Chapter 6
CHAPTER SIX
JAX
Iwant her.
Ever since she looked up at me with her emerald green eyes and uttered excuse me she was all I could think about.
My task had been simple; distract her long enough for Blake and Morgan to get into her dorm room that night and leave a very clear message. A message that was meant to get back to her father. She hadn't even connected that dead fish insinuated swimming with the fish in death.
Instead of going to plan, my lips had found hers and my fingers ached to feel the heat between her legs. There was something about her that drew me to her and I wanted to make her mine, but she'd stopped me. No one ever stopped me.
I leaned on the railing at the edge of our cliff and looked out at the glistening ocean in the moonlight.
I shut my eyes and imagined slicing through the water at top speeds and swimming alongside my aquatic friends.
It had only been three days since I'd been in the ocean, but my skin itched for a swim and my heart ached for the companionship of the other creatures that called the ocean home.
"Are the police taken care of?" Blake interrupted my fantasy and I turned toward him, leaning my forearms back against the railing.
Morgan stood shoulder to shoulder with Blake, both of their eyes shooting daggers at me. I'd fucked up again.
I should have dived right off the cliff to avoid the conversation that I'd already had with myself. I was supposed to run point on this assignment and had fucked up several times already. I couldn't help that my lips craved the taste of hers or that my broken heart muddled my thoughts.
I had one job. Scout out her house and see where possible entry points were. There was an alarm, but it wasn't operational. A quick call to the alarm company that Blake’s father had investments in confirmed that.
"They bought it." I turned back to the ocean and felt them come to stand behind me. "I've got it under control."
All it had taken was ripping my shirt off and unbuttoning my pants to have the cops believe I had been fucking a girl. They wouldn't dare question me, not when our families were so deeply entrenched in their livelihood at the Salinity Cove Police Department.
"Do you?" Blake leaned on the railing and looked at me with concern in his eyes. I was tired of them looking at me like that. "Bro, you broke into her house."
My jaw ticked at his condescending tone and I didn't speak. It was true. I had let my emotions get the best of me. There was something about her that captivated me and refused to let go, even though she was the last person I should want.
I hadn't had the intention of entering her house or even making my presence known, but she had a pull over me I couldn't explain. Ever since I'd kissed those soft pink lips of hers, I'd wanted more.
When I had walked around the townhouse to the small backyard, I saw her through the sliding glass door at the front window, peering out. The front of the house had nowhere to hide a spare key, but the back had plenty. It was easy to find.
"Did you forget the other reason why we're doing this?" Morgan put his hand on my shoulder. "Maybe we're due for a trip to see your sister."
I shook my head and headed back toward the large sliding doors that spanned the entire living area of the house. I didn't want to think about my sister and didn't need to see her to remember why my father was so hell bent on finding Robert Kline and making him pay. "I'm going for a swim."
Riley claimed to not even know Robert, and while that might have been true, he was still her father. A father wouldn't just let his daughter suffer, would he? He'd come to save his little girl if we pushed her enough. My own father was certain of it.
"We need to tread carefully with this girl." Morgan shoved his hands in his pockets and followed me inside. "That includes keeping your lips off her."
"Wait a fucking second. You kissed her?" Blake was pissed. I was pissed at myself for having no self-control. "When?"
"At the yearbook retreat." I headed toward the elevator, but Blake stepped in front of me. "And Monday after class." Plus, I thought about it multiple times while jacking off and in my dreams. Oh, and anytime I saw her.
"I thought we agreed not to take things there. I mean, shit, she is cute as hell, but we can't... I mean, can we?" Blake put his hands on his hips and then a grin spread across his face. "Maybe we should take it there. I bet she's a virgin."
"We?" I clenched my fists and resisted the urge to punch him in the gut. We might have been close, but that didn't make them immune to getting the beat down if it needed to happen. "I'm not sharing her."
"Then stop fucking kissing her." Blake stepped out of the way. "We'll go see your sister. I'll put a call in for us."
"I don't need to see my sister."
"We're supposed to be proving we're ready." Morgan's reminder felt like a kick to my balls. "We need to keep our eyes on the prize."
I pressed the button and the elevator dinged open. They followed me inside and we stood in silence as it descended to sea level. We stepped out into the cave and started removing our clothes.
"She has a knife that looks an awful lot like a siren's." I had considered not telling them about it because I wasn't one-hundred percent sure it had been real. It couldn't have been real.
"Excuse me?" Morgan's eyes went wide as he folded his pants and put them on a bench. "How?"
"I didn't get that good of a look at it, but I swear I saw abalone insets on the hilt. She had her fist pretty tightly wrapped around it." I rubbed the back of my neck. "That would be impossible though."
"I'd have to see it." Blake stood at the edge of the platform. "It's doubtful it's real."
I stood next to him. "I hope you're right." Because if it was real, we needed to worry about where she got it.
Morgan was practically vibrating standing on the edge of the platform. "We can't go this long again. It hurts to shift."
Our house sat on a cliff overlooking the ocean, and in the cliff was a hollowed-out section with boats and jet skis. With a push of a button, the cliff opened to the wide-open sea. There was also an exit under the water for us to swim through.
"Stop being a guppy." Blake dove into the water, his body instantly morphing as soon as his fingertips hit the surface.
Morgan whooped and dove in after him.
Even if I did want to kiss Riley more, she would never accept this world. Humans could never know of our existence, which was the entire purpose of some of us being on land in the first place. With tritons being entrenched in the human world, we could squelch any discovery of our existence.
I dove off the platform and the change ripped through me, my legs burning as the connective tissue grew. Morgan was right about it being uncomfortable. Freshman year we could only go a day without changing.
With swimming practice three days a week, the urge to shift was strong. Only true tritons from an elite bloodline could manage to keep the human appearance for as long as we could, and even then it took years of training to work up to a solid week of being bipedal.
Blake and Morgan stared back at me under the water with their amber-colored eyes. Our eyes were similar to a feline's which allowed for quick adjustment of the pupil underwater.
I swam toward the exit of the cave and then we were free. My mind and body became relaxed as we raced out to sea.