“Cay!” She undulated against him, shivering with need at the feelings his stroking fingers ignited. He flicked her clit lightly and rapidly until she whimpered in his arms. Every nerve ending tingled with awareness of him.
“That’s it, my darling Bell,” he crooned in her ear. “You’re so damn sweet. Come for me before I fuck that tight pussy of yours. It’s all I can think about. Is that bad?”
She laughed in relief. “I hope not. Because if it is, then we’re both in trouble.”
He chuckled low in his throat and wrapped her legs around his waist, stroking the sleek muscles that embraced him. “Can you hold on to me with your thighs?”
“Yes,” she responded breathlessly.
He kneaded her thigh once more and went back to kissing her. While her arms were hooked around his neck, he had one hand hanging on to the Belle’s ladder and the other wrapped around her back supporting her. Her hand slid down again, over his chest and down his stomach. He trembled as she fondled him, cupping his testicles and stroking the rampant thrust of his cock.
“Easy, Bell!” he whispered hoarsely. “Not too fast or I’ll come on you instead of inside you.”
“I don’t want to wait,” she breathed against his lips, and pressed herself against him. Grabbing his penis, she guided him between her legs. He groaned and sheathed himself inside her with one sharp thrust forward.
“Hang on,” he growled, bracing his feet against the back of the boat as he pumped powerfully into her, keeping one hand on her hip to help hold her in place. Despite the passion clouding his senses, he made sure he supported her and kept her from hitting against the boat. She gasped his name against his lips and her head dropped back. In the moonlight, he watched waves of pleasure wash through her. Both of his hands bracketed her hips as he plunged into her tight core once more. His head dropped next to hers as he cried out and came inside her.
“Oh my!” she laughed as she continued to cling to him.
“You can say that again.” He kissed the end of her nose. They stayed that way for several minutes while their breathing and their heart rates settled down. “Let’s get you back on the boat and dried off before you get too chilled.”
He had just boosted her over the Belle’s stern when something slammed into him, making his head whip forward so that his forehead struck the boat with a sharp crack.
“Shit!” he exclaimed, an explosion of pain fogging his brain.
“Cayden? What is it? What’s wrong?” Bell’s anxious face appeared over the edge of the boat.
“Get back, Bell!” he ordered. Still half-dazed, he spun around to see Ciaran turning to make another pass at him. Cayden snarled. Logically he knew he needed to transform, he could never fight him off in human form.
“Cay! Watch out!” Bell yelled right before Ciaran slammed into him again. Cayden’s thigh hit the propeller on the small motor. Pain sliced through him, but he ignored it. He had to protect her, and he could only do that if he transformed. He stared up at Bell, his dark eyes pain-filled and pleading.
“Whatever you see, Bell,” he gasped, “remember I love you!”
He ducked under the water and shifted into his seal form, at once feeling power flow through him despite his injuries.
****
Annabel thought she was going to faint. She turned and slumped down inside the boat for a minute and shook her head. She must be hallucinating! She would have sworn she just saw Cayden turn into a seal! That wasn’t possible. Was it? She twisted back around and peered over the edge of the boat again, now hearing two seals as their fight continued above and below water. She remembered the glint of gold around Cayden’s neck, and suddenly it all fell into place.
Whiskers. Cayden. They were the same. She watched in fascinated horror. Silkies. They were Silkies! But that was just a myth, a fantasy. Not something that was real. Yet the proof was fighting right in front of her. She had loved seals since she was a little girl and had read every bit of lore she could find. As a child, she fantasized that Whiskers was a Silkie. At the time she had longed for him to turn into a boy who would take her away from her mother’s death and her father’s grieving. As an adult another part of her was furiously angry that he’d kept it hidden from her.
