Moonlight Mist: A Limited Edition Collection of Fantasy & Paranormal)

by Nicole Morgan

  Okay, she would have to stare at his cock. It was the only area she’d tattooed. She forced herself to turn back around and look down at his semi-erect shaft.

  Her breath halted at the beautiful sight. The tentacle he said she’d tattooed all around his cock was literally shimmering, as if maybe he’d put glitter on himself or something.

  “We have to hurry.” There was an urgency in his voice as he grabbed her hand, his strong fingers intertwining with hers.

  Oh no, she hoped he wasn’t going to kill her. Yet instinctively she somehow knew he would never hurt her.

  Okay girl, ignore your fucking instincts! Fight and run! She blew out a hard breath and forced herself to follow him down her RV steps and into the warm, salt-tinged air.

  It was almost dark and damned if that tentacle tattoo of his wasn’t glowing. They stopped at the water’s edge.

  “Come on in.”

  She shook her head. “I’m fine here.”

  “I won’t drown you. I promise.” His white teeth flashed in the darkness as he chuckled. Well, at least one of them was having fun.

  “Just a few steps in. I want you holding my hand when I turn and I need a couple of feet of water so I can breathe.”

  Fine. To her surprise her instincts were getting stronger. They were urging her to move into the water with him. Stupid girl that she was, she was actually allowing him to pull her in farther.

  Suddenly, an exquisite scent drifted through the air. The enticing aroma wrapped around her body and cuddled her, held her, caressed her.

  She moaned softly as she leaned closer to him. His body was warm and hard.

  He didn’t say anything. He just stood beside her, facing the ocean, looking out at the big, white, full moon hanging on the midnight-blue water.

  His breathing was growing hoarse and more erratic. Her heart beat faster and her eyes widened as he dropped to his knees. The splash of water sounded like an explosion.

  He let go of her hand and she instantly thought about running, but then the intoxicating scent riveted her to stay beside him.

  Earlier, he’d mentioned she had a scent. Obviously he had one too. It was lovely. It made her heart pound faster and made her want to be with him. She stood in stunned fascination as Calder’s arms suddenly seemed to soften and grow smaller and rounder and shorter, until they were shaped like tentacles. His head and torso remained in human form.

  Okay, she was officially insane.

  It happened within thirty seconds. Not more than a moment ago a man had fallen to his knees right in front of her and now Calder’s arms had turned to tentacles and a couple more of them peeked out from the water. His legs? Yes, his arms and legs were now tentacles, just like when she’d thought she’d fantasized or dreamed or whatever the hell those things had been when she’d had sex with him in the ocean.

  Disbelief rocked her.

  “This cannot be happening,” she whispered, totally awestruck at what she’d just witnessed. She held her breath as he lifted a tentacle and pushed his ear forward, angling his head so she could see the back of his ear.

  Oh my goodness. Gills?

  “I need to dive under as when I am in this shape, I can’t breathe air.” His voice was croaky, as if he truly was gasping for air.

  And then without another word he turned around, slipped beneath the calm ocean water and disappeared, leaving only an array of circles playing along the top of the water.

  She didn’t know how long she stood there, staring, before she finally remembered how to walk.

  Despite his disappearing into the water, his strong scent still wafted around her in waves. He wasn’t too far away and she needed to be here with him. That thought, of course, totally confused her due to the fact he’d kidnapped her.

  Instincts. He’d said in this Octoposeidon form she’d live by her instincts. But she hadn’t turned tonight and her instincts were telling her to be near him.

  “Oh come on,” she blurted, her voice echoing in the still night air, making her tense with wariness. What if he got hurt out there in the ocean? What if he got killed by predators?

  She swallowed at her suddenly dry throat and focused on trying to think of what she should do next. A huge part of her urged her to stay and wait here for him to come back to her. He was her mate. He’d fucked her in the ocean depths. He’d claimed her in order to protect her and because he loved her.

  Oh come on, Cat. You’ve flipped your freaking lid. He’s probably drugged you and you’re hallucinating all this.

  Another part of her, the curious side, urged her to explore all possibilities that maybe, just maybe, he was telling the truth. Her hand slipped into the pocket of her robe and she found a piece of paper. Suddenly, she knew what to do.

  Calder lay at the depths of the sandy ocean floor and waited for the golden rays of sunshine to do its magic and transform him back to human form. It had been a long and lonely night without Catalina. The anguish of thinking she might not be there when he came back out of the water had just about driven him mad. After what seemed like an eternity, the morning finally arrived and he swam closer to shore. As the sun split over the horizon, its bright rays splashed into the water and Calder felt the stirrings of the approaching change.

  Impatience raged through him as his tentacles slowly receded into his body and his human shape began to shift. Blood poured into his limbs and the familiar crushing pressure increased inside him as his body realigned and his bones reformed.

  When he could no longer breathe in the water, he popped his head past the surface and sucked fresh, salty air deep into his newly converted lungs. Immediately he opened his eyes and searched the beach. Surprise and excitement crashed through him as he spied Catalina’s large RV with its colorful splash of sea life creatures emblazoned on the side.

