Sea Bride- Children of the Waves (3 page)

BOOK: Sea Bride- Children of the Waves
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She raised her eyes up, staring
into the ocean depths of his gaze and almost drowned. Recognition in the form
of déjà vu slammed into her.

“There you are,” the gorgeous
man said. “Sorry, ladies. Good evening. Are you going up?”

“Well, hello,” Desiree greeted
him. “Yes, we were.”

“Could I perhaps, change your
mind?” He stepped out of the elevator, effectively blocking them from getting
on, and allowed the door to close behind him.

Neither woman rushed to stop it
from leaving.

Cori couldn’t move. She
knew
this man—and yet she’d never
met him before.

“Oh, yeah,” Des purred. “What
did you have in mind?”

Her gut tightened at the sound
of her friend’s interest. She didn’t like the fact that Des seemed attracted to
him. Not at all. She frowned, but why should she care?

“How about I buy you lovely
ladies a drink?” While he addressed them both, his gaze remained on Cori. His
blatant interest made her feel a little better.

“Ah, not for me, thanks,” Cori
answered, finally finding her voice. On the one hand, she wanted to spend time
basking in this guy’s aura. He possessed some seriously fine mojo. Too handsome
really, as in, he could
not
be real.
She shook her head to clear it of the spell he weaved around her. “I’ll take a
rain check.” The words came out of her mouth but her heart shouted,
Are you insane? He’s yours.
Too much sea
sickness medication giving her delusions.

“What? Cori, no.” Desiree
seemed quick to protest. “Come on, just one quick drink. With, ah—what is
your name?”

“I’m sorry, that was rude of
me. My name is Xavior Oceanus.”

“Oceanus? You’re not American
are you?” Cori asked, curious. His dark hair looked almost black, pulled back
away from his face, emphasizing already perfect features. Perfect, except for
the scar above his right eyebrow, which gave him a wicked appearance and
enhanced instead of detracted from his looks. His shirt remained open down to
his chest, and she could see his lightly tanned skin. Just a brushing, so you
knew he got a little sun. And even though the shirt hung loosely over his
frame, she could see the outline of his muscles through the material. He would
feel hard to the touch.

“I was actually born in the
Atlantic Ocean in U.S. territorial waters, so technically, I am an American,
but my father was Greek.”

Oh yeah, Cori thought, a Greek
God. It wafted off every delicious inch of him.

“Fascinating,” Des drawled,
grinning at Cori. “Ah, I’m Desiree Holden, but call me Des.” She turned to her
and, still grinning, said, “And this is my good friend Cori Daniels. Come on,
Cori, just one drink.”

“What could it hurt?” he urged.

Cori wanted to answer—
her soul and her sanity!
The longer she
stayed in his company, the more she wanted him. Some part of her kept screaming
he already belonged to her, she just needed to claim him. This all seemed
ridiculous; she didn’t even know the man. Then again, she also couldn’t leave
her friend alone with a stranger, no matter how hot he might be. That didn’t
make him safe. To be honest, she and Des came onboard, prepared to have fun and
enjoy the cruise, and possibly to meet someone and have wild sex.

Technically, she wasn’t a
virgin, but it had been two years and only a handful of times ever, with two
different men. She knew her experience wasn’t normal, but she hadn’t enjoyed
any of it. On an intellectual level, she understood the fault lay with the men
and not her. Des had been preaching to her for years, she needed to own her
sexuality. She looked Xavior up and down. Perhaps, he could help with that.
If
she let him.
What made her want to jump his bones—okay so other than his
unbelievable looks? Something about him seemed familiar. Like she knew him,
like they’d met before. The feeling would not go away.

Des nudged her arm, bringing
her attention back to them. “Okay, just one drink,” she heard herself say.

He held out his arms for each
woman to take, and they walked back outside and down to one of the lounges.

With each step, Cori felt pure
steel lay under his cotton shirt. She kept telling herself not to rub up
against him and every one of his hard muscles.
Was he hard all over?

The sea witch had been right.
From the moment he saw Cori, Xavior knew she was his. A sense of familiarity
ricocheted between them, connecting them. Like they’d already met. He’d begun
to age, so at some point in her lifetime they must have crossed paths, but he
had no memory of it, even after seeing her. Otherwise, he would have claimed
her years ago. With zero doubt in his mind, he knew his bride. Cori’s touch on
his arm confirmed it. Heat hummed in her touch, not only the heat of
attraction, although it existed between them at furnace level, but also
something more.

He just needed to separate her
from her friend and get her into the sea. What could he be thinking?
She was human!
Although, once she became
his bride, she would be capable of living under the water, but would she ever
forgive him if he simply stole her away from her world of landwalkers? A child
of the sea would, he wasn’t sure about a human female. He knew how his people
would react to finding a mate, the immediate recognition and acceptance, but
had no clue about a human. Now, what the hell should he do?