“Stop!” she yelled at them, but to no avail. Who was it? Another seal? But she had never known them to be aggressive toward humans without provocation. Was it his father? Oh God, not that. She shook her head. Not Carrick. He would never battle his own son as if he wanted to kill him. His brother. It had to be Ciaran. Hadn’t Cayden said they had often fought? The fighting continued, teeth ripping at one another and bodies slamming together, it moved from the water onto the edge of the beach. Even in the dark, she saw that Cayden was not moving as fast as Ciaran, and she knew he must be hurt. Cayden was also not as large as his younger brother, and the weight and size differences took their toll, in addition to the injuries he’d already received before he shifted.
They weren’t paying any attention to her. She had to get help from somewhere. The radio. She’d seen the antenna and knew the transmitter must be down in the cabin. Bell grabbed her crutches and dragged her uncooperative body below to the radio there. She fumbled with it for a minute and then turned it on, praying she would find the right frequency that someone would answer.
“This is the Belle calling the Skerry.” She waited for a few seconds and when she got no reply she went to the next frequency and repeated herself. On the fifth try she finally heard a response.
“This is the Skerry, go ahead Belle.”
“I need to speak to Carrick Clifton.”
The voice on the other end was cold. “Speaking. Who is this?”
“Annabel Barton…”
“I have nothing to say to you.”
“Please! Listen!”
She spoke to dead air. “Aargh. Pig-headed seal.”
That left only her. Her hand trembled as she clipped the microphone back on the side of the radio.
****
Cayden was weakening. He felt his strength wane each time Ciaran slammed into him. He knew he had lost a lot of blood, mainly from the propeller cut he’d suffered before he transformed.
Stop Ciaran. I have done nothing to you. Stop.
Nothing? You’ve taken my place, the place I earned after your banishment.
I don’t want it. You can have it. I won’t fight you!
I don’t believe you. Fight or die, Cayden.
Cayden struggled to defend himself, but wouldn’t strike back at his brother. Whatever it was Ciaran wanted, he could have it. All Cayden wanted was to protect Bell.
Fight! Damn you, Cayden.
No.
He would not fight his brother, only try to defend himself. As Ciaran continued to press his attack, Cayden’s strength waned.
****
If Carrick or no one from the Skerry would help, then she would stop this on her own. Annabel frantically lurched through the cabin until she located the compartment that held Cayden’s emergency kit. She found a flare gun and two flares. The snarls and the slamming of the two male seals against each other continued, the sounds echoing through the cove. With her breath coming in sobs, she dragged herself back up on deck. She saw one seal standing over a form that appeared human and very still. Oh God! Had he killed him?
“No!” She screamed. She jammed a flare into the gun and raised it toward the remaining seal. “Get away from him, Ciaran. Get away or I’ll shoot!”
The seal hesitated a moment, his sleek head swiveling between Cayden’s limp body and the flare gun she held steadily on him, and then he threw himself into the dark water. While the threat to Cayden might be history, now Annabel faced a different and even more frightening dilemma as she stared at the expanse of water that separated them. She had no idea where Ciaran had disappeared. It never occurred to her that he might try to board the boat. He was interested in Cayden, not her.
Her eyes shifted. Cayden lay so still. He needed help. She couldn’t bring the B
elle closer for fear of beaching or capsizing her, and she saw no way of getting him on board. She would have to go to him. She would have to risk being in the water with Ciaran.
Annabel was in agony. She wanted to get to Cayden quickly, but she also knew she could make only one trip. She did not have the strength to go back and forth. She found the small inflatable life raft, released the inflation trigger and then put it over the side of the Belle. Then she went through the boat, methodically locating everything she thought she might need before tossing it into the raft. She went below one more time and tried the radio again. Someone had to answer. They had to.
“This is the Belle calling the Skerry. Over.”
She waited. No answer. God. She was afraid to call the Coast Guard because of what she now knew Cayden and his family to be. They would want to take him to a hospital and then what if he turned into a seal again? She would try one more time, but longer than that she couldn’t wait. God! Cayden could be bleeding to death for all she knew.
“Please,” she begged on the same frequency she’d made contact before. “This is the Belle calling the Skerry. If you can hear me, we’re anchored in the cove approximately ten miles northwest of Barton’s point. Please answer. Cayden needs your help,” her voice broke on a sob. “Please help him. Over.”
