For the Taking (10 page)

“And I can cook us some steak and potatoes with a salad on the side.”

“Even better.”

Lass looked away quickly as he stood up, but not quite quickly enough. She still saw everything a woman needed to see. Loucan was so casual about his body. Didn’t pick up the towel he could have slung around his waist, just padded down the steps to the cabin in his bare feet.

And he left the door open. Feeling like a schoolgirl for whom biology class wasn’t nearly informative enough, Lass peeked. It was dark in the cabin for a few seconds, and she could see only a glow of blue-white moonlight outlining his arm and shoulder. Then he switched on a warm yellow lamp and began to
move back and forth around the cabin as he opened various hatches and storage bins.

Each time, Lass caught a half-second flash of his body and absorbed a different impression. First, the shallow S curve of his spine as he reached for something stored at head level, then the long, hard lines of his thigh muscles, ending in tight knees, and finally the heavy darkness at his groin.

She heard the sounds of a gas flame being lit, and of steak beginning to sizzle in a pan. A microwave oven purred. There were some flashes of color—denim-blue and cotton-white—then he appeared again, clothed in jeans and a T-shirt, holding the clothing he’d found for her. She waited until he had gone back inside, then peeled off the towel and stood up to dress.

The harbor was dark and silent. It must be very late by now. Most of the commercial fishing boats were out at sea, and the pleasure boats had sails furled or canvas canopies fastened. Beside the farthest dock, one boat had its lights on and there was music playing. Some people were having a party on board, but they wouldn’t be able to see this far.

Lass brushed some tiny, pearlescent scales from her legs, then slipped the boxer shorts on. They were made of silk, and barely perceptible against her skin, lighter than the caress of Loucan’s fingers. The T-shirt was thicker and heavier. As she pulled it over her head, something dragged against the sleeve and squeezed her upper forearm.

Cyria’s bangle watch.

Lass’s stomach sank. She’d forgotten, hours ago, that she was even wearing it, and it wasn’t waterproof like the other much more practical watch she wore
most days, on the same wrist. She gave a little cry of consternation, and Loucan heard it as he came back up on deck.

“We can eat the hot meal in a couple of minutes,” he said. “But I thought you might like a glass of wine and some cheese and crackers. What’s the matter?”

“My watch.” She fumbled with the clasp, trying to get it off. “I shouldn’t have gotten it wet.”

“Here, let me help.”

The heels of his hands brushed her wrists, and his fingers were warm. With his head bent as he tried to work the mechanism of the clasp, his eyes were shaded by thick black lashes.

“It’s stopped,” Lass said. “The hands have stopped at eight thirty-five. That must have been when I first put it underwater.”

“There, I’ve got it.” He dangled the watch in his fingers and they both saw a drop of water seep from the back of the casing and fall to the deck below.

“It’s ruined,” Lass said. She felt sick with regret that she’d forgotten it. “That’s… just terrible. I’ve looked after it so carefully for so long. Cyria always said that one day she’d tell me what the gift meant, but I didn’t need her to do that. I always knew it meant that she loved me, and now it’s broken.”

“What it meant?” Loucan echoed her words. “She told you it meant something?”

“That she loved me,” Lass repeated. “She could never say it, you see.”

“No, Lass. It’s more than that. I’m sure it is.” He began to mutter under his breath. “It’s tight. There’s no screw or catch. I know nothing about jewelry like this. What have I got? A knife blade?”

“The key,” she realized aloud. “You think this is where she’s hidden the key.”

“It’s the right size.”

“Why didn’t she tell me? She would have
told
me!”

“She was waiting until she considered you fully adult.”

“She died quite suddenly of heart failure, just a few months before I turned twenty-one. But Loucan, this is just an idea.”

“That’s why I’m looking for a razor blade, and a pocket knife. Hell, the steaks are burning!”

“I’ll get them. You look at the watch.”

Lass switched off the gas, then came back and watched as Loucan tried first his pocket knife and then a razor blade. Finally, with a tiny click, the back of the watch flipped open. More water dripped out, and beneath it was the quarter circle that Loucan had been looking for, its silver-white shape set into a circle of gold.

“I knew you must have it,” Loucan said. “I should have guessed that Cyria would have it hidden in plain sight, and that she would have chosen a hiding place that was valuable in itself, befitting your status as a princess. It fits, too, that she wouldn’t have trusted you with the knowledge until you were twenty-one, or maybe even older.”

