Page 26 of Adonis (Salt and Starlight #1)

Connor and Laurence kicked off to sea. Connor stayed on his knees, his balance feeling steadier that way. It didn’t matter if he stayed down; with both him and Laurence rowing, he didn’t need the extra leverage that came with being upright. They passed the turn in the shoreline, where they lost view of the dock. Waiting ahead with his head poking out of the water was Adonis.

His dark eyes gleamed and once they were past the bend, he approached with a quick lash of his tail. He surged out of the water next to Connor. Connor had already set his oar down to meet the affectionate greeting with both hands.

A startled noise came from Laurence.

Adonis didn’t spare him so much as a glance as he wrapped his arms around Connor’s waist and buried his cheek against Connor’s stomach. His body shook as he hummed, letting out noises of delight from deep in his chest.

Those noises soothed Connor’s nerves. His anxiety and worry melted away under the bounding affection from Adonis. He hoped he would always greet him like this. Like he’d never been happier to see someone in his life.

Connor sunk his fingers into Adonis’s hair, massaging his scalp affectionately.

“I’ll be able to stay out until after lunch today, so long as Laurence doesn’t get bored,”

Connor told Adonis.

Adonis jolted in Connor’s arms. He pulled back, his gaze jerking to Connor’s face. An unhappy expression flitted across his face. He touched Connor’s throat, his warm fingers gentle against his swollen glands, and he made a questioning sound. “Sore?”

Laurence gasped.

“A little, yeah,”

Connor told him. “I have medicine for it, though.”

He dug the soothers Nick had given him out of his pocket. “These will help.”

It was a lie. Medicine never had any effect on him.

Adonis glanced at the soothers. “Medicine,”

he repeated. His voice wasn’t nearly as husky as it had been for his first few words.

“I was thinking of going to the nearer shore. You know where it’s all ferns on the land? And we could drift there.”

Connor popped one soother into the mouth.

“I push,”

Adonis said. He cast another worried look at Connor’s throat before drifting toward the back of the boat. He splashed his tail, spraying Laurence with ocean water. He squeaked. “Laurence. Hold,”

Adonis warned. The sweetness of it was cut short by the mocking sneer that accompanied the warning.

Luckily, Laurence was too amazed to be upset. “You know my name!”

“It’s not too heavy with the two of us?”

Connor asked.

Adonis snorted.

Connor rolled his eyes. “Arrogant as always, Adonis.”

He reached back to take Laurence’s oar and clipped it into place. “You’d better hold on like he said.”

Laurence copied Connor and gripped the sides of the board in both hands. Adonis had them cutting through the water in moments; despite Connor’s worry, he clearly had no issue with the added weight of Laurence. And given he added another forty-five kg to the board, Connor was impressed. He wouldn’t say as much; Adonis seemed to have an ego regarding physical strength.

As they cut through the water, the only sign of life aside from themselves was the ugly shipping barge far in the distance. Connor studied it, uneasy despite knowing they were too far away to be seen. Besides, if anyone came near, Adonis was always the first to know.

“It belongs to Cessair,”

Laurence said.

Connor looked over his shoulder to see that Laurence was also studying the ship.

“How do you know that?”

Connor wasn’t as quick to dismiss Laurence’s conspiracies anymore. Not now that he knew the case was being investigated for corruption for real. Not now that he’d heard that Cessair’s nickname was the same one Austin used for his dad. Something was going on; his mind wouldn’t let him dismiss anything anymore.

“I looked up the assets he has in Ireland. It’s called ‘The Infinite.’”

“He named it himself?”

It was something a kid would come up with.

“I’m not sure.”

He shrugged.

As they continued along the coast, the ship disappeared from the horizon, and Connor’s uneasy feeling eased away.

They reached the abandoned little bay where the waves fell in languid rolls that hardly shook the board. Connor settled down, glancing around them to be sure they were alone.

“Are you going swimming?”

Laurence asked in surprise as Connor unclipped his snorkelling gear. He’d brought the headpiece and the flippers, though he imagined Adonis would be curious or mocking of the equipment. Probably both.

