Falling in Deep Collection Box Set

by Pauline Creeden

  She ran her fingers through her hair, tugging the tangles free. Her face was in profile. High cheekbones, a button nose, and full, pouty lips.

  Her full breasts pushed at the bodice. His mouth wasn’t so dry anymore. The sides of her breasts spilled out of the leather and begged to be touched. He imagined running his finger along the line that separated them.

  He had no idea where the hell he was and only a vague idea of how he got here. The last thing he should be thinking about was breasts. Boobs. Ta-tas. But with ones that exquisite on display, it was hard to get his brain to obey when his body was on full alert.

  Her long hair was parted in the middle and the curled tips fell between her the full curve of her breasts. It was the most erotic sight he’d ever seen. In the midst of all his muscle aches, he felt his pants tighten with arousal.

  “Something smells good,” he said, trying to divert his attention away from his attraction to her. He wasn’t going to let his dick cloud his thinking.

  “It’s snapper. I caught it this afternoon.”

  Snapper. She had to go and say snapper. A dozen bawdy jokes popped into his head. The boys on this ship would love the sticky situation he found himself in.

  Son of a bitch.

  His stomach growled. “Do you live here?”

  He looked around. He didn’t see a house or even a shack. Just palm trees, sand and water.

  “I spend quite a bit of time here,” she answered.

  No boat. No dock. No land in the distance. Maybe it was too dark to see. Maybe there was something on the other side of the island. Maybe he’d bumped his head even harder than he thought.

  “How do you get back and forth?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “I swim.”

  Swim? They must be close to land. He breathed a sigh of relief. If he could get to a phone, he could call the Coast Guard. The sooner the better.

  “Ready to eat?” she asked.

  His stomach growled, louder this time. “Yes, ma’am.”

  “I’ll be out in a few minutes. There’s some fresh water in the bucket beside you. I’ll bring the food to you.”

  The bucket was well within arm’s reach. He hadn’t noticed the container before. He didn’t know whether to drink it or use it to wash the salt and sweat off his brow. In the end, he decided to drink first and see what was left. He was careful to drink slowly, remembering the admonitions he’d received in training that drinking too fast would make him sick all over again.

  Ten minutes later, he felt worlds better. He pushed himself to his feet and using his good leg, he hopped over to her. When he approached, she jumped, as if she were a little unsure of him. He stopped short of her and raised his palms. “I just came over to thank you before dinner.”

  He concentrated on looking into her eyes instead of staring at her perfect breasts. Not an easy task. Breasts as perfect as hers only appeared in magazines. “I have no idea who you are or why you were out in the middle of the ocean, but I’m sure glad you were. Thank you for saving me. I’m Dylan.”

  “I’m Syreena,” she said, making no move to rise from the water. “I’m glad I was there, too. The sharks would’ve gotten you,” she said. “They were circling you when I swam through,” she said. “I dove deep and then ascended into the middle of the circle to help you.”

  “Swam through?” He propped himself up on his elbows and looked toward her.

  She nodded, as if swimming through sharks was something she did every day. “I’m not afraid of them.”

  “Where’s your diving equipment? If you were under them, you must’ve had diving equipment.”

  She sank deeper into the sand. “I’m afraid I do not understand.”

  “I’ll do my best,” he said. “But French is not easy for me.” He paused for a moment, tried to call up all the vocabulary words he’d learned in college. “Equipement de plongee?” He managed a weak smile.

  “Try to explain it in English.”

  “Wet suit, scuba mask,” he said, making circles with his fingers around his eyes. “How can you breathe under there without an oxygen tank?” He placed his palm over his mouth and took deep breaths. “You know, all the stuff you need to dive and stay under water for more than a minute or two.”

  “I don’t need any of this diving equipment.”

  “Are you some kind of superhero? Have I been rescued by Aqua Woman?”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Aqua Woman indeed. Instead of being like most mythical mermaids who pulled their lovers to the bottom of the sea so that they could swim together for eternity, Syreena wanted a one-way ticket. Out. Back to land. Houses with chairs. Fine china cups and silver place settings. Pastries.

