Deep Betrayal Page 0,98

adjusted me in his arms and slid me, ever so gently, out of the blanket and into the lake. I slipped in smoothly and all my muscles relaxed, my shoulders dropped. The pain dissolved like sugar into the waves, the water finding no resistance against my body.

Calder knelt at the edge of the dock with his face inches from mine. “If I leave you, you’re not going to go anywhere, are you?”

“What do you mean, ‘if I leave you’?” I asked.

“Just for a second. I’ll bring the blanket back to the house, check in on your parents. I worked too hard with your dad to make this reunion happen. We hadn’t counted on your little … accident. I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere.”

His hand brushed across my back, raking his fingers through what was left of my tattered shorts. “I’ve never seen a mermaid in a Hendrix T-shirt before. Or with a tattoo. I wondered if that would stay.”

“You’ve been wondering if this would happen?”

“Worrying is probably closer to the truth. Now stay here.”

I watched him run back to the house, his arms pumping and his muscles flexing, his skin smooth and glistening in the sun. The front door slammed, and I was alone.

It was peaceful. Right now, the trials of the landlocked world were as foreign to me as life on the moon. I ran my fingers over my tail. It was dark raspberry with iridescent pink, possibly the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, next to Calder’s.

I swam away from the dock. Just a little. While I waited for Calder, I turned in circles, flipping over and around, trying out new muscles, wondering, wondering. I swam out deeper and dove down to skim along the bottom. I held my breath—too afraid to see how imperfect the transformation had been. How embarrassing would it be to try to breathe underwater only to come up choking and sputtering?

Out of the corner of my eye, I sensed a movement. The floodlights were off, and a cloud blocked out the moon. The water was a black, matte canvas. Still, there was something there. In the distance. A dark shape. At first I thought it was a submerged log, but it was moving fast. And then I knew. My thoughts must have been too loud for Maris not to notice me.

“Well, well, well, Lily Hancock. Aren’t you just full of surprises.” My instincts were to retreat, but she did not hold the same threat she once had. Maris was visibly weak, while my muscles twitched with pent-up energy. “Calder will be back soon,” I said.

“Doesn’t that sound lovely,” she said, drawing close. I tried not to show my surprise at her appearance. I could count every one of her ribs. Her eyes bulged in sunken sockets. Her pale, milky hair floated sparsely around her face.

“What do you want?” I asked. “Where’s Pavati?”

“She’s already left,” Maris said. “She couldn’t stay a minute longer now that …”

“So she did love Jack after all.”

Maris rolled her eyes. “She chose him, yes. But she had no choice but to end him once she heard his confession. His mind was too addled. I’d warned her about that when we left last fall, but she never listens. There would be no reasoning with him, and we can’t afford for him to continue to interfere with our hunting schedule. Humans have a way of ruining the best laid plans.”

I didn’t know exactly whom she was referring to, there were so many options at this point. My name was probably at the top of her list. Although, was I still human? How did that work?

“Where did Pavati go?” I asked.

“She’s hoping to pick up with that blue-eyed boy.”

“Daniel Catron?”

“Is that his name? He’s her Plan B.”

“I’m sure he’ll take it,” I said, although I couldn’t help thinking, Poor boy. I was pretty sure I knew what Pavati’s intentions were in regard to Daniel, but it was still impossible to imagine him fathering Pavati’s child, let alone parenting it for its first year. Daniel was just a kid. But, then again, it wasn’t like he was going in blind.

Maris laughed condescendingly. “Of course he’ll ‘take it.’ Pavati’s completely intoxicated on what she absorbed from that Pettit boy. She’ll stagger into Cornucopia, and that blue-eyed boy will scoop her up so fast.… After the deed is done, she’ll head to New Orleans. I’m meeting her there in a few weeks.”

“So you’re leaving, too?”

“Maybe no one believed what Jack Pettit was saying, but