“Just for a bit,”

Connor said. All that bothered him was his throat. If he really started to feel unwell, he would get back on the board. “Do you want to as well?”

Laurence glanced at the surrounding water. It was well past his depth where they were. “I’m good,”

he said. He reached around to dig out his sketchbook from Connor’s waterproof bag. “I’m going to draw Adonis.”

Adonis swam to Connor, pulling the board around so that it was perpendicular to the shore. He looked curiously at the flippers as Connor pulled them on.

Connor watched his face closely as he set his feet in the water. Adonis disappeared underneath to investigate. Connor felt his hesitant touch examining where the flipper ended at the top of his foot. He had a clear pair, and the silicone material was transparent enough that his feet were visible within.

Connor shrugged off his shirt as Adonis did his investigating. “Is that the one with the other sketches you did of Adonis? You should show him. I’m curious what he’ll think of them.”

Laurence stared at Connor.

Connor cast him a glance.

“Did Adonis do that?”

Laurence asked, looking at Connor’s stomach. At the bite mark.

“Ah,”

Connor remembered them too late. “Well… yes.”

Laurence put aside his sketch mark going forward on his knees. “Why is it shiny? All silver like that?”

“Silver?”

Connor looked down at himself. The skin healing over the bite mark was silver. The type of silver that shimmered as the light caught it.

“Your shoulder is the same,”

Laurence told him. “It’s like a layer of soft scales has scabbed over it.”

He touched Connor’s shoulder, brushing his thumb over the silver layer. Warm shivers raced over Connor’s skin.

The water at Connor’s legs exploded. Adonis came out of the water, snarling, his arm whipping out to shove Laurence back. Laurence fell with a yelp, catching himself on his hands. His eyes widened with fright.

“Adonis!”

Adonis wrapped his arms around Connor, his top lip curling back as he growled at Laurence.

“Adonis,”

Connor repeated, pissed. He looked anxiously at Laurence, trying to spot anything hard he might have collided with that he might have gotten hurt on.

Adonis’s growl became a rumble in his chest. His eyes were fixed dangerously on Laurence.

“Sorry, Adonis,”

Laurence squeaked. “I didn’t mean to touch the marks. I didn’t know you wouldn’t like that.”

He got himself upright and stayed as far back as the paddleboard allowed.

Adonis’s rumble lessened. His top lip curled back once more, and he let out a threatening growl. “Don’t.”

He seethed.

Laurence nodded quickly.

Adonis finally relaxed his glower but kept a distrustful eye on Laurence. It had Laurence looking half-terrified.

Connor reached down to cup Adonis’s face, forcing him to look at him. Anger swept through him, hard and fast. “If you ever push him like that again, we’re done. I’m not being with anyone who’ll hurt my kid brother for any reason. You understand?”

Adonis’s eyes widened, and his gills flared out. “He—”

Apparently, emotion stunted Adonis’s ability to talk because the word came out garbled before cutting off.

“I don’t care what he did. You’re bigger than he is and a lot stronger. You could seriously injure him.”

Adonis cut a glare toward Laurence. With an angry sneer, he pushed away from Connor and disappeared into the water, splashing his tail and spraying them both.

The ripples of the water settled back into normal waves, and Connor lost sight of where Adonis darted off to.

“That was a bit mean of you,”

Laurence eventually said.

Connor jolted, snapping his head toward Laurence. “Mean of me?”

“He didn’t push me very hard, Connor,”

Laurence said. “If he’d used any strength, I would have gone into the ocean, not just fallen back.”

Laurence sat with his legs crossed. “He probably doesn’t get that I’m your precious kid brother.”

A smile twitched Laurence’s lips into a grin as he said it. “So imagine getting mad at a partner for being unhappy with someone touching the hickey they left?”

“I didn’t say precious.”

“You should apologise.”

Connor looked away from Laurence, annoyed. He wasn’t trying to be mean. He just—Adonis was big and strong. And while Connor didn’t think he would hurt either of them, he wasn’t taking any chances. He wasn’t going to sit there for any aggressive behaviour directed toward Laurence.

“Do you want to head back?”

Connor asked as he surveyed the water.

Laurence looked at him in surprise. “No. Do you?”

