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It’s terrifying, and wonderful, and I barely have the mental faculties to process it because he’s absolutely relentless in the pleasure he’s giving me.

When I cry out and clutch even tighter to his hair—probably a little too tight, not that he’s complaining—he ratchets up that demanding pace, pushing me higher, closer, right to the edge.

I tumble over with his name on my lips and heat coursing through every inch of me. Even then, he doesn’t back off for a moment, keeps working me through each spasm, devouring me completely.

It’s only after I’ve slumped back to the bed, boneless and exhausted, and make a protesting little noise in the back of my throat when his lips brush up against my too-sensitive clit that he relents. Moving up the bed, he hovers over me.

“Gods above, Nora,” he breathes, kissing me and feeding me the taste of myself.

His hips settle against mine, cock still hard and insistent under the soft fabric of his pants. I trace my fingers under his waistband, reveling in the feel of his hot skin and the firm muscles of his ass and hips. All of that power, all of that strength, just waiting to be unleashed.

Only… that’s not all I feel.

There, just at the side of his hip, his skin has changed. It’s deepened to a dark blue-gray. It has a different texture as well, covered in striations and bumps, and it’s slightly slippery.

Kraken skin.

Elias notices it at the same time I reach down to touch, and he jerks away like my fingertips have burned him. Cursing softly, he rolls off of me and settles on his back on the bed.

“Fuck, Nora,” he says. “I’m sorry.”

Confused, I prop myself up on an elbow and look at him. “About what?”

He lets out a long, shaky breath. “You said you weren’t comfortable with me shifting. And I… I didn’t mean for that to happen.”

“This?” I ask, reaching back down to stroke the patch of kraken skin that’s already receding.

At my touch, he leans instinctively closer, even as a frustrated growl rumbles in his chest.

“Yes,” he says, moving my hand away again. “I usually have better control of the shift.”

He still looks irritated and disappointed with himself, but an improbable laugh bubbles up in my chest.

“So,” I say, laying back down on top of him. “What you’re telling me is that I’m bad for your sense of control?”

All that irritation disappears. “You’re devastating for my control, Lenora Perry.”

“Good. I think I like that.”

Elias’s grin is crooked, his eyes dancing in the morning light. “Little siren. You’re going to be the absolute unraveling of me, aren’t you?”

“Maybe.” I snuggle closer to him. “But maybe you’ll like being unraveled.”

Another low, warm laugh. “Yes. I think I will.”

13

Elias

When Nora and I finally get ourselves out of bed and I return to my room to get dressed for the day, it’s with a mixture of shame and desire and disappointment in myself.

I’ve never shifted unconsciously. Never even so much as half-shifted.

I have no excuse for it, no reason other than how lost in Nora I was. Having her respond to me, feeling how eager she was, how wet, how wanting as I slid between her thighs…

In my three hundred years, I’ve known nothing sweeter than Nora. I could have stayed there for hours, days, the rest of my life, wringing drop after drop of pleasure from her until she was delirious with it.

It’s truly no wonder I started to shift without meaning to. Regardless, I can’t forget myself like that again. It was there, in her eyes, the hesitance to see me in my shifted form.