Chapter 24
Zoe
T hat night was a blur. I drifted in and out of sleep, falling under when exhaustion claimed me and waking to Vodyan fucking my barely conscious body, his hands and tentacles cradling me tenderly as he whispered sweet, filthy words in my ear.
“Sleep. I just need to fill you more. I can’t resist, sweet thing. But you should rest. I promise I’ll be done soon. This cunt is such a good sheath for my cock. Sleep, sweetheart.”
He didn’t stop touching me, and I felt him even in my dreams, tracing the shape between my legs with his fingers, filling me gently with his tentacle as he chided my pussy for letting his cum slip out, caressing my belly, my throat, my breasts, and my face.
I slept completely entangled in him, and he kept me luxuriously warm. It was everything I’d ever wanted and so much more.
He didn’t sleep, and I let him do everything. His behavior was compulsive—obsessive, just like he said—and it filled me with a bone-deep, satiating comfort. It felt as if I was finally fed after a lifetime of barely eating enough. He met my voracious need for touch, giving me more than I could ever dream of.
No man had ever done that. Never. I hadn’t even dared to want it, because attention so consuming, caresses to erotic and tender, used to belong to the realm of fantasy.
A small voice in my head warned that it would have to end, sooner or later. That I shouldn’t get used to it. I pushed it away, though, deciding to wait and see.
It was a moot point, anyway. Vodyan captivated me, completely and utterly, and I was in this for the long haul.
Sometime around noon, we finally rolled out of the pool. He let me use the bathroom alone while he ordered us lunch, but as I walked across the room, his eyes followed me with greedy attention. I left the door unlocked in case he wanted to come in.
I didn’t mind his overbearing presence in the least. In fact, it was exactly what I needed.
We ate, and then, he asked if I wanted to check my email or social media using his computer.
“The connection is secure, and you’ve been offline for weeks,” he said, an unhappy frown on his face. “I thought you might want to check what’s happening with your family.”
I was halfway to his computer set into the wall when I realized his frown grew deeper, his teeth gnashing together.
“You don’t like it,” I stated, facing him. “Why and why did you offer, then?”
His jaw clenched as he looked aside, folding his arms.
“I want to give you everything you want, Zoe,” he finally said, his voice low. “But I’m afraid you’ll want something or someone more than me. It’s horrible, and an impossible contradiction. I want to take you out again, because you loved Yeseera, and at the same time, I’m terrified someone will catch your eye, and you’ll leave. And I’ll have no choice but to let you go, because what you want is more important than what I want.”
I smiled and came over, hugging him closely until he softened with a good-natured grumble, embracing me back.
“I will only say this once, because you told me you don’t want to know these things about me. But I think what I’m about to tell you will prove an important point, okay?”
He nodded, his chin brushing the top of my head. I stepped back so I could look into his eyes, but my hands stayed on his waist.
“I’ve had eight long-term partners before you. I was engaged twice. With each and every one of them, I felt a connection, and most of those relationships were good. But—this part is important. None of those men made me feel the way you do. I thought I knew what it meant to love someone, but I was wrong. Because now I know, and all those feelings I felt for other people in the past are pale and washed out in comparison to what I feel for you.”
He swallowed thickly, his eyes softening, though he was still frowning.
“Why so many? Did you get bored? Didn’t they do it for you?”
I winced, because the question was crude, his tone harsh, but I understood where it came from. He probably worried I had a pattern of breaking things off. He couldn’t be further from the truth.
“I wish, baby,” I said, pressing my lips together, because the truth was embarrassing. “Actually, out of all those people, I was never the one to end things. Never. It was always them finding me lacking. Or too much, depending on how you look at it.”
His eyes bored into me, so intense, I had to look away. My face burned with shame. I knew it wasn’t my fault, I knew nothing was wrong with me, but statistics didn’t lie.
When eight men break up with you, most of them in under a year, you gotta wonder .
That shame rose in my gut, hot and choking, but before it could become too much, solid arms and tentacles wrapped around me, Vodyan’s lips pressing to the top of my head.
“Idiots, all of them,” he growled, showering me with kisses. “You’re too precious to ever let you go.”
“Thank you,” I whispered, while that shame inside me murmured, “Just wait and see. Will he still think so a year from now? Or will he tell you to go?”
I sniffed, melting into his embrace as I pushed that unpleasant voice away.
