by Nalini Singh
It was Edison who'd given the container to her.
She kept snacks in there for when she didn't feel like swimming or doing anything. She was old and she'd outlived too many of her descendants. She hadn't planned to outlive her mate, too, but two days after his death, a heartbroken little girl had curled up next to her shell and then how could Bebe give in to her own terrible heartbreak?
She was allowed to be lazy and to eat chocolate bars five days in a row if she wanted.
Digging through the chocolate bars that the special container kept hard even when it was hot--she didn't know how and she didn't care, just that it worked--she closed her hand around a sleek black device.
The phone was cutting-edge, given to her by another one of her grandchildren. There were too many greats to fuss about at this point. It wasn't like she wanted to be reminded that she was positively ancient. Armand kept worrying she'd hurt herself on the island and no one would know. What worrywarts her descendants were!
Inputting the call code by memory because her brain worked just fine, thank you very much, she wasn't surprised when the call was picked up on the first ring. "Young man, do you play chess?"
Bowen Knight's voice had a crack in it when it came on the line. "It's been a year or two since I last had time for a match."
"I'll set up a game on my end and you do it on yours." Kaia's human had a strategic brain that intrigued her. "Did you let her go because she asked, or because you think three steps ahead?"
"I wasn't thinking much . . . for the first few minutes." His voice was no longer uneven. "Then I remembered that Kaia is possessive of her people and that she'll talk to you even when she shuts down with everyone else. She told me about your island and how she used to sleep curled up next to your shell."
Bebe chuckled. "It will be a good game, I think." She went to hang up, because men as beautifully devious as Bowen Knight shouldn't always be rewarded for their stratagems, but then she remembered her own beautifully devious mate and how soft his heart had been when it came to her. "It worked as you said it would."
Then she hung up.
A man should wait a little for his woman. Even if he had reached out across oceans to claim her.
Bebe smiled. "I like you, Bowen Knight." He saw her Kaia in a way others never had, not even her cousins who'd become brothers and a big sister; he saw her fears and he saw her flaws--but most of all, he saw her incredible heart.
Kaia Luna never let go of those who were her own.
Bebe included.
"I'm going to smack that boy's fin in a minute," Bebe muttered bad-temperedly when she spied a familiar form in the water. "Now not only do I have to deal with worrywart grandchildren, I have to stay alive long enough to win a chess match against Bowen Knight." And to make sure Kaia had another pair of arms she trusted to hold her when her world fractured.
Because sooner or later, death came for them all. If you were lucky, as Bebe had been lucky, it was after decades and decades and decades of love and joy and children and grandchildren and even worrywart who-knew-how-many-greats grandchildren. Her mate had seen Kaia born, had held her in his wrinkled hands and kissed her on her plump little cheeks.
Such a life she wished for Kaia and for Bowen Knight, a human who loved Bebe's girl enough to fight for her through fair means or foul.
Chapter 68
KJ is gone. We found his wife hysterical near her yacht. They took it out half a day before I gave the order to find him, and at some point, KJ dived in to check something underneath the yacht and never came back up. She almost drowned diving to look for him--Miane had to haul her out because she wouldn't stop looking.
--Malachai Rhys in a call to Bowen Knight
BO LISTENED TO Mal while standing barefoot under a glittering night sky on an isolated stretch of Italian coastline. KJ wasn't dead, that much was apparent to both of them. Someone had obviously noticed Hugo's hacking and warned KJ to get the hell out. Whether or not KJ would stay alive was another question.
"Any indications why KJ turned against the clan?" he asked, his eyes on the horizon and his feet digging into the sand.
"Nothing so far, but we're still excavating his life. Regardless--the fact he married a woman only to abandon her to save his own skin tells me he's not who we all thought he was."
Bo had been racking his brain for signs of evil in KJ, but all he could remember was the other man's good nature. The only indication of anything "off" was that night after the second injection when he'd stirred awake because someone was in his room. He'd assumed it to be George, but there'd been a scent he hadn't been able to put his finger on at the time.
