Sea Witch (24 page)

her.”

Caleb wasn’t a kid anymore. He was used to dealing with

uncooperative and hostile witnesses.

“Where? Where did they go?”

“Back where she came from.” Bart turned his face to the darkness

beyond the window. “Damn her.”

“Where’s that?”

“None of your damn business.”

“She’s my mother.”

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“She was my
wife
!” Bart roared. “Fourteen years I lived with that

woman. Loved her. But that didn’t stop her. Oh, no. First chance she got,

she ran off.”

“Where?”

His father slumped against the door. “I’m going to be sick.”

“Not in the Jeep.”

Caleb managed to pull over and open the passenger door before Bart

lost it in a violent, stinking stream.

Caleb handed him a handkerchief and helped him back into the Jeep.

His father couldn’t hit him anymore to shut him up. But being dog

sick in a ditch and then passing out in the backseat were just as effective.

Caleb steadied the old man out of the vehicle and up the porch steps.

At least with the poisons out of his system, there was a chance Lucy

wouldn’t have to clean up after him tonight.

Propping the old man under the yellow porch light, he patted him

down for his keys.

The door cracked open. Lucy stood in the illuminated rectangle,

barefoot and with her hair in a braid. She looked about twelve years old.

“Is he all right?”

“He’s drunk,” Caleb said bluntly. “Go back to bed.”

Her wry smile didn’t quite reach her eyes. “Newsflash, big brother.

My bedtime’s after nine o’clock now. And I have as much experience

putting him to bed as you do.”

Guilt twinged. “So take a night off.”

Lucy stepped back as Caleb supported Bart over the threshold.

Laughter and applause wafted from the television in the living room, and

then Maggie was there, taking in the scene with her big, dark-as-chocolate eyes.

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Caleb’s heart pumped like a fist, knocking the air from his lungs.

Bart trembled. “Who’s that? Who are you?”

“That’s Maggie, Pop.” Caleb nudged him toward the stairs. “She’s

staying here for a few days.”

Bart lurched forward and gripped her arm, hard enough to bruise.

Wincing, Maggie tried to peel his fingers from her arm.

“Easy.” Caleb grabbed his jacket. “Let her go.”

His father barely noticed, thrusting his head forward to peer into

Maggie’s face. “Are you her? Have you come back?”

Maggie made a soft, protesting sound.

Caleb shook his father by the collar. “Let her go,” he repeated

through his teeth.

Bart dropped her arm and swung at Caleb.

He didn’t have time to duck. The punch glanced clumsily off his

jaw, stunning him. It had been years since his father hit him.

He wanted to hit back.

But he never had. Even when he was big enough. Strong enough.

He caught his father’s fist on the next swing, pulling his arm up and

behind him. “Enough,” he growled.

Bart made a sound, a terrible sound like wet rope rattling through

rusty hinges, and collapsed against him. It took Caleb several long

moments to realize his father was weeping. He supported his father’s tall,

wasted body, rage and pity churning in his stomach.

“I am sorry.” Maggie’s beautiful face was grave, her tone gentle.

“She is not coming back.”

Caleb frowned. “Do you know each other?”

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“Her eyes . . .” Beads of perspiration dotted Bart’s pale face. His

breath was rank.

“What about them?”

“She has your mother’s eyes.”

Baffled, Caleb met his sister’s gaze, gray green as his own. “Lucy?”

“The other one,” Bart mumbled. “Staring at me. Your mother’s

eyes.”

“He’s sick,” Lucy said. “Let me take him upstairs.”

“I’ve got him,” Caleb said grimly.

Whether he wanted him or not.

* * * *

Margred watched Caleb help his father up the stairs. Despite the

impatience in his voice, the frustration in his eyes, there was such

strength inside him.

Such tenderness.

“He should have a care for his leg,” she murmured.

“Caleb’s better at taking care of other people than himself, ” Lucy

said. “He raised me, you know.”

Margred tilted her head. “Until he left to fight.”

“Actually, he went away to school when I was nine. It was that, or

haul lobsters with Dad, and by then they could barely stand to eat dinner

at the same table, let alone be cooped up on the same boat twelve hours a

day. Caleb put up with it as long as he could. He’s a good brother.” Her

gaze, earnest and unguarded, met Margred’s, and for a moment Margred

felt a buzz, a click, a— The girl looked away. “He’s a good man.”

Selkies did not think in terms of good or bad. They simply were, and

their existence was enough. But for humans, whose lives were short and

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messy, whose choices determined the eternal fate of their souls, good and

evil had meaning.

Caleb
was
a good man, Margred realized, feeling an ache like a

bruise at her heart. Whether he believed her or not, he was trying to

protect her. To care for her.

And one day he would die.

How could he stand it?

How would she?

Her mate had died, and she had mourned him. But her life with him

had not been very different from the centuries that had gone before or the

decades since: sunlight, sea, and storm, the cycle of the seasons, the

richness of the ocean, the freedom of the waves. Fifty years later, she

could not recall his touch or the timbre of his voice.

Caleb limped down the stairs, his wonderful green eyes sober, his

mouth tight with pain, and she felt a pang in her belly.

He
had moved her. Changed her.

Even if she could go back to the sea, would she ever be the same?

“How’s Dad?” Lucy asked.

Caleb’s expression softened when he looked at his sister. “Asleep.”

“Oh. Oh, well, that’s good.” Lucy shifted her weight from foot to

foot. Shifted her gaze from Caleb to Maggie. “I think I’ll watch the rest of

my show up in my room. Good night.”

“ ’Night, Lu.”

