Shifting (Swans Landing) (2 page)

Kyle came up sputtering next to the dock, his perfectly combed hair now soaked and sticking to his head.

I snatched up the crabs from the dock before they could escape back into the sound and returned them to the bucket. Then I leaned down toward where Kyle was trying to get his footing on the soft sand.

“You keep forgetting one thing, McCutcheon. I ain’t no fish.” I looked back at Elizabeth. “I’m leaving. Either you go too, or you stay behind with this creep. It’s up to you.”

Elizabeth’s gaze darted between me and Kyle, who slipped and crashed back into the water again. She shot me a smirk before sauntering down the dock, tossing her hair over her shoulder.

I spit into the water near where Kyle glared up at me, gave him a big grin, and then followed Elizabeth down the dock, swinging my crab bucket from one finger.

Chapter Two

“It’s been almost two months, Dylan,” Mara said as I stepped to her side later that evening on the empty strip of beach known as Pirate’s Cove. Her gaze never left the ocean stretched before us, the foamy waves crashing against the shore endlessly . She wrapped her arms around herself in a tight hug. Black wisps had fallen out of her messy bun and now whipped around her head as a breeze swept over the Atlantic Ocean.

I stared out at a place in the distance where the ocean blended into the gray sky. The chill in the air made it feel like we were still stuck in late winter even though it was now May.

“It’s a long swim,” I told her.

Mara sighed, the sound almost matching the song of the water that vibrated through me and mixed with the energy of the earth beneath my bare feet.

“I feel like I should have heard something,” she said. “Or
feel
something. I should know if he’s still alive, right?”

I clenched my teeth together, fighting back the grimace that thoughts of Josh Canavan caused. Even though he had been gone since mid-March, his presence was still very much alive here on the island.

“Maybe you don’t feel anything because he
is
alive. Maybe you’d only feel something if he were...” I couldn’t say the word. No matter how I felt about Josh, I had to believe he was still alive out there somewhere. That he was finding his way toward the ancestral home of our people and would eventually come back to Swans Landing.

As long as Josh was okay, I could believe Sailor was alive too.

Mara turned her gaze away from the water, her golden brown eyes studying me for a moment. “Do
you
think they’re still out there?” she asked.

Blonde hair whipped across my face for a moment, before the wind whipped it back the other way.

“Yes. They’re still alive.”

I didn’t want to think about Josh and Sailor, or a place none of us on the island had ever seen. The ancient homeland, if it even existed at all, was nothing more than a myth to us. Whatever was going on out there didn’t change anything here.

I had to focus on the now. Mara and I were still here, and I hated that she spent her time outside of school standing on this beach, waiting for someone who might never return.

“Come on,” I said, unbuttoning my cut-off khaki shorts. “Let’s go for a swim.”

I didn’t wait for her answer. I kicked out of my clothes, shivering a little in the weak sun that barely filtered through the haze as I splashed into the water. It was cold, but I was finfolk, and I was born to survive the ocean.

“Dylan!” Mara’s shout reached me over the water, but I forged farther into the waves, feeling the shudders beginning deep in my bones as the change took hold of me. I dipped under the surface, immersing myself in the salt water and filling my belly with a huge gulp of it. I twisted and bucked under the water as my body reformed itself, legs becoming one long blue-scaled tail.

When it was done, I propelled myself toward the surface and leaped into the air, arms stretched out in front of me as I arced back into the ocean.

I surfaced again and shook my head, clearing water from my eyes as I looked back toward shore. The beach was empty.

Another head popped up from the waves near me, spraying water from her mouth. Mara’s hair clung to her brown skin, rivulets of water running down her cheeks and dripping from her chin. I eyed the neckline of her T-shirt, now soaked and clinging to her body. When the water dipped low enough, I could see the shape of her breasts beneath the cloth and I couldn’t keep my gaze from straying to that area.

“Good day for a swim,” I said.

Mara laughed. I liked her laugh. “You think every day is a good day for a swim.”

I shrugged. “I am finfolk.”

She leaned back and flicked her golden tail fin, splashing water in my direction. She was becoming better at swimming and controlling her finfolk form. She looked natural in the water, as if she had spent her whole life swimming it.

I wanted that ease, that confidence she had. It was what had drawn me to her the day we first met.

I still wanted her to choose me, even though she belonged to someone else.

I pushed these thoughts away and focused on the now. I had these moments alone with her. She may have been waiting for Josh to come back, but for now, I had her to myself.

I grabbed her hand, letting my tail fin sweep across hers under the water. Mara looked at me, her eyebrows raised. I could see the objection in her face. She opened her mouth and I could already hear the “let’s just be friends” speech starting in her mind.

Before she could say anything, I said, “Come on, let’s swim.” And then I dove under the water, pulling her with me.

Chapter Three

Propping the old broom against my shoulder, I checked over the rough wood floor of Moody’s Variety Store for any tracks of sand I had missed. The shop was old and dusty, so my attempts at sweeping didn’t amount to much of a difference.

“Looks good,” Jim Moody, the owner of Swans Landing’s only grocery store/video rental/bookstore grunted from his place behind the counter. He nodded to some empty boxes along one wall. “Take those out back and break them down. Put them with the others. You’ll see them when you get out there.”

“Yes, sir,” I said as I bent to retrieve the stack.

I had only recently taken on work at Moody’s. My parents weren’t exactly thrilled about it, since I was already working with Lake most mornings.

“You should be focusing on school,” my mom always said. “You take on too much responsibility doing other things.”