No answer. For just a moment, she let her shoulders slump wearily, but she couldn’t afford to wait any longer.
Annabel gathered their clothing and tossed it onto the raft. Finally, she grabbed the spear gun she had found and headed for the stern. She had loaded it and checked the CO2 cylinder. If Ciaran came after her, she would have to use it. If it didn’t stop him, it might at least slow him down. She had to get to Cayden. And she wouldn’t let his brother stop her. She slipped into the water, the spear gun on a wrist tether, and swam around to the raft. As much as she tried, she couldn’t stop the nervousness that made her whole body quake. Her eyes darted around her and then again to the distance between the boat and the sand where Cayden lay so still. If Ciaran attacked her the way he had Cayden, he would kill her unless she could shoot him first. She untied the raft, pushing it along by butting it with her head while she swam.
Ahead of her, on the shore, Cayden lay so still she wondered if she would find him alive.
Chapter 11
Despite having turned the volume down on the radio, Carrick Clifton heard Annabel Barton’s second call. He scowled at the radio, stubborn pride holding him rigid. The girl was the source of all the problems they had, and if Cayden had trouble now… well then it was no more than he’d asked for walking out on his own flesh and blood to tie himself to a cripple.
A slight sound behind him made him turn. Catriona stood in the doorway to the bridge, staring at him in disillusionment. He had seen the disappointment on her face ever since Ciaran and Cayden left. His chest tightened.
“Are you going to answer her?” Catriona asked. Her beautiful face was pale and showed the ravages of recent events in the hollowness of her cheeks and the circles under her eyes. She tried almost non-stop to reach out with her thoughts to both her sons, but they had closed their minds to her. The efforts had taken a toll.
“He made his bed; let him lie in it.”
Catriona stared at him. “What’s happened to you Carrick? What’s happened to the man I have loved since I was just a girl? When did you harden your heart so?”
“That girl has been nothing but trouble for all of us!” he thundered. “I will not talk to her.”
Catriona moved to his side and laid her hand on his arm. “Didn’t you hear her, Carrick? She’s telling you Cayden needs our help. Think. Do you think he would have put her on the radio, knowing how you feel about her, if there was any way he could talk? Think, Carrick. Don’t let your anger cloud your judgment so that you spend the rest of your life in regret.”
He stared at the radio.
“Please, Carrick,” Catriona pleaded. “He hasn’t answered me telepathically, but I just have a feeling something is wrong. Please, my love, I beg of you. If you won’t do it for him, then for me.”
Carrick snatched the microphone. “Belle, this is the Skerry. Go ahead.”
There was no answer.
“Belle, this is the Skerry. Go ahead.”
Dead air.
Carrick hung up the microphone and raked his fingers through his long hair. “She gave an approximate position with her last transmission.”
“Do you remember what that was?”
He shook his head.
****
Annabel panted with the effort of pulling both herself and the raft from the water. Cayden still had not moved. As soon as she was sure she had the raft far enough up the sand so it wouldn’t float away, she turned her attention to him. She checked to make sure he still breathed and then checked his pulse. Both were strong but slightly elevated. She sobbed with relief and closed her eyes for just a moment to steady herself so she could get to work.
She had dragged the emergency kit with her. Fumbling around inside, she located a flashlight and turned it on to begin checking his injuries. There was a large bump and bruise on his forehead along with numerous cuts and scrapes on his arms, shoulders and torso, but the real damage was to his thigh. She gasped as she saw the gaping wound, still slowly seeping blood. It needed stitching.
“Cayden?” she called softly, her voice thick with tears and shaky with fright. “Cay? Please, answer me, Cay. Wake up, baby, please!”
No response. Everything around them was silent. There was no one, no one at all to help. She stuck the flashlight between her teeth and gathered swabs to clean the wound. It was her or no one. So if she didn’t clean his wound, it wouldn’t get done. It didn’t matter how tired she was. After cleaning the cut, Annabel searched for butterfly bandages. They would have to do until he could get it sutured correctly. She surveyed what she had done and checked him again for any other injuries, but she couldn’t see any. He felt cold, and he was still lying partially in the water of the cove. She had to move him.
