Chapter 18

Luna dashed into Sweet Clams, disheveled and wild-eyed.

She’d not slept after Kai left, her heart heavy with some dread she couldn’t place. And with missing him. Something she didn’t want to feel. She’d never missed anyone other than her family.

But gods! She missed him. Wanting to be held in his embrace all night, to find him there in her bed the next morning, his two hearts beating against her one, his tentacles exploring her needy body.

It felt like she was being pulled apart, simply for daring to feel. It hurt like the scars on Kai’s body must, even though there were no marks on hers. This. This was why she didn’t want… didn’t need… love…

Don’t even think that word.

Harper, putting roll mops together at the counter, cocked her head. “Here’s the champ! Oh—” She stopped abruptly, frowning at Luna’s expression. “What’s up, hon?”

“Have you seen Wyatt this morning?”

“No, thank the goddess.”

“I need to find him urgently.”

“Why?”

“I got a lift home in his water taxi last night and now I can’t find my phone anywhere. I think I may have left it on his boat.”

Harper rolled her eyes. “Good luck with that. He’s probably hawked it already.”

Luna’s body stiffened. Hell, she sure hoped not. Her whole life was on that phone… But at least it had a code to get into it.

Harper clearly saw her chagrin, and reassured her. “Knowing Wyatt, hon, he wouldn’t even have noticed. He never cleans the boat anyway. He’ll likely be snoring in the hold and waiting for the tavern to open.” She shuddered. “How did I ever date the guy?”

Luna tried to laugh, but it came out as a gruff squeak. She was so uptight.

“And hey, congratulations again on the win, babe, you annihilated him. What are you going to do now?”

“Hadn’t got that far in my thinking.”

“But… I thought you had a plan?”

“Funny how plans change.” She dashed out. Was that true? Had she faltered now that her and Kai were…

You and Kai are nothing. You boinked twice. So what. NO big deal.

Except somehow it felt like a big deal, a huge deal, and one she had no capacity to handle. What next? She needed to fulfil her plans—of course she did—but she didn’t want to hurt this guy. He’d let her win, he was kind, sweet, funny. He was… the best fuck she’d ever had. She recoiled from calling it that, even though that was her usual word. But with Kai… it had meant something more, damn it.

She practically sprinted along the quay, followed by a few whistles and shouts of “Congratulation Luna,” just to remind her she’d won.

Cheated. Not won.

She waved distractedly and ran to the end of the quay.

Funnily enough, Wyatt was not asleep. In fact, he looked remarkably full of himself, lounging on a post, drinking a large mug of steaming coffee and chatting to another couple of selkie fishermen.

Luna ground to a halt in front of him, rubbing her tight forehead. “Hi Wyatt. Can I have a word?”

“Well, if it isn’t our little champ. The humans are super chuffed about your win.”

She glared at him. “How would you know?”

He shrugged, grinned. “News spreads fast, y’know. I’d expect a call from the Council of Towns if I were you.”

“They’ve never bothered to contact me before, so why the fuck would they now?”

“Winners are grinners. And you’re goin’ to be flavor of the month. Mark my words.”

She tssked her tongue impatiently. “Have you found my phone? I think I left it on your boat.”

“Nope.” He said it too fast, his eyes shifting away.

He’s lying.

“Can I climb on board and have a look?”

He looked like he didn’t want to let her. But then he shrugged. “Sure, go ahead.”

She jumped on, wrinkling her nose at the smell. Searched around the seat where she’d been, but only found a stinky fish skeleton. A rat scuttled away.

Holy hell. He was worse in his care of his boat than she’d even imagined.

In the cabin there were fishhooks and dirty coffee cups and cigarette butts in ashtrays scattered haphazardly around. A bottle of half-drunk rum. Binoculars, and an old worn-out map book. Everything was grubby. A final demand for his dock fees was half crumpled, and when she moved it aside, there was her phone.

So he had found it. She would never have left it in here. She grabbed it and bounced off the boat indignantly.

“It was on your desk,” she said, accusatory eyes bugging at him.

Wyatt shrugged his big selkie shoulders. “Oh, that phone. Had no idea whose it was. I was going to take it to lost property after my coffee.”

The lying rat-bag. Of course he knew it was hers. She was probably his only passenger last night.

When she got further up the quay, she punched in her code, hoping against hope that by now she’d have the app to upload from Kai. Her heart was in her mouth.

But her code wouldn’t work.

She tapped it in again. And again. Access denied each time.

Someone must have tampered with her phone. Probably trying to get the password to her bank or some such.

And there was only one slimy culprit it could be.

“Fuck you, Wyatt,” Luna muttered through gritted teeth.

Kai’s eyes tried to acclimatize to the heavy darkness, but even with his kraken sight he could make out nothing. Here in the Cave of Contrition, the darkness was like no other. It pressed on his eyeballs like gravity. Sick of floating in the bitterly cold water, he hauled himself up on a rock in the midst of it, his tentacles sore and tight and still bruised from the games.

The games you lost.

When he finally got back to Thedaka, no doubt he would be shunned again.

