Page 7 of Seduced By the Mermen
“Hello.” I hang up my coat by the door and remove my shoes, placing them in the bin.
“Hey.” Grayson lifts his head from his tablet on the sofa.
“How’s things going?”
“I’m going to have to head to the mainland soon,” Grayson says.
Forrest appears from around the corner. “Cook says dinner will be ready soon.”
I glare at him. Forrest clears his throat. The governor of Stele doesn’t like being scolded. I furrow my brow in a silent challenge of then-don’t-be-an-ass.
“Rodgers says dinner will be ready soon,” Forrest says.
I incline my head at him for correcting his mistake. While my family was well-off growing up as a podlet, we were nowhere near as wealthy as Forrest’s familiar pod. He’s had cooks, housekeepers, nannies, and butlers his whole life, but it was new for me when I mated into this pod twenty years ago.
“It smells delicious.” All the talk with Uncle Stefano about hedge-tots has me craving them now. “Who’s home for dinner?” I ask Grayson, as Forrest has disappeared down the hall.
“You, Forrest, Delmar, and me. Clark and Zion are working, and who knows where Sterling is.”
I sit on the arm of the sofa. “Do you think Sterling is going to be a problem when it comes to Blair?”
“I think Sterling is always going to be a problem,” Grayson says without looking up.
Chapter 4
Blair
“I’m not going to take the last one of these.” I eye the last hedge-tot sitting lonely in the basket.
“It’s fine, Aunt Blair. I made them for you,” Holter says.
I really do like them. There’s a lot of food here, and it’s all so good, but these are one of the few things that look like home. We didn’t eat a lot of fish on the farm. Well, not unless it was catfish. Which I despise, mostly because the ex made me clean it after he left it in a cooler with no ice. So many bones. I shouldn’t have, but I used to pray that I might miss one and he would choke on it. I should have left sooner. But I stayed.
I remind myself I’m stronger than that scared woman who stayed and ate catfish.
Nico elbows me. “Take it. It will keep us from fighting over it.” He’s so friendly and nice, but I’ve seen the way people quiver when he walks by. Like they are so scared they might just faint if he turned and looked at them. But honestly, he’s the sweetest of my niece’s mates.
Oh, they’re all smitten with her. And I love seeing every second. Never have I had a man encourage me to take the last favorite anything. Once, I left the last oatmeal cookie in the jarfor a week until I made more because I was afraid my ex would come looking for it.
“I insist.” Nico’s voice has dropped, and I take the fritter from the plate. It’s not hard to understand how he commanded a submarine and had everyone following his directions.
I chew and nod at the same time. My niece’s glare at her mate isn’t hard to pick up on. “Thank you. I really do like them.” I smile, hoping I can smooth any edges I might have roughened between them.
“Yes, but Nico doesn’t have the right to order you around, Aunt Blair. No one does.” She smiles. Where this girl got her confidence from when she lived in the same oppressive house that I did for all those years, I have no idea.
“Oh, he’s fine. It wasn’t an order.” I laugh.
“This is your home now. You have every right to be secure.” Annabelle stands and takes her plate and Marlee’s to the kitchen.
I fold my napkin and place it on the table. “I do feel secure.” And I’ve never spoken truer words. I’m at ease. And the last two nights, I’ve slept soundly, even with the shadows of Annabelle’s three sharks making dappled patterns on the ceiling. “Let me do the washing up.”
Castor takes the plate from me. “No, it’s Eros’s turn. Plus, we have a surprise for you and Marlee. Go take a seat on the sofa.”
“Wait!” Annabelle calls out. “I want to turn the sofa around so they get a better view.”
“You go, Belle. I’ll get things set up,” Holter says. And then he picks the sofa up around the middle and flips it to face the giant windows outside. Finished, he hands me his phone. “I’m going to turn the lights off. But if you want them on, hit this.” It’s a green button with the scratch-like writing of the Dorian. “Wait. Sorry.” He takes his phone—block—back and fiddles withit, then hands it back to me. Now it’s in English and the lights on and off button is obvious.
I thank him and scooch down the sofa closer to Marlee and put my arm around her. Neither one of us is fond of the dark. I spent a lot of nights in a twin bed sleeping next to both girls when I wasn’t sure what my ex was going to do, if he was mad that someone looked at him sideways the day before. And here . . . it’s so dark. Even during the day. But when you turn the lights off, it’s absolutely black. That was one of the surprising things on the first night here.
