Chapter 17
Ari
I don’t know what I expected her reaction to be, but when she throws her head back and laughs maniacally, I startle. It’s a barking laugh that she struggles to catch her breath through.
After what must have been a solid minute of her laughing, she places her hands on her knees, heaving deep gulps of oxygen.
Once she’s settled, she looks up at me and apologizes for laughing.
I take that as the perfect moment to allow my hands to shift, webbing taking its place between each of my fingers, then raising them to the moonlight for her to see.
Her smile falls, eyes widening as she wordlessly takes my hand in both of hers, feeling the sensitive webbing, the bond feeling even stronger in my most natural form.
She opens her mouth to speak, stammers, “I-wh-ah,” before snapping her mouth shut and giving up.
It’s now or never I suppose. I sink down, sitting on the sand, holding my hand above my head for Erica to join me. She does, her body tense and eyes narrowed in confusion, or suspicion, I’m not sure which.
Offering her a weak and nervous smile, I allow the rest of my shift to take over my body, minus the gills.
Baby steps. When it’s complete, I brush my tail fin against her leg and she gasps, looking between where my tail lies beneath the water, and my eyes.
Holding on to the smile, and my breath, I wait for any kind of response from her, terrified she’ll run screaming and never look back.
“I-is this some kind of-of party trick?” she whispers into the night, finally saying something. Progress.
A laugh escapes me. “What a strange and unnecessary trick that would be,” I say while I wait for the rest of her thoughts to begin tumbling from her.
“All of you?” she asks succinctly.
“Yes. We grew up together . . . in the ocean.” I feel the need to clarify that for some reason, really trying to drive the point home, apparently.
She’s staring out over the water now, not turning to look at me when she asks, “Anything else?”
A sinking feeling begins to settle in my stomach at the hollowness in her voice.
Moving her hands from where she’s leaning against them in the sand to her lap, her eyes still stare out into the night when she says with complete seriousness, “Is this where you kill me? Drown me? Take me to some underwater kingdom as an offering or something?”
I can’t help it. It’s my turn to laugh, never having laughed so hard in all my life, head thrown back, startling the guys still a respectable distance away.
Tears are rolling from my eyes when I finally kind of catch my breath and return my attention to Erica, whose face is red and her brow is creased like she’s stuck somewhere between embarrassed about her question and mad at me for laughing.
“I’m sorry, but where on earth would you get an idea like that?” I gasp.
She rubs a hand up her opposite arm, eyes on her lap now. “I mean aren’t mermaids evil sea monsters that drag pirates and sailors to their doom?”
More uncontrollable laughter rips from my body so hard my stomach hurts and the tears keep coming.
She’s still not laughing though. She crosses her arms with a hmph before changing her mind and punching me in the arm.
“Ow! What was that for?” I ask as I get myself under control once more.
“You’re out here telling me some big, crazy secret I’m supposed to believe, and when I asked you a question you laughed at me,” she says in what she thinks is her grumpy voice, but she’s so cute that she’s not good at looking mean.
“To be fair, I’m absolutely terrified you’ll hate me.
And you laughed at me first. When I shared my secret.
. . ” I begin, then respond to her previous question, trying not to sound patronizing.
“While that might have been the case hundreds of years ago, I’d like to inform you that we have evolved, as most of the worlds have.
So no, I will not be killing, drowning, or sacrificing you tonight. ”
She finally turns her stare to me, her eyes volleying between mine. “Then why tell me?” she whispers. “Don’t fairy tales all have a rule that humans aren’t allowed to know or something.”
Releasing a breathy chuckle I say, “I mean, kind of. There are rules but it’s more complicated than that.” I hold her stare and push as much honesty through to her as I can. “I couldn’t keep the secret from you anymore. Not with . . . not with what you’re coming to mean to me.”
Her mouth falls open a bit, and a new blush stains her cheeks before she refocuses with a sultry, wicked smile. “And what am I coming to mean to you?”
“Honestly?”
She nods, biting her bottom lip.
“Everything.”