Chapter 6
G reta burst deeper into the golden kelp forest, stalks whipping across her face and shoulders like wet lashes. The dense vegetation closed around her, turning the turquoise water into a swaying maze of amber-gold blades.
Her gills flared hard with each panicked breath. Every muscle burned from the unfamiliar motion, but she kept kicking, webbed hands slicing through the fronds.
She thought she might have lost him. Lost them all.
Then a dark cobalt shape exploded through the kelp wall directly in front of her.
The aggressive rival with heavy ridges along his forearms had broken away from the pack. His amber eyes burned with raw, feral hunger as they locked onto her.
Fresh blood still leaked from deep gashes across his chest, drifting in thin red ribbons into the water.
“Finally alone, pink bitch!” he snarled, the harsh click-whistle vibrating through the current. “Time to finish what I started!”
He moved faster than she could react .
One powerful arm snaked around her waist and slammed her backward against a thick coral outcrop.
The impact drove the breath from her gills in a burst of bubbles. Before she could twist away, his larger body pinned her completely, hips forcing her legs apart with brutal efficiency.
“No—get off me!” Greta screamed, her voice a high, frantic trill. “Don’t you dare!”
He ignored her.
His free hand groped between her thighs, rough and demanding, forcing her legs wider.
His erect cock—thick, ridged, and flushed dark—pressed insistently against her entrance.
“Fight me,” he growled, teeth grazing her neck.
“I like it when they squirm. You’re going to take every inch of my first claim right here. ”
Greta thrashed harder, kicking and clawing. “I said get off!” She raked her webbed claws across his face and neck, opening deep furrows that clouded the water with fresh blood. “You’re not touching me!”
The rival only laughed, a low, vibrating sound. “Keep screaming. It makes me harder.”
His markings flared bright cyan as he shoved his hips forward, trying to force himself inside her. But she twisted at the last moment.
A savage roar shook the water.
Klari slammed into the aggressive rival like a living battering ram, shoulder connecting with ribs in a crunch Greta felt through the water.
The impact tore the rival off her, sending both males tumbling away in a violent tangle of limbs and claws.
“Get your filthy hands off her, ridge-back!” Klari roared.
Greta curled against the coral, gasping through her gills, one hand pressed to the fresh bruises on her hips. She watched in horrified fascination as the two blue males tore into each other.
“You think you can steal my claim, Klari?” the rival snarled, raking claws across Klari’s chest. “I’ll gut you and fuck her on your corpse!”
Klari drove a clawed fist into the rival’s side, then spun him and slammed his face into a jagged coral branch. “She is not yours to take!” he growled, voice low and deadly. “Touch her again and I’ll end you!”
They grappled, biting and slashing, bodies twisting in the current. The rival landed a brutal kick that sent Klari reeling backward.
He recovered instantly, surged forward, and locked his arms around the other male’s throat from behind. With a savage twist and a powerful thrust of his legs, Klari drove them both downward and slammed the rival’s head against the seabed hard enough to crack coral.
The aggressive male went limp, drifting slowly in the current.
Klari didn’t make the mistake of checking if he was dead, and instead buried his sharp teeth into the male’s throat. A disgusting crunch later, and he spun, amber eyes scanning the water, and locked onto Greta.
She was already pushing off the coral, trying to swim away—any direction, just away. “Stay back!” she shouted, voice still shaky and trilling. “I don’t need your help!”
Klari spat the chunk of flesh out and caught her wrist in a firm but careful grip. Not bruising. Not crushing. He pulled her toward him with undeniable strength.
“You do right now,” he said, voice steady despite the fight. “The others are still coming. And they will find you.”
Greta yanked hard against his hold, webbed fingers prying at his arm. “Let go of me! You’re no different from him!” She kicked backward, trying to break free. “I’m not your prize!”
Klari didn’t release her. Instead he wrapped one arm around her waist and propelled them both away from the drifting body and the blood cloud with powerful strokes.
“I just saved your life,” he said quietly, the clicks and whistles carrying clearly through the water.
“At least let me get you somewhere safe before you try to drown yourself running from me.”
Behind them, the sounds of the remaining rivals grew louder again—distant roars and clicks echoing through the kelp.
Klari glanced back once, jaw tight, then pulled Greta faster toward the thickest part of the kelp forest.
Greta kept fighting his hold the entire way—twisting, kicking, and arguing. “Safe? Nowhere here is safe!”
He couldn’t argue with her there. No Mating Games were safe.
Klari’s grip remained steady. “Right now, surviving comes first.”
They plunged deeper into the swaying golden fronds as the rivals’ voices grew closer once more.