  A whole basket of éclairs.

  She also wanted a man with two feet, ears, and lungs who could get her back to Saint-Domingue and make a woman out of her.

  Gills, even the temporary ones, were over-rated.

  There was no Underwater Kingdom with a smiling king with a charming gray beard. No singing clams or dancing seahorses. It wasn’t the least bit like the fairy tales.

  The ocean was deep and wide and mostly empty. Especially when you weren’t a native.

  Syreena couldn’t talk to whales telepathically and she had no friends who were starfish or dolphins. She was totally alone and, until Monsieur Gray came along, invisible.

  This man wasn’t leaving her island with anything less than a declaration of his love and a promise to protect her. Men didn’t wash up every day. There was no way she was going to waste an opportunity.

  “I just wondered how you breathe under water without any scuba gear. Are you a free-diver?” He ran his finger over the gash on his head and winced.

  Free diver? Breathe under water?

  It hit her with the punch of a hurricane. The man didn’t realize she was a mermaid.

  His French was so bad, her English so rusty, there was only one thing to do: Show him.

  Using her arms, Syreena pulled herself out of the water and onto the sand of beach. The Change wouldn’t happen unless she willed it, concentrated on it. “Do you see now?”

  The man’s mouth opened into an “O”. “That’s not a custom diving suit is it?” His eyes widened and he shook his head. “This can’t be,” he said, child-like wonder in his voice.

  “It is,” she said.

  “But …but …I…,” he stuttered. “I’ve been at sea for years and I’ve never seen an actual m-m-m-mer-mer-mermaid.”

  “If it makes you feel any better, I’m the only one I’ve ever seen. I don’t think mermaids are very common.”

  He laughed. It was deep and rich, and for the first time since The Change, she felt connected to another living thing. She closed her eyes and just listened to the sound of his voice.

  “I’m not always a mermaid. My legs come back sometimes.”

  He raised one eyebrow. “What do you mean?”

  “If I concentrate really hard, my tail changes back into legs and I can be a regular woman for a few hours, usually until I’m hungry again.”

  He shook his head. “I must have hit the rail harder than I thought.”

  Syreena had been alone for so long, she’d forgotten how strange her story, her reality, must seem. “I know it’s hard to believe, but it’s real.”

  *****

  She was the mermaid of his dreams.

  He’d had a mermaid fantasy since puberty. He blamed it on a comic book he’d borrowed from a friend.

  He could still see the illustrations. Delicious.

  Not to mention his fantasies of making love to Daryl Hannah in the movie Splash. The movie was old—he’d watched it on Netflix aboard a Coast Guard Cutter—but the image of that long red tail and that sun-bleached blonde hair tickling her breasts always made him hard as a rock. Harder.

  Dylan couldn’t stop staring at Syreena. She’d propped herself against the trunk of a palm tree, her long glorious tail spread out in front of her. In the waning sunlight, the scales were purple and green and
blue. Shimmery and flecked with gold and silver. Like a peacock of the sea.

  Her hair, having mostly dried, was the color of sunshine and it exploded over her shoulders in perfect corkscrew curls. Her eyes shifted between the green of a piece of sea glass and the blue of the Caribbean. Her skin was tanned to a perfect bronze.

  Mermaids didn’t exist.

  Dylan knew that. He’d spent the last eight years of his life on the USCGC Campbell, cruising the ocean from Maine to the Caribbean. If mermaids existed, he would’ve seen one before now.

  Before this. Before one saved him and towed him to her own island. Correction: cay.

  He was dead. He had drowned and this was the nautical division of heaven. He closed his eyes and kept them closed for at least a minute. He counted. When he opened them again, she was still there.

  “Mermaids aren’t real,” he said, making another attempt at convincing himself. “This is either heaven, a strangely complex dream or a really elaborate prank.”

  “It’s none of those things,” she said. “This is my island, a place to store my things and dry out.”

  He shook his head. “Who are you? Really?”

  “Syreena. Just like I said before.”