His blue eyes gleamed and he didn’t even look at Lass. Her stomach dropped, and the closeness she’d felt to him so recently evaporated like morning mist on the water.

“You’ll go back now, won’t you?” she said, forcing her voice to stay steady. “As soon as you can.
This was the most important reason why you came. To find the final piece of the key.”

He looked up, his expression clearer and more open than she had expected. “I told you that.”

And you also told me that you’d take me to Pacifica, when I was ready.

Just minutes ago, she had trusted that promise. Now she realized that there was a corollary condition that he hadn’t troubled to mention out loud.

As long as I’m ready when it’s convenient for him.

“Take me home,” she said. “To my place.”

He narrowed his eyes. “Now?”

“Yes.”

“Because you think you’re not important anymore, now that I have the final piece of the key?”

“That’s true, isn’t it?”

“You were never important.”

It was a brutal statement, and she gasped.

“Don’t take that the wrong way,” he cautioned.

She laughed. “Oh, there’s a right way to take it?”

“
You
were never important,” he repeated much more gently. “How could you be—you, Lass, the person you are—when I didn’t know you? You’ve become very important, in such a short time. It rocked me to discover that we both had similar demons in our past.”

“Yes,” she agreed.

“Loved ones that we’d lost in a horrific way, and whom we both felt we should have saved. But don’t ask me to solve that for you, Lass. Don’t ask me to deal with it for you. You’re the only one who can do that.”

“You said—”

“Yes, I’ll help you. I’ll take you to Pacifica, if you
want to go. But you’re the one who has to decide if it’s the right thing, and if you can do it. And even though I might want to, I can’t wait for long. Your accusation was right. This isn’t about you. Or about me. It’s not personal. In that sense, neither of us is important.

“It’s about the safety and future of Pacifica itself, and all who live there. I’m not going to soften that truth for your benefit, Lass. I have the final part of the key now, and I’ll leave here at first light, the day after tomorrow, whether you’re with me or not. Now, are you going to eat, and have some wine?”

“Please.” She thought she might pass out if she didn’t.

“Good,” he said.

“Why are you so blunt, sometimes?”

“Do you have to ask, after everything we’ve talked about tonight?”

“No. No, I suppose I don’t.”

He turned and went down the steps into the cabin without saying anything more. He was a man who made decisions and acted on them, she realized. A man who saw a problem, worked to find its solution, then put the solution into place.

She found it both refreshing and hard to take, like an unexpected splash of icy water in her face.

“We’ll eat on the deck,” he said. “I like it up here. I never spend much time below, unless the weather is bad.”

He poured cold white wine into a glass and handed it to her. From the far side of the little harbor, there came the sound of voices and car doors banging as the party on the other boat broke up. The sea breeze
had freshened, and the steak smelled salty and delicious.

“Forget the cheese and crackers,” Lass said. “I’m too hungry to wait.”

She took a gulp of the wine and began to eat, feeling a strange sense of giddy happiness that combined both exhilaration and peace.

Courage, too. Everything seemed simple, suddenly. Everything seemed
possible.
Before the feeling faded, she raised her glass once more, looked Loucan steadily in the eye and told him, “I will come to Pacifica with you. You’re right. I’ll never be at peace with my memories and with who I am, if I don’t.”

He nodded, then a smile of satisfaction spread slowly across his face, lighting it up with warmth. “I hoped you would,” he said. “I had faith that you would. Can you be ready in time?”

“Megan, Susie and Rob will take over for me. They’ve offered several times to buy the place if I ever want to sell. But at this stage, I—I’m not sure how long I want to stay away.”

“For a while, I hope…”

“We’ll see.”

“…because there’s one more thing I wanted to suggest, Lass.”

“Yes?”

“I want you to come to Pacifica as my bride.”

For several seconds the words didn’t make any sense. His bride? Was that what he had said? He’d also said that he was leaving at first light, a day and a half from now. That meant he wanted her to marry him
tomorrow?

“You can’t be serious!” she gasped at last.

“It’s not about love,” Loucan said quickly, before
Lass could gather her wits to find a better reply. “That’s meaningless. I’m not even sure it exists.”

“You loved Tara.”

“I
wanted
her,” he corrected Lass. “And to a young man cut off from his roots, that meant the whole package. I called it love, then.”

“So what is it about?”

“Ensuring your safety. Strengthening the promise of unity in Pacifica. If Galen’s son can marry Okeana’s daughter, then people will see that there’s hope for peace and compromise and change.”

