Crave the Night (12 page)

The bartender slid his fingers over the
bills, apparently checking their validity, then slipped them into
his pocket.

"Talk to the mermaid. She's been coming in
for months. Rumor has it she's planning a visit to the hag herself
and looking for a companion."

"Mermaid? How did she come by that name?"
Nolan needed a guide, one tough enough to weather whatever journey
lay before him. He didn't need a female looking for help of her
own.

"Not a name. It's her...breed."

"Breed?" Surely the bartender didn't believe
whoever this female was that she was truly a mermaid. Mermaids were
myths like dragons and Pegasus and...Nolan flicked his tongue over
one canine...vampires.

He growled. "Where can I find her?"

"She was in the back earlier. Sitting alone.
Can't miss her." The bartender straightened his arms, ready to push
himself away from the bar, but then apparently thought better of
it. He reached out and grabbed Nolan by the arm. His fingers
digging into Nolan's bicep, he whispered, "You ain't the first one
what went with her. She takes 'em to the docks and they never come
back."

Nolan stared down at the man's fingers. The
bartender loosened his hold and stepped back as if burned, but
Nolan wasn't done with him. He leaned over the bar. "She's taken
others to the hag?" He hadn't heard of anyone successfully making
it to wherever the sea hag called home, or if they had, they'd
never returned to share their stories.

The bartender shook his head, his eyes wide
now and worried. "Don't think so. They weren't gone that long.
She's like the rest of her kind, but with legs. She lures men out
to the water and pulls them under...from there...?" His voice
dropped. "There's no coming back."

Sarina Neri crossed her legs at the ankle
and stared toward the front of the bar. Someone new had entered,
someone different from the worn-out men who usually stumbled into
the place. Maybe, finally, her search was over. Maybe, finally, she
would find a man capable of passing the sea hag's tests.

He was talking with the bartender and,
Sarina could tell, hearing tales of her dangers. The superstitious
man's gossip didn't worry her.

No man could resist the lure of a nixie, if
she turned her attention his way.

After taking a drink of her beer, she
uncrossed her ankles and placed her bare feet onto the filthy bar
floor. She was preparing to stand, to search out this new man, when
she saw him crossing the room toward her.

She smiled. This one was coming to her.

As he approached, she studied him, looking
for some sign that he was different from the others. She'd tried
eight so far, each younger and, from outward appearance, stronger
than the last, but none had survived her test. None had lasted the
quarter of an hour Sarina considered the minimum she would need to
trick the sea hag into thinking she had brought the old goddess
what she demanded—a man who could live out his life beside her
under the sea.

This man was tall with broad shoulders that
tapered to an athletic waist. Trim and fit—neither signs he
possessed the talent Sarina needed. He was handsome too, with
rugged features and a cleft in his chin. The hag, like all sea
beings, appreciated beauty. So, his looks were a plus, but neither
that, nor the confident way he prowled forward, were enough.

He had to be able to stay alive in the sea
hag’s home long enough for Sarina to swim away with the soul.

As he moved closer, Sarina spun in her seat
to face him. "Are you looking for me?"

He paused, surprise registering on his face.
Like the others, he'd probably taken her soft features and feminine
form as some sign she would be submissive, an easy target for
whatever caused him to search her out.

But mermaids, nixies, none of their kind,
were submissive or easy targets.

She stood, sweeping her waist-length hair
behind her. The long shirt she'd taken from her last failed
candidate fell open over one bare shoulder and the dungarees she'd
belted at her waist slipped. Annoyed with the human clothing, she
undid the belt with one hand and let the pants fall to the
ground.

Stepping out of them, she moved forward.

She trailed her fingers over the newcomer's
chest as she walked around him, appraising. "What did the bartender
tell you?" This man was the first to come to her. The others she
had searched out. They had come willingly enough, of course, but
they hadn't walked into the bar looking for her, as she suspected
this male had.

"I need a guide," murmured.

His chest and back were layered with muscle.
She paused for a second to lay her palm flat, over his heart. Its
beat was slow, slower than any she had felt before. Her brows
pulled forward, and confused, she took a step back to study him
again.

He was not a merman come to land, or a
selkie. Her fortune couldn't be that great. Or poor—another
creature like herself would be harder to fool, harder to mesmerize
into thinking he was in love with her, and harder to convince to
accompany her on her journey to see the sea hag.

"What type of guide?" she asked, for the
moment making no effort to charm him in any way. She wanted to hear
the answer he intended to give, not one put into his mind by
spell.

"I have business at sea." He paused, and she
sighed. Nothing special after all.

"With the sea hag," he added.

Sarina's body stiffened, and she stepped
back, studying him again. "You know Melusine?"

"My business is just that...business. I have
no prior connection with the hag...Melusine."

Sarina tilted her head. Ordinary humans
didn't know of Melusine, or if they did, thought her nothing but
legend. But this man before her wasn't selkie or merman, so what
could he be? What was his story?

She inhaled, checking for the scent of the
sea.

Sadly, or luckily, she wasn't sure which
yet, he smelled no more of the ocean than any of the unbathed
seafarers seated at the tables nearby. He didn't, however, smell
entirely human either. There was something different about him, but
Sarina couldn't peg what it was.

"As it happens, I'm in need of a companion
myself," she replied, keeping her tone neutral.

He smiled, confident, like a man used to
getting his way. "So I heard. That is, then, fortunate for us both,
isn't it?"

Perhaps. Sarina still didn't trust that her
luck had finally changed. "Can you swim?" she asked. All said they
could, but none really knew what they might expect to encounter in
a journey to Melusine's home.

Like the others, he nodded his head in
assent.

Tired of speculating as to whether her
search was finally over, she walked past him and strode to the
door.

