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Raziel watched as the older man lifted Coven into his arms. Avalon adjusted the shirt laying on top of the girl to cover her.

One by one the people left.

Reef eyed Mer. “We need to speak.”

Mer nodded. “Tomorrow.”

The tall healer strode away, the darkness swallowing him up.

Raziel and Mer just stood there in silence.

Bioluminescent plants glowed softly around the cove, but it wasn’t as charming as he’d found it before. Today it felt insidious.

She shivered and he forced his legs to move toward their cottage. She let him lead her into the house. Raz released her by the fire and moved back to the door, shifting the large chunk of driftwood in place.

“Did you see her eyes?” Mer whispered.

Vacant eyes.

Raziel shuddered and leaned his forehead onto their makeshift door. “I did.”

“Did you know those markings around her eyes only happens when someone drowns?”

He pushed away from the door and moved to the fire, staring into the flames. “Are we not going to talk about her…siphons?”

Coven was Sirenidae.

“I’ve never seen anything like that in my life,” Mer murmured.

He flinched, staring hard at his wife. “She is one of your people, is she not?”

Mer met his gaze, her magenta eyes burning. “No. I don’t know what she is.”

Chapter Thirty-Six

RAZIEL

He would bea liar if he said that he wasn’t attracted to his wife.

After the adrenaline wore off, he caught whiffs of the Lure teasing the air. Raziel backed away from his wife and sat at the small kitchen table, the rickety old grain groaning beneath his weight.

Raziel dropped his head into his hands and closed his eyes. He was so tired.

Soul weary.

The rustling of clothes captured his attention and he lifted his head, watching his wife pulling the wet, sandy dress from her body and tossing it in front of the hearth. She caught his eye but he didn’t look away and neither did she. The moment stretched, filling with tension until it broke as she turned her back to him.

He mapped scars along her back as she walked around the bed, yanking her nightdress from a cord strung above the bathtub. Raziel stifled a groan. The nightdress had been givento her as a well-meant gift, but it was so threadbare that it was nearly translucent.

While Mer had no problem walking around the house in all sorts of undress, there was something about the shabby little nightdress that made him want to ravish his wife.

You’re a fool.

It was true. He could scarcely keep his eyes from her odd yet pleasing figure. She was so pale compared to his burnished skin. Her little scales glimmering softly in the light along with the gills that rested nearly invisible along the sides of her neck.

While he’d been out of his mind with the Lure the first time they met, part of him recognized what was going on. He remembered the silky soft texture of her gills between his fingers, and he had not imagined the way she had shuddered before she pushed his hand away.

Despite their best efforts, there was attraction blooming between them.