Chapter 2

CHAPTER TWO

LEVI

“Hello?”

The vintage Miles Davis deep cut I’d been holding in one of my tentacles slipped from my grasp and dropped to the floor, shattering into pieces.

“Fuck.” Closing my eyes, I willed my tentacles back, pulling them into my body. When I wasn’t partially shifted or fully in my kraken form, they looked like intricate tattoos wrapped around my arms and torso, but they had texture, raised a little like a long-healed scar. “I’m in the back. Have a look around, and I’ll be up in a sec.” Kicking the broken record out of the way, I dusted off my hands and passed through the beaded curtain that separated the storage room from the front of the shop.

Outside, the sun had disappeared behind the clouds, and my tentacles tingled with the sense of an impending storm. I wondered for a second if we were in for rain or snow. This far north at this time of year, it could easily go either way.

My stomach rumbled, and I slapped a hand over it, trying to remember the last time I’d eaten. Once again, I’d lost track of time, but that felt like par for the course for a new small business owner. I’d only been in Lifeboat, Maine, for a week, and I’d spent most of that time sorting through inventory for the shop and setting up the storefront. This wasn’t the first time I’d worked through lunch without a break.

A throat cleared behind me, reminding me why I’d come out to the front of the shop.

The owner of the throat was human, broad, and hot as fuck. His dark hair had a tiny bit of gray at the temples, and there was a touch more gray peppered through his full beard. His eyes were dark, and I felt them roam over me from head to foot as we both studied each other. He looked like a lumberjack in a red and black flannel shirt with a gray sherpa-lined heavy cotton coat over it and a black scarf draped around his neck. His long legs were wrapped in dark denim, and the material molded to his thick thighs in a way that made my mouth water and my blood pump a little faster. Even his leather boots were hot. Until that moment, I had no idea I had a thing for lumberjacks. Now, this one would be starring in my upcoming fantasies.

My tongue felt too big for my mouth, and my tentacles tingled against my skin anxious to come out and play. Usually, they didn’t get too invested in the people I met, but something about this guy had them interested. As I held back the urge to let them free, I couldn’t get my brain to make my mouth form words, so he was the first to speak. “I like your shirt.”

It took me a second to bring my faculties online enough to make my eyes glance down to see what I’d pulled out of the unpacked cardboard box that held my clothes. It was one of my favorites, a black T-shirt with a punk rock octopus holding drumsticks, a guitar, and a mic in different tentacles with the words Squid Vicious written in the same font used by the Sex Pistols above it.

“Thanks. Are you a fan of seventies punk?”

The stranger shrugged noncommittally.

“No offense, but one doesn’t simply shrug off Siouxsie and the Banshees. You’re either a fan or not. There is no middle ground.”

Hottie stranger shrugged again. “Then not, I guess, since I’ve never heard of Siouxsie and the Banshees.” He nodded at my shirt. “I do like a good pun, though, and I know enough to have an idea of who Sid Vicious is.”

That made me smile. “Fair enough, and I too prefer puns to punk as a general rule.” I checked to make sure my hand wasn’t too dirty from the old records I’d been sorting and held it out. “Levi Shoal.”

He took it, and for a second, all three of my hearts stopped beating as electric heat raced through my veins. It felt like my skin was vibrating, almost like it did right before I shifted into my kraken form but at a slightly different frequency, and I said a silent prayer to Poseidon that my tentacles would not make an appearance. The stranger, whose name I still hadn’t gotten, must have felt what I was feeling too because he was staring at our still-joined hands, a scowl creasing the skin between his eyebrows.

It was my turn to clear my throat.

He looked up at me and met my eyes, but he didn’t drop my hand, and I took that as a good sign.

“And you are?” I mentally pumped all eight of my fists when my voice came out steady and unaffected, even though I was lost in the stranger’s heated gaze and hadn’t felt an electric shock like the one I was still experiencing with the lumberjack’s hand in mine since the last time I accidentally touched an electric eel.

He blinked twice, then dropped my hand, looking down at his palm, rubbing his other thumb over the callused skin, and I almost pouted. “I’m Kris. Kris, uh, Kringle.”

Kris Kringle. I rolled his name around on my tongue and mentally drew little hearts around it. I liked the way it sounded.

Then I realized he was looking at me expectantly, that small crease between his thick eyebrows again, and I finally remembered my manners.