“There’s literally no chance that anything in my email will make me want to leave you,” I promised. “You don’t have to worry. And if you want, you can even look over my shoulder. I don’t mind.”
He stiffened, then relaxed with a deep exhale.
“I really want to do just that, but I recognize how fucked up it is,” he said after a moment. “No. Check your email, Zoe. I’ll go to the main level to grab the food when it arrives, okay?”
Since Vodyan didn’t need chairs, there weren’t any in the apartment. I used his computer while standing. The screen was big, set into the wall, and the keyboard rolled out after clicking a button.
My inbox was stuffed, and I scrolled to the very bottom first to look at my messages chronologically. Most of it was newsletters, but my sister sent me occasional emails since she knew email was always the first thing I checked. I read through her brief messages letting me know she and my parents were safe.
Vodyan came back, and I still wasn’t done with the avalanche in my inbox. I couldn’t believe how many things I was even subscribed to. It was fucking unhealthy.
“Almost done,” I called when he asked me if I would eat. “God, what’s this morbid thing? What kind of freak sends an email with the subject ‘Come out or he dies’? I swear, those marketing people will do anything to…”
“What? Show me! ”
Vodyan was by my side in seconds, just as the message loaded. We both stared at a blurry photo of a skull submerged in water.
“Is this the boy?” Vodyan asked sharply, putting his arm around my shoulders.
“What b—oh my God.”
It was Azahl. I hadn’t realized it at first, because his face filled the screen, and it seemed bigger because of the perspective. But now, I saw it. It was him.
“Is there anything else?” Vodyan asked, his tentacle winding around my leg like he needed to touch me as much as he could.
“I… Yeah, let me just…”
I scrolled down, but there was just the photo. No text apart from the ominous subject line.
“I knew he sent you threats in your email,” Vodyan said grimly. “How old is it?”
“It’s new, so… From two hours ago,” I said. “That’s… How did he know?”
When I looked at him, Vodyan was grim. “He knows you’re in Yeseera, safe and untouchable behind the fence. He knows you’re not hiding anymore. I’d say it was a pretty good guess on his part that you might check your inbox. Or he might have sent this across multiple channels, you just happened upon the email first.”
“Wait. There’s an attachment.”
I clicked on the MPEG file, my heart hammering sickly in my chest. Carver’s face wearing a clear plastic mask filled the screen, handsome in a cold, ruthless kind of way. He grinned, his white smile marred by a gap where his central incisor used to be. The image blurred because it was filmed underwater, but his voice came through clearly.
“And I missed you again, Zoe Gilbert. I was so close!” he grinned into the camera, seemingly having the time of his life.
I shivered, and Vodyan wrapped another tentacle around me. I sank into his touch gratefully, letting him ground me .
“And now you’re hiding in the vodnik city like the little fucking coward you are,” Carver continued, that smile tightening into a grimace. “Zoe, Zoe. Come out. Let’s play. Don’t you think it’s high time we met? There you are, scuttling in the shadows, hiding behind bodyguards, and it’s no fun!”
He grinned again, and the camera panned away from his face, showing Azahl tied up, held between two lamias. He struggled weakly, but it was obvious he either lacked strength or the will to move.
A sob lodged in my throat, and I swallowed it to hear Carver talk.
“Now, did you know, Zoe Gilbert, that abominations can survive up to two hours underwater? Two hours! That’s a long fucking time. Well, we’ve been here on this underwater trip for a hundred minutes. Can you do the math, Zoe?”
The camera returned to his face as he laughed, his eyes flashing mockingly. “Now, maybe we’ll come up to the surface so he can take a few breaths, or maybe we won’t. I fancy killing him just to make you cry, you fucking bitch. I lost a tooth because of you!”
He screamed, pointing at the gap in his mouth, his amused manner completely gone. I flinched, and Vodyan held me tighter.
Carver shook himself off and continued. “I lost a tooth and precious cargo, and I lost good customers because of your little eavesdropping stint. But I did my research on you, bitch. I know you’re a fucking do-gooder who probably gets off on touching children, so here’s what will happen. Within the next twelve hours, I’ll send you a location. If you don’t show up within an hour, the fucking abomination will die, and it will be on you. Bring your bodyguard. My new lamia friends have some business with him. If I see anyone but the two of you, the boy will die.”
The video ended, and I realized I was barely breathing, so I gulped in a long, shuddering breath that did nothing to ease the knot of terror in my gut.