Peppermint.
Like the gum KJ was always chewing.
On the other hand, with all the layers of corruption and deception they'd uncovered, Bo wasn't taking anything at face value. "Doesn't make sense that he didn't take the opportunity to do me harm."
"It does if KJ was meant to be a long-term mole," Malachai pointed out. "Any action against you would've put the entire station under a spotlight. His bosses must've weighed it up, decided it wasn't worth losing KJ."
Bo had no counterargument to that, but his doubts continued to hover. "Mal, is there any chance he could've been set up?" What better way to hide a traitor than to have that traitor be found out? "Hugo could've truly believed he'd unearthed the name of the betrayer, but was being used the entire time."
"We're looking at that." Malachai's tone was as cold as the ocean; his anger hadn't abated any during the search for the truth. "If Hugo's intel is right, though, then these Consortium assholes have been smarter than we thought. Having all these people doing small things for them, no one knowing about the others, while distracting us with the big hits."
"Yes." While Malachai tried to ensure BlackSea was now free of moles, Bowen had Lily and Cassius digging for any other indications of trouble within the Alliance, however slight the problem might be--like BlackSea, they had to eliminate any tiny holes the Consortium had put in their wall of security and loyalty. "I don't want it to be KJ."
"None of us want it to be KJ. Especially after Hugo." Flat words. "I should have funeral details in the next forty-eight hours. The pathologist is still running tests on the poison."
Bo continued to watch the water. "Heenali will come, no matter when the funeral. But she needs time to say good-bye."
"I'll make sure she has it. His parents have already agreed to her nightwatch--they're glad their son had a chance to fall in love before he was murdered."
All these broken lives, Bowen thought, all this pain, just because the members of the Consortium had an endless lust for power. They couldn't bear to see a world at peace, made more profit when Psy, changeling, and humans stayed in their separate corners and suspicion hung in the air.
"If it wasn't KJ, he's dead," Malachai said into the quiet that had fallen between them.
"Yes." He'd have been the sacrificial lamb to lend credence to Hugo's discovery. "But hard as it is for me to accept, it also makes sense that it was him."
"A man no one would suspect."
"Exactly." A friendly, easygoing surfer type who was training in a profession that was all about care. "Any assistance I or the Alliance can offer, just ask and it's yours."
His eye caught on a break in the wave in the far distance. "I have to go."
"Is she there?"
"Yes." Bowen couldn't see her; she was too far out, but he knew. The same way he'd known which beach to come to tonight--the tug of the mating bond had become stronger and stronger the closer Kaia came, until she became the signal and Bowen's heart the antenna.
Though the sea was night dark and turbulent, he stripped off his clothing and waded in to the waist. The cold water lapped against him as he searched for her. He still couldn't see her, but he could feel the wildness of her deep in--
Something bumped his leg.
He looked down, gleaned nothing through the water.
Another bump, this one on his hip.
&nb
sp; Lips wanting to curve, he began to "listen" to the sea, and the next time there was a shift that couldn't be explained by the waves, he reached out . . . but she was too fast, his playful mate whose other form was designed for the ocean. Whooping like a madman, his blood too hot to fear the icy chill, he dived into the water. She surfaced with him this time, and she wasn't in her human form.
Her eyes were vibrant and intelligent--and mischievous. "I knew you were a dolphin." Even before the mating bond and the knowledge it had thrust into his soul. "All that playfulness, such a tight-knit pod of family, these beautiful eyes."
Another nudge, this one at his chest before she dived under, and when she next surfaced, she was far enough out that she could dive up out of the water then back in. Showing off for him before swimming back in and sliding up against him. He ran his hand gently over her delicate skin, astonished and delighted and so fucking happy it hurt.
When he petted her dorsal fin, he noticed the small notch near the top. Curious, he bent to examine it, wondering if it was the result of an accident at some point in her life or if it was the counterpart to her "diva nail."
She nudged at him impatiently.
Laughing, he got the hint and began to stroke her again.