“Well, Kris, it’s lovely to meet you.” I looked around the shop. “As you can see, I’ve been busy, and I haven’t gotten out to meet many folks in town yet.”

His face twisted in surprise, his eyebrow crease deepening for a second like what I’d said wasn’t what he’d been expecting. For a heartbeat he just stared at me, then he shook his head and said, “I might be able to help you meet some folks in town. Maybe. I mean, if you’re interested in meeting a bunch of old men who love a good fish tale.”

“Fish tales are my favorite kind.”

Kris eyed me skeptically, then his mouth tipped up in a half smile making his beard twitch. “Mine too.” He held out a piece of red paper, and I took it.

It was an invitation to a holiday event. The graphics on the page were nicely done, and I more than appreciated the stylized kraken at the top. The shape of the head was technically incorrect, but it was a cool image all the same. My eyes skimmed over the rest of the page. “Oh, cool. You guys have a KELPS chapter.”

“You’ve heard of KELPS?”

“Uh, obviously.” I gestured to myself, a kraken, standing right in front of him. Of course I was part of the organization dedicated to protecting the cultural lore of my species. Did he not recognize the tentacle markings on my arms? It was kind of a dead giveaway. Maybe there weren’t any other krakens in town. I hadn’t met any so far, and we were a pretty rare sea monster species.

Again, Kris’s gaze traveled over me from head to foot, but this time when his eyes met mine, his expression said maybe we weren’t quite on the same page about something. And I had the niggling suspicion it might not be what he thought it was.

“What do you think KELPS stands for?” he asked.

“The Kraken Enthusiast and Lore Protection Society.” Kris’s eyes went as wide as sand dollars. “Is that not what you think it stands for?” The picture of a kraken on the flyer told me it had to be, but maybe I’d misinterpreted.

“No, that’s what it means, it’s just most people don’t care much about kraken lore let alone know that there is an international society dedicated to the continued study of the kraken. It’s sort of a niche area of interest.” He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck.

That was an odd thing to say. Maybe he was new to Lifeboat and didn’t know that he had taken up residence in a haven town along one of the oceanic ley lines.

“How long have you lived here?”

Kris narrowed his eyes in confusion at my question. “What?”

“How long have you lived in Lifeboat?”

“Uh, my whole life, so thirty-eight years. Why?”

That didn’t make sense. Something strange was going on here. He’d been living amongst mythical sea creatures—krakens, kelpies, merfolk, sirens, and others—his entire life, and he had no idea? How was that possible? I knew the ley line havens all had their own cultures. For example, in Baleen on the northwest coast of Ireland, where my parents lived, the sea monsters in the town barely bothered expending the magic it would take to keep up a glamour unless there were visitors in town, which was exceedingly rare given the town’s location. It was completely normal to see a tentacle, fin, or gill while walking around town, and no one cared, but I was suddenly getting the feeling that was definitely not the case here. In fact, now that I thought about it, I hadn’t seen a single tentacle or scale since I’d arrived. Granted, I hadn’t been out and about all that much, but still. Something was very different here than it was in Baleen, and I wasn’t sure I liked it.

It also made me wonder about the reasons my grandfather had for leaving Lifeboat back at the end of the nineteenth century. I knew he left because my grandmother was from Baleen, and her father was ill, but could it be possible there was more to it? Maybe he didn’t like living somewhere where he had to hide? Is that even what was going on? I knew my great grandfather had been mayor in Lifeboat. I couldn’t imagine he would have fostered the kind of community where people were forced to hide, but that was a long time ago. I wished I could ask my grandfather, but he and my grandmother had retired to a haven town in Norway where they spent most of their time in their kraken forms in what could only be described as an underwater retirement community for active adults housed in a deep lake within the haven town’s boundaries. Unless I went to visit, it would be very difficult to get in touch with him.

I got the feeling it would be best to pretend I wasn’t a mythical sea monster living among the human populace. For now.

“Uh, no reason. I was just curious. You know, since I’m very new in town.”

Kris nodded. “Right.”

A moment of charged silence fell between us, and I tried to find something else to say to keep Kris in my shop just a little longer. “What do you do for fun around here?”

“Not mu—” Kris started to respond, but the tinkling of the bell over the door made us both turn.

