Sheltered by the Sea Lord (Lords of Atlantis #10) - Starla Night Page 0,52

few days, and the whole place falls apart.”

“You betrayed us,” a quiet voice replied.

Starr peered over the edge to see just how much danger they were in.

The voice belonged to Ryerson’s assistant, the nondescript man who wore square reflective glasses and business suits.

He looked completely different in fatigues. The clothing emphasized his compact frame, and the patches and pins on his breast suggested he knew how to use the stuff attached to the tactical belt around his trim waist.

“Frank Williams, please.” Ryerson’s tone turned wounded. “You’re the one who betrayed me. How could you stab me in the back?”

This was not going to go well.

And there were no other exits.

Gailen pushed on the glass door, but it was stuck tight.

They were trapped.

Gailen traced the door edges while the Sons of Hercules argued below.

The glass was thick, but breaking it would make a lot of noise and create jagged edges that could injure Starr.

“This is crazy.” Ryerson’s dryly incredulous voice echoed Gailen’s feelings but did not sound convincing. “Look at what you’re doing here. Blowing up expensive real estate in the middle of the sea? Is this the kind of statement you want to make?”

“You know it’s not,” the male, Frank, replied softly. “We agreed to wait until everyone gathered at the grand opening. The jammer would have taken out communications. They would have been helpless to call for rescue when the timed charges went off.”

“Timed?” Ryerson’s voice flattened. “I thought you had it wired?”

“I changed it. We would have gotten them all at once: the mermen, their human sympathizers, and the female breeders hidden in plain sight. We all agreed.”

“We didn’t agree to anything. Look, this is a big misunderstanding. Take down the bombs and I’ll get you a nice, quiet room at the VA.”

“Something you don’t understand, sir, is that you may leave the military, but the military never leaves you. When the president learns what we’ve done, we’ll receive medals. We can’t stand by while mermen flood our cities.”

“No one is flooding anything.”

“The coast guard can’t patrol the whole coastline. We have to stop the monsters now before they convert all our women to breeders and unleash a tsunami on our cities to drown the men.”

Starr glanced back at him with a grimace.

Gailen shook his head. A merman couldn’t control tides, unleash tsunamis, or even physically react to a woman who was not his soul mate. In fact, a tsunami was just as dangerous to mermen because it could smash them into submerged objects and terrain.

“The mermen want Waterworld, Ryerson. They want us huddled and broken on these floating cities they tricked you into building so that when they hunt the fish out of the oceans, they can spear us on land. We’re land fish to them. We have to stop it now before the cannibalism begins.”

“It pains me to hear these words come out of your mouth,” Ryerson replied. “When you were with me the moment I made them up.”

“You had an insight. An epiphany. The fish are disappearing out of the oceans and the tides are rising. You saw the truth. We’re the next fish.”

“I was pandering!” Ryerson barked a laugh. “Do you think I can get money from conspiracy theorists using ordinary reasoning? It’s all made up.”

“But it makes sense.”

“No, it doesn’t.”

Frank’s tone turned resigned. “You’ve led so many others to the light, and yet now you back away from the truth.”

“Because it’s not true!”

“And that’s a shame.” Frank’s voice lowered as he moved away. “Arm the satchel.”

“No, no, no. Wait. We can work this out.”

“That’s something a human sympathizer would say. You know there’s no negotiating with fish-men. We need air to breathe. They don’t.”

“But that… Be reasonable. Please. Don’t arm the…” Ryerson changed from desperate pleading to abject fury. “You’re a fool. The absolute worst assistant anyone ever had. I regret every moment I worked with you. Just being in your presence makes me stupid. You’re fired. Do you hear me? You’ll never work in this industry again.”

Gailen renewed his attention on the door. There was a hinged side and an open side. A small gap appeared at the bottom and at the top… Ah. A long rod anchored the door to the metal frame. He pulled it up.

The wind tore the door open, and it banged against the outside glass.

“What was that?” someone asked.

Starr raced with him out the door. He helped her clamber over the railing and lowered her down the sharp incline. The wind pushed her, and she slid and