Page 5 of Adonis (Salt and Starlight #1)

“Connor?”

Connor’s attention was stolen from the bigger fish that teased the edge of his vision. He looked over his shoulder at a bulky man with greying hair and wide green eyes. “Arthur, hi.”

Connor straightened up as Arthur approached him, bringing with him the potent smell of fish. He wore an oilskin jacket and pants with his feet stuffed into heavy-duty wellies.

“Just in?”

Connor asked.

“I was picking up some equipment we had out in the water.”

Arthur brandished a sphere-shaped black object lined with camera lenses. “We were getting a lot of activity readings on this fella. I couldn’t wait any longer before hauling it in.”

Arthur was as married to his work as Connor’s dad. Maybe that was a job requirement for underwater labs?

“Your security is beefier,”

Connor said.

“Those two brutes didn’t give you any trouble, did they?”

“No. But they have me curious… what happened to the old fella?”

Arthur’s smile was gone. “A minor accident, unfortunately. He’s retired now, and he has a big pension to thank him for doing his job well. Don’t mind the guards. Our boss remembered what his lab is worth and wants to protect his assets.”

“And there’s no problem with me being here?”

Connor asked doubtfully.

“You’ve been running around this place since you could walk. Of course, it’s no problem.”

Arthur reassured him. “Are you here to see your dad?”

“He’s supervising me.”

“Ah, that’s right. You have your probation conditions to meet.”

Arthur nodded. “Well, you can set up anywhere you like. Ben is in the middle of examining some new specimens we just got in, so he’ll be awhile.”

Connor knew that he might not even see his dad today. “Alright. Thanks, Arthur.”

“No problem.”

Arthur gave Connor’s shoulder a warm pat as he walked by, continuing his path along the walkway until he disappeared into the office furthest from the elevator.

Connor approached the empty desks. The lab had obviously been set up for dozens and dozens of workers, but the only two people Connor had ever seen down here were his dad and Arthur. Connor dropped his bag onto the nearest desk and searched for the light switch. All the desks came with glow lights to make up for the room’s darkness. Aside from the low-intensity blue and green lights scattered around the office, there wasn’t much else to illuminate anything.

It was undoubtedly kept on low lighting so that you could see more looking out into the ocean, and Connor wondered what it would look like with the lights switched off entirely. Connor sat after finding the light switch and dug out his book. He’d given up on Orlando yesterday and picked up a book filled with short stories instead. He thought the shorter segments might be more manageable.

Connor had vastly overestimated his ability to concentrate.

An hour in, he’d scarcely taken any notes and had little to no progress to show for himself. Getting up, Connor wandered to the glass with his book. He glanced around himself, then sat with his back to the glass, liking the icy chill radiating from the ocean. After another hour of reading, he closed the book and tossed it away.

Would the judge consider giving him jail time instead?

Connor lay on his side, his back against the glass still, before rolling over.

A cry of surprise left his mouth as he startled terribly; he scrambled away from the glass and the face. He rushed back on his heels and hands, throwing himself too hastily to get to his feet. His wrist crashed into the steps of the walkway, halting his progress.

Connor stopped. He stared at the face floating in the water, at the dark blue eyes fixed on Connor. The blue light of the lab shone on the individual, highlighting sharp cheekbones, and pointed ear tips.

A diver, his rational mind whispered to him.

His rational mind had apparently ignored the point where thick, corded ab muscles bled into a glistening tail of greens and blues. Connor stared at that point, seeking the subterfuge. The obvious place where fabric was bolted down or a thread had come loose.

A pale hand skimmed the line where scales became skin. His gaze jerked back to the face and found—it? him?—looking down at himself, touching where Connor had been staring. He rubbed himself with his hand as if brushing off dust. Those dark blue eyes, devoid of white, darted back to Connor. And, as near as Connor could tell, there was an expression on his face. His lips grew taunt; he looked down again and wiped at the same spot, then abruptly pushed off the glass and sped away from Connor. His tail was long, disproportionally large compared to the length of his torso.

