A nod from Santino revealed he knew as much, too. A phantom weight rolled off my chest.
What I was telling him was bad enough. I didn’t want him to hear from my lips that any kind of sexual intercourse with a Rusalka was ultimately lethal. Especially when I didn’t know how much of that curse I’d brought along with me when I’d changed.
My cheeks heated at the thought—at why the subject had even crossed my mind—and the gentle brush of wind seemed sharper against my skin. But I didn’t flinch away from our interlaced fingers.
Even when every nerve in my body was torn between wanting Santino and running from him.
“When the magic hit,” I continued as he led the way through a series of tightly scattered rocks with me following just a half of a step behind, “three of us changed. The Rusalkas attacked Iza at once, tainting the water red with her blood before she could even utter a word. But Angela—she attempted to plead with them. Reason with them. She was one of the core members of the group, one of the oldest, too. She tried to convince her sisters, her friends, that just because she had a tail, it didn’t make her any different from the spirit they had spent decades—some even centuries—with.”
A shudder rippled through me. Santino stopped to turn around, his blue-and-silver gaze revealing an edge of hardness that wasn’t directed at me—but at what he knew followed.
I bit down a sob. “Santino, I escaped while they were tearing Angela apart. I used the spill of her blood as cover and swam as fast and as far as this new body could take me. I knew my sisters would kill me if they ever laid eyes on me again, perhaps even came after me if the currents brought hints of my location. But I never thought they would send someone to kill me while I was on land. Not when being separated from water is a punishment I have to live with every second of every day just because I’m different.”
The pain within me shifted into anger. Tears scalded my cheeks, and I wiped them away before they had the opportunity to fall. While a single drop shouldn’t be enough to ignite the magic, I didn’t want to risk even the slimmest chance of going through another shift. I was exhausted, and hurt, and needed to find out where I would go once Santino led me back to Piran.
The man in question caught another stray tear with the tip of his finger, then gently cupped my cheek.
“I’ll help you, Liana,” he whispered, the velvet of his voice engulfing me as gently as the press of night around us. “I’ll help you get your freedom back.”
6
Santino’s apartment in the very heart of Piran was small, but not unpleasantly so. It smelled of books, old and new, that were perched on the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves dominating the southern wall. They made me fall in love with the place in an instant. But even more than the alluring fragrance of paper I’d missed so much while living in the morass, it was the traces of him that captured my senses and wrapped me in their velvet cloak. It was as if Santino himself were embedded in every atom of air, in every dark-hued throw pillow scattered across the cozy love seat, and in the minimal, but tasteful decorations that created a unique, warm atmosphere.
And yet that same scent made me pause as the door locked behind us.
“This… Santino, I can’t.” I shook my head, mortified that I had been so selfish as to even let it come this far. “Police or not, I can’t let you risk ruining your life because of me.”
He crossed his arms and leaned against the doorframe as if he was ready to physically block me in case I acted on the growing urge to escape. “I won’t go back on my word, Liana. Now, do I have to stand here all night or can I make us some dinner?”
I blinked. He couldn’t be serious… But before I had the chance to protest, my stomach rumbled—another little side effect of this new mermaid state, since food wasn’t all that vital for a Rusalka.
Santino gave me a pointed look. He got his answer. Or, rather, my treacherous body gave it to him with another rumble to back it up.
I grunted, and walked deeper inside the apartment to show him I wouldn’t bolt. For now. Seemingly satisfied, Santino spilled from the doorframe with liquid grace, his long strides carrying him towards the kitchenette occupying the corner adjacent to the living room.
Gods, he really was serious.
He opened a cupboard and reached for the top shelf, the soft clank of dishes filling the silence that stretched between us. For a moment, all I did was stare at him, noting the tasteful, fit triangle of his back. My gaze involuntarily dipped lower, then back up again as heat invaded my cheeks.
I’d dreamed about being here, dreamed of sharing something as simple as a meal with this gorgeous man on far too many nights when the draw of the ocean subsided and I finally fell asleep, secreted away in the colorless boarding house.
But that was it. A dream. Wishful thinking that would never step beyond the realm of the imaginary.
I let loose a steadying breath. “Can I at least bandage your shoulder before you whip out the dishes?”
I could have sworn I’d seen a hint of a smile touch his face when he glanced at me, a silver pot dangling from his hand. It was all I got, too, because between one heartbeat and the next, he was already by the sink, filling the dish with tap water before placing it on the narrow stove.
“It’s just a flesh wound, cara.” He shrugged, then slowly turned around and prowled over to the nook beneath the stairs that connected the ground floor to the spacious upper level I’d spied over the airy railing. “I’ll clean it up while you change.”
He opened a couple of drawers and reemerged with a bundle in his hands, then, wordlessly, deposited the clothes in my lap. My fingers bunched in the fabric. I stared at the dark gray man’s T-shirt and black boxer shorts—with the tag still on—but before I could argue, Santino’s palm pressed against the small of my back, ushering me towards the bathroom.
“Dinner will be ready in fifteen,” was all he said before he closed the door behind me, leaving me bewildered and utterly wrapped in his spell.
