by Starla Night
The InstantPot in Balim’s office beeped. It had depressurized and cooled.
Balim fished out his Sea Opal and poured the last of the depressurized elixir into Warrior Pelan’s tank. He poured in new water and put his Sea Opal back into the pot.
This was to say, Bella’s Sea Opal. Not that she would ever return to accept it.
His chest ached.
“All marks are within specification.” Mitch recorded the temperature of the tank and the other tests into his records. “Almost back to where we were a week ago. I hope the new security gate stops the Sons of Hercules from getting close again.”
Balim did as well. He’d exited the hired car at the gate, limiting the number of people who gained any access.
He examined Pelan through the glass.
The warrior looked better under the water.
The week in a bed had made Pelan sunken and nauseous even with his bride right beside him. He’d received limited comfort from their connection.
Not because their connection was flawed, but because the air was harder to connect through. It was hard for any warrior, healthy or ill. For example, Balim could stand in front of Bella, offer himself to her, even kiss her, and she’d still walked away.
He rubbed his pained chest.
Balim strode into his office and sat in his chair. It was still damp from the deluge. Fans whirred.
He prioritized the tasks Roxanne had left him. Focus.
Bella would have rejected him after she learned his secrets. Secrets he had never told another human or mer, not even the warriors he now considered his closest friends.
But he could not have guessed how he would fail at protecting her.
Now Bella had to rely on human medicine to heal Jonah.
He fished her Sea Opal out of his pot and studied the smooth pearl.
She would never be back again.
Mitch’s voice echoed in the room behind him. “Morning, Bella.”
“Hi, Mitch.”
Her voice clenched Balim’s soul in a fist.
He leaped out of his chair and stumbled into the main room. Around the corner of the office, he could see the entrance corridor. And there she stood. Bella.
Chapter Ten
Balim could not have been more stunned if he’d been shot in the chest.
Warm confidence filled Bella’s closemouthed smile. “Balim.”
He couldn’t breathe.
Her soul light flared and banked with inner turmoil, showing that her calm was a lie.
Blue denim material hugged her curvy thighs, and a puffy green shirt swooped low over generous breasts he wanted to bury his face in and rest.
Something had changed.
She’d had no intention of returning to him once she’d left the hospital director’s office. Yet here she was. Impending doom clouded her arrival, and even though he wished to embrace her and bury himself in her kiss, he waited with caution for her to explain.
“How’ve you been?” Mitch divided his attention between friendliness to her and his clipboard of tank specifications. “It’s been a while. Your kid’s okay?”
“Pretty much the same. I came to talk to Balim about him, actually.”
“Good thought. He’s never lost a patient.”
“Never?”
“That’s what the warriors said. He—”
“You know each other,” Balim said.
Everyone knew her but him. Dannika had known her. Faier had also. Now, Mitch.
“Mitch’s son is the same age as Jonah,” Bella offered, as though that explained anything. “He helped me with the elixir when we were conducting tests on Jonah.”
“Before you surfaced,” Mitch said.
The coincidences of how close Bella had been this whole time shook Balim. Only two weeks ago, he’d thought their near-miss at the emergency department was the closest they would ever pass.
Yet she had met Mitch. She’d visited this lab. Knew security.
He’d felt her everywhere and thought she was beyond his reach.
In that time, she’d felt nothing.
He pulled himself together, calmed his shock, and gifted her his steady professionalism. Uncontrollable resonance did not draw her the way it drew him.
She would never come to him.
“Why are you here?” he asked.
She smiled with a closed mouth and set a teasing tone. “You don’t sound that pleased to see me, your fated soul mate.”
“The sooner I give you what you need, the sooner you will leave me again.”
Mitch gave him a side-eye, then backed out of the room and escaped down the hall to give them privacy. Pelan and his bride, sleeping in the tank, would not respond.
Bella laughed, startled by his accuracy. “That’s a little harsh, don’t you think?”
“Am I wrong?”
Her laughter died.
“You had no intention of returning. Something has gone wrong.”
“I wanted to see you and make sure you were okay.”
“You are doing it again.”
She put her hand to her mouth. “Doing what?”
“That. Yes.” He nodded to remind her he could see her true emotions reflected in her soul, not only the falseness of her smile. “You lie when you pretend to smile.”
“It’s only because…fine. We’ll do this the mer way. Blunt and with no accounting for social graces.” She dropped her hand and rested her thumb in her pocket. “I came to see you.”
His chest squeezed. He cleared his dry throat. “Now I am seen.”
“And to ask something…”
“Ask.”
She diverted her gaze and strolled around the tank. The devices behind her ears emitted the high-pitched shrieking.
“This place is clean. No listening devices here. It’s secure.”
“Aside from the devices behind your ears, yes.”
She struck him with her startled gaze and then veered away again. “Are you staying here all weekend?”
“Unless I am called away.”
“You might ignore any call-outs until you have better security.”
“Why?”
“Here seems like a safe place to hide from the Sons of Hercules.”
His failure stabbed into him again.