He disappeared into the murk and camouflage of the water below and the many weeds that drifted up from the ocean floor. Connor realised that whip of a tail was what he’d seen when he’d arrived.

Connor’s heart rabbited.

Was it a trick? Was it possible to make a trick so convincing?

He waited on the step, barely breathing, and peered into the waters. The ocean groaned, and the cold of the lab seeped into his body, making him shiver.

A door creaked open; Connor’s head jerked toward the noise. His dad exited his office and strode down the walkway. His head was bent down, and his focus was on the tablet in his hand as he scrolled through something. Ben didn’t notice him until his foot collided with the book Connor had thrown aside earlier. Ben looked at the book, and then his eyes darted sideways to Connor.

“Connor,”

he said, surprise in his voice. “I forgot you were here.”

“I’m shocked,”

Connor said dryly. He climbed to his feet and shook out his wrist. The bang had numbed his fingers.

“I’m going up for coffee.”

“Don’t you have a coffee machine in your office?”

Connor’s voice was shaky. A mixture of nerves and excitement made the pitch skew despite his attempt at a casual facade. Not that his dad would notice either way.

Ben kept everything needed to work for days on end in the lab. And suddenly, Connor could see what he found so interesting about fish and seaweed that he stayed here for weeks at a time.

“It’s broken, unfortunately.”

His dad showed Connor the hand not holding the tablet, revealing an empty coffee pot. The glass was so clean Connor had the absurd image of his dad licking the glass for every minute remnant of caffeine.

“That is unfortunate,”

Connor echoed. He scowled at himself. His voice was still pitched wrong.

“There’s food upstairs, too. You can get lunch,”

his dad said, and he continued walking toward the elevator. Once again, not noticing Connor’s peaked tone.

Connor glanced at the last spot he’d seen the creature before following. The doors closed shut with a hiss of air. Connor settled himself into the corner and held onto the bar for support. The elevator’s metal doors were shiny enough to reflect his face at himself; a distorted expression. He forced his body to stop its excited thrumming and steadied himself.

Connor turned to his dad. “Do you study mermaids?”

His dad’s attention, which had never fully left his tablet, was captured. Curiosity filled his expression, and a sharpened gaze darted to Connor. His dad had never looked at him with so much interest before.

“Did you experience something?”

Ben asked, his voice high and excited.

“I would have been blind to miss it,”

Connor said.

“Blind to…”

Ben paused. “Oh, you saw something? How close did it get? Which one was it?”

There were multiple? As in, a family was swimming around out there? A pack? Or, Connor thought wryly, an entire species. He squeezed the bar of the elevator as the doors pinged open. His heart was racing again, pure excitement taking charge of the muscle.

“Come on.”

Ben put his arm over Connor’s shoulders and urged him along. “We can talk while I get this brewed. Could you tell which one it was?”

A pungent scent of fish and coffee washed over him. Despite it and his urge to make a wry comment on the matter, physical affection was so rare from his dad that he couldn’t bring himself to push away. “Why don’t you give me a rundown on distinctive features? I have no way of knowing which one it was since I didn’t know anything of the sort even existed before now.”

They walked into a large kitchen that was big enough to house the staff of several restaurants. The only part used was the corner nearest the door where the coffee machine was set up. Clean cups were placed on the draining tray of the sink. Did they have a super-secretive cleaner on staff? He couldn’t imagine either the guards or the scientists would be bothered with so small a task.

“The tail was green and blue. I think it had black hair. It was hard to tell with the way the light was hitting it. It could have just been dark brown. And its eyes were dark blue, sort of like—”

The breath went out of Ben.

Connor paused, casting his dad a questioning look.

There was awe in his expression. “It was close enough you could make out its eye colour?”

