She knew she was being ridiculous, but River slammed the glass door shut behind her when she left.
Should I call Leo, since Jason isn’t going to be any kind of backup?
It was tempting, especially knowing her brother had lost his mind over Fen.
Leo will know what to do…
No, she thought fiercely, shaking her head as if she could shake off whatever need was clouding her judgment. I’m taking care of this by myself. I won’t have anyone else handling my problems for me, ever again.
With a determined stride, River walked through her backyard and towards the sea. Pine needles crunched under her feet as she crossed the little wooded threshold separating her property from the beach.
As soon as her feet hit sand, River took a Rambo stance, shotgun at the ready.
Only there was no one there. The beach was empty, the descending sun making an idyllic scene of the lonely stretch of beach she’d planned on making her battle ground.
Feeling part boob, part secret agent, River crept forward peering around her carefully.
“Hello?” she called. “Anybody there?”
Silence. She decided bravado was the answer.
“Come out, come out, wherever you are!”
A bird called from the trees behind her, but other than that, nothing.
He’s not even here. He’s just some punk kid fucking with Jason, and he got me too.
The shotgun suddenly felt like it weighed a hundred pounds.
Why the hell am I carrying this thing? And when did I become someone who even owns a shotgun, let alone plans on using it?
Disgusted with herself, River sat down on the sand, staring down at the gun lying across her lap.
She took a deep breath, then released it slowly, trying to get her thoughts back in order.
Her beach was the place she retreated to so she could relax, be alone and finally feel at peace. It felt different now, knowing that Fen had been here, poisoning her brother with his lies.
It felt like she’d lost one more place to feel safe, as if one more thing had been spoiled.
That’s when the shape came out of the water.
Springing to her feet like a ninja, River pointed the shotgun squarely at the intruder.
Only to realize she was threatening deadly violence on a seal.
It blinked its huge black eyes at her, its golden coat catching the last dregs of sunshine lighting the sky.
Now River really felt like an idiot. She lowered her weapon.
“Er, sorry, Mr. Seal. I’m not really going to shoot you.”
The seal nodded at her, as if it understood her. Meanwhile, the adrenaline was still coursing through River’s system, with nowhere else to go but out of her mouth, in a stream of nervous babble.
“You’re a strange fellow. What’re you doing here, all alone?”
The seal’s only response was to come closer to her. Alarmed, she took a step back. It stopped its forward motion as she did so.
Do seals attack humans? She frantically tried to remember her seal lore.
It shook its head side to side, and then flopped down off its front flippers, staring up at her with its wide, innocent eyes.
She suddenly really wanted to touch it.
Despite herself, she took a step forward. It only watched her, so she took another. Only when she took a third did it finally move, rolling over on its back like a dog, still looking up at her in clear invitation.
“Really?” she marveled. “Do you really want me to pet you?”
She couldn’t imagine this was normal behavior, but for some reason it felt right. When she thought about touching the seal, she knew it wanted her to do just that.
Taking a few more cautious steps forward, River edged around to approach the seal from the side. She figured if it was really a rabid seal intent on attacking her, she’d be able to get out of its way before it managed to regain its feet. Er, flippers.
She crept forward two more paces and it snorted gently, reproachfully eyeballing the shotgun still clutched in her left hand.
“Oh, right. Sorry,” River said, setting the shotgun behind her on the sand. She’d have to clean it when this was over, but she really didn’t think she was going to need it.
The seal not only acted friendly, but also felt friendly.
And the animal was so beautiful River didn’t want to question a notion that would have seemed crazy at any other time.
So River kept inching forward, her hands clenched at her sides, until she was looming over it.
That close, the animal was huge. Much larger than she’d imagined the seals she’d seen cavorting on the small islands dotting Maine’s coast to be. They’d converge in droves, rolling around each other sensually, their days seeming to consist of nothing more than playing, hunting and basking.
More than once, River had wished she could be a seal, if only for a short time.
“You’re beautiful,” she murmured, squatting down to sit on her heels, an arm’s length from the animal.
It blinked at her as if accepting her compliment, snuffling in a seal chuckle.
And then it held out its right flipper, as if inviting her in.
Next thing she knew, her own arm was extended, her fingers brushing against the warm, soft fur of its front flipper. She noticed with surprise that the seal had nails.
Who knew? she thought. And I wonder how the seals cut them?
When the seal didn’t move at her touch, her fingers grew bolder, stroking further along its flipper. Stock still, it only snuffled gently as she scooted forward on the balls of her feet. When it still didn’t move, she touched the warm soft fur of its flank.
It made a noise like a sigh, and closed its eyes happily.
River couldn’t help it. She laughed with delight, a low sound of genuine pleasure, the sort she hadn’t made in a very long time.
“You do like being petted, don’t you?” she asked the seal, rhetorically. “You are a silly thing. Like a puppy. Maybe you were raised by humans?”
Unable to understand why a wild animal would behave this way, but too enchanted by the moment to want to ruin it, River scooted forward a little more. Now she was close enough that she could run her hand, palm down, over the creature’s flank. The feel of its fur under her hand was utterly delicious.