So what’s new?

He should be meditating on the texts that they all learned as younglings, the verses recounting kraken deeds of strength and fortitude, of battling humans and bringing down their ships.

Humans!

If he let his thoughts stray to Luna, he would probably weep from the overpowering sense of rage and betrayal inside him. And that would only make his current situation a thousand times worse.

Kai hugged his tentacles around his knees. He remained defiantly in half shift, even though he knew he should be full kraken to ward off the coldness of the water down here. If he got sick, who fucking cared. Even his own father had watched wordlessly as he was led away into isolation.

His mom, so proud of her only son when he’d told her he was this year’s competitor, would be gutted. He knew already from his father’s pinched and sad face how he’d let his parents down.

He winced, trying not to think of anything that brought more pain. But there was nowhere his mind could go to find peace. Everything led to betrayal and humiliation. Now the humans would be bolder in their forays out into deeper waters, they would dare to edge closer to Thedaka’s borders, looking to catch bigger fish hauls. Yeah, what a fallacy that was! The city had only recently started to rejuvenate from the chemicals spewed out to sea from Motham’s human owned industries. Pollution that had bleached its coral reefs and killed its fish reserves.

Fuck you. Fuck you, Luna Storm.

Groaning, he closed his eyes against the darkness, trying to shut out images of their lovemaking; the way she’d arched against him, the feel of her soft human skin sliding on his, the dark wet recesses of her sweet cunt, her clit ripe and swollen just for him.

Even now he could feel his cock hardening, his mating arm wanting to stretch out toward… nothing. No one. Just an illusion.

She’d felt like his mate. In those brief collisions of intimacy and need, be honest, it had felt like that was where they were meant to be. In each other’s embrace. Forever.

He heard himself bellow in the darkness, the sound echoing back at him from rock walls he couldn’t see.

And then, strangely, he could see.

He blinked. Surely that wasn’t possible? But no, it was unmistakable: there was a small bright light heading his way. A jagged toothed anglerfish emerged, its little lantern bobbing in front of it. And behind it loomed the shadow of something much bigger, weaving in and out of the rocks on the bed of the cave.

Wh—what the hell? Kai peered harder.

The anglerfish looked a little worried as it swam closer. “Don’t eat me, I am escorting an ally.”

Kai gave the ugly creature a disgusted look. Sure, he was hungry, but not that hungry! And then suddenly he saw who it was. The shadowy form was his best friend.

“Torqua?”

The dolphin clicked sharply in greeting, the sound bouncing off the cave walls.

Kai was touched to the core that his friend would go to these lengths to visit him.

“What are you doing here?”

“When you lost the games, I knew you’d end up here. No way was I going to leave you to suffer alone.”

“But it’s against the rules. I’m in isolation.”

“Yeah, but they’re kraken rules, and last time I checked, my species began with a D. So hey, I can do what the hell I like.” Torqua clicked gleefully. “Now, tell me what the fuck went down there in the big smoke.”

Kai sighed heavily. “You don’t want to know.”

Torqua chuckled. “Which means I really, really wanna know.”

Even Kai had to smirk at that. In the light thrown by the deep-sea fish’s lantern, he recounted the whole sorry fucked up mess. (Skipping over the intimate details—not even his best friend would ever know them.)

After Kai had finished, Torqua rubbed at his forehead with a flipper. “So the elders believe she’s working for the Tween Council of Towns?”

“Yeah. It must be true. What other reason would she have to take shots of me in my fucking birthday suit and broadcast them around?” Kai chewed on his lip, frowning. “But fuck, when she told me that stuff about her family, it seemed so genuine. I was ready to confront Razad, all the elders, arrange for her to meet them… then she said she’d lost her phone… another fucking lie.”

“Why would she lie about that?”

“To hook me in, I guess.”

“Sounds like you were hooked from the moment you saw her.”

Kai frowned. It was true, she’d not searched him out. He’d chased her, from that very first time he’d seen her near the caves.

“I don’t know what to think of her, Torqua, she’s a bunch of contradictions.”

“If she’s a spy she could have just fucked you and photographed you. No need for a whole sob story about lost family.”

“Gee thanks, you reckon I’m that easy a lay?”

“Desperate, more like.”

Kai thumped his friend on the flank, his mood already lighter. Apart from making him laugh at his misfortune, Torqua was talking sense. He was right, nothing about this added up.

“What if someone else leaked them,” the dolphin mused. “She might have shown them to her trainer, maybe the orc did it.”

Kai pondered this. Unlikely, but…

Hell! The way she broke apart in his arms, the way she’d keened his name. Not once, but twice now. The pain inside her that he’d sensed from the very first moment he’d set eyes on her, surely that was real. And the photo in the locket. Those people were her family. He was certain of that.

“Torqua,” Kai said finally. “Could you do me a huge favor?”

“Anything— you know that buddy.” Torqua’s usually cheeky grin was gone, replaced by genuine concern.

“Could you go and talk to Luna? I—I have to know whether she leaked those shots, or I’m going to go crazy.”