Page 59 of Bride of the Sea King

Triton clenched his jaw.

A sideways glance at Rayna and the stunning dark-haired, dark-skinned man standing next to her—he must’ve been Wesson—showed they were even more shocked than the fighting couple, Greta and Platt.

When Triton didn’t speak again right away, still trying to calm himself, I figured it was time to hold up my side of the bargain. The bargain that didn’t exactly favor me, but I was the one who offered it.

I stepped around Triton, and he immediately dragged me to his chest, roughly.

Maybe he hadn’t been just trying to block my view.

Maybe he’d been trying to shield me from them.

“I think what the king means to say is this relationship is very clearly fucked up,” I said, forcing my voice to come out upbeat. I wasn’t angry like the king was, but one of us needed to stay calm and pleasant if that was usually how he did things. “You’re shouting curses and insults at her,” I gestured from the man to the woman. “You’re literally breaking furniture with his body in response.” I gestured from the woman back to the man. “If this was Earth, the cops would be involved, and you’d probably be going to prison or…therapy.”

I couldn’t come up with the word for therapy in their language, so I just threw it out there in English after a moment of trying to come up with it.

Greta and Platt both gaped at me.

Maybe they didn’t know what therapy was.

“Do you have therapy here?” I asked Triton aloud.

“What is it?” His voice was low. He was clearly still trying to gain control of his anger.

“When you talk to someone about your issues so they can help you work through your problems and give you tools to do better.”

“Then no, we don’t have therapy.”

“Maybe humans havesomethingover merrae, then.” I tried to step away from Triton, but his grip was iron. “Look at yourselves.” I gestured between the couple. “Do you let your children fight like this?”

Greta’s face flushed bright red.

That was an obvious no.

Platt snarled out, “This is who we are. You are nothing but a womb—a tiny human female who cannot understand the workings of merrae warriors.”

Triton’s magic slammed through the room like a bolt of lightning.

Everyone sucked in a breath as their hair raised and the air in the room thickened—including me.

Though the way my back arched made it obvious that it affected me much differently than it did them, because the blood drained from all of their faces. Even his sister’s and brother-in-law’s.

“Go ahead and repeat what you just said about my queen.” There was no missing the pure, undiluted fury in Triton’s voice.

Platt eyed the man behind me, and said nothing, though he did rise to his feet.

“He only means that we voted in favor of you taking a mate for the sake of repopulation,” Greta said quietly but evenly as she stepped up in front of her mate. She was only a few inchesshorter than him, but he could see over her just fine. “We never planned on seeing her as a queen. No one did.”

Apparently, she could stand up for her mate when she wasn’t trying to murder him with a coffee table.

“Then perhaps you should’ve asked my opinion.” Triton’s growl was back, his magic still surrounding us all in a way that made it difficult for me not to grind against him or moan.

I needed to get my shit together, but his power made that pretty much impossible.

“I have spent the last century solving your problems and dealing with your temper tantrums almost entirely alone.” Triton finally released me, placing me behind him again as he slowly stalked toward the couple.

Staying where he put me, I just watched him.

And fought like hell not to give into the urge to touch myself.

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