“No wonder they made you into coats,” she murmured, unable to resist. One of the seal’s eyes snapped open, glaring at her in approbation. She chuckled; figuring it was upset she’d stopped petting.
“Sorry,” she said, moving even closer so she could use both hands. She stroked over the creature’s huge, muscular shape with happy alacrity, enjoying its evident pleasure. Petting the seal was like stroking a horse, it was so large and sleek, but its reactions were more like that of a clever dog.
She realized at some point that she was giggling and cooing like a little girl with a doll, talking to the huge animal in baby talk. She couldn’t help it. Its faith in her made something in her heart twist, and she wanted it to know she would never betray that trust.
The seal’s eyes opened, locking on hers. A wave of emotion swept over her, but they weren’t River’s own. And yet she could feel, as clearly as daylight on her face, that something wanted her to know she could trust, that she was safe and that she was cared for.
Tears sprang to her eyes as something deep inside of her—a voice she would never let speak under normal circumstances—answered with a resounding yes. It wanted to be safe and to trust too.
Before she could take back such mutinous thoughts, the seal’s form began to shimmer.
Unable to look away or to remove her hands, River’s body was engulfed in the warm glow emanating from the body in front of her. The seal’s flippers moved down, extending into hands that parted the fur from beneath her palms. Her flesh now rested on warm human skin, and when the shimmering stopped the seal had disappeared.
Her hands now rested on Fen’s muscular belly, but the eyes that looked up at her were s
till the seal’s.
There was a thud as her butt hit the sand behind her, her brain unable to process what it had just experienced.
And then Fen began to speak.
Chapter Six
“Hello there, River,” the selkie said, smiling down at River’s hands on his stomach.
River snatched them back, but her still-shocked body didn’t move away.
“You didn’t have to do that.” Fen sat up, his inhuman black eyes inches away from River’s.
I should be panicking, River realized. Whatever this man is, he’s not human. I should be reaching for my shotgun.
But instead, River’s surprise was being replaced by a warm calm that she knew came from Fen, but that she also knew was honest. She really shouldn’t fear him. He had no intention to hurt her.
In fact, he clearly intended the opposite.
River blushed, feeling an answering surge of lust rise in her own belly to meet the selkie’s. Her eyes flicked down, to where that smooth golden belly tapered down to strong, narrow hips and groin.
Blushing furiously, her eyes popped back up to meet Fen’s.
“What are you?” she whispered.
“I’m a selkie,” Fen said, in the same voice one might say, “I’m from Milwaukee.”
“Isn’t that…?”
“A seal shapeshifter, yes.”
River had only recently seen Ondine, and remembered her disappointment at the film’s ending. She’d wanted the girl to be magic, not something sordid and all-too-human.
“What does that mean?” River asked, her emotions roiling. Fen felt trepidation–a natural reaction for a human faced with an alteration of their worldview. But he also felt excitement, interest, and a touch of joy, as if some deep-seated prayer of River’s had been granted to her.
“If you mean how I work, I have this sealskin.” Fen reached up to where a sealskin did, indeed, lie underneath him. “If I don this, I’m a seal. If I take it off, I’m a man.” Fen’s hand moved from his skin to her face, only to playfully flick the tip of her nose with his thumb. River felt an answering shiver in her spine.
“But what does it mean?” she repeated, at a loss for words.
Fen studied the woman before him, and her emotions.
“Ah,” he said. “You mean why am I here, and what do I want with you, and what will my being here mean for you and Jason?”
River nodded, mutely.
“What do you think it means, lass?” Fen asked, shifting forward ever so slowly so that his firm, lush lips were just inches from River’s own.
“It means magic is real?” River asked first, and Fen smiled, desperately wanting to kiss her but wanting her to want it, as well.
“You’ve always hoped it to be real, haven’t you?” he asked of her.
She nodded, her eyes moving to his mouth.
“Well, you were right, sweet girl. Magic is real.”
“Are you all that’s out there?”
“No. There are other selkies. And many other creatures.”
“Are they all like…you?”
“What do you mean, like me?”
“I mean, you seem…good. I feel…safe. Are you making me feel this way?” At that question, River backed away a few inches, and Fen felt her searching for those barriers his revelation had finally burst through.
“I’m not making you feel anything that’s not real,” Fen soothed, reaching up to run a hand gently down her arm, over her layers of clothing. His touch settled her, but she looked down at his hand as if surprised it could do so.
“I am letting you feel what I feel. It’s like a broadcast. I’m opening my emotions to you. But you would feel anything that was there, whether positive or not. I mean you only good, so you feel that. But if I did mean you harm, you’d feel that too.”
River felt Fen’s honesty as he spoke. She also knew that she’d face quite a philosophical conundrum if she ever tried explaining how this whole “I feel I can trust him because I can feel I trust him” worked.
But it did work. All those well-honed knives of distrust and fear that had grown up inside of her withdrew in Fen’s presence.