  It had to be a prank. Syreena? Was that even a real name?

  “You can tell me the real story.”

  “It’s too complicated.”

  He looked around. Nothing but sand, waves and wind. “I’ve got the time.” The sun was sinking lower and lower into the water turning it the electric oranges and yellows of lava. Help wasn’t coming tonight, if it all. If this shit was even real. Maybe he’d wake up soon but until he did, he might as well let this beautiful mermaid entertain him. There were worse ways to pass the time.

  The moon was waning, only giving a hint of silvery tendrils of light to the beach. He’d worry about finding a way off the island tomorrow when he was stronger. Tonight, he was sleeping beside a mermaid. At the very least he’d have an entertaining story for the Officer’s Club.

  “I’ll tell you about it,” she said. “But first, you need food and stitches. I need to Change.”

  “Change?”

  “Shhh, I need to concentrate and get dressed,” she said.

  “Dressed?” The hallucination was becoming weirder by the second.

  “I’m usually alone and I know that clothes don’t make much sense out here but they washed up on the beach and I’ve grown used to wearing them when I’m in human form.”

  He wouldn’t have believed it if he hadn’t seen it with his own eyes. Correction: he didn’t believe it now. It was simply the combination of the wicked head injury and the blood loss. But even if he didn’t believe it, he was seeing it. With his own eyes.

  It was as if her tail became blurry, fuzzy, shimmery around the edges. Her upper body tensed, as if she were fighting an unseen enemy. She closed her eyes and clenched her teeth. He wondered if it was painful.

  In less than a minute, she opened her eyes, looked around and pushed herself off the trunk of the palm tree.

  Dylan wasn’t sure what was sexier: a shimmering mermaid tail or shapely, tanned legs.

  Syreena was tall. The small shimmery skirt she pulled over her hips after The Change began just below her belly button and covered very little. He could see the firm curve of her bottom and itched to reach out and place his hand in that place where her thigh met her ass.

  The most beautiful spot on a woman’s body. Correction: one of the top three most beautiful parts of a woman.

  He watched her walk to the small fire pit and put the cooked fish on the remnants of an oyster shell.

  Syreena sat beside Dylan and handed him the fish. “Sorry. No proper plates.”

  He smiled. “Don’t often have dinner guests, huh?”

  She laughed. “Nope. You’re the first one in a long time.”

  “How did you start the fire?” he asked.

  She shrugged. “A spindle stick and some dry palm leaves. I eat mostly raw fish these days but I figured you’d prefer it grilled.”

  “A mermaid who can save a drowning man, start fires without matches and switch into legs when her fins don’t suit her. Holy shit. This is some trip. Did you give me some opiate pain killers or something? Pills?”

  “Where would I get pills?” she asked. “We’re stuck out here in the middle of nowhere,” she said.

  Now she was employing logic.

  Dylan took a bite of the fish. It was delicious. He tried to eat slowly but it wasn’t easy. He wanted to scarf it down, beg for more. It seemed like it had been months since he’d eaten.

  “I wasn’t always a mermaid. I was once a regular woman, the daughter of a planter. I had fashionable dresses and suitors.” She took a deep breath. “It was a beautiful life.” Her voice was wistful and full of nostalgia.

  Dylan combed his brain for mermaid legends. The only thing that came to mind was the Disney version of The Little Mermaid. No help at all.

  “How did you go from privileged young woman to mermaid?” The question itself was absurd. He rubbed the gash on his head. The salt had cleaned the wound. The skin felt crusty and raw. “Are you sure this isn’t just some kind of hallucination? I hit my head pretty hard.”

  She shook her head. Her curls bounced like loaded springs. “It’s real. My father’s manservant used voodoo to transform me into a mermaid. He was trying to save my life.”

  Mermaids. Shape-shifting. Did she say voodoo?

  He wasn’t afraid of much, but just the mention of voodoo made every hair on his body stand at attention.

  Growing up in Miami, he’d heard plenty of stories from his Haitian neighbors. Nope. He wanted no part of that. Ever.