Light sparkled . . . and then there was a brown-eyed siren under his hands.
She wrapped her legs around his waist, her arms around his neck, and kissed him wild and wet and with keening need. He could do nothing but kiss her in return, drinking her in like she was water and he was parched. "You came back." The words were torn out of him.
He'd played every card he held, but in the end it had been her choice and all Bowen could do was wait.
"Because you're mine." Implacable words. "I was half-mad when I said what I did. I don't see land when I see you, Bo. I see my heart and it terrifies me."
"Me, too," he said huskily. "You swim in the ocean and it's full of dangers even without those who're hunting BlackSea. I had to force myself to breathe when I learned you were out there on your own." He'd never expected her to take off from Bebe's island and head straight for him. "God, baby, you came such a long way all alone."
Pride in the smile she gave him. "I had to come claim my mate."
"You own me, Siren. You always will."
"Forgive me, then?" A nuzzle of her nose against his. "I hurt you."
"Ah, Kaia, I'd forgive you the world."
This kiss was gentler, slower, tenderness in every fragment of a moment as they soothed hurts in each other. He knew she remained badly wounded, the losses piling up on her soft heart. And she knew he was bruised from her rejection. It hadn't been real, he understood that, but it had hurt all the same.
So he let her heal him and he tried to heal her, and when their bodies joined, it was with a devotion that lit up both their souls. Afterward, as he carried her to the sand he'd cleared of snow to lay down a thick rug and create a warm bed of blankets, Kaia said, "I miss Hugo," and her voice, it broke.
In the hour that followed, Kaia finally cried for her friend who'd lost his way, the sobs rocking her whole body as she lay curled up in Bowen's arms.
* * *
*
KAIA had never cried as she cried that night, held safe against her mate's strong, warm body under a thick blanket he'd chosen because it'd be soft on her skin. She cried for her parents, taken so young, and for Hugo, who'd made such foolish mistakes--and she cried for herself, for the wounds that scarred her. She cried until her tears ran dry and then she cried until her throat was raw.
Through it all, one thing remained a constant: Bowen.
Her love. Her anchor. Her mate.
She lifted swollen eyelids.
The world was silent around them but for the soft, soothing sound of the waves. Above, the night sky glittered like a thousand tiny lights had been turned on just for them. And though the temperature bit with winter's sharp teeth, she was lazily warm. The blanket was comfortingly heavy and her mate had set up self-contained heaters around their bed on the sand.
He was wonderful. And he was hers. "The sand's probably already in places I don't want anything," she said in a vain effort to banish the echoes of sorrow.
"I'll help you wash," he replied in the same playful tone, though his voice held a roughness that told her he'd cried with her.
"How is Heenali?"
"Broken." Bowen pressed his lips to her drying hair. "All we can do is give her time."
Kaia hurt for the other woman and for Hugo, who'd won a woman of substance and courage but who would never know what they could be together. "I'm going to make friends with her," she vowed. "She can talk to me about Hugo. No one in the Alliance knows him like Heenali and I do."
"Heenali can be a tough nut to crack."
"I'm stubborn." Kaia would watch over the soldier her friend had loved, a gift to his memory. "I wish you could've known him, Bo. I think you'd have liked him."
"Tell me about him."
So she did, and at times they laughed at the memories and at times she cried again. But she shared her friend with Bowen, and in doing so, she kept him alive a little longer. "I'm so happy to be here with you," she whispered. "I feel myself again." No frantic agitation, no sense of claustrophobic imprisonment inside her own skin.
"It took you a long time to swim here." Grim words, his embrace tighter. "I've been waiting for days--I'm fucking proud of you, but I'm not sure my heart can take it."
"I'm built for the water and for swimming long distances." Kaia rose up on her elbow to look down into his face, the hard lines and angles of it so precious to her now. "I know it might be dangerous, but I'm so tired of being afraid."
"What do you need me to do?" Unwavering devotion.
Kaia fell in love with him all over again. "Give me time enough to find my wings again."