They didn’t have a lot of time.
Perhaps, if he first gained her confidence, she might trust him enough to come
with him. Yeah right, like any human would believe in a being who wasn’t human.
And she would need to trust him. And not just trust. Could she come to love
him? The throne would only accept her if she truly was his bride, which meant
she must or would love him. The promise of love ran across her fingertips every
time she caressed his arm. He just needed to believe.

Staring at the beautiful woman
walking beside him, something assured him, loving her would not pose a hardship
at all. He already seemed drawn to her on many levels. Although, he’d been told
his bride would be on board, still, part of him didn’t truly believe. His wait
had been so long. When he looked down from his balcony and spotted her standing
on the deck, he thought he’d finally succumbed to water depravation. It
happened sometimes to a few of their kind who stayed away from the life-giving
liquid for too long a time. Usually, to those who moved too far inland. They
fell into madness, and then they never could seem to deal with reality again.
But that wasn’t the case here. He hadn’t been gone from the depths for very long,
and they were still close enough to the water to where he could feel its
rejuvenating powers in the air.

Where
and when did we meet before?
He would have most definitely
remembered her. She stood tall and proud with a dark honey-colored complexion.
She wasn’t as curvy as her friend, but make no mistake, she was still all
woman. When she flipped her shoulder-length brown hair with those auburn
highlights over her shoulder, he wanted to arrange the locks for her. He wanted
to know what they felt like tangled in his fingers. He wanted her locks
whipping in his face while he made love to her as the ocean danced around their
naked bodies.

They entered the lounge and a
live band played at one end of the room. They made their way over to a few
empty stools at the end of the bar.

“Excuse me, would you like to
dance?”

He was so taken with Cori he
hadn’t even registered the stranger approaching them until he stood right in
front of Desiree.

Desiree didn’t hesitate, she
took the man’s hand and walked off with him to the dance floor.

“Would you like to dance?” he
asked Cori, wanting to feel her in his arms.

“No, I better not. I’m just
starting to get my sea legs and don’t want to tempt fate.”

“Sea legs?”

“Yes. I’m afraid I’ve been ill
for the last few days. Today is the first day I’ve actually been able to leave
our cabin. Either the patch or medicine finally kicked in. Probably both.”

“Ah, I see.” Damn, seasickness.
He never thought of that. He could see the little beige square against the gold
tone of her arm now. This would be impossible, how could he have a bride who
got sick from the motion of the sea? In the water, at the depths they dwelt,
the motion around them grew very intense. Maybe the power of the necklace he
wore around his neck would help, and if the King’s Chair accepted her, it
should cure that. Still, when Aaron found out, he would laugh his ass off.
Xavior wanted to groan but it wouldn’t have done any good. And it didn’t really
matter, she
was
his. Already, the
ties binding them were being woven.

 

Chapter
Three

 

“When Des comes back, would you
tell her I wasn’t feeling well and went back to the cabin?” As much as Cori
wanted to spend some time investigating the attraction between herself and this
sea god with a sense of familiarity that kept tugging at her, she really wasn’t
feeling well. All of a sudden, the movement of the boat didn’t seem as smooth
as before. Definitely, some new rocking from side to side was happening. Enough
so her stomach rolled when the boat did.

“I believe there’s a storm outside
now,” Xavior explained. “Let me see you back to the cabin.”

“That’s okay. I’ll be fine.
It’s just a little rain. Besides, I don’t have to walk outside to get to our
cabin.”

“What kind of a gentleman would
I be to let you leave by yourself, when you’re not feeling well?”

Cori smiled. He seemed to be
very thoughtful. “All right, fine, but if you leave with me, Des won’t know
what happened.” She didn’t have her phone with her to text her friend; she left
it in their cabin.

“Hmm, good point. You stay here
and I’ll go tell her.”

“I think she’s in the middle of
that mass of gyrating bodies.”

He stood up, towering over her.
“Be right back.”

As soon as he turned his back
and got swallowed into the crowd, her stomach heaved, she knew she couldn’t
wait. She really felt awful and needed to leave. She hopped off the bar stool
and made her way to the exit. She didn’t want him to see her like this. If she
was going to be sick, she absolutely didn’t want Xavior anywhere near her.
Barfing off the side of the boat might make a lasting impression, just not the
one she wanted. She would try to find him again tomorrow, when she felt better.
She knew the location of his cabin, so it shouldn’t be hard to bump into him
again and apologize for running out on him.

At first, she stayed in the
interior corridors, but the feeling of being closed in kept getting worse. Deep
breaths were not helping. When she saw an exit to the outer deck, she took it,
hoping the night air might help clear her head. Stepping onto the deck, she saw
a flash of lightning in the distance over the water, while light rain fell from
the sky. The waves were no longer calm. The ship rolled beneath her sandaled
feet, propelling her forward. Instead of turning to go back inside, Cori
continued onward. In spite of everything, it still felt better being out in the
crisp night air than in the enclosed space.

About halfway to her cabin, the
ship’s sirens went off. She inhaled sharply. One man in a white uniform tried
to rush past her and she grabbed his arm to stop him. “What’s going on?” she
asked.

BOOK: Sea Bride- Children of the Waves
14Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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