Page 7 of Kept By the Kraken

“Okay. You’re not a talker. That’s fine. I talk enough for everyone.”

I don’t respond, situating another piece on the stump and swinging my axe. The crack of the firewood is a jarring, angry sound between us. Splinters of wood cover her boots and she steps back.

“I’m a researcher for Sable University. A marine biologist working out at the NOAA lab on the other side of the bay. The villagers said you may be able to help me identify a symbol I saw on a dive earlier this week. Maybe you can tell me what it’s on?”

Her words are breathy this time, and when she speaks, I imagine her coming on my cock as I stuff her full of my tentacles. I can almost hear her moans, the way the honey in her voice would turn thick. I shake myself, horrified by the thought.

She thrusts her phone into my face, her arm shaking. “Do you know what this is? What animal or symbol it could be?”

I blink. Once. Twice. I set down my ax and take the phone. The image remains the same. In the grainy watery depths, there is a glowing white light. It’s a picture of me. Well, my Beast. The rune on my back is unmistakable.

My Beast throws up an image of a diver under the water, wrapped in our appendages.

Mate.

Protect.

Hazy memories float one after another. Yesterday when I returned to shore. The scavenging of a camera and a metal box outside my territory. Stalking the coast in the water, back and forth along a small strip of beach. I remember breaking the surface to bring treasures to her door.

My kraken recognized her as our mate and led her to me. The Beast doesn’t understand why I’m refusing the mate call. He has grieved for our lost and he avenged them, but he does not believe a new mate is a betrayal. I am not the Beast. I wrench control, sealing the cracks in the veil. Her phone crunches in my palm, the glass and metal breaking.

Not only did the gods send me a mate, but they’ve also sent me a scientist. Even if my Beast desires to claim her, a scientist can’t know of our existence. Already she is asking questions of the villagers. How long before this scientist has me in a lab? How long before shifters are exposed?

“What the hell? You have serious issues with phones. Is it a hermit thing?” She huffs at me, trying to rescue the broken object from my grasp. Her scent doesn’t reek of fear, only annoyance.

Trusting, reckless human.

The rumble from my chest does nothing to deter her. I hold the phone over my head, pulling it from her reach, but she jumps and grabs for it, moving her soft curves against me.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” Her small hands push against my chest. “First you barge in on a call and now you break the damn thing. Is this, like, an anti-technology conspiracy theory?”

“Who else have you told?” I clutch her with one hand, my fingers digging into her bicep and caging her to me. My teeth ache from how hard I’m clenching my jaw. I want to make herdisappear forever. And I want to pull her closer, kiss her lips, and never let her go.

Her pupils dilate, her scent growing thicker between us. She takes a harsh breath and another. “Do you know what it is? Or what’s happening between us?”

“Answer me. Who have you told?”

“No one.”

My eyes narrow and a warning sounds from my throat. She will not lie to me. Already her actions may have put us both in danger. “The villagers?”

She looks away, a guilty expression on her face. “Why? What do you know? Why is it secret? Why am I drawn to you?”

I tug her chin, forcing those violet eyes to me. “Answer me.”

Her pink lips part and I’m overcome with the urge to taste her.

“The villagers, some folks at the diner, the captain of the boat I’m using for my work, and my ex-husband. He studies old languages. He’s the one you hung up on.”

I curse my luck. An academic like her. If he’s curious, he’s going to be trouble. The last thing I need is attention on the area.

Actually, no. The last thing I need is a mate. And she may have blown my hiding spot. I’ve got safe houses along the eastern coast that I move between when I outlive my human age and it’s time for a new identity. But this one is my home base, and I don’t want to lose it.

I want her gone. No matter how beautiful she is, how good she smells, or how much I want to protect her from her dickhead ex, I refuse to claim her. But I can’t let her go back out into the world and risk her exposing me. And no matter the anguish in my heart, I can’t hurt her. Even if a part of me wishes she didn’t exist.

“Tell him you made a mistake. We don’t want scientists up here making our town into a spectacle.” I shove the broken cellinto her palm and push away from our embrace, too harshly for a delicate mate. She needs to run as far and as fast from me as possible.

I should feel shame for treating her this way. My Beast does—he curses me from the veil. Mates are gifts from the gods, meant to be treasured and protected. But this woman is proof that I failed in my promise to protect. Nothing but my own fear courses through me when she looks at me with wide eyes. She has come to wreck me, and I want no part in it.

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