by D. K. Combs
“A God?” he asked faintly, shock lining every inch of his face. The room began to rumble with deep voices. “You bring a god to this place?”
Mari frowned. Were they talking about her?
“A god?”
“The Exiled One and a god?”
“Here?”
“No..!”
Around her, the voices of all the men rose, overlapping each other. She stood there with her arm twined with Ambrose’s, confusion coursing through her. They thought she was a god? And Ambrose hadn’t corrected them?
“Hey,” she whispered, pressing closer against him as the voices got louder. They were all debating with each other over something, and the roar was turning into a full-blown argument. “Maybe we should sneak out while they’re distracted. Why do they think I’m a god?”
Ambrose turned his head and looked down at her. His eyes were worried, but his face was set in hard lines. “Just…stay quiet Mari. If you let them think you’re a god, we can avoid a fight and hopefully have a place to stay. These men might even give their loyalty to you.”
“But I’m not a god!” she said, throwing her hands up. “And I really don’t want the loyalty of these…hooligans.”
A smile quirked his lips. “You’re starting to sound like me,” he murmured back, covering her hand with his. The action caused a shot of warmth to travel down her arm, leaving her almost breathless.
Funny. She didn’t feel so worried anymore.
“Don’t worry, Mari. Men have a tendency to worship those with a higher status, especially these ones. They may be rough, and they may cavort with Octopians on rare occasions, but they help those they admire.”
“Not a single one of those men admire me,” she replied, even as a blush tinged her cheeks. The way Ambrose had said that almost made it sound like he was one of those men.
“Oh, but they will. Just stay quiet and let me take care of this.”
She looked at him skeptically. “Won’t they wonder why the big, bad goddess isn’t taking a stand for herself?”
“No. They will think of you as cunning for watching the scene and not saying anything.” This time, he flashed her a full-blown smile and began to extract her from him.
“What scene…” The rest of what she said fell on deaf ears. Ambrose was too busy surging forward and grabbing the man closest to her by the arm, digging his hand into an open flesh wound.
A scream ripped the air, startling everyone into silence.
“Talk like that in front of her again, and you’ll wish you had never grown that tail,” Ambrose growled, causing shivers to run down her back. He wasn’t really going to start a fight on purpose, was he?
No. That would be dumb. Ambrose wasn’t dumb. He wouldn’t…
“Oy! You wanna take this somewhere else?” A man standing only several feet away from her snarled like a wild animal before the metallic ring of metal sliced through the air. After that, several other weapons were unsheathed, and the man without an eye came forward.
With a steely, narrow gaze, he ran his eye over Ambrose before looking at Mari.
“We’ll challenge you for ‘er.”
Mari started. “What?”
“Just be quiet,” Ambrose growled. He seemed to assess the man standing in front of him before releasing the grasp he’d had on the merman. The guy fell back, panting, face as red as a tomato.
Mari barely noticed, and really didn’t care. Ambrose had said so himself that he wasn’t strong enough to handle a fight, so why the hell was he doing this right now?
“If we win, we get to keep ‘er. If you win, ye’ get to stay here and we won’t lay a finger on her.” The man traced her body with his eye. She shivered, reaching for Ambrose again. She wouldn’t say anything, she really wouldn’t say anything—
“That’s fucking nasty.”
“Mari!” Ambrose exclaimed, grabbing her outstretched hand.
“I’m sorry! I’m really sorry!” She covered her face with her hands as Ambrose wrapped an arm around her shoulder in a tight grip, silencing her.
Mari could feel the eyeless man looking at her. “Mayhap she is much more valuable than we thought…” He didn’t have a chance to finish.
Everything happened at once. Ambrose dropped her like a rock, shoving her back with his tail as the akrina wrapped its nasty-ass hand around her arm and the eyeless man, with two others, lunged at Ambrose.
The next moments were a blur. The men around her began to shout, urging on their guys, while Ambrose struggled under their weight. Panic spread through her like a wildfire. He wasn’t getting up or moving, but letting them beat on him like a punching bag.