  She hadn’t left?

  During the long, lonely night, he’d convinced himself she wouldn’t be here. As blood poured through his limbs, his strength returned.

  Finally, after several moments, he could stand. The sturdy sand beneath his feet allowed him to move swiftly toward the beach and her RV. Although he could travel faster as an Octoposeidon by using his tentacles, he’d learned to move quickly after a change into human form and he took off at a dead run out of the water.

  He made it to the side door of the RV and halted. No sound came from within and his hearts dropped in despair. Had she walked out of here? Had she gone to the authorities? Were they on their way to arrest him?

  A surge of adrenaline pounded through him and with intense wariness he surveyed the surrounding fields for any sign of activity. Nothing moved except the ankle-high grass. About two miles out in the ocean, he spied a sailboat and then a cruiser, but nothing to indicate a problem.

  If he was ever caught, he would have to either escape or kill himself with the death pill embedded safely and deeply inside his thigh, before night fell, to avoid exposing his race. Humans hadn’t evolved enough in order to be trustworthy with a species such as shapeshifters. Until they were honorable, his kind would continue to protect their species via suicide.

  As Calder lifted the latch on the door, he was surprised to find it unlocked. Although if she had run for help, she wouldn’t have bothered to lock up anyway.

  He padded up the two steps into the interior and immediately found her. Apparently she’d closed the windows as the trailer was very warm and her scent intoxicated him to the point where he wanted to wake her and start fucking her. But he held himself under strict control. He didn’t want to frighten her again.

  His breath backed up in his lungs. She’d fallen asleep, her face cradled in her arms, propped on top of the small table. The laptop sat right in front of her. The website URL and password he’d written on the card and put in her robe pocket lay on the table beside the laptop. Even if the authorities had come and found the card and used it, they would think the site was just for kooks.

  Calder grinned down at Catalina. Such a beautiful human with her soft, silky, aubur
n tresses and smooth skin. He ran his fingertip along her wrist to her elbow and sucked in a hot breath when she whimpered softly. Yes, even in sleep she would know his touch, his scent. He’d been her first Octoposeidon and she would always know him.

  He touched the screen on the laptop and it flared to life, bringing vivid images of the mating section of the Octoposeidon website. Erotic pictures of shifters with their human torsos and tentacle arms and legs intertwined, or swollen tentacles penetrating mouths, vaginas and asses, had his breath coming faster.

  He wondered if she believed him now. Wondered if her instincts for preserving their kind ran as deep as his own. The first week of an Octoposeidon’s change was always the most vulnerable time for their species. The octopus side was rarely an issue. It was the human side of the shifting that caused most of their problems.

  Confusion. Insanity. Denial. Suicide. He hoped Catalina would embrace who she really was.

  There would, of course, be many questions. On both sides. The urge to fuck her grew more intense as he continued to inhale her succulent scent. When a female slept and dreamed of sex or when she was close to her mate, her sensual odor was always present. Those were the most dangerous times for the human side of the female Octoposeidon, giving her away to fellow Octos who might be in the area.

  Right now she was giving off an extremely seductive aroma and it was wreaking havoc with his self-control. Perhaps that’s why she had kept her windows closed? Because she’d read the warnings on the website?

  Excitement pounded through him at that hope.

  “Catalina,” he whispered. His voice sounded too hoarse. Desperate. He needed to calm himself or he would frighten her. Or then again, if she got him even more aroused, his smell would fire off his skin and seduce her into his arms.

  He needed to wake her before he grew even more heady. They needed to talk.

  “Catalina,” he repeated, this time a little louder.

  She whimpered again, a sexy little moan that had him wanting to hoist her up on the table and slide his tentacle-tattooed shaft deep into the snug warmth of her pussy. He smiled down at her as she blinked. Warmth melted through his entire body as she lifted her head and stared at him. His gut hollowed out at the momentary flash of fear shifting through her pretty, sky-blue eyes.

  Then it was gone. Replaced by trust and acceptance. Instincts told him her brain had successfully made the transition. Her human side had caught up with her Octoposeidon side. He hadn’t anticipated it to happen this quickly. He’d expected a few more days of holding her here against her will, and then shifting together to Octo form and back to human form before her instincts for self-preservation would kick in. She was smarter than he’d given her credit for.

  “Hey,” she whispered and smiled. The beauty of it stabbed deep into his hearts like a ray of sunshine, lifting his spirits and increasing his urgency to mate with her.

  “You smell nice,” she said, tilting her head as she gazed up at him. Her lips were slightly parted, as if she were expecting a kiss. Dare he kiss her?

  Shit. His odor was seducing her. Ah, hell. He’d just have to go for it.

  Catalina should be afraid of him. At least a part of her brain was telling her that, but her need to be with him was pushing away the remnants of fear with every breath. By studying that website she’d begun to understand the things that had been happening to her. The intense sexual dreams, her crazy attraction to Calder, her fascination with tentacles and why she’d been blacking out.

  Okay, so she wasn’t pure human. She’d get over it. She had to.