For just a moment, her composure crumbled again. She couldn’t do it. She was exhausted and her muscles already trembled with fatigue. It was too much. She covered her face with her hands as she shivered in the cooling night air. In that moment, she hated the weakened body she had been left with seven years ago, hated herself for having put Cayden in harm’s way because she was so helpless. Her head fell forward, but then she saw his pale, still face.
This man loved her. He was willing to give up even his own family to be with her. He deserved better than her giving up on him because she was a little tired. Annabel tied a rope around his waist and made a loop on the other end which she slipped over one shoulder. Slowly, laboriously, she crawled up the beach. She struggled to find purchase in the sand as she dug her elbows in and dragged not only her body, but his as well. The rope bit into her shoulder, abrading her flesh.
Annabel lost all track of time as she focused on getting him away from the water. Her breath came in painful gasps and sweat poured from her body, but she had done it. He was clear of the rising tide. Still, she couldn’t rest yet. She had to get him covered. By the time she had pulled a blanket over him, she could do nothing else, not even cover herself. She had pushed her fragile body beyond the limits of its endurance and there was simply nothing left. She fell to her side next to him and fainted.
****
Carrick Clifton stared at his wife. He had been so angry hearing the girl’s voice he paid little attention to what she actually said. He struggled now to remember.
“It was a cove ten miles from Barton’s point.” He swallowed. “I don’t remember the direction. Can’t you tune into him?”
“No. He’s shut his mind to me, Carrick. Try the radio again. I’ll get on the phone and try her house to see if someone answers.”
A quarter of an hour later, they were still no nearer locating them. The options were narrowing. The Coast Guard would be a last resort, because if Cayden had been unable to come to the r
adio, there was always a possibility it was because he wasn’t in human form.
Carrick looked at his wife, hating the heavy, haunted look in her eyes. He pulled her into a snug embrace. “We’ll find them, Cat. I promise.”
His mind flashed back to seven years ago. That time it had been Cayden he’d tried to comfort as they searched churning seas for Annabel and her boat. Carrick knew he would have to bury his animosity toward the girl, at least temporarily, so he could find his son and discover what had happened. But later? Later, once things were all right, he would find a way to separate them. He had to for the sake of his son. Right now, though, he had to come up with a plan. He stroked Cat’s long red hair as he thought.
“Let’s take the ski boat,” Carrick finally said. “We’ll go to the Barton’s house. Maybe by the time we get there, someone will be home. Maybe Annabel and Cayden will already be there. Even if they aren’t, we’ll need to use the house as a base and set up search quadrants.”
He woke the skipper and left instructions for him to move the Skerry closer to Barton’s Point. In the meantime, Carrick helped Catriona into the ski boat and then gunned the engine as he turned to head toward the Barton’s dock. There was little talking to be done over the roar of the engines but he felt his wife’s worry reach out to him, and sensed her once again sending out calls to Cayden. It took them another quarter hour to reach the dock below the big blue house that belonged to the Bartons.
As they pulled up to the dock and Carrick jumped up to tie a line, Catriona spoke. “There’s a light on downstairs. Let’s both go up.”
****
Taylor heard the pounding. He’d gotten home a half hour earlier, tired after an evening at one of the bars in town. His best friend, Geoff Sanderson had come down for the weekend. They’d both had plenty to drink, and through the evening, it had become obvious to him that Geoff was very unhappy with the job he’d taken at a major law firm.
When he returned home and saw Poppy hadn’t yet returned, he didn’t think much of it. She was out with Cayden no doubt having a wonderful time. So he’d stripped down to his boxers and crawled into bed. Now, hearing the pounding this late at night, he was instantly alert, and his heart pounded an equal tattoo with the knocking on the door. He jerked on a pair of shorts, grabbed a shirt and his shoes and started down the steps.
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