“This is another one of those times when you’re not going to waste your energy on softening the truth, right?” she drawled. Her skin was prickling with heat and her lungs didn’t seem to be working properly.

“Should I?”

He came toward her, took the wineglass from her hand and placed it on the deck. Suddenly, all her awareness of him, all her
wanting
—to use the word he’d chosen a few moments ago—was back, and they both knew it. He touched her cheek and looked into her eyes. Maybe she should have pulled away, but she couldn’t.

“Shouldn’t we build on this, Lass?” he asked her. His mouth was very close to hers now. “It’s not love, but as long as we don’t kid ourselves about that, does it matter? We both want peace for Pacifica. We want you and your siblings to be able to visit there in safety. Or even live there. And we respect each other. Those are very worthwhile things on which to build a marriage.”

“A lasting marriage? Loucan—”

“Not if that sounds too hard. We can arrange a traditional mer ceremony tomorrow, and if it doesn’t
work out, you can have its protection while you’re in Pacifica and still return here as a free woman. A mer marriage can’t bind you legally on land. You have nothing to lose, Lass…”

Except my heart.

“…and everything to gain.”

She nodded, ignoring the stricken little voice that had cried out inside her. “That’s true.”

And when she told him a few moments later that she would become his bride, she didn’t know if it was the best and bravest thing she’d ever done, or the biggest mistake of her life.

S
he took his breath away.

Loucan was already waiting for Lass on the beach at sunset the following evening. They had chosen the quietest cove she could think of, accessible by car only with the use of Susie and Rob’s four-wheel drive. The surprised couple had agreed to act as witnesses to what Lass had told them was a “personal commitment ceremony.” Lass had explained that it was not a marriage, but something she and Loucan wanted to do to affirm their feelings for each other. In Pacifica, of course, it would be considered a legal and binding marriage.

Loucan had returned his rental car earlier in the day and walked to the cove, a good three miles along sand and around rocky headlands from the harbor at Condy’s Bay. He’d arrived a little early, and he felt nervous in a way that a king embarking on a cool-headed political alliance should not.

He paced the hard sand just above the waterline in
his bare feet, already dressed in his mer wedding clothes of full-sleeved silk shirt and calf-length pants made of butter-soft sealskin. At last he heard the sound of the four-wheel drive engine grinding along the final section of the rough track. Several minutes later, Lass arrived on the sand, with Rob and Susie walking on either side of her.

And for a good thirty seconds and more, Loucan really couldn’t breathe. He hadn’t felt this way since those crazy early days with Tara. Young men were like that, though. A pretty face or a sexy walk could send their heads spinning for days. This light-headed feeling of suffocating awareness was all the more powerful because a mature man in his prime shouldn’t still be able to feel this way.

Bearded Rob looked solemn, while small, freckle-faced Susie was grinning excitedly. She and Lass each carried bouquets of jasmine and white roses, which they must have picked from Lass’s garden. Loucan vaguely took in Susie’s outfit of blue and black, and registered that Rob wore something dark, but the only person he really saw was Lass.

She wore a white bikini, covered from the waist down by a diaphanous silver-white sarong that fell in soft folds around her bare, silky-smooth legs. A veil in the same fabric swirled lightly around her in the sea breeze, brushing first across her breast and then her shoulder.

She had white flowers in her hair, and several long strands of priceless Pacifican pearls around her neck. Loucan had given them to her this morning and asked her to wear them. At the time, the gift had merely felt appropriate. Now, the way the pearls gleamed on her body seemed like a brand of almost reverent posses
sion. These treasures of the sea might be beyond price, but still their value was nothing compared to Lass’s unique worth.

She was a bride fit for a king.

Her skin glowed pale gold against the white of fabric, flowers and pearls, and every curve of her body was lush and female and perfect. Like his, her feet were bare, and she’d painted her dainty toenails with a pearlescent polish. Even the way she trod the soft sand spoke of the sensuality at the heart of her.

Loucan felt a heaviness building in his groin and realized silently,
We never talked about tonight. Our wedding night. I don’t want to consummate this. It would complicate things too much. It wouldn’t be fair. But I never told her that. I don’t know what she expects. And I don’t know how strong I can be.

Too late to do anything about it now.

She had almost reached him, and he could see the series of complex emotions shifting on her face, the way sunlight and shadow shifted on the ocean when the weather was changing. She looked shy, determined, eager and nervous all at the same time.

She
was expecting a wedding night, with all that it usually meant. He could see it written right there in her face.

Dear Lord, why hadn’t he said something, spelled it out? For his own protection as much as hers.