  Dylan’s head throbbed too badly to try and reason it out properly. He wasn’t awake. Couldn’t be. His brain was just traveling through the pages of some fantasy book he’d read at some point in his past.

  He finished the fish and put the shell aside. Now that his stomach wasn’t growling anymore, he was beginning to feel terribly sleepy.

  He collapsed back onto the sand. He longed for his bunk, humble as it was, aboard the USCGS Campbell. A tub where everything was orderly, organized and squared away. All those years of wishing for a vacation on a deserted island with a beautiful woman and he was marooned with a mermaid, a bum leg, a gash that needed stitches and nothing but a palm tree to sleep beneath.

  He should’ve been more careful with his wishes. More specific.

  “I should look at your cuts. I have the things I need to fix them.” Her voice was soft, lyrical, like a wind-chime.

  He scrambled into a sitting position and raised his hands as if to ward her off. “Look, I appreciate that you put yourself in tremendous danger to save me, but I don’t want any part of the voodoo.”

  “I’m not talking about any spells or potions. I was just going to clean it up a bit and stitch it.”

  A mermaid with medical skills? What the hell? Seriously. What the hell?

  “I’ll be fine.”

  She smirked. “The wounds might get infected if we don’t close them.”

  “I’ll take my chances.”

  “I can’t let you do that. I’ll stitch them.”

  “There’s no way I’m going to let a mermaid, who knows quite a bit about voodoo, stitch up my cuts.”

  “Then, sew it up yourself,” she snipped. She tossed several pieces of string and a small quill, probably from a puffer fish, onto the sand beside him.

  Dylan shook his head. Not only was he stuck on a deserted island with a mermaid, but she was hot, French and sassy. And she had him apologizing already. He admired her pluck, not to mention her resourcefulness. She had a fire, a determination and grit that made him smile.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to sound ungrateful.”

  She arched one blonde eyebrow. “Now you want me to fix the cuts?”

  He nodded. “Do we have any rum?”

  Syreena smiled. “Unfortunately the pirates didn’t leave any
on this island.”

  “Promise to be gentle?”

  She nodded. “As a butterfly.”

  Dylan’s leg hurt like hell. His head throbbed as if it were being sliced open with a spoon but if he had to go overboard, there were much worse places to wind up. Especially when he figured in the French Factor.

  He chuckled to himself.

  “What’s so funny?”

  “Nothing. Just how impossible this seems. Like something out of a story book.”

  Syreena exhaled. “I never thought it would be like this.”

  Dylan lay back on the sand and stretched his forearm across his eyes to shield them from the blistering sun. “What do you mean?”

  “It’s been so long since I’ve seen another human. I’m just in a little bit of shock.”

  “You’re in shock?” he asked. He opened his eyes and looked over at her. “How about me?”

  *****

  Dylan knew she was right. He ran his index finger along the jagged edge of the cut and winced at the sting. He couldn’t risk blood loss out here. He couldn’t risk infection either. He picked up one of the quills and poked the end of his finger with it. When a small bead of blood appeared, he was convinced it was sharp enough.

  “Bootlace?” he asked, holding up the thin black thread.

  “Yes. They were made of several strands twisted together. I separated them. The thread seems to be pretty strong. I think it will hold long enough to help your leg heal.”

  Nylon. He was sure of it. While he’d never thought much about the makeup of boot laces, he was glad they weren’t cotton. Natural fibers would break down quickly and might cause more infection.

  Syreena retrieved the quills and the thread. Her hands were small and delicate. He tried to ignore the heat of her touch. “We might as well do it now. Then you can sleep,” she said.

  “Leg only. Leave the one on my forehead alone.”

  She nodded. “It might scar.”

  “I can live with that.” Dylan grimaced. “I can’t imagine how this is going to hurt.”

  “Don’t imagine. It will only make it worse,” she said. Syreena walked to the water’s edge and rinsed the quill. It was already as clean as it could be under the circumstance but she didn’t want a grain of sand to get into the cut. “I will be quick. I promise.”