It went on for minutes. She screamed and kicked, tried to get the damn akrina to let go of her, even went as far as crying, but it was to no avail. Her heart hammered in her chest, pain for Ambrose coursing through every vein in her body. Tears fell down her cheeks, or would have had they not joined the rest of the water around them.
“Ambrose, get the hell up! God damnit, just…get up,” she screamed, fighting against the hold that the akrina had on her. Her breath caught on a sob, the sound of punches and kicks and slicing flesh making her flinch as they fell into her ears with an unending resonance.
“Ambrose…” God, if she could only get away from the akrina. Her hands itched to kill something, to strangle the men that were hurting Ambrose. He shouldn’t have done this so soon; he’d said so himself that he didn’t have the strength.
Had he known this was going to happen?
Mari looked away sharply as one of the guys drove his fist into Ambrose’s temple. Oh my god…
The akrina took the hint, covering her eyes for her, blacking out everything completely. Whether it was because Ambrose had willed it to do that, or because akrina knew she couldn’t bear it, she didn’t know and didn’t care.
Seconds later, she felt the shift in the room.
Someone grunted—and not Ambrose.
Then the screaming started. Blood curdling, skin-raising screams that would haunt Mari for the rest of her life.
And it wasn’t from just three men. No, it was from everyone that was in the room except Mari. The screams surrounded her from every single point, the sounds of pain so loud her eardrums started to hammer.
Ambrose. He was doing this. She could sense it, feel it, hear it. He was showing them who was dominant like some wolf in a pack, and she was the deciding factor. He’d accepted the pain for her, made them feel like they were winning, and then rounded on them with a ferociousness she’d known he’d possessed.
Her eyes welled with tears just as the screams died down.
She waited for the moment when the akrina would release her. The blackness slowly receded and the akrina let her go completely. She instantly spotted Ambrose, standing in the center of a dozen or more limp bodies, with pieces of flesh slowly orbiting the room and blood following in their wake.
Mari almost started crying right then and there—but not because of the groaning men or the carnage that were laying on the floor at Ambrose’s fin.
She shot forward, throwing herself against his body. Mari was never going to forget the image of all those men on Ambrose, beating the holy hell out of him. Not ever in a million years would she forgive herself for starting this, either.
“Ambrose, I’m so sorry… I’m so, so sorry…” She felt her eyes start to sting and she tightened her arms around his neck, not even noticing the way he was trying to pry her off of him while gasping for water. “I can’t believe… I’ll never not listen to you again—I’m so sorry…”
“Mari, stop it. I can’t breathe—” She immediately loosened her grip on him, but not completely. She had to make sure he was okay after what had happened, and he clearly wasn’t.
There was a cut going from his temple to his jaw and it was seeping blood, a black eye was already forming, and his lip was busted. She didn’t even want to see the state of his shoulders. Sobbing, she demanded, “Why would you let something like that hap
pen?”
“It had to be done—Oh, sweet Atlantis. Not with the crying—“
“Why would you let them beat you fishless?”
“Mari, please don’t cry like that, I’m really not hurt and now we have a place to sleep tonight—“
“These bastards tried to kill you!”
Ungodly rage flared within her and she looked for the nearest thing to her—and thwacked it with her tail as hard as she could. It groaned, pleasing her. “You rat—fish bastard! If my brothers were here, they’d be cutting you into small pieces and sprinkling you over some noodles with Alfredo sauce, and where would you be now, huh? Cut up and in my god damn stomach! How about that?” She slammed her tail against another body near her, not even caring that she was probably making an army of enemies.
She paused, breathing heavily. “That’s exactly what I thought.”
It whimpered.
Pleased, she pushed her hair behind her ear and met Ambrose’s eyes, then blinked when she actually saw the rush of relief leave his body.