"Not even a question, tesoro mio."
She felt like his treasure, adored and cherished. "I was driven by raw emotion this time." Sighing as he played with her hair, she petted his bare chest. "My return trip will be a conscious choice." It wouldn't be easy and she'd have to break her journey into many segments in order to beat the fear, but this time around, she was playing for keeps. "I'm going to start with the blue and work up to land."
Bowen reached to cup the side of her face with one big hand. "Are you hurting now?"
Kaia wanted to lie, wanted to tell him she'd conquered her demons, but he was her mate and he deserved nothing but the truth. "It's starting to build." The ugly churning, the flashes of cold and heat, the erratic heartbeat.
Running one hand down her back, Bowen cradled her close. "Go," he whispered roughly. "I'll see you soon."
For Hugo's funeral.
Her scarred heart stretched despite the pain. Because this man, he'd never surrender, not even to her fear. "I'll swim for a day, then catch a high-speed jet from one of our cities." Both so she could be there when her friend was laid to rest and so she could see her mate again.
"Call me as soon as you hit a BlackSea city." A hard kiss. "I'd microchip you if I could."
Kaia laughed but she held him, too, as afraid for the dangers he faced daily as he was for her swimming alone in the blue. "I'm going to buy you a bulletproof coat."
* * *
*
KAIA dived high out of the water for Bowen as she swam out. She saw him raise his hand, and part of her wanted to swim right back to him. But she was determined that the next time she came to him, she'd do so with enough strength to last the night, then to last the day.
She'd speak to the healers and to Bebe and she'd contact Ivy Jane Zen again.
Most of all, she'd lean on the mating bond. Her mate wouldn't mind.
Hope and determination a winged being in her heart, she made her first waypoint several hours later and shifted to call Bo. Her friends on the small floating town waved her off thirty minutes later. Two more waypoints. Two more calls. Two more kisses blown across an ocean to her mate.
She was halfway through the longest stretc
h between towns, her next stop where she planned to catch a jet, when something shimmered in her vision.
Fear, visceral and cold, tore a scream from both parts of her nature.
Then the net was closing around her and cutting into her skin and she fell into a nightmare.
Chapter 69
How many of our vanished are dead, Mal? How many of my people will I never be able to bring home?
--Miane Leveque to Malachai Rhys, one dark rainswept night
KAIA HAD LEFT in the middle of the night, a strong, beautiful woman who'd waded out into the water without fear. Standing submerged up to her hips, she'd turned and whistled at Bo in a complicated pattern. He'd done the same in return and she'd grinned with utter delight . . . then dived. Only to reappear far in the distance, her dolphin form arcing over the water to splash back in.
Bo had watched until there was no hope of seeing her again. Going back to Venice afterward, he'd waited for her to call in from the waypoints she intended to pass. His siren was a wild creature, but she understood his worry, had laid out her entire path back home so he could track her on the massive map of the world's oceans that he'd put up on his office wall.
The first call had eased the fist clutching his heart, Kaia had sounded so joyously delighted in herself for making the trip alone. The second and third calls left him smiling. He waited for the fourth one, when she'd haul herself out of the ocean and get on a jet.
It never came.
Lungs in a vise, he called Malachai. "Kaia should have reached Miraza by now." He'd marked the floating city on his map. "She hasn't called in. She's only half an hour overdue, but I have a bad feeling about this."
"Fuck." Malachai hung up on that single harsh word.
He called back minutes later to confirm that Kaia hadn't made it to Miraza--nor had she been spotted by the city's long-range scouts.
BlackSea was initiating a search.
Bo thought desperately about what he could do. BlackSea was better equipped to search the deepest parts of the ocean. So he'd search the areas closer to land. Commandeering a small boat, he began to crisscross the water starting from the beach and heading along the route she'd told him she was taking.
Yes, she'd made three waypoints before disappearing, but perhaps by following her trail he'd find a clue to what had happened. Maybe he'd run across a yacht or ship that had seen another vessel on her tail.