He clenched his hand into a fist around the pearl in his palm. Every instant she was here, he had to use his entire strength to stop himself from falling at her knees and begging forgiveness. “Ask your question, Bella.”
She crossed her arms. “You’re making this a little hard, you know.”
“How so?”
“Do you not know?” She laughed, nerves mixing with disgruntlement. “I’m worried about the Sons of Hercules, and I’m trying to ask if you would…” Her gaze focused on his fist. Her fake smile wiped away. “Is that your Sea Opal?”
His fingers opened on the smooth pearl. Smaller than some other warriors’, still tinted with the minerals of his home city, and all his.
He extended it.
She pulled it into her cupped hands.
Her fingertips ghosted across his palm.
Shivers walked up his spine. He clenched his hand.
She lifted the pearly gemstone. It looked larger in her hands than in his. Wonder and terror lit her face. She studied the Sea Opal with an uncomfortable mix of honest emotions.
“I can sense you on it somehow.” She turned the palm-filling pearl over and over. “I saw Faier’s once. Yours is more…I don’t know. Sustaining, and capable, and yet also dark…”
“It is yours.”
She closed her fingers around the gemstone tight and held it to her chest. Her soul brightened with fierce heat. “I can have this?”
“It already belongs to you.”
She returned her gaze to the Sea Opal. Warriors had been gifting them to sacred brides for generations. When a bride accepted her warrior’s offering, she accepted their marriage.
Wicked light reflected in her green eyes. “Mine…”
The rush
of hunger crashed over him and dragged at him, urging him forward. To take her into his arms. To own her. To unite their bodies and souls.
He set his feet, resisting.
Her calculating gaze flicked to him once more. “Would you give me anything?”
“Yes.”
“Even things you don’t own?”
“Those are easiest for me to give.”
A real smile lifted her lips. “You’re so different from Faier.”
He dipped his head in acknowledgment. Faier bore heroic scars with greater honor.
Balim’s scars existed only in his mind. Hidden inside, he was fractured by torture, splintered by revenge, filled with seeds of deadly evil.
Most days, he healed his warriors and supported the rise of his race. But on any day, he could flip and end them. Mer and humans.
Bella knew. She sensed it even when he spoke no words. Her amusement wavered.
The metal behind her ears vibrated.
“You wear the earrings once more,” he commented.
Discomfort flashed across her face. “Oops. Caught again. How do you do that?”
“Hearing such high-pitched sound is a trait of the mer.”
“That seems likely.” She twirled around the room, glanced into his office, and peeked out the hall doors to the labs and conference rooms. “I came to peruse your new lab… There…and to invite you on a road trip.”
“Road trip?”
“Upstate. I’ve got family I want you to meet.”
He noted the hesitation. “Why?”
“If we’re serious, it’s important you know who I am.”
“Serious?”
“About me becoming your bride.” She clicked her boots together. “Going to Atlantis. Joining in front of the Life Tree.”
He stopped.
Fear and anger showed in her expression along with resolve. Complex emotions beyond simple lies.
She intended to join with him as his bride?
The tide crashed over him again. He needed her. He wanted her.
He would destroy her.
Warrior Pelan needed him. He must speak with Dannika. Doctor Kowalski. Wait for the call of the data company. Figure out how to secure the incoming warriors from the Sons of Hercules.
“Just say yes,” she pushed. “Live a little.”
“I am dangerous to you.”
Her brows smoothed with assurance and another touch of amusement. “I’ll keep us safe. I promise.”
He didn’t believe her.
She reached over and took his hand.
His fingers closed around hers of their own accord. She was warm, vital, a lifeline of strength and light. With her, he could be redeemed. He could become honorable.
No. His past was too black.
“Come on.” Bella pulled him, prancing backward through the lab. “I promise you’ll have a…a time.”
On that promise, he followed her to her matte-red car. The offer wasn’t real. He felt dazed. Bespelled.
She tried to put his offering into her jeans pocket, but it was too small to contain the gemstone.
Instead, she secured it inside her purse, folded him into the passenger’s seat, waved at the guard at the gate, and drove onto the highway.
He patted his pockets. He’d left everything important in the lab. His cell phone. The identification cards Hazel and Dannika asked him to take.
“I never drive,” she confessed, weaving between cars and jerking hard on the wheel. “We have to make a quick stop.”
He concentrated on the sounds of the engines of these strange land boats. Bella clicked on the radio. Her nail lacquer was fresher this time, as if she’d put it on when she was more composed. They exited the blaring road and pulled up in front of the metropolitan hospital.
Anger and disappointment rushed through him. He’d thought she would accept his Sea Opal. But no. She rejected him still.
“Wait right here,” she said. “I just have to do something real fast.”
“You give the gemstone to Jonah.”
Her mouth opened and closed. She tucked a lock of red hair behind her ear. “Is that a problem?”
Only her jettisoning his offering moments after she received it.
But he was unfair. This surprise contact, this “road trip,” was more than he thought he’d receive from her again. No matter the reason, she had gifted him with contact.