“Thank the gods that you aren’t crying anymore,” he mumbled, looking around the bodies. Not a single merman had been left standing. The tables were thrown against the wall, stools floating around them, and glass cups were wavering in the water like they didn’t know what to do with themselves.
“But…Why are you not crying over this? Aren’t women supposed to cry when something like this happens, and not…I don’t know, make it worse?
She narrowed her eyes at him. “You’re just like all the other men, aren’t you? Just because I’m a feminine fish, I can’t be happy about a little bit of much-needed carnage that doesn’t involve you dead at my feet! Well, let me tell you, my dear fishy Ambrose—I like violence!” She threw up her hands in exasperation. “And I like that you’re still alive enough for me to give you a good piece of my mind— If you ever pull a stunt like that again—” she growled. “I can guarantee you will have wanted to be among the bodies dead on the floor.”
He held up a hand, frowning. “None of them are dead, Mari.”
“I can fix that.”
He stared at her, then shook his head.
“So…for sure, you aren’t upset about this? Not scared of me?”
Mari snorted. “If anything, I think you should be scared of me, because the second I get you up in that bedroom—” I’m going to find out how long it takes to get shit-faced horny with a pair of legs to wrap around your waist.
“You’re going to what?” he asked, brows lowering over his eyes.
Bad Mari. Bad. Terribly bad. Horribly bad.
Still, the thought of actually carrying out with that image in her head…
God damnit. What the hell had gotten into her? Lusting after a merman after hours of meeting him? She had gone from horrified, to terrified, to crying, to angry, and to horny within the span of seconds. This wasn't like her at all—but the emotions were too strong for her to deny or fight. All she could do was go with what was happening.
The only reason she wasn’t about to admit herself into a mental ward was because the whole entire day has been totally FUBAR’d. First her boyfriend, the cruise, the goddess, turning into a fish, and then this? Too much for one girl to handle, way too much.
Which was why, right as alarm flashed over Ambrose’s face, she passed.
The hell.
Out.
Mari woke up to the most amazing sensation ever.
She couldn’t exactly place it, or even guess why she was feeling it, but she knew she never wanted it to stop. Small, heated tingles warmed her body from the inside out, making her sigh.
So lovely, so soothing.
She rolled onto her side, stretching with a smile on her face, blinking her eyes open—
Only to jerk with a soft gasp.
Sitting beside her—or more like slumping—was Ambrose. His head was on his crossed arms, which were resting on the side of the cot that she lay on. He was settled into an uncomfortable looking chair and he’d fallen asleep with lines of worry etched in his face.
“Oh, you poor thing,” she whispered, reaching out to lay a hand on his shoulder to wake him up. He looked so awkward laying there, and she could only imagine how bad his muscles would ache when he woke up.
Mari looked passed her sleeping guardian, taking in the room. It was small yet homey, completely at odds with the rest of the hotel that she’d seen. There was a small stand in the corner of the room with a weird creation of welded forks and spoons. At the opposite side of the room was a shelf with all sorts of seashells and under it, a dresser. It was see-through, but empty except an anchor in the bottom shelf.
Across the bed was an open window with stringy, pink vines that acted like a curtain—a terrible curtain. Outside of the window, she saw the evil little fish swimming around the room. They didn’t enter, which shocked her, but she wasn’t going to complain.
Instead of soggy-looking walls covered in moss, the room was built with glowing blue walls that mimicked a marble-type finish, something she had never seen before. It looked like it could have been transparent, but it was thick enough that she couldn’t see through to surrounding rooms. The floor, when she looked at it, was tiled with the same sort of material that made up the walls. It was so magical that she was overwhelmed.
The exquisite, breath-taking sensation ran through her body again, snapping her attention away from Ambrose and to her tail, where his was slowly brushing back and forth over hers. She shivered, eyes fluttering closed before she forced herself to keep them open.
She vaguely remembered his reaction the last time she’d had their tails together. “Don’t…touch me there, Mari. Bad idea, really bad idea.” She shivered, casting a glance at him. So it was the same for a male as a female to get turned on?
