Page 25 of Stealing the Merman

On the opposite ledge and toward the end of the cave, a pale-skinned, brunet merman was busy shredding Kristian’s clothes. Kristian was huffing and grunting. He was tied with an old, frayed rope that had to snap the moment he gave it one good tug. He twisted in his restraints but never attempted to break them. His feigning infuriation was so transparent, over the top and ineffective, Darin saw right through it.

Kristian’s behavior didn’t surprise him. Kristian and Fernando had only expressed interest in women. When they were confronted with the otherworldly beauty of mermen, their bodies reacted in unexpected ways. Their minds sought to maintain the fiction of their singular preference, but they realized that no man could resist a merman, no matter if he was dedicated to women otherwise. They understood once the tremendous pleasure mermen inflicted set in.

Finn pulled him out of his thoughts and into the cave. Behind them, a black merman with a jade green tail carried Luis inside.

A few yards from Kristian, Finn grabbed at the ledge, arresting their drift. He nodded his chin forward, motioning for Darin to climb onto the rock. Darin propped himself up on the stone and lifted onto it. The ledge topped the water level by a few inches, and to Darin’s surprise, it was dry. He shuffled backward on the flat surface until, after six or seven feet, he hit a wall. At his back, his hands came to rest upon a coarse material. Wondering what it was, he wrapped his fingers around it, finding that it was a rope. The same kind the other mermen had used for Fernando and Kristian.

“Please tell me you’re going to tie me up,” Darin said, collecting the rope. “I’ll be naughty if you need a reason. I can struggle and try to get away…” He lifted an eyebrow suggestively.

“I can tie you up just because,” Finn said, humor coloring his voice. He pushed up on the ledge and down on Darin until he was hovering above him.

“I’d like that.” A drop of seawater dripped from Finn’s hair and onto Darin’s bottom lip. He licked it up, savoring the taste. “Salty.”

“I bet you like salty.” Finn winked.

“I love salty,” Darin said, knowing they were no longer talking about seawater.

“So do I.”

“Mm.” Darin couldn’t stop the images of Conall and his hard, thick, veiny cock spilling precum from overrunning his mind. Conall’s body was one of two temples Darin worshiped at.

On the one hand, he was glad Conall and his stern look weren’t here, that this time, he wouldn’t interrupt them. On the other hand, Finn’s presence made Darin long for him more acutely than he had in months.

Finn dipped down to kiss him. Darin responded, inhaling his scent of sea, sunshine and lemon. Finn undressed him, then his hands found Darin’s and took the rope from him. Darin was too busy kissing him to pay attention to the coarse fibers wrapping around his wrists.

When his hands were secured, Finn withdrew and tautened the rope, stretching Darin’s arms behind his head. Finn surveyed him, looking pleased.

“Don’t you want to spread my legs and tie them apart?” Darin asked, thinking about how the other men had been tied, spread wide open. “It’s better to prevent me from closing my legs, don’t you agree?”

“I do,” Finn said, “but I also want you to wrap them around me. You think you can be persuaded?”

Darin pulled his legs up and crossed his ankles behind the dome of Finn’s merman butt. Finn’s weight pressed him down, him and his cock. They kissed, and Darin moaned into his mouth at the delicious pressure.

“I didn’t think I’d see you again,” Finn said against his lips. “Not after I left Shroud Cay.”

“The New World is large,” Darin said, “but I come to many islands.”

“I’m glad you do.”

“Me too.” Darin pecked him. His fingers curled around the rope to have something to hold onto as he laid himself bare. “I thought about you all the time.”

“Likewise. I couldn’t forget you. Neither you nor…” Conall.

Darin nodded. He understood. It wasn’t like he was any more successful putting Conall out of his mind, no matter how inauspicious the end of their affair had been.

He longingly looked into Finn’s eyes, their aquamarine a shade darker in the dim cave. “You were on my mind every day,” Darin said.

Surprise, happiness and arousal flicked across Finn’s face in quick succession. “Fuck.”

Darin yearned to sink his hands into his curls, to hold him in his arms, to please him in any way he could. “Help yourself to me.”

A shudder raced through Finn. The tiny blond hairs on his arms stood on end, gooseflesh traveling over his skin. He shook. “You don’t know how badly I need you.”

Darin reared up under him, pushing against Finn. “Take what you want. That’s what I’m here for. Damn, I wish I could make you feel out of this world good. I wish I could help you find release. I know I can’t, but let me alleviate your need.”

His cock pressed into Finn’s lower abs, ready for anything. He was rock-hard; there was no way Finn didn’t feel his arousal. Finn’s abdominal muscles shifted. “I’m clenching up so hard inside for you,” he panted. “I need—”

Darin surged and kissed him with uncontained force, and Finn responded in kind. It was all teeth and desperation. Finn ground his hips into him, and Darin groaned at the heavy friction. Desire met desire, and their combined demand for more fanned the fire between them.

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