“You’re not scared? At all? Despite the fact he could very easily drown the both of us, and there’s nothing we could do about it?”

Laurence opened up his sketchbook, rolling his eyes at Connor. “You’re a bit dramatic sometimes. He was just jealous.”

He opened a page and looked around himself. “Adonis, I drew a picture of you and Connor together. Do you want to see it?”

A few seconds later, Adonis popped out of the water at Laurence’s far side. Laurence held up the sketchbook, showing the picture he’d drawn of Adonis resting his head on Connor’s lap. His eyes scanned the page, and his gills flared open. He snorted and disappeared back underwater without so much as a glance at Connor.

Laurence grinned at Connor. “He liked it.”

And he was apparently angry with Connor. And now that Laurence had sided with Adonis, Connor worried about the tone he’d used. He could have told Adonis not to push Laurence without the threat…

“I’m going to swim,”

Connor said. He put on the snorkelling headpiece and dipped into the water. He let his body adjust to the cold and paddled out, setting his face to look down into the water. He found Adonis swimming directly below him on his back, purposefully deep enough that Connor wouldn’t be able to see him from the board.

When he realised Connor could see him, he bared his teeth and turned around so that he was facing away from Connor.

Okay…Connor had clearly upset him.

Connor took a deep breath and dived, swimming under the water until he reached Adonis on the ocean floor littered with rocks and seaweed. Adonis, despite himself, obviously couldn’t resist looking at Connor as he approached.

Connor brushed his hand against Adonis’s scales and used his tail as leverage to climb up Adonis’s body, eventually wrapping his arms around Adonis’s chest. He pulled the mouthpiece out and pressed his lips against the bite mark on the back of Adonis’s neck.

Adonis shuddered. Connor could feel the sound that would have come from his throat had they been above water. He floated above Adonis, trailing his eyes down to watch how his gills flared out with each breath—that vulnerable flare of pink exposed to the ocean every few seconds. His hair hung in the water around his face, his entire being something ethereal as he floated.

The need for air pressed upon Connor. He tilted his body, flapping his fins and swam to the surface. He dragged in deep breaths and smiled when Adonis’s head rose out of the water next to him, and he pressed his cheek against Connor’s. A soft apology hummed from his throat.

Connor sighed. “I’m sorry, too. I shouldn’t have threatened you like that.”

Adonis paused his humming to grumble at him. He didn’t need to say anything for Connor to know he was complaining.

“I’m the worst, am I?”

Adonis nodded.

Connor’s lips twitched into a smile. He wrapped his arms around Adonis’s shoulders. “I’m sorry.”

He stroked the bite mark on the back of Adonis’s neck, and the grumble turned into a whimper. “Shall we dive for a bit? So I can see you swimming underwater?”

Connor and Adonis explored the reef together until Adonis found a sand-coloured octopus to offer to Connor, and Connor decided he didn’t want a merman boyfriend after all. Adonis kept catching passing fish and offering them to Connor until Connor picked out a colourful rock to offer Adonis, and Adonis mimicked him. Except he must have thought Connor had been trying to find him a crab because that was what he gave to Connor next.

Connor swam up, his head throbbing. The time he could hold his breath on each dive grew shorter and shorter, and he took that as a sign he needed to give it a rest. They swam back to Laurence, who was sketching. Connor’s arms trembled as he tried to pull himself out of the ocean, and he fell back, sloshing in the water. His breaths were short.

“Are you okay?”

Laurence asked, worried.

“Fine,”

Connor said. He manoeuvred to get his fins off and tossed them on board with his snorkelling headpiece. He tried again, and when weakness collapsed his body, Adonis caught him, supporting him enough to get on board. Connor lay on his side, panting.

“Dad packed some Panadol?”

Connor grunted. Adonis leaned over Connor, resting his forehead against his, and rubbed his fingers against Connor’s throat. Warmth prickled over Connor’s skin, and his body went boneless, relaxing and melting until he felt fused to the board. The heat from Adonis’s hands swallowed the aching pain in his throat. Adonis massaged all the pain out of Connor; when his fingers worked their way onto Connor’s nape—utter bliss filled him.