* * *
Two years ago she had witnessed her parents’ selfishness first-hand. They had invited Milly, who was struggling under her well-meaning aunt’s strict rules, to the Azores to finish high school and go to university. They’d wanted to reconnect.
Zara had been cautious, but Milly had been ecstatic.
“I haven’t been there since I was three!” She was dancing, Zara could tell, on the other end of the cell phone. “It’s like rediscovering long-lost family. And there will be no curfews!”
Zara rubbed the ridged scar on her forehead. “Are you sure about this?”
“Absolutely!”
Milly had been three but Zara had been seven when their grandfather died. Scrounging moldy plates for a meal while her parents chucked wine bottles at her head — laughing when the glass shattered — was a memory she’d mostly suppressed.
But Milly hadn’t suffered. She’d always been their parents’ favorite. And she was no helpless child.
Zara let her hand drop. “Call if you need anything.”
“Of course. Don’t be such a worry-wart! This is going to be great.”
And at first, it had been. Excitement at their rich lifestyle gradually bled to distress and, finally, disappearance.
Her letter arrived on the last day of Zara’s senior finals. How her parents started out nice but fought all the time about money. How when Milly, an essentially good kid who just wanted to spread her wings a little, refused to drink or take drugs or go anywhere alone with their creepier friends, they got mean. And, finally, how they took away her money, passport, clothes, and cell phone, and made her a prisoner on their yacht. They were moored at the Ilha Sagrada in a last-ditch effort to force her into some ancient surrogacy “Sea Bride” cult.
“The legend says, ‘when the moon lights the spring path, a lord of the sea will arise, shower the family with wealth, and claim the daughter for his bride.’” Milly’s letter explained. “Our parents know people who got Sea Opal gemstones this way, though I don’t think they believe the ‘sea lord’ part for a moment. But, honestly, Zara, if a real, live ‘sea lord’ appeared in front of me right now, I wouldn’t hesitate. An undersea kingdom can’t possibly be worse than what I’m going through right now.”
The rest of the letter was filled with how she was to blame for her predicament, how she had driven her parents to their actions, and other toxic brainwashing abusers used to groom, hobble, and finally break their victims. It read like an example testimony out of Zara’s textbooks. Except it was her sister, and it had happened on Zara’s watch.
What Social Justice major could fail her own sister? Zara knew the signs. She’d just been too busy, too certain she was the only victim, too complacent to pay attention.
She would never forgive herself.
Zara had arrived in the Azores, contacted police, and chartered her own boat to the isolated Ilha Sagrada where Milly was held captive. The police were delayed by a worse emergency, so Zara stormed the stronghold expecting to find ropes, sedatives, and violent kidnappers.
Instead, she found only her sister and her parents.
Her sister had hunched in a corner of the cave wearing a dirty hotel bathrobe. One arm locked tight around her knees. Her gaze focused on the small pool in the middle of the cavern.
Her mother sat nearby and poured insults like poison syrup into her ears.
“You have my hair. Such pretty hair. Well, it would be pretty if it wasn’t so greasy. You’re dirty. Ugly. No one can stand you. Your aunt couldn’t stand you, and neither could your sister. I can’t stand you either, and that’s why you have to repay our kindness. We invited you here. You owe us.”
Zara stepped into the shaft of light. “Milly.”
Her sister blinked, frowned, and then focused as though coming out of a fog. “Zara. You came.” Her eyes filled with tears. “I knew you’d come.”
Zara held out her hand. “Let’s go.”
Her mother clamped a hand on Milly’s arm, forcing her back down. “It’s not time to go yet.”
Milly wavered.
“Yes, it is.” Zara stared into the black pits. “There’s a boat waiting for us and the police are on their way.”
“Police?” Her mother looked genuinely confused. “Why?”
“Come on.” Zara tugged Milly to her bare feet.
Her mother clawed on, dragged upright as well. “Milly wants to be here. She wants to help us.”