  “We need to talk,” he whispered as his head drew closer and, to her delight, his lips tingled softly across her mouth, leaving her wanting more. So much more.

  “About?”

  He pulled away and straightened.

  “Us,” he said.

  She really liked the sound of that.

  “You can’t tell anyone about what we are, Cat. Pure humans can’t handle it.” His tone was serious and she forced herself to focus on being serious too. Kind of hard when all she wanted was the sexy man’s tattooed cock buried deep inside her.

  “I know. I went through the website with a fine-toothed comb.”

  “Yeah, I know it’s fascinating stuff about discovering there is another species living among the human population, but you can’t tell any of your friends. Under any circumstances.”

  “I understand.” After witnessing his transformation, she’d gone online and read everything on that site. Her brain fully comprehended the seriousness of the situation and the dangers of being a female Octoposeidon, especially during the times when males smelled her and might fight Calder to get her.

  It was weird how easily she’d accepted what she’d read. How it all made sense.

  “I don’t understand why my mother and father never told me the truth. How could they not tell me? I remember when my mom was alive I always had babysitters at night. Mom and Dad worked nights, or so they said. My mom was at home during the day and she took care of me. My dad worked as a teacher at the local college. I just thought he was a workaholic. I never questioned why he worked so much. And when my mom passed away, the woman he remarried must be an Octoposeidon.”

  “Once a male has a female and he loses her, he finds it extremely difficult to continue living, so he is forced to find and fight for a mate quickly. Your father was lucky to have found two mates in his lifetime. As you have read on the website, females are rare.”

  She nodded, remembering reading that.

  “They probably didn’t tell you because they were trying to protect you. Many times the child remains human and never changes. Sometimes parents decide to keep their shapeshifting a secret from the child to give them as normal a life as possible. There’s no real way to know if a child will change until the scent.”

  Catalina smiled as warmth splashed through her. “Oh yes, the scent. Which, by the way, I love on you. You smell too good to resist, my man with the tentacle tattoo. Too good to resist.”

  His eyes flared a deeper shade of green and he leaned closer. “I love you, Catalina. I’ve loved you from the moment I first smelled you.”

  “I can honestly say the same, Calder. I love you too.”

  “When do I get the rest of my tattoo?” he whispered against her mouth.

  “After. We have more important things to do at the moment,” she replied.

  Excitement laced his face and his mouth descended upon hers again, his warm lips making love to hers. He made her entire body tingle and her instincts told her she finally fit in somewhere. It was awesome, this strong sense of belonging. She wouldn’t trade it for anything in the world. She was going to love this new way of life and she was going to love Calder.

  Forever.

  Destined

  Of Fate and Fury

  Carly O’Shea and Cam Cassidy

  About the Story

  Kathryn Callahan expected nothing, resigned to her world and the literal trappings of it, having no knowledge of the danger her life was in by just existing. The world she lived in was an illusion, one created years ago, unbeknownst to her, one that was on the verge of complete destruction from a terror so dark and unhuman no one would expect it.

  Alexei Vanzetti was a vampire living in the human world, his secrets hidden, his life never complete, despite living as veritable royalty of the vampires. He was a consummate ladies’ man and a master of business, having had decades to do so. The stories passed down through history had always foretold the end of the human’s rule of the world, and the vampire-human couple that could keep the earth from utter ruin, yet he had no idea of his role.

  In one moment, everything changes and the path of the world and the two who can save it are never going to be the same. Can two people who have nothing - yet everything - in common save the world? Will passions win or will fear of the unknown destroy their very chances before they even start.

  Chapter One

  Kathryn Callahan laid in bed and stared at t
he ceiling deep in thought. She had been a guest of Master Eugene Tussand for what had seemed like an eternity. A guest was what he liked to call her, what he said to his so-called friends or associates that stopped by. The word could not have been further from the truth. She thought back to the first time she had laid eyes on him. Walking through the open markets in Baton Rouge was her usual routine. It had been an unusually hot day and she was dressed in shorts and a tank top, and had pulled her long dark hair up on top of her head in a messy bun. Even now, if she closed her eyes and thought hard enough, she could almost smell the sweet scent of the fresh fruit. The feeling of eyes had been on her, following her and sending a chill through her despite the heat. Back then she attributed it to paranoia.

  Young and stupid is what you were, Kat. Always go with your gut.

  She left the market. Unable to shake the feeling of being watched she turned several times only to find no one there. Once home, she walked into her small apartment, went to the kitchen and placed the bags on the counter. A cold wind seemed to blow through the room, and when she turned, her heart leaped into her throat and she screamed at the man who stood beside her. In one step he had her, his hand pressed over her mouth. "I have looked for a treasure such as you for a century, my dear. Know that I wish you no harm; that is, unless you force my hand, which I assure can be quite firm and not to your liking."

  With all the strength she had, she shoved against his chest with both hands. He stood unyielding. She bit at his hand across her mouth, and his hand jerked away only to quickly wrap it around her throat, holding her in place. "Drawing my blood is not something that you would wish to do, little one. At least not now. One day we will discover the implications if that were to occur. Only then would I possibly allow you to take of my blood."