“Good night,” Margred echoed.

Lucy’s footfalls sounded going up the stairs.

“You want to tell me what’s going on?” Caleb asked quietly.

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She arched her eyebrows. “I have been watching television with

your sister. It is very . . . educational.”

Caleb’s mouth quirked. “Honey, it’s
American Idol
, not the History

Channel.” He pressed a button, and the set went dark. “What was that

business with my father? He acted like he recognized you.”

“He did. Or rather,” she corrected herself, “he recognizes what I

am.”

“What the hell is that?”

The question buried itself like a knife in her chest. She had told him,

and he had not believed her. “Did you ask him?”

“I can’t get a straight answer out of the old man when he’s sober. He

makes even less sense when he’s drunk.”

She lifted her chin. “And as long as you can tell yourself he is drunk

and I am crazy, you don’t have to believe either of us.”

He shook his head. “I didn’t come here to fight with you. I’ve

missed you, Maggie.”

Her heart shook. She crossed her arms to hold it in her breast. “After

one day.”

He smiled wryly. “After five minutes. That’s how long it took me to

realize I could have handled things better yesterday. I was angry. Jealous,

I guess. And I took it out on you.” His gaze met hers, all nerves and need,

and she felt the jolt in the pit of her stomach. “Come home with me,

Maggie.”

His admission moved her. But it was not enough. She drew a shaky

breath. “You do not trust me.”

“I want you.”

“You do not
know
me.” The words burst from her.

He raised his eyebrows. “That didn’t stop us before.”

“It did not matter before.”

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He
had not mattered.

And now he did. Margred bit her lip.

It was as simple—and as painful—as that.

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Sixteen

THE SELKIE PROVED STRONGER THAN THE HUMAN. More

resistant to Tan’s will, and slow to die.

The first was an inconvenience, the demon thought, looking down at

her naked, bleeding body. Which made the second rather handy. The

longer she lived, the better chance he had of teasing information from her.

When Tan first sensed the arrival of another elemental on the beach,

he’d been almost disappointed his victim had delivered herself so easily

into his hands. More disappointed when he struck her down and realized

she was not the one he sought.

But she served his purpose.

Or she would, if he could persuade her to give up her sealskin.

Unfortunately, she was proving resistant.

Tan frowned, tapping his teeth with the knife. He appreciated his

adversary’s strength almost as much as he enjoyed her weakness. He

spread his other hand on the selkie’s breast and let it rest there,

unmoving. Not to inflict pain, not this time, but to prove she was as much

in his power as his human host. He could do anything he liked with her.

With both of them.

And had, for the past hour.

Long enough for the babbling self-loathing, the screams of mental

anguish, the incoherent protests of his human host to run together and

fade into forgotten background noise, like a radio left playing for too

long. Such a shame. Tan missed the thrill of awareness, his host’s weak

struggles for control. Forcing his will on the human as he forced his touch

on the selkie was an exquisite added zest, a doubled delight.

But now, as Tan gazed down at his hand on the selkie’s breast, her

bound and naked body, her perfect skin—well, not so perfect anymore—he realized his host’s male parts had swollen, pressing and twitching

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against the front of his pants. His body responded to the straining limbs,

the quivering flesh, the slipperiness under his hands.

Tan pinched her nipple, drawing blood.

Ohgod, ohno, ohplease . .
.

Delicious.

Idly, Tan took out the human’s cock and fondled it, savoring this

fresh sensation, relishing the new wariness in the selkie’s eyes. He would

not scare her with sex. She was selkie, after all. An opponent worthy of

his effort.

But he had her attention now. Oh, yes.

“Nothing to say, dear sister?” he taunted.

He had brought her here to talk. To talk, and to get her away from

the sea, where she might draw on the water’s power. Unfortunately, he

could not allow her to scream. Someone might notice, and he really did

not want to be interrupted again. He had been forced to abandon his last

job half-finished, destroying his victim’s pelt but not her human body.

She was beyond his reach at the moment, hedged about by humans. He

could not reach her without drawing the unwelcome attention of both

Heaven and the land beneath the wave.

But this one . . .

He had stuffed a sock in the selkie’s mouth and bound it—like her

wrists and ankles—with thick tape. Tan had found the tape, the saw, and

some pliers in the garage. Human technology might be polluting the

earth, but he could not deny their tools were occasionally useful.

He ripped the tape from her jaw, taking some of her hair with it. She

moaned.

“Patience,” he chided.

He worked the gag, wet with blood and saliva, from between her

torn lips and waited.

“Water,” she croaked.

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He needed her to be capable of speech. But she was mer. Water was

her element. He must be careful not to revive her too much.

“Tell me where you left your pelt, and I will let you drink.”

She worked her mouth. Glared at him with her remaining eye. “Go

to hell, demon.”

Tan appreciated her humor—if, indeed, she wasn’t past the point of

relishing her own joke.

“Certainly I will. After you tell me.” He squatted beside her chair.

The cock jutted, red and eager, from his gaping zipper. “Tell me,” Tan

coaxed. “Tell me, and we will end this, and you can return to the sea.”

He lied. Even if he would set her free to accuse him, she could never

go back. Not if he possessed her sealskin.

And she knew it, cunning female, which was why she had hidden it

so well. Resisted him this long.

“I am selkie,” she panted. “Whatever you do to this body, you

cannot end me. I will not die.”

Tan straightened and stood over her.
Nononononooo . .
.

“You will not die,” he agreed. He stroked his host’s cock, his hand

slick with selkie blood, pleasuring himself with the human’s horrified