“Great. She can explain that in the police station.”
“No,” her mother said. “The time is now. She wants to be here.”
Milly hesitated. Her voice sounded thick with disuse, and this close, she did smell unwashed, with sour breath as though she’d been afraid to eat or take off her clothes. Dark hollows shadowed her eyes; she hadn’t been sleeping either. “They took everything. My money, my passport.”
“She gave it to us,” her mother shrieked.
“We’ll get it reissued at the embassy,” Zara assured her quietly.
A weight lifted from her sister’s brow.
Her mother blackened. “If you leave here, Milly, you’ll never go to university.”
Milly hesitated again.
Did all traffickers read the same textbook?
“Forget it,” Zara said. “We’ll sort it out later.”
“But they’re going to pay for my tuition.” Milly frowned. “All of it.”
“That’s what scholarships are for.”
“But—”
“It’s a lie. They don’t have the money. Otherwise, they wouldn’t be selling you to some stranger.” Zara tugged her. “Let’s go.”
Milly started to walk to freedom.
Their mother sucked in a deep breath and screamed, high-pitched, like a young girl. The noise pierced Zara’s ears like a pin. Milly clamped her hands over hers and crouched, shaking.
Their father rose like a bear from hibernation, stumbling to his feet with a furious roar. He fixed on his wife, who broke off with a gasp, and then on Zara.
“Who’re you?” he demanded, his voice steady and his question ending on a snarl.
For the first time since arriving in the country, a cold shudder of suppressed memories rolled over Zara. Ugly fear burned the back of her throat like acid bile.
She froze.
Her mother spoke in an ordinary tone. “That’s our plain daughter, Zara.”
He stared at her without a flicker of recognition. But his manner changed from a hulking bear to a charismatic businessman. “Zara! I didn’t recognize you. Are you coming to join our family holiday? What a nice surprise.”
Milly clung to her.
Zara shook herself free of the spell. She backed away.
“Where are you going?” he asked, the picture of cheer.
“She’s taking Milly away, and she says the police are coming.”
He blinked. “The police aren’t coming.”
Hot anger forced itself out of Zara’s mouth. “Yes, they are!”
That’s how she missed the sign.
Milly whimpered.
Her father threw his half-full gin bottle. It punched her shoulder, knocking her sideways. She landed on her butt.
And then her father was on her.
He shoved Milly out of the way. She shrieked. His fist gripped Zara by the hair and he wrenched her head back. The shock of it made her whole body jerk. Her skin stretched tight. His face loomed, shadowed by the blinding skylight. His gin-laced breath stank.
“I don’t like people who sneak in to hurt me.”
Her heart rate escalated to black.
She tried to swallow. He was pulling her hair so taut it made her face clench. She could barely suck in a breath. Her gaze tunneled.
He shook her. His smile remained intact. “Understand me?”
Behind him, her mother was standing over Milly. Watching. No one was doing anything. She was all alone.
She couldn’t speak no matter how hard she tried. Was her father going to snap her
neck?
And then, over his shoulder, a man emerged from the pool.
She only had a sense of movement. Lithe muscle, severe grace. The amber glint of a sharply bladed staff, a trident. Aquamarine tattoos.
The male crossed the cavern and gripped her father around the back of the neck the same way he gripped her. Her father let her go in shock and struggled to turn and face his attacker. “Who—”
The male flung her father across the cavern.
Her father landed in a heap, rolled, and groaned.
Zara dropped to her palms and gasped for breath. Apparently while her father had been gripping her, he’d also been strangling her, and she hadn’t noticed from the all-consuming panic. The black tunnel receded as oxygen returned to her lungs.
She looked up to see the male — nude, tattoos swirling over his torso and fine buttocks — pointing his blade at her mother. Her mother froze. Saying words in an unfamiliar language, he nudged the tip on the back of her hand. She released Milly, and both women stepped back. He waved his trident in a subtle but unmistakable order to move away. Their mother moved into the middle of the cavern until she was closer to their father.