For long, long seconds, I stood on the cool tiles, clutching the spare clothes and staring blankly at the white wood door, filtering through the sounds of Santino rummaging around the kitchen. My mind was a swarm of jumbled thoughts, all of them centered around the silver-haired cafe owner. My boss. Savior. I shook my head. All of this was just too…peculiar.
I was well aware that I’d spent a century surrounded by no one but the Rusalkas and those men we drew to their sloshing graves. Enough to lose my grip on reality existing beyond the water. But even before, I couldn’t remember many humans acting this aloof after getting shot—while trying to save a mermaid’s tail, at that.
Honestly, I didn’t know whether I should laugh or march out there and give him a piece of my mind.
A cop, I reminded myself. Santino was a cop. Getting shot isn’t a novelty to him, so stop panicking and pull yourself together.
Sadly, that was easier said than done. My thoughts refused to cooperate, and I was fairly certain I was flirting with a nervous breakdown somewhere down the line. But eventually I regained enough composure to strip away the towel and bra. Not wanting to go through another shift, I decided against a shower, although the salt clinging to my skin persisted to act as a cruel, aromatic reminder of just how lost I was in this world.
Lost, but not stranded.
I bit my lip as Santino’s image flooded my mind again, the memory of the heat in his silver eyes when he skimmed my almost naked form…
Stop it.
That had been before he knew the ugly truth of who I’d been—still was, in a way. Although he was obviously inclined to help me, the notion surely came out of the same sense of duty that had driven him to join the force. His show of goodwill wasn’t personal in an intimate way. Nor was it a gesture of affection, regardless of how much I might have wished otherwise.
With a sigh, I pulled on the gray cotton tee, then snapped the tag of the boxer shorts and slipped them on, marveling just a little at how good they felt against my skin. My hair was an un
ruly lilac mess of salt-kissed strands, so I finger combed it into submission, then walked back out the door, my mood a few shades lighter.
However, any moderate amount of calmness I might have gained while confined within the bathroom walls was gone the instant my gaze fell on Santino.
The man had changed his clothes while I was inside. A three-quarter sleeved raglan black shirt adorned his honed body now, coupled with matching dark slacks that rippled with movement and showed off the inviting swell of his ass every time he leaned over the white wood counter. I blushed violently, swatting away those thoughts with an almost feverish urge, and forced my feet to move. By some miracle, I managed to make it to the small table where Santino had already laid out two plates, filled to the rim with parmesan and olive-covered pasta.
Having barely eaten a thing all day, my mouth watered at the scent. I sat down and snatched a silver fork before realizing it wasn’t polite to eat while your company was still working. A chuckle came from behind just as I froze, the fork suspended in mid-air.
“Go ahead, piccola. I’ll be there in a second.”
I glanced over my shoulder, noting the grace with which Santino poured two large glasses of red wine—a local Teran, judging by the colors on the label—then walked over and placed one in front of me while holding on to the other. There were no traces of his previous harshness, of those shadows I’d seen amassing and dissipating like morning mist when I’d revealed my heritage.
No, there was only Santino—the carefree Italian who seemed so at ease in his beloved bar, enjoying life one day at a time. If I had been shocked before, when the light had given way to darkness, the staggering transformation I witnessed now was well beyond my comprehension.
My thoughts must have shown somewhere on my face because he shrugged and lazily swirled the wine, filling the atmosphere with its potent aroma. “Anger or fear cause more problems than they solve, piccola. If you give in to their clutches, the rise to the surface is far longer than it would have otherwise been.”
A little to my surprise, I’d taken Santino’s advice to heart and enjoyed my meal in pleasant silence, the quiet only occasionally ruffled by a casual remark that, while seeming out of place given the circumstances, felt so right in the intimacy of his apartment and company. Only when the last of the pasta had been cleared away and our wineglasses once more refilled did Santino return to the grim origin of our peculiar situation.
“Caz, my former partner, still works for the police. I’ll reach out to him, see if he can find anything on the PI or his…employers.” That last word dripped with distaste, but it wasn’t his obvious aversion to Rusalkas that made me clutch my wineglass tighter. No, that involuntary jerk had everything to do with what I’d instinctively felt he would say next.
“He’ll scour the official and unofficial channels alike.”
I forced myself to loosen my grip before I cracked the delicate stem. “Your partner isn’t human?”
It wasn’t the supernatural aspect that caught me off guard, but rather the odd time frame it was nestled in.
From what I’d learned during my brief stay on land, the police had added quite a large number of supernatural individuals to their ranks—not only because of their superior strength, but to make up for the knowledge humankind lacked. Yet for all the open-mindedness the world at large seemed to exhibit now, the inclusion of non-human assets had only happened two years ago… So either Santino had only recently quit the force—which I somehow doubted—or his partner must have done his own undercover stint whilst applying for the job. Long before the magic hit.
“Caz has always been inventive,” Santino commented with a smile to his voice, confirming my suspicion. “Kept a supply of blood handy for any random tests thrown his way, and the only people to witness his true strength were the criminals he brought down.” A real smile now played across his lips. “Quite impressively, I must say, even when limited to only his human form.”