The mermaid, as the bartender had called
her, said nothing to Nolan as she passed. She simply walked toward
the door showing not the tiniest amount of doubt that he would
follow.

And he would. In fact, he was surprised
every man in the place didn't rise to his feet and rush after
her.

Maybe one-hundred and twenty pounds and
under five feet eight inches in height, she was slim and athletic,
but also exuded femininity.

He had never encountered another woman, or
creature, like her.

As he turned, his foot caught in the pants
she had dropped so casually to the floor. He stared down at them,
wondering if he should scoop them up and carry them along.

From the front, the bartender's gaze
met his. Even through the hazy air, Nolan could read the man’s
face. He thought Nolan a fool, or worse a
soon-to-be-dead
fool.

Little did he know, Nolan was already the
walking dead.

With a grimace, he left the pants and
followed the "mermaid."

Sarina stood on the damp dock, waiting for
the human. The wind had picked up, catching her hair and wrapping
it around her. She could smell the water behind her; her body
itched to leap into the bay that lead to the ocean. Her toes
wiggled, already preparing to shift to the fin she still found so
much more natural.

As the man approached, her hand wrapped
around the tiny vial hanging from her neck. Feeling its pulsing
warmth against her palm calmed her, assured her that what she was
about to do was necessary.

Having a soul had saved her, but at times
like this, it cost her too.

"Now what?" The man arched one brow and
stared out over the water.

She moved toward him with all the power and
grace of her kind. Humming, she grabbed fistfuls of his shirt and
rose up on her toes. "You said you can swim, right?" She sang the
words with no tune in mind. The notes didn't matter, any that left
her throat, any mermaid’s throat, would be enough to lure a human
into her bidding.

He stared down at her, his gaze hooded. "I
did."

"Then now...." She brushed her lips over
his, and took a teasing step back. "...is the time to prove
it."

With no other warning, she fell backward
into the bay, taking the human with her.

Icy water rushed over Nolan, hitting him in
the face. He closed his eyes and cursed his own stupidity. The
bartender had warned him. The woman had too, in a way. She had
asked him if he could swim.

Stupidly, he had expected her to take him at
his word.

He held his breath and waited for her to
loosen her hold on him so he could prove his claim, but as seconds
ticked by, her grip remained iron strong. And he was no longer
falling, he was being pulled...down...at an impossible speed.

His eyes flew open, and his upper lip pulled
back, revealing his fangs—not that the woman saw them. She was too
busy swimming herself, tugging him down in steady flap, after
steady flap, of her undeniably aquatic tail.

The bartender hadn't been wrong.

The guide he had searched out
was
a mermaid.

And, based on the hold she had on Nolan and
the speed she was traveling, her intentions were not good.

Nolan's first instinct was to lash out, to
show her the timid fish she thought she'd caught was in fact a
shark, sharp teeth and all, but as water slid over him and he
caught sight of her hair flowing behind her and her shirt clinging
to her breasts, he calmed.

He was at no risk. He was a vampire. He had
no need to breathe. Let her tow him wherever she liked. It would do
her no good, and he would learn more about her and her kind—the
mystical mermaids no one truly believed existed.

Just as no one believed vampires
existed.

Her tail slapped against his side. He closed
his eyes and enjoyed the feel of being swept along. In some strange
way—despite the tight grip she had on his body—it felt like
freedom.

Sarina had quit singing when her back
touched the water. She swam now, strong and determined to reach the
bottom of the bay before the human she held came out from under the
fog she had created.

She glanced at him. His eyes were closed and
he looked...peaceful. Minutes had passed, five at least. By now,
the need to breathe should have overcome the fog—or should soon.
She flapped her tail again, sending her and the human shooting
another ten feet toward the bottom.

The man moved. This was the part she
hated...the part that having her own soul made hard.

For other mermaids—shells with no souls of
their own—it was easy, expected even, to capture sailors and the
like and tow them to the bottom of the sea. The mermaids gathered
men, not even realizing what they hungered for—a soul—couldn't be
harvested in this way.

But, not any soul would do. For a mermaid to
be free of the hunger and the ties to the sea, she needed the soul
meant for her and her alone.

Sarina glanced at the man again. His eyes
were open now. She steeled herself against his panic and tightened
her grip to keep him from breaking away.

Then he smiled.

Sarina's mouth opened and a bubble escaped.
They were pressing against the fifteen minute mark now, and he was
calm, beyond calm. He looked...pleased.

She loosened her hold and pushed him free.
He didn't move; he just hung in place like seaweed attached to the
bay floor.

His gaze shifted, from her face, down her
borrowed shirt and finally to her tail. It clung there, making her
feel uneasy and exposed.

She'd walked among the humans for two years
now, knew the bartender had guessed her secret, but she had only
revealed herself so thoroughly to the men she had brought to the
bay for her test. And none of the others had survived.

This man, however, was different.
He
was
surviving, and he
would know what she was, know mermaids were real.

She pulled back further, suddenly uncertain.
The idea that mermaids were myth had protected the nixies. Sure, a
few storm-tossed sailors had washed to shore with tales of her
kind, but that was it. There were no real photographs, and no
rational accounts. No proof that other humans couldn't brush off as
the rantings of some battered, most often drunk, sailor wanting for
attention.

But this man...with his self-possessed gait
and his confident stare...this man people would believe.

She twirled in the water and swam to the
side, leaving him floating and watching her, his attention and
ability to hold his breath eerie now.

It wasn't too late. She could drag him
deeper, to a part of the ocean that, no matter his ability to hold
his breath, he could never escape.

She rushed forward, intent on righting the
mistake she'd almost made and stopped in front of him. Her hair
billowed forward, forming a veil around them. He reached out with
one finger and lightly touched the vial that floated upward, away
from her chest. She clasped her hand around the tiny tube and
jerked it back down.