The male spoke to them harshly in an unfamiliar language. Although it wasn’t clear what he said, everyone flinched at the appropriate moments.
Milly crawled to Zara and clung to her as if she were the only real thing. They were treated to a view of his fine backside as he lectured their parents.
“The legend is true,” she whispered to Zara. “It’s the Sea Lord.”
It was hard to argue with her. He’d emerged like a ninja from a pool. In partial profile, he had a dark head of hair, bluish, tanned skin swirled with aquamarine tribal tattoos, and implacable muscle that spoke of a life of hard physical exertion. The salty droplets on his skin could be sweat. He had the build of a warrior. Broad shoulders, tapered waist, firm buttocks, huge thighs and calves, and arms that rippled from his neck down to his wrists in perfect muscle groups. He was like a bodybuilder who existed on fish and seaweed; high protein, zero fat.
And he had daggers strapped to him with what appeared to be seaweed. Tied to both biceps and both thighs, with the trident, he was a regular commando.
His eyes, when he finally turned away from her parents as not a threat, were an otherworldly blue with flecks of aquamarine. His eyes matched his tattoos. No, that didn’t make any sense. Someone must have matched his ink to his eyes.
From here, he might be a warrior. But the feeling, when he turned to them with gentle protectiveness, was of a knight.
* * *
Zara jolted back to the present. The dark beach, the nearby crab, the clouds rolling across the starlit sky. She was safe. It was over. She had survived.
Her heart still thundered, all out of rhythm, and sweat beaded up on her body, chilled by the night breeze.
Zara rolled over and hugged her elbows, relishing the grit of sand.
That day in the sacred island cave had stuck in Zara’s chest as a starkly violent, bloody trauma she had survived because Elan had saved her.
She had not saved herself. She had not channeled some mysterious power.
She had been completely at her father’s mercy. Terrified and terrorized. Her noble intentions to save Milly had been smashed by his brutal force.
She should have waited for the police. She should have run the instant her father roared awake. She could not have defeated him. To this day, she could not defeat her father.
He was more powerful. More ruthless. More violent.
So were the undersea warriors. Their assault a year ago had amplified the first trauma tenfold. It had shattered her belief only her father was capable of violence. Assaults could come from anyone. At any time. And Elan could not save her.
How could she save herself?
Could she afford not to try?
Zara sat up, removed her tennis shoes and socks, and walked barefoot across the moonlit shore. The ocean waves caressed her all-too-human toes.
It was the first time she’d touched the ocean since she’d climbed out a year ago. She wiggled her toes and walked deeper. Clear water and silky sand fluttered as she walked into the waves, bracing for wave after wave endlessly assaulting the shore.
This was dumb. She wasn’t capable. If she’d had special powers, they already would have revealed themselves.
She took another step deeper. A sneaker wave shoved her back, tossing her off balance. She retreated to the shallows.
This was impossible.
On dry land, she knew her enemies. Police enforced the laws. Her family — whether her aunt who had saved her and Milly as children, or Vaw Vaw’s family, or the extended Azores community — cared.
Under the water, lawless warriors followed an ancient honor code. She didn’t know who to trust. Everyone was a potential enemy.
Zara strode for the shore, flopped down next to her abandoned shoes, and buried her feet in the warm, dry sand. Piling it high, she anchored herself.
Having fighting powers was a dream. A fantasy. She wanted it to be possible, but she couldn’t un-live the horrors of that long-ago night. She couldn’t stand up to her parents if they appeared in front of her right now. She couldn’t save Zain or Elan. She couldn’t rewrite history to save herself.
She hugged her knees.
Elan’s powerful figure emerged from the sea, Zain boosted gently in his arms. Her heart eased. They were alive.
Zara stood and grabbed her tennis shoes and socks.
Milly picked them up at the appointed time. The ride home was wet and quiet and they made her car smell like sea water.
