“Adrian, we saw her leave just now. And everyone in the cabin is passed out, so she most definitely wasn’t visiting one of them.”
“No. No, no, no,” he whispered.
“You can’t see me,” Oceanne had whispered. And then…silver hair. The glimpse of it he had seen when she was saving him. But many mermaids had silver hair…
“Adrian, I’m going to need you to say something. Because if it turns out you’re a fucking traitor, who has given our whereabouts to a Star that most definitely isn’t on our side, then I’m going to have to kill you all over again.”
Adrian gulped as he looked wildly between Enzo and Elara.
It was Enzo, to Adrian’s absolute shock, who crouched before him, a far gentler look in his eyes than in Elara’s. “I know her charm, Adrian. I called on her favour once long ago. Her magick coats this deck. I can smell it.Feel it.”
“I-I wasn’t with Cancia. I was with a siren called Oceanne. She… She came up to the ship a few weeks ago. Elara, I told you.”
He was panicking now as moments flitted through his mind. Her speaking of being trapped, and…aquamarine light. Light he had thought was his. But…what if it had been her starlight?
Then he stilled. How was it that Scorpius had found them so easily, in the middle of the ocean?
The night before, Adrian had spoken to Oceanne, had mentioned Elara and Enzo in passing.
And the very next day…
“Oh, I am going to kill her,” he growled. AStar? He had made love to aStar? One who had lied to him, who was the consort of his worst enemy? She had tricked and lured and deceived him with her siren charm to…what? To find Elara and Enzo? To feed information back to her poisonous lover?
He felt sick, passing a trembling hand over his face.
“What do you think?” Elara murmured to Enzo. He nodded.
“I trust him. He didn’t know, look at him.”
Elara did, and fucking hell, Adrian realised he really, really didn’t want to get on her bad side if this was what a mere look could illicit in him. Her eyes were terrifying, alight with unsaid threats.
“I could kill you with a touch,” she murmured. “Remember that.”
“I didn’t fucking know!” he shouted.
“Now,mypatience is running out,” Enzo growled. “Raise your voice to her one more time, andIwill kill you with a touch.”
Adrian let out an exasperated sigh as he scrambled up. “I swear to you both I didn’t know who she was. She made me wear a blindfold when we…”
Elara and Enzo looked at him in disbelief. And then Elara began to laugh, the sound hollow. “Oh my gods,” she said. “You fucked her? Blindfolded?”
Enzo began to laugh then, deep and warm as he wrapped an arm around Elara. “You couldn’t make this shit up.”
Adrian was laughing then too, and the three were in hysterics. It was ridiculous, he realised.
But his laughter died as an emptiness began to claw at his chest. He hadn’t felt the way he had about Oceanne, well…ever. This mermaid he’d never seen had begun to awaken something within him that he dared not consider further. He was used to having loyal people around him, and save for Elara stabbing him through the chest, he’d never felt a betrayal like it.
Elara softened, clearly seeing his expression, and squeezed his arm. “We’ll discuss this properly later and what Cancia knows from your meetings. But right now…there’s something more important we need answers to.”
Her face was grave as she exchanged a glance with Enzo.
“One crisis at a fucking time,” Elara muttered, yanking Enzo with her towards the cabin as Adrian followed.
She slammed the door open, revealing Isra, Eli, Merissa, and Leo, all in various stages of undress from Bare Cards, strewn on chairs, tables, or the floor.
They stirred, Eli sitting up instantly, his eyes narrowed.
Elara didn’t waste a breath.