“What’s the point?” I would ask. She would only give me that look, the one that said “I’m the parent and I know best.” But even she couldn’t deny that I would never leave the island to go off to college. Finfolk didn’t do that. Some had tried, but they always came back. We couldn’t go farther inland without feeling the effects of being too far from the ocean. There wasn’t a college in Swans Landing, or anywhere else along North Carolina’s Outer Banks, so my options were pretty much limited to remaining here. The ones in coastal cities weren’t close enough to the ocean to keep my body satisfied.

No, my future was already set in the vibrations of the water and earth here on the island. I’d most likely become a fisherman or else make trinkets for the declining tourist industry. Either way, focusing on high school didn’t seem to be important.

Most human business owners in Swans Landing didn’t hire finfolk, so I was lucky to get this job. But then, Mr. Moody wasn’t exactly like most other humans.

The day was cool and cloudy and the wind whipped my jacket around my body as I descended the wooden staircase outside Moody’s. The shop sat on top of wooden pilings, raised off the ground in case of floods from hurricanes, like most other homes and buildings on the island.

I went around back and began stomping the boxes flat. I could see exactly where Mr. Moody wanted them to go, since there was already a huge pile of boxes back there, most of them water-stained and soggy. He didn’t seem to consider actually getting rid of the boxes to be much of a priority.

I was so focused on stomping the boxes I didn’t hear the crunch of gravel and sand to warn me that I wasn’t alone. The sound of a voice made me jump.

“Hello, Fish Boy.”

I whipped around to find Elizabeth Connors standing only a few feet away, her arms crossed over her chest. She wore low cut sweater and my gaze immediately strayed to the deep vee of the collar, where the crossing of her arms accentuated her cleavage. She may have been a bitch, but she was still hot.

“What do you want?” I asked, resuming my task of flattening boxes.

“I was out for a walk and saw you coming down the stairs.” She stepped toward me, keeping her arms crossed tight and swinging her hips a little. “I heard you’re working here now.”

“Yeah,” I said. “Mr. Moody offered me Sailor’s old job.” Not that Sailor ever really worked at Moody’s. She was technically employed there, but she rarely showed up to work. She never seemed comfortable around Mr. Moody, even though he was her grandfather. But then, Mr. Moody never seemed comfortable around her either.

Elizabeth wrinkled her nose. I wasn’t sure if it was at the mention of Sailor, or the fact that I was working.

I went back to crushing the boxes, but Elizabeth didn’t move. I felt her standing there, her green eyes watching me.

“Did you need something?” I finally asked, when her staring started to get on my nerves. It made my skin prickle, the way she just watched as I stomped the boxes.

“I had a question I wanted to ask.” She tilted her head to one side.

“What?”

“How do...” She grinned, a wicked gleam in her eye. “How do you people...
you know
?”

I shook my head. “No, I don’t know. I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“I was wondering, how much of you is fish and how much is human?” She stood with one hip jutted out, the wind whipping her brown hair across her face.

I scowled. “None of me is fish.”

“So then,” she started, her gaze flitting down toward the front of my jeans, “you have all the normal parts?”

Immediately, it dawned on me what exactly she was asking. A hot flush creeped up my neck and I glared at her, clenching my teeth together. I scanned the area, looking for Jackie or Elizabeth’s other little groupies that followed her around. We were alone, but that didn’t make me relax.

“If this is one of your dumb jokes, I’m not in the mood.” I grabbed the rest of the crushed boxes and flung them into the pile under the shop. Then I stomped toward the stairs, brushing past her.

“Wait.” Elizabeth hurried to block my path, pressing her hand flat against my chest. Her skin felt warm, even through the cotton of my shirt. Elizabeth Connors had
never
touched me before. She avoided any contact with finfolk as much as possible. In second grade, we’d taken a school field trip to the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, and Elizabeth and I had been assigned class buddies. We were supposed to hold hands as we walked to keep from getting lost, but Elizabeth had refused to touch me, claiming I would be “slimy like a fish.” For as long as I’d known her, Elizabeth had followed along with her father’s insults against us.

Elizabeth’s slender fingers rested on my chest. She didn’t move her hand. We stood only inches apart under the shadow of the back stairs leading up to Moody’s, Elizabeth’s face tilted up toward mine.

“Why did you help me the other night?” she asked in a low voice.

I swallowed. “Kyle was being a jerk. Anyone would have done the same thing.”

She shook her head. “No, they wouldn’t. We had just left a whole group of people and none of them tried to stop Kyle when I told him not to touch me.”

“Maybe you should get new friends,” I told her.

Her eyes were hooded as she looked up at me, her mouth curled into a small smile at the corners. Her hand was still on my chest, sending a tingling sensation radiating outward. She smelled like floral perfume, so different from the smell of salt and sand that permeated Swans Landing. “You’re different from other guys. Special. Unique.”

“I’m a regular guy.” I hoped she couldn’t feel the way my heart had suddenly started beating overtime under her hand.

Elizabeth shook her head. “You’re not, Dylan Waverly. You never have been a regular guy.” She stepped closer to me and the smell of her perfume made me feel a little light-headed.

I licked my lips, which had gone dry. “What do you want, Elizabeth?” I asked again.

“To figure something out,” she whispered.

She bridged the space between us, raising herself on tiptoe. Her face moved closer, a small fraction of an inch as each second passed until finally, her lips pressed against mine.

She was soft and warm and the smell of her perfume seemed to wrap around us. My hands moved on their own, resting on the curve of her hips, steadying her as she leaned into me. Her hand on my chest moved upward until her fingers threaded through the ponytail at the back of my neck while her other hand slipped around my waist, pressing against my back.