At home, Zara intended to follow Milly up the stairs to her bed, but hesitated on the bottom step.
Elan moved.
“Do not run.” He put one hand on the railing, blocking the stairs. “You are stronger than this.”
His hot breath made shivers travel up the back of her neck and a flowering sensation blossom between her legs. His masculine scent of salt and male hooked her libido and squeezed.
But it was dangerous.
“Sometimes the only choice is to run,” she whispered.
“You have another choice.”
“How can I defeat your warriors if you failed?”
The dark shadows deepened around his eyes.
Reality wasn’t what he needed right now, clearly. She was still confused in her heart and he was beyond exhausted. He needed kindness, and anyway, his faith in her was like a sweet wish that made her chest ache even as she denied its possibility.
She linked her arm in his and led him to the couch. “Come and sleep.”
Even though they had already had sex once here, the living room couch felt more exposed and therefore less likely to end in a repeat. As much as she craved sex, at this point, it would only confuse her tangled feelings more.
She tugged him down. He obediently stretched his imposing form, and then he tugged her. She tumbled into his arms. He held her tightly, resting his chin on her head.
Curving into his warm, protective arms felt too good.
She protested. “Let me go.”
“Please. A short time.” His muscles tensed and relaxed. “I dreamed of this every night for a year.”
Her, too.
Her defenses eased. His large palms squeezed her biceps and shoulders and thighs, raising delicious anticipation that tossed over her earlier intention to only sleep.
And then his limbs weighted down and his breathing slowed, collapsing in as though he were drugged.
Staying in his arms tested her self-control. The temptation to run her fingers over his hard abs and lower was almost unbearable. She wiggled to get free.
He sucked in a breath and squeezed her tighter.
She stopped. Maybe it was okay to stay for a few minutes…
Zara awoke to stark morning light.
Elan’s breath sighed gently against her neck in the slow, long rhythm of deep sleep. In the night, his wide hand had reached down to
cup her mons and the other gently kneaded her breast.
Her body flooded with hot desire.
Waking him would be cruel. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d slept. And time already moved differently under the water, with a single hour lasting nearly a day and a week lasting almost a month.
Zain whimpered in the bathroom.
Her baby needed her!
Zara eased out of Elan’s unconscious embrace, tugged her disheveled, day-old clothes into place, and checked on her son.
He was sitting upright in the tub, his fins splayed, and the seaweed floating in a pool of liquid that hadn’t existed the night before. But she hadn’t heard the water flowing into the tub.
“You drank a lot of sea water, didn’t you?” She teased her serious little boy, who stared at her with a miniature version of her own dark brown eyes flecked with Elan’s aquamarine. “You know what? This seaweed has gotten stinky. Let’s get rid of it and give you a bath.”
He made no protest as she drained the tub, dragged the seaweed outside, and then filled the bath with fresh water and scrubbed Zain with no-tears baby soap.
She’d worried this impulse purchase would never come in handy. And now, she was using it.
This was her dream.
Zain splashed in the water, not seeming to mind the bubbles at all, and came out smelling like orange sherbet and clean baby. She dried him in a fluffy towel and carried him outside.
Twenty minutes later, when she was serving applesauce and leftover mashed stew from Vaw Vaw, it suddenly struck her that she’d carried Zain outside. He hadn’t made a peep.
Progress! What had changed?
She’d given him the bath, absentminded, and had been thinking that everything would work out. She’d felt satisfied. Content.
Not afraid.
Elan was right.
When she defeated her fears, she would become a whole person.
And then she would once more embrace love.
The key was Zain. In only three days Zain had gone from frantic rejection to calm acceptance. Babies really were very resilient.
He was fighting his hardest to become a family. Elan, too. Why couldn’t she?
A tickle in her throat warned her that she was about to get very emotional. Like magic, his little mouth turned upside down and his eyes filled with baby tears.
Sirens and Scales Page 63
