shoved under the door after I got home.”
“Then the police can catch them. We’re not giving in to their terror.”
“Yes, we are.”
“This has to go to the police.” Milly pinched the edge between her fingertips. “It could have fingerprints. Especially given how crumpled it is.”
Zara’s mouth opened and closed. She looked chagrined. “I crumpled it.”
Uvim spoke low to Milly. “We must warn the other warriors.”
“Good plan.” And what a relief. He would put aside his hurt and work with her to protect the Sea Festival. “Summoning more warriors will guarantee we d
iscover any hidden bombs.”
“Dosan,” he clarified, “and Xalu.”
“Oh. Well, sure, they should be on their guard—”
“Wait a minute.” Zara whirled on Uvim with new fury. “What are you still doing here? Collect your warriors — the ones who nearly got Milly killed — and get out.”
He stiffened.
She faced off against Zara again. “You can’t order him away. This is my choice.” She lifted her chin. “I say he’s staying.”
“You drank temporary elixir,” Zara snapped. “It will wear off.”
“I won’t let it.”
“You are going to stay on this land until that stupid elixir wears off and then you’ll be a human. Ordinary. Normal. And safe.”
“I love him.”
Zara sucked in a breath.
Uvim searched her face. Not happy at her confession. Panicked.
Panicked?
Panicked or not, Uvim was her warrior. She had trusted him. Now, she would fight for him.
“No,” Zara thundered.
“You don’t get to decide.”
Why was Uvim panicked by her confession? He’d told her over and over he wanted her for his queen. Did he still think she wasn’t ready? He obeyed Zara, Queen of Dragao Azul, over Milly, queen of his heart?
“You have no idea what you’re talking about.” Zara gestured at Uvim. “Don’t you know this warrior dragged me to the surface? I nearly died.”
“I know, but—”
“You’re confused. But I’m not. There’s no relationship here. I forbid it.”
“Zara.” Milly took a deep breath. “Uvim’s not going anywhere. We’re together.”
“Phone,” Uvim said. “I need it.”
What the heck?
Milly turned on him. “Uvim?”
Zara snapped in irritation, “Quiet. We’re fighting.”
“Cell phone.”
“Uvim—”
“Now.” His tone was flinty. Uncompromising.
Zara’s eyes narrowed. “Don’t order my sister around.”
He flinched but remained resolute.
Milly took his hands. They were so big. Tremors shook them like earthquakes.
Her anger died.
He did love her. But he was so battered by Zara’s attack he crumpled.
She handed him her cell phone.
He operated it expertly. In moments, it was ringing. He held it to his ear. “Ian? Operate your car to Milly’s castle. House. Yes.” He ended the call and handed the phone back to Milly without meeting her or Zara’s eye.