And how often did a girl meet a man who was really magic, anyway?
“So you’re magic. And you’re good,” she said.
Fen smiled. “I am magic. And I don’t know if I’m good, but I try to be. Although sometimes I can be very greedy.”
Fen’s inhumanly dark gaze swept over River’s body in a possessive, hungry way that made her cunt clench. Fen lingered over her desire, pleased at how deeply and intensely she could feel. River would be a wonderful lover.
“What else?” she asked, almost shyly.
“Well, most of it you can guess. I’m of the sea—she’s my mother, my lover, my sanctuary. I’m only a guest on land.”
Interesting, River though, filing that information away for later.
“And why are you here?” she asked, realizing that Fen might have good intentions, but that she didn’t know the parameters of those good intentions.
What if he thinks I need a supernatural babydaddy? Isn’t that what all the Fae did in the stories my mother read to me? Knocked up the humans, since they had trouble conceiving?
The knives crept back into position as her wariness flooded through Fen’s empathic channels.
“I’m only here because I sensed someone was in trouble. I didn’t know who it was, or how. I thought it was your brother, at first.”
“So you do know Jason?”
“Oh, yes. We’ve had quite a few chats, now. He’s delightful.” The selkie’s emotions glowed with genuine affection, and a paternal protectiveness that eased River’s mind. The sad fact was that some people were drawn to Jason’s vulnerability and child-like innocence for all the wrong reasons, with intentions that were anything but protective. River had learned the hard way that any man coming into her mother’s life, and later her own, was a potential predator. Luckily, between River and her mom, the predators had been weeded out almost immediately.
Mom was a flake with a thing for losers, but she also had a knack for spotting the true Bad Hats.
Ironically, that ability had not passed on to her otherwise much more cautious and conservative daughter.
“He is delightful,” River agreed, her love for her brother emanating from her.
“And he loves you very much,” Fen said, carefully. “He’s worried about you.”
River’s emotions careened alarmingly, a thousand disparate emotions sparking like a trail of gunpowder accidentally set alight.
“What? That’s ridiculous. I’m fine.”
Fen only gazed at her quietly, causing River to sputter.
“Okay, I’ll admit it’s been a rough year. But all that stuff is over and we’re good. We’re fine. I’m fine. Besides, I’m the one who takes care of Jason, not the other way around.”
To her irritation, River knew her voice had grown petulant.
“You’ve always taken care of Jason, haven’t you?”
“Somebody had to.”
“What about your parents?”
“They were pretty useless,” River answered, automatically.
“Really?” Fen asked, leaning back on his hands. River couldn’t help but admire his body as he did so, and regret that he’d moved away. But it also felt like she had room to think, suddenly. So she did.
“No, I’m being unfair. Our parents loved us. They were just both in their own worlds. And they were always fighting and leaving each other, dragging us around the country as they broke up, then made up. And in between there was always a string of equally unstable boyfriends and girlfriends. We never had any security, and that’s what Jason needed more than anything else. He needed to be safe.”
“We can never really be safe, River, although we can feel safe.”
River gave the selkie a sharp side-eye.
“Feeling safe is being safe,” was her only response.
Fen let it go, for now.
“So
why is Jason worried about you?”
River shrugged her shoulders, a look of irritation crossing her features.
“I’ve got no idea. He’s never talked to me about it. But I’m fine.”
“He told me he worries you don’t have any fun.”
“What? We have fun all the time. We go bowling, and for pizza, and we watch movies…”
“Those things are fun, yes. But they’re sort of for Jason, aren’t they?”
“We have fun together. It’s fine.”
“You like that word, ‘fine.’”
River gave Fen a withering look. The selkie only smiled at her.
“So you have fun with Jason,” he said. “But when do you have your own fun?”
“That is my fun.”
“But can you see how Jason might feel like you’re always taking care of him, rather than yourself?”
River winced, Fen’s casual words hitting like a punch.
“He takes care of me, believe me,” she said, her voice haunted. Then she rallied her knives.
“Why am I even talking to you about all this?”
Fen knew he’d gone as far as they could that day.
“You’re right. We’re only just getting to know each other. So how about we have some fun?”
His smile was sensual, and his desire beat against her in dizzying waves. River’s own arousal answered Fen’s, two-fold.
But he’s a stranger, and I don’t do boyfriends, she reminded herself, trying to quell her sudden need to ravage him.
“Fun?” she asked, stalling.
“Fun, yes. I thought we could go swimming.”
Well that put a whole new spin on things.
“What?” she demanded. “That’s ridiculous, we can’t go swimming. Well, I can’t at least.”
“Why not?” That sexy smile remained, although now amusement crinkled the corners of his eyes.
“I’d die, you nut. It’s freezing out there.”
“River, you just watched me change from a seal into a man. We talked about how I’m magic. You don’t think I have my ways?”
“How do I know you’re not just going to drown me?” she asked, even though she could feel he had no intention of drowning her.
“That’s sirens who like to drown people, and you’d know it if I was a siren. They’re part fish, first of all, and they sing a lot.”
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