Something Fishy About Love (Monstrana Paranormal Romance 3)

He raised his eyes to her face and arched a single eyebrow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“We’re not...”

She hesitated, wondering if she should zip her lips. Living under the water most of her life hadn’t given her much time to explore the world or meet other cultures. Most of what she knew came from their ancient scrolls and stories passed down from mermaid to mermaid. She’d always taken it as the ultimate authority and truth, but already, her few hours out of the water had seemed to challenge some of those notions. Leo certainly wasn’t what she’d imagined. Still, those old prejudices remained.

“Monsters?” he offered, the muscles in his jaw twitching.

She shrugged. “Well, yes.”

“Seems like you’ve made your mind up about me.” He moved away, breaking their contact, and perched himself on the boulder. She thought she saw disappointment and hurt in his eyes. It was a surprising thing to see in a vampire. “Guess we’re at a standstill here.”

“Guess so.” She crossed her arms again, but deep inside, confusion reigned. What had just happened? Why did she suddenly feel like the bad guy? “Nothing to do but wait.”

“Or, better yet,” he grabbed a loose stone from the ground and chucked it into the sea, “you could let me go. Tell everyone else I escaped?”

She pursed her lips and raised an eyebrow at him. She hadn’t been hatched yesterday.

“Not a chance.”

A dramatic sigh tore from his lips and he leaned back on the rock, his wet shirt clinging to his muscular abdomen. Eina had to force herself not to stare. Instead, she turned to the side and peered at him from the corner of her eyes.

“I’ll go see about getting you that meal,” she said, barely concealing a shudder at the thought. “Sit tight. And remember, there are always mermaids watching the island. Don’t even think about trying to escape.”

“Yes, my lady.” He gave her a mocking little bow and a flourish of his right hand. “Anything you say, my lady. This monster shall stay put.”

She rolled her eyes. It seemed that their conversation was going to come back to bite her in the tail fins. She could live with that. What she couldn’t live with was losing their prisoner. Come hurricane or tidal wave, Prince Leo was hers to guard. There was no way he was going to pull one over on her. She had to prove to her sisters that she was ready to take her place at the forefront of their crusade.

Prince Charming would just have to save his smiles for someone else.

Chapter Seven

Leo stared at the morning sun with a resentful frown, his dislike for sunlight reaching a whole new level of intensity. It was already his third day on the island. A terribly boring, tiny little hole of island likely to drive him out of his mind.

He imagined Viktor finding him there, years later. He’d have named all the trees by then. Painted faces on their scraggly bark. Maybe even started a pet rock collection and shaped a few to resemble Rodrigo.

They’d cart him back to Monstrana in a straight jacket. He’d spend the rest of his nights babbling on about his tree friends. Eventually, they’d do him a favor and put him out of his misery with a dagger. Yes, that was the outlook for the rest of his immortal life. Not a very pleasant one.

And it was all because of one mermaid. One frustratingly gorgeous mermaid who seemed to know how to push his buttons in all the right and wrong ways. She’d spent most of the past few days following him around the island like a watchful guard dog. It was obvious she was passionate about politics. She couldn’t stop spewing about world problems or what she would change about the world. Eventually, he had to join in the conversations just to get her to talk about something else. It was all very confusing. He couldn’t stand to be around her and for some unknown reason, he couldn’t stand to be without her irritating presence.

If anything, he blamed the lack of nutrition. Service on this island wasn’t exactly four star. Eina had scraped together a single blood bag yesterday. It wasn’t even warm.

He kicked a rock as he traversed the beach for his daily exercise. Anything to pass the time. It skipped along the shore and into the waves, coming to a sudden halt against a massive gray form that hadn’t been there a few hours ago. Leo dug his heels into the ground and stared at the newest addition to his beach, wondering if he’d imagined it.

It was sleek and long, half submerged in the swells pounding against the shore. At first impression, he thought it was a dolphin. But on closer observation, he realized it was an eight-foot long shark too close to shore to swim back out.

“Looks like I’m not the only predator stuck in this place,” Leo mused as he did a quick circle of the beast.

Its tail flicked weakly and beady black eyes seemed to follow his movements. He leaned in closer to get a look at its jagged teeth and shuddered.

“I’m guessing this is how humans feel when they see me in all my vampire glory.”

He rubbed his chin and his thoughts drifted toward his petite jailer. It was no secret she held similar disregard for his kind. She thought he was a monster. Of that much, she’d been crystal clear. His very touch had made her shiver with disgust. That had stung even more than her insults.

“Seems that neither of us are getting out of here, buddy,” Leo said, patting the shark on its back, keeping a safe distance from its mouth.

He looked out at the sea at that moment and spotted Eina emerging from the sea on shapely human legs. The water around her legs shimmered as the aqua scales from her tail slowly receded. She hid something in her hands and Leo’s mouth began to salivate. He could only hope it was more sustenance.

“Please tell me that’s some fresh-from-the-vein type O negative,” he said, walking through the waves toward her.