Chapter 16
An hour later, I was surrounded by that wide open sea.
I hadn’t wanted to wait as long as it would take to drive to the harbour where I moored the Rosy Dawn.
I kept a small wooden dinghy with a crappy old outboard motor down on the beach from April to October, and all I had to do was pull on my boots, grab a jacket, a towel, a bottle of water and some sunscreen, and run down to the shore.
Dave was waiting for me.
I didn’t even need to check in on him to know he was there. I felt him like a tide in my blood, drawing me out to sea.
Once I was out on the water, the wind picked up, tossing spray into my face. I pointed the dinghy at the horizon and went out and out and out, until the coastline behind me was nothing more than a dark, hazy smudge.
I faced front and kept on going.
Eventually, I slowed and shut off the engine. It was cold as hell out here, despite the bright sun. I’d warm up as soon as Dave found me. When I was with him in the water, I left petty human problems like hypothermia and the need for oxygen as far behind me as I left the land.
When I was with him, I wasn’t sure that I was entirely human anymore.
Perhaps the future held more options for being together all year round than I thought.
But Jerry was right. Worrying about all of that was for later.
Now was my summer of mad shagging.
I stripped down to my boxers, perched on the gunwale, pinched my nose shut, and rolled off the side. Dropping through the icy water, I stared up as the light-tricked surface danced above me.
I sensed him, then. Coming for me—and coming fast.
He was a pulse in the water all around me, penetrating all the way down to my bones. I turned myself in lazy circles, trying to spot him.
And then—there.
A rush of terrifying speed, heading right for me. I kicked up for the surface. He was on me before I made it.
He drove me backwards through the water as his body impacted mine, his arms coming around me and his powerful tail driving between my legs as he rolled us.
A demanding mouth landed on mine and he sent out a welcoming vibration over and through me, parting my lips with his and pushing his tongue inside.
My hands were in his hair, holding him to me as I thrashed my legs, trying to get them around his hips. He reached down and gripped my thighs, pulling them up. Once I’d locked my ankles, he gave a single, powerful flex of his body and we rose up to the surface.
I gasped in fresh air and wiped the water from my eyes. Dave lay beneath me and between my legs, long and beautiful, watching me. His big hands cupped my waist possessively.
“Hi,” I said.
He hummed back at me and lifted his chin.
I bent at the waist, stretching out over him and pressing our torsos together.
I’d never get enough of this. Of him beneath me, or on top of me. His skin against mine. His attention on me and mine on his, as if nothing in the world existed but this.
But us.
He ran a hand up my back to rest it over the nape of my neck. I propped my chin on my fists and smiled at him.
He smiled back.
I leaned up and kissed him until my lips stung and my heart was pounding.
“You’d better stay even longer this year,” I informed him.
“I’m going to need much more of this. Okay?
” I stroked a line down the bridge of his nose, and touched his lips.
“So you should stay longer this year, and come earlier next year.”
He watched me. He didn’t understand my words, but I was almost sure he knew what I was saying.
He made a small hum of agreement at the back of his throat. “Joe,” he said in that deep, inhuman voice of his. “Dave.”
“Yeah,” I said. “Always.”
Always.