8. Isla

Isla

8

After we're both drained and spent, he holds me and quietly rocks me on his lap making soft shushing noises like the sea. He looks at me like I'm the most precious thing in the world. A treasure. His treasure.

Hands and lips and tentacle tips trail my skin with gentle touches as stinging tears fall from my eyes. I'm not even sure why I'm crying. Adrenaline crash maybe. Or maybe I've just been longing for this for so long. For someone to take care of me, cherish me, dominate me. I never realized until this moment how much I needed someone to take control and take the weight of the world off my shoulders. Now that I finally have someone's undivided attention and support, it breaks something in me.

A beautiful breaking.

His fingers wrap around the collar at my neck, and his lips brush my ear as he whispers, "Mine."

He doesn't say it as a question, but I know it is. This is his one final ask, one last opportunity for me to make for the hills or stay and be his forever. It's not really a choice, because I was his from the first moment—I just didn't realize it. My mind might have fought against this at first, but my body and soul knew.

I press my palm over his heart. "Yours."

Taking his coronet off, he places his crown upon my head. "You're mine now," he whispers. "There's no escaping what we are, what we can be together."

Here, with witnesses as ancient as my sand-man, on my Poseidon's throne, my Daddy's lap, I have become his queen.

With one hand on the nape of my neck, and his tentacles still around me, he kisses me with a softness that's all new. Like the dawn breaking over the horizon, it's an invitation to a fresh day. For the first time in a long time, this cove feels like home again. I don't know what life will be like with a monster made of sand by my side, but I know I'm his and he's mine. So we'll figure it out.

"What the hell, Isla? I thought I told you not to come near this beach." The sound of another voice pops the bubble of bliss I've been floating in.

I twist around to look at the man who's made me feel small ever since he came to Mountcastle Cove. Billy fucking Johnson.

"What is it with your family and debasing this town's sculptures?" Clearly he thinks I've been rolling around in the sand just to tarnish his precious summer fair. Though he's half right, there's nothing impure about what I'm doing on this beach.

Stepping closer, I can see the moment that he understands what is really going on. His mouth is gaping like fish gills trying to grab oxygen from the air, and it's clear he's only just realized that I'm not making out with a large clump of sand, but a living Poseidon imbued with power all his own. My Daddy lifts us off his throne, his tentacles shrouding me as he glides forward.

"You aren't welcome here," he bellows, still holding me as he positions himself slightly between me and Billy.

Billy's eyes are wide and I swear the greedy man is shaking like the dollar bills he covets, but he doesn't retreat. "Who are you and how did you ruin all these sandcastles, or was that Isla disregarding me? She's just like her father, never listening to what I tell her to do."

"No one tells Isla what to do but me." A tentacle slashes out and Billy only barely manages to jump away from it. Another slaps the sand at his feet forcing him back so fast he falls.

"I've heard the way you speak to my mate, and I won't tolerate it any longer. She is a beautiful, conscientious soul, who loves the beach." With me at his back, Poseidon towers over the crumbled man, a vengeful god defending his own. "You will treat Isla with respect from now on or I will bury you in the deepest ocean where no one will ever find you."

I swear I smell piss as Billy cowers in fear before my Daddy. He scrambles away from us on his knees and I can't help laughing at the man scurrying like a crab escaping a boiling pot. He may not have faced the height of Poseidon's wrath, but something tells me I won't be bothered by that busy-body ever again.

"Thank you." I nuzzle into Poseidon's side and place a soft kiss on his shoulder. "Thank you, Daddy."

My beautiful man gives me a smile so seductive it makes my insides liquify. "I'll have you thanking me all night until your mouth is too parched to speak and your voice rasps like sandpaper. I'll fill you up with gratitude and my seed."

Unwrapped like a present, I'm fully exposed to the sea and my sand-man once again. With a tug on my earlobe between his teeth, he leans down and says, "Because you're mine now."

I squeal as he lands a quick pop on my ass, and I know, right then, that this night is far from over.