He was awed by the fact that she was prepared to entrust him with the innocence she’d been forced to keep for so long, but he didn’t want it. Was it the responsibility he was rejecting? Or the power? He knew he didn’t want to hurt her, but there was more to it than that—much more than he had time to analyze right now.

She was afraid. He could see that, too. And yet she didn’t hesitate as she came to meet him. Passing her flowers to Susie, she held out her hands, and Loucan took them. They felt warm and soft and dry. She smiled up at him, the spread of her lips tremulous and slow.

“Hi,” he whispered. “You look fabulous. Just perfect.”

Why was his voice refusing to function properly? It was the same when Rob gave them the gold-rimmed white cards on which they’d handwritten their traditional mer vows.

Loucan had spoken vows of marriage before, to a giggling young bride in a Las Vegas wedding chapel. This felt so different. With the goals of their marriage clearly spelled out, this ceremony should have meant less than the one he’d had with Tara, but that wasn’t how it felt.

Instead, the vows he exchanged with Lass were solemn and almost holy—not promises to disregard or carelessly break. Vows to fulfill, then? How far?

As he said the last word, Loucan knew that however much he held back, he’d already gone far deeper into this than he wanted to be.

Listening to the words on Loucan’s lips, Lass found them beautiful and awe-inspiring. She had been the one to ask about them, just as she’d asked him about what mer brides usually wore. She had no memory of ever attending a mer wedding as a child. Loucan had confirmed that, yes, there were some traditional vows, and told her that mer brides were usually very lightly dressed.

He’d been a witness to numerous mer weddings in recent years, apparently. Some of them had been clan
destine events, he had said, taking place between two people who’d grown up on opposite sides of the conflict that plagued the tiny undersea nation. It had taken only a few minutes for him to remember the words and scribble them down. And sure, yes, he’d said, he had no problem with saying them.

Today, he seemed less sure about it. His voice was scratchy and hesitant, and his lips hardly moved. Yet he didn’t look down at the card he held for prompting. Instead, his blue eyes never left her face.

He must be nervous, too,
she decided to herself.
He’s humbled by this, just as I am.

The full moon had risen over the water, and the sun had set. A lacy wave washed their bare feet then retreated again. Lass repeated the vows that Loucan had made, and that was the end of it. This was all they had planned. They were married now.

Still with hands joined, they looked at each other, lost in the moment, until Rob finally said heartily, “Aren’t you going to kiss the bride, Luke?”

“That’s right,” Loucan murmured. “I’d forgotten that bit.”

He frowned and bent his head. Lass closed her eyes and lifted her face, but it was over in a moment, just a light brush of his parted lips across hers. She opened her eyes. Loucan stepped back, still frowning.

There was a beat of silence, then Susie began to clap and cheer. She pulled handfuls of rose and jasmine petals from her bouquet and threw them into the air. The light breeze caught them at once and showered them onto Lass and Loucan. A couple of them settled on his silk-covered shoulder, and one landed on her cheek.

Seeing his hand reaching for it, she quickly brushed it away and turned to Susie and Rob.

“Thank you so much for doing this….”

“Oh, Lass, we were honored! A little surprised, but very honored,” Susie answered. “And we will run that place like clockwork for you while you’re on your honeymoon. Stay away as long as you like! What happens now? Can we drive you back to Luke’s boat? I guess you’ll want to be alone as soon as possible….”

“We’ll walk back, shall we, Lass?” Loucan said.

“That’s fine,” she agreed, still trying to work out what she felt about that pale excuse for a kiss. “A walk along the beach would be…so romantic.” The last words were mainly for Susie’s benefit.

Susie frowned. “It’s a long way. Too far for me! What is it about you two? You seem to belong here in a way I’ve never seen in anyone before.” Her frown deepened, and a faraway light came into her brown eyes. “I could almost imagine that as soon as Rob and I turn our backs, you’ll both dive into the water and—” She broke off, laughing, and shook her head as if to clear water-clogged ears.

“Susie?” Rob said curiously.

“No, it’s nothing. Forget it. It’s impossible. Ridiculous. A wonderful fantasy, but quite impossible.”

Still smiling broadly, she opened her arms and gave Lass a huge hug. “I love the way you’ve done this,” she said. “So original, with those lovely vows you made up. So private and personal. We went for the big family wedding, didn’t we, Rob?”

“No choice,” he answered. “We’ve both got big families.”