He folded his arms and focused on the empty cars surrounding them. “I await your return.”
Chapter Eleven
The implacable warrior turned his dark, thoughtful gaze on Bella. The red threads in his eyes gleamed. He knew she was messing with him. Lying. She couldn’t help it. Even to save his life, she couldn’t be honest.
She tapped the car door. “I’ll be right back.”
He tipped his head back and gazed over the vacant lot.
She strode in, hurried up to the children’s ward, and skipped her usual pleasantries with the nurses. They knew what had happened; everyone kindly worried on her behalf and on Jonah’s.
But now, thanks to Balim, she again held a small token. And she had to give it to him, even interrupting the road trip.
She changed in the locker room and raced to Jonah’s room, pushed through the strong fan, zipped the door closed again, and walked through the second door. Nothing must penetrate Jonah’s safe, sterile chamber.
Jonah was asleep again.
She’d only seen him awake a few minutes this month. He’d finished his most recent regimen of chemo after they weren’t sure he could handle any more. Now, in the recovery phase, she was praying.
This might help.
She took out her contraband.
The Sea Opal.
She’d washed it and sanitized it as best she could, even though the hospital did more to purify cards, birthday presents, and the supplies intended to enter his room. There wasn’t time.
Bella tucked it into his hand, but the stone was so big and he was lax in sleep. Just like when he’d been a toddler.
Speaking of which…
She dug out his ragged bear—he was sleeping on it for comfort—and opened the back. The bear, made with her own shirt she’d sent in to a custom shop in Omaha, played her heartbeat, but the battery had worn out long ago. She pulled out the dead heartbeat mechanism and put in the Sea Opal instead, Velcroing it shut. She placed it in the crook of his arm.
He tightened on it, hugging it to his chest.
She rested on her heels.
Another hope. Probably a dead end. Please, please let this help Jonah heal.
Exiting, she hurried to the locker room and found her way blocked by the grandmotherly nurse.
“I’m so sorry to hear about what happened last weekend.” The gentle nurse squeezed Bella’s fabric-clad forearm. “Jonah’s a sweetheart. We’re rooting for him.”
“Thank you so much.” She patted the nurse and edged around her.
The longer Balim was outside, the more chance the Sons of Hercules would discover him.
The nurse held her ground. “Have you found a support group for when the time comes?”
“Yes, I’ve met support groups for family battling long-term illnesses, but I haven’t quite had the time—”
“Grief support,” the nurse corrected. “For letting go. When the time comes.”
Fire crackled in her heart and acid sizzled on her tongue.
Jonah was not terminal. There was still hope. Hope was tiny and fragile and slipping away, but it was all she had, and Bella would not relinquish it for anyone, not a megalomaniacal sociopath and not a well-meaning nurse either.
Bella took a deep breath and squeezed her hands. “Thank you so much for checking in with me. I can’t emphasize enough how…much…your concern makes me feel. I am seeking support systems during this trying time. Thank you.”
She studied Bella but accepted the answer, patted her hand, and stepped aside. Bella thanked her once more and escaped into the locker room.
Perhaps Balim was rubbing off on her.
Bella rested her forehead against the cold metal.
She had to face Balim. The weekend together. This road trip.
Starr had taken every protective measure to safeguard the warriors from whatever the Sons of Hercules were scheming—without revealing her existence. But Bella had forgotten something. In only a few days, she’d pushed away from the memory of how Balim mesmerized her. Made her forget herself. Made her crave a life she could never live. Made her want him.
Bella had to see this through.
She dragged on her jeans and a warm purple sweater, gave herself a touch-up in the mirror, and strode out.
Balim waited for her in the rental coupe alone.
A worry behind her chest eased.
She avoided his gaze and forced her smile, unable to stop herself even though she knew that he knew what she was doing. She buckled in and started the engine.
“Jonah is unchanged,” he guessed.
“Yes.” She composed herself. “Thank you for your patience.”
He did not respond.
She drove out of the hospital.
The drive out of the burroughs was quiet as the Sunday afternoon should be. In a short time, she’d pushed out of the dense population. Once past Yonkers, the whole state opened up to scenic greenery—well, it was fall, so the green had turned to rustic reds, coppery oranges, and golds. Soon the trees would die back and reveal peeks of the nearby mountains.
Her shoulders relaxed.
New York State was such a strange mix. Inside the city, in the burroughs, the concrete and glass seemed infinite against the gray of canals, sea, and cloudy sky, but only a short distance out of town nestled the rural underpinnings of apple orchards, mountain villages, and the tip of the Great Lakes. Buffalo was six hours’ drive from Manhattan, but it felt about six states away, instead of being within the same state.
Bella fiddled with the radio, alternating between NPR and old jazz. Perhaps they could reach their destination without her ever having to tell Balim anything.
“It cannot help,” he said.
She rested her hand on the parking brake. “What wouldn’t?”
“The Sea Opal. You already gave him elixir. Ingesting micro particles is much more effective for humans than skin contact with the resin stone.”