Mari wished she had a fan or ice cubes or something. Slowly slipping her tail out from under Ambrose’s, she shifted her weight so that she could lean on her elbows, studying him.
Ray had never been as handsome as Ambrose was now. Not even when they’d been in college. Mari, of course, had been too naïve to realize that Ray wasn’t all he was hyped up to be, but that didn’t matter now.
Mari was traveling with probably one of the hottest, nicest men she had ever met and she was now single. She had never been one to shy away from sex—even though the thought of having sex as a fish was somewhat confusing and a lot repulsing. But then, the way she’d felt when his tail had been brushing against hers…
Her eyes closed at the memory, wishing she hadn’t moved her tail away. It was pretty damn amazing. Nothing Ray had ever done to her had made her feel like that before, and Ambrose hadn’t even been meaning to do it.
Her eyes narrowed, an ache settling in her chest. Ray had never really tried to bring her pleasure, or make her feel anything other than a slight buzz. And while he had done nothing, she’d done everything to make him happy.
Or actually, nothing to make him happy. He liked it quick and short, and that was it. Out of all the years they were together, he never let her be creative in bed, never let her do anything other than the normal “hop on top and hump till you dump” routine he’d decided on using.
Her whole life, she realized, had become a routine. Because of him. Her—Them—Everything. They taught at the same school, worked the same schedule, corrected the same amount of papers, paid the same bills, and did things by the book—his book—so much that it had just become natural.
Mari had thought they were compatible. Her mother always talked about her relationship with Mari’s father as magical. There was nothing that was always the same, the passion hadn’t yet died out, and they still spent every moment together as if it were their first.
With Ray and her?
She leaned her cheek against her palm, staring at Ambrose. Ray had been so…dull. Predictable. Stable. Nothing like what she had thought she would find, like her mother and father had.
Mari had thought that that was the end, though. Graduating college, finding a ste
ady job, and then getting together with Ray had been acceptable, because she had felt lucky enough to get even that. Her brothers had had so much going for them—brains, looks, personalities, professions. They were the prodigy children, and Mari was just the trilingual teacher with nothing else going for her.
Ray gave her no room to be excited. He gave her no room to be creative. He’d been “do this,” “do that,” and “be here” every single day of their life together. And now that he wasn’t hanging on her shoulders like some sort of “be serious” noose, she was finally able to express herself and be herself—and Ambrose didn’t mind; she wouldn’t have cared if he did.
Mari wasn’t going to let some fuck-up named Ray ruin the rest of her oceanic life. Although, she admitted, he might have helped her.
Without him, she never would have gone on the cruise. While it was by his own fault that he’d slipped up with the emails, she was almost glad it had happened. If it hadn’t, she would have been down there, staring at one of the sexiest, hottest men she had ever had the pleasure to, and the whole time she would be feeling guilty.
Mari sighed. Yeah, the way she had thought about him before passing out was enough to make a prostitute feel guilty.
Ambrose just had that “way” about him. He was silent, straight-forward, proper, hard and calculating when he needed to be, stern. Most of all…he was a man who actually cared. His worry, his concern, all of the respect he’d given her despite the situation they were in?
It was enough to make her heart pound and her stomach flutter—something that Ray had never been able to do for her.
“You’re awake.”
Mari snapped to attention at the deep, gravelly voice. Then blinked when she realized how close they were. His eyes were amazingly blue, circled with black waves and speckled with white.
“Ah, yeah. I am. And so are you.”
Her face started to heat, and she started to pull away from him, to get some distance. But as she moved, his hand came out and touched her arm, gently. As if he were almost too scared.
“I was worried about you,” he said. Then his eyes closed and he looked like he wanted to slap himself. She watched him, biting her lip. Ambrose tried again. “When you started to…you know…I didn’t know what to do, so I, ah…got us a room and—are you hungry? Akrina has a lot of fruit left over.”