Curiosity stirred, and I took a long sip of my wine. We had far more important things to discuss now that Santino seemed to be open to the unpleasant side of our rendezvous, but I simply couldn’t resist asking. “What is he?”
Something shifted in Santino’s gaze—that same shadow I had seen when I admitted my nymph heritage. His words, however, held no emotion as he said, “Perelesnyk.”
The breath whizzed out of my lungs as if someone punched me in the gut.
A Perelesnyk. An incubus dragon.
I must have paled, because Santino was beside me the next moment, those silver eyes scanning my face and one arm ready to catch me in case I tumbled down from my chair.
“Are you all right?”
I nodded, then drank the rest of my wine in a single gulp while Santino reclaimed his spot on the opposite side of the table. He was giving me space, but the tension visible in the corded muscles of his lean body let on he was still far from being relaxed himself.
Still waiting to intervene, I realized.
“I’m sorry,” I made myself say with a weak smile I knew could hardly mask my duress. “I know it must seem odd to you that a water nymph could be shaken by anything of the supernatural variety. But myths are myths. Even for my kind. Well, former kind, at least.”
“Dragons can have that effect on people,” Santino agreed, an odd mix of amusement and vigilance lurking in the tone of his voice. “But Caz is a good man. And he’s a great cop. On and off the books.”
I nodded, trusting his word and more than a little angry at myself for reacting in such a manner. While fear is something I had little influence over, prejudice was another thing altogether. Judging an entire species based on one dragon’s actions was, in its core, just as bad as the Rusalkas hunting me for being a mermaid. I let out a breath and squared my shoulders, finally meeting Santino’s gaze without the presence of doubt etched into the lines of my face.
“So what am I supposed to do in the meantime?” I asked, changing the subject, but not without cause.
It was getting late, and the food, as well as the frequent shifts, were making me drowsy. Yet despite the exhaustion, I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep without having at least a sliver of a plan to hold on to.
“You stay here.”
His response was quick, casual, as if me staying at my boss’s place while there was a bounty out on my head was a perfectly normal thing to do. Santino’s silver eyes dug into mine, squishing my objections.
“I can’t keep watch over you if you wander around town, and the boarding house is not safe enough. I’ll pick up the rest of your things when I go out in the morning.”
He nudged his head towards the club table, to the light glint of metal I noticed only now. My purse.
“You left it at the bar before you stormed out.”
Gods, it said a lot about my state of mind that I hadn’t as much as noticed my purse was missing for an entire day. Then again, I hadn’t needed one for a century, and having something draped over my shoulder was a sensation I hadn’t grown accustomed to well enough so that its absence would bother me. Still… I obviously needed to shut down for the night before I lost my head, too, as my grandma liked to say.
“Thank you,” I said as I stood, Santino doing the same on the other side. Exhaustion slithered through me, a rolling force that bloomed as the presence of danger receded and weighted heavily on my eyelids. I glanced at the love seat, then Santino. “If it’s not too much trouble, do you have a sheet I could use to cover—”
“Nonsense,” he cut in. “You’re taking the bed, cara, and that’s nonnegotiable.”
He meant it, too, because as my lips parted in objection, Santino was already moving to the wooden stairs—although ladder was perhaps a better term—leading up to the gallery. I ascended behind him, all the while marveling at how high the slanted ceiling was in this part of the apartment. There were no walls up here, only a light railing that lined the edge of the floor and gave a wonderful view of the kitchenette and living room spread down below.
> From this perspective, the space seemed even more endearing, and the king-size bed dominating the open bedroom plan drew me in with the sweet promise of temporary oblivion. I plopped down on the mattress, unable to keep my eyes from closing at how good the cool caresses of silk felt against my thighs. My bed in the boarding house was functional, but this… It was divine.
When I opened my eyes anew, Santino was watching me, his sensual lips touched with the ghost of a smile. He sat down on the edge of the bed, close enough to touch if I moved even the slightest bit.
I didn’t take that leap.
But Santino did.
He brushed his knuckles against my cheek, the touch so light, yet heated, that a soft moan I refused to give voice to swelled in my chest. The inviting curls of his hair fell forward in a silver cascade that framed his handsome face, yet for all the breathtaking beauty, I couldn’t help noticing the edge of sadness that lingered in his eyes as he gazed down upon me, bathing my skin with the warmth of his.
“Rusalka or not,” he whispered, and I shivered beneath his touch, “nobody deserves to be hunted for what they cannot change.”
His fingers trailed the line of my jaw and dipped down to my neck, exploring and caressing the sensitive skin, then, finally, skimmed across my collarbone. He exhaled, eyes like burning moonlight as he met my gaze. Then, as if tugged back by an invisible force, he straightened, leaving me stranded and cold in the sudden absence of his touch. With silent strides, he walked over to the stairs, one hand already on the railing.
I heard a long breath uncoil from his chest before he turned around, shadows dancing across his stark features. “I’ve learned how hard second chances are to come by, piccola. Regardless of how difficult or impossible it may seem at first, you should never waste them. Buona notte.”
Sirens and Scales Page 78