“I need to send it to Malgeri,” Vodyan said quietly, reaching for the keyboard with one hand .
“What? No!” I grabbed his wrist, looking at him pleadingly. “You can’t tell the feds! They don’t fucking care about abominations, no one does! They will sacrifice him to get Carver! Please, baby. Please! You heard what he said.”
He nodded patiently, and when I stopped begging, breathing fast as tears crowded my eyes, he leaned in and kissed my forehead.
“We won’t tell the feds. There’s a mole, remember? But I need to tell Malgeri. He is the head of my branch of the MSA, and I promise you, if there’s anyone who cares about persecuted monster children, it’s him. Okay, Zoe? We need a plan and all the support we can get if we are to save Azahl.”
I blinked a few times, taken aback so much that even the urge to cry went away. “Wait. You… You’d do that? I thought… Vodyan, I thought you wouldn’t let me go. I thought you’d be ready to sacrifice him, too. To keep me safe.”
I didn’t mind it in the least—I was happy he was on my side in this, and I’d give my life for Azahl’s in a flash. After all, I owed him. He came to me, and I failed him, and it was my fault that he was in Carver’s grip.
Vodyan gave me a tight smile.
“I think we’ve already established I’ll give you everything you want, and you want to save the boy,” he said, his voice harsh. “But I won’t be fucking stupid about it. We won’t go there like lambs for slaughter, and just to be clear, if I have to choose between the boy and you, I’ll save you. But I will try my best not to let that happen.”
I stared at him for a moment, the cold anger in him settling my fear until I could almost breathe fully.
“Okay,” I whispered, and when he reached for the keyboard again, I let him.
Vodyan spent a long time on a call with his boss after that, and he didn’t let me out of his sight, even following me to the bathroom. His eyes were on me the whole time, watchful and alert, and I had the feeling he wanted to drink me in while we were still in safety. Whenever I was available to touch, he wound around me with almost all his limbs, as if his life depended on keeping me close .
I didn’t understand most of the conversation. They spoke in code, talking about numbered strategies, negotiation techniques, discussing other people in MSA’s employ I had no idea about. Malgeri exploded a few times, calling Vodyan a stubborn son of a bitch and a lovesick idiot, to which Vodyan just smiled, playing with my hair.
Finally, an agreement was reached, people were put on alert, transport organized.
“And now we wait,” Vodyan said, running his fingers through my hair while his tentacles wrapped around my legs and torso, only leaving my arms and head out. “He’ll pick a place close to Yeseera since he knows we’re here. Though it will probably be far enough that getting there will tire me out.”
We were both tense. I was sure the message would come any moment and we’d miss it. Vodyan showed me a secret panel in the wall hiding his weapon cabinet, and he armed himself to the teeth with a few jet guns and knives, and a bullet gun he could keep in a vacuum package and rip out fast if he had to fight on land.
“And this is for you,” he said, presenting me with a discreet black belt sheathing a short knife. “It shouldn’t be very obvious against your suit. Fuck, I’m so glad you won’t need your tank.”
“Oh.” I thought about it. “How long does it actually last? Your cum?”
I ended up sucking his cock while he cleaned and checked his bullet gun, because he hadn’t used it in ages, and he wanted to make sure it was fully operational. It was surreal. His hands were busy, his eyes on the gun, but his cock was hard and eager in my mouth, playing with my tongue. A tentacle coiled over my shoulders, urging me on.
“That’s it, sweetheart,” he murmured, not even looking at me. “You feel so good. Fuck, what’s this?”
He frowned, reaching for a small bottle of gun oil, and a shiver went down my spine. He looked so hot and dangerous when his long, emerald fingers deftly handled a gun. I could see myself blowing him while he did this in the future. Or while he trained. I wondered if he’d be game to have his cock sucked while he did bicep curls, or another upper body exercise…
A loud noise from the computer jolted us both. The volume was turned way up, and Vodyan immediately glanced at the screen.
“Your favorite sex toy shop has a sale,” he said without inflection, going back to his gun.
Well, there was that. Way too many newsletter subscriptions. They wracked my nerves.
Finally, Vodyan couldn’t focus on the gun anymore, his eyes sliding to my face time and again. It didn’t take long after that. He came in my mouth and then brought me up for a long, devouring kiss.
And then, we waited some more, getting two more jump scares from innocuous mail. Until, finally, Carver’s message came through at 8 pm.
“Showtime.”