“Which we loved, of course. But there was some
thing really…” Susie shook her head and ran her fingers through her hair, as though she’d walked through a spiderweb. “…so
special
about this, with the ocean and the beach and the moon, and just the two of you.” She kissed Lass, who had tears in her eyes now.

“I do have a good friend in you, don’t I?” Lass said to her.

Susie’s brown eyes widened as she held her at arm’s length. “Well, of course you do, Lass Morgan!” she said. “Didn’t you know that?”

“I do now.”

A few minutes later, Susie and Rob had gone, and Lass and Loucan were alone on the beach.

“I knew you would look beautiful,” he said.

“Thank you.” She felt the heat rising in her face.

“But the reality turned my expectations to dust. You look beyond beautiful. Thank you for agreeing to do this. I know it wasn’t an easy decision for you. I’ll do my best to ensure that you have no reason for regret.”

It was an oddly formal speech from a man to his new bride. Lass frowned at him.

He answered her unspoken question at once. “I realized we should have been clearer with each other yesterday about what this entails,” he said. “I’m not intending for us to consummate this marriage, Lass. I don’t want either of us to lose sight of what it’s really about.”

She bristled. “Would that happen if we slept together? And are you suggesting that I’m the one who wouldn’t manage to keep things in perspective?”

“Both of us,” he growled. “Both of us would have a problem with that. You know that’s true. Don’t ever
think I don’t feel what you’re feeling. This desire, this need that’s growing between us. It’s just as strong in me as it is in you. But I don’t want the distraction. Wanting each other like this doesn’t mean anything. Not when there’s so much else that’s more important.”

Hard to argue with that.

Lass felt selfish and trivial for even thinking about their wedding night in personal terms. She understood exactly where his single-mindedness came from, and wondered if she understood better than he did how much it had to do with his personal past. She didn’t like his rationalizations, nor his choices.

Do we have to choose between Pacifica and our own needs? Isn’t there room for both?

One look at the hard set of his face made her keep those questions to herself. She might desire him, respond to him as a woman in a way she’d never known she could respond to a man, but this didn’t mean she would blind herself to the streak of cool-headed ruthlessness woven deep into the fabric of his nature.

She was stronger than that.

“Look,” he said, cutting across her increasingly confident train of thought. “There are the dolphins…”

She followed his pointing hand and saw two dark, curved fins loop gracefully out of the water and disappear once more. With her eyes fixed on the moonlit ocean, she counted seven of them. They were surfing. The fishing must have been good, they’d eaten their fill and now they were ready to play.

They streaked through the curve of each breaking wave, then dived down and out of sight at the last moment, only to reappear back out to sea, ready for
the next one. They jockeyed for the best position, appeared to tease and chase each other, and all of it was pure play.

Lass laughed. “I love them when they’re in this mood.”

“Maybe we could get ourselves in that mood, too. There’s no one else on the beach, Lass.”

Tonight she didn’t need anything more in the way of encouragement, and they definitely needed a distraction from each other. Wading into the water as far as her thighs, she felt the sarong dragging around her legs. Her veil was wet, too. She pulled it off uncertainly, then found that Loucan had brought a woven sea-grass bag for their clothing. He wore its long strap across his bare torso as they swam.

This time, she kept the protection of her bikini top, and they surfed with the dolphins for an hour. The mer transformation happened seamlessly, without guilt or fear, the way she dimly remembered it happening in her childhood, and her feelings about Loucan were so confused that the waves seemed steady by comparison.

If he wasn’t here, I couldn’t feel this same joy,
she thought.
And yet he’s turned my life upside down. I can see that it had to happen. In some ways, I can’t imagine a better messenger from my childhood. I want him so much, but it’s not a blissful feeling. He’s not making any of this easy for me, and there’s a hardness to him. Could he ever be a safe man for a woman to love? I doubt it. I’d be afraid to love a man like him….

A dolphin’s sleek gray body arrowed past her and veered across her path. Turning to avoid it, she collided with Loucan himself and felt his strong hands
clasp her waist, keeping them both steady in the water. With one ripple of his body, he’d swum away again, leaving every inch of her skin newly painted with sensation. Breaking the water’s surface, she had to gasp for air.

It was another two hours before she and Loucan finally hauled themselves, breathless, onto the deck of the
Ondina.

Lass had filled a large hatch with her things earlier in the day, so this time she had clothing to wear. As the night was sultry and still milky warm, and her skin was still reluctant to endure the touch of fabric after the liquid caress of the ocean, she chose a pair of brief denim shorts and left her white and almost dry bikini top in place.