“Ah, our newest resident.” A tall, leanly built, blond man strode into the shop. His perfectly tailored gray suit and rolling gait made it look like he was walking a runway. He was objectively handsome, but I caught the aquiline shape of his nose and the almost perfect roundness of his eyes. His suit and a clever glamour concealed his wings, but I knew they were there.

Kris rolled his eyes as the siren breezed past him, barely sparing him a glance.

“Mayor Calder Delmar. Welcome to Lifeboat.” He held out his hand, and I shook it. Most people assumed all sirens were women, but that wasn’t technically true. The women just got a bad rep because they were the hunters sent to the cliffs to sing and lure fish into their nets. Apparently, human men were as easy to sway with siren song as fish. Go figure.

“Levi Shoal.” A shudder completely unlike the one that had rolled through my tentacles when Kris and I had shaken hands slipped down my spine as Mayor Delmar’s gaze landed on my arms, and I knew he saw my tentacle markings for exactly what they were. “Uh, thank you.”

“I was hoping I might have a word.” The siren smiled, but it didn’t reach his eyes.

“Sure. What can I do for you, Mayor Delmar?”

He laughed. “Please call me Calder.”

“Okay. What can I do for you, Calder?”

“It’s a bit of a private matter.” He looked over his shoulder at Kris, who immediately took the hint.

“I have more flyers to hand out. I’ll see you around, Levi. It was nice to meet you.” He tipped his head toward the mayor, who returned the gesture but didn’t otherwise acknowledge him.

“It was nice to meet you too, Kris. Stop in anytime, and I’ll see you at the KELPS event.”

He hesitated for a minute like he didn’t want to leave, but he shook his head and walked toward the door. I watched him go and tried to keep my hearts from fluttering when he turned back and gave me a little wave at the door. The second the door closed behind him, I missed him, and I started a mental countdown until the KELPS holiday meeting when I was guaranteed to see him again.

“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” Calder started. “Well, actually, I did. I saw Kris come in here, and I realized I hadn’t yet properly welcomed you to town.”

There was something about this guy I really didn’t like, especially since he’d basically driven Kris out of my shop. Now I just wanted Calder gone too. “Consider me welcomed. I don’t mean to be rude, but I have a lot I still need to get ready before I can officially open.”

“Of course, of course. But you need to understand that we do things differently here in Lifeboat.” He waved vaguely at the door. “That isn’t the kind of thing we really…foster here.”

“I don’t understand.” I had a feeling I did, but I wanted him to say it.

“I know it’s different in other haven towns, but here, we”—he gestured between us—“stick to ourselves. It’s better not to get too close to the humans in town. They don’t know what we are.”

“What? Why not?”

His jaw ticked. “We just don’t encourage that in Lifeboat. It’s been the way things are for generations.”

“So, I’m not allowed to meet the humans in town? They aren’t allowed to shop at my store? There aren’t any mixed-species couples?”

“Supporting the local economy is one thing. Making friends with them is another. And yes, there are mixed-species couples in Lifeboat just none that are sea monster and human .” His inflection on the final word made my tentacles quiver in disgust.

That was fucked up, but at least my suspicions were correct. The humans in Lifeboat had no idea they were living among mythical sea creatures. Kris had no idea I was a kraken. Which might be a slight problem since I wanted to get my tentacles all over him. Still, I couldn’t hold back a snort. “Okay. But that’s not the way I roll. I’ll stay in my human form, and I’ll keep the secret”—I mentally added the for now —“but just so we’re clear, I firmly intend to make friends of all species while I’m here.”

Calder’s jaw ticked again and his beady bird eyes narrowed. “Are you sure Lifeboat is the right place for you, Levi? There are plenty of other haven towns.”

Kris’s handsome face with his cute eyebrow crease flashed through my mind, and my hearts did a little flip-flop. Oh, yeah. I was definitely staying. “Yep.”

“Then I hope you’ll take heed of what I’ve said. I would hate for things to be difficult for you here.”

My tentacles twitched again, coming off my body a little at his thinly veiled threat. Calder’s eyes caught the motion, and he took a tiny step back.

“Thanks for stopping by, Mr. Delmar, but I really do need to get back to work.” I turned my back to him and walked toward the storage room. I heard him sputter like he wasn’t used to being dismissed, and I waited just beyond the beaded curtain until I heard the bell over the door signal his departure.

I’d left Baleen looking for a change, an adventure, and if today was any indication, things in Lifeboat, Maine, were definitely going to be interesting.