It freaked me the hell out, Connor wanted to say, but that tipped over the scales of how much emotion he felt comfortable showing his dad.

“I was leaning against the glass, and he just popped up. I think he scared me on purpose,”

Connor relayed, recalling his fright. It seemed less of a nightmare now that he was talking about it.

“He?”

“It looked male.”

“Fascinating.”

Ben released Connor, dragged a stool from under a stainless steel table, and urged Connor to sit.

Connor, for once, agreed with his dad’s take on fascinating.

“It must be a new juvenile,”

Ben mused, talking more to himself than Connor as he pulled up another stool. “How close did you say he got?”

“At the glass.”

“At the glass.”

There was the blooming awe in his dad’s eyes again. “He’s bold. They hate the lab, you see. They don’t like being watched. But this new juvenile must be a curious creature to venture in. Maybe seeing someone new in the lab caught his interest?”

“How many are there?”

Connor asked.

Ben muttered to himself about checking the footage and seeing did the outdoor cameras catch a good angle. Then he was tapping at his tablet and typing. Connor examined his dad, seeing that he’d lost his attention as suddenly as he’d gained it. With a sigh, he got up and set the coffee brewing. It was the same one they’d had since Connor was a kid. Coffee-boy had been his job on days when there were no babysitters available, and he had to go to work with his dad. He had never seen any mermaids in the water then.

Connor leaned against the counter as the coffee machine spat; after a few clicks, steam rose out of the top, and the emptied coffee pot filled. If he had his phone on him, Connor would google everything he could about mermaids right that second. But then again, he wasn’t sure if turning on his phone to sate his curiosity was even worth it, given the barrage of hate messages waiting to greet him. He’d rather stop by the library in town. Actually, his dad had an enormous collection.

“Mind if I drop by your house on the way home?”

Connor asked casually. “I left some clothes there.”

His dad didn’t hear him until Connor repeated the question. Twice. At which point, he cast Connor a pointed frown. “I don’t have time to drive you over.”

“Just give me the keys. You’re spending the night here anyway, right? To go over your footage? I’ll be back in the morning to return them,”

Connor argued with him.

Ben looked reluctant.

“Plus,”

Connor added quickly, “You have to finish the work on your specimen. And you have to comb through the data on the sphere that Arthur just brought in. There’s no way you’ll have time to go home today.”

“Well… I suppose you’re right. Alright,”

he agreed.

Connor was relieved. He knew it was a fifty-fifty chance of his dad simply digging in his heels with a hard “no”

and getting irritated with him, but the risk had paid off this time. “Thank you.”

His dad became withdrawn and zoned out, too entrenched in documenting what Connor had told him to bother answering any of Connor’s questions. He didn’t even give Connor a speech about not telling anyone else, leaving Connor alone in the lab when he returned to his office with the fresh coffee pot.

Connor retrieved his abandoned book, though continued to neglect it as he proceeded to sit on the steps and stare at the water.

The intercom buzzed, breaking Connor’s concentration. A voice came through the speaker above the elevator: “Edith is at the gate.”

Connor flipped his book closed and stood.

He emptied his bag of books onto the desk, knowing he’d be back tomorrow, and took the empty bag with him upstairs. The taller guard walked him to the gate, where Edith was waiting with the car turned around for a speedy getaway.

The shorter guard watched them approach, and he jutted his chin toward them. “Where’s our coffee?”

“There’s none left,”

the taller guard said, a sour look on his face.

The short one cursed, and both his dogs hunkered down, alert for what he was mad at. Connor wondered when their shift would end, and the next pair of guards would take over. Did they know what was being studied in the lab, or did they think they were there to guard equipment? They seemed too scary to think they were only guarding two scientists, and not the knowledge of a new species.

Connor climbed into the car where his mom was sipping a takeaway cup of coffee. “Don’t tease them, Mom,”

he said, noting that both guards stared at her drink. “They might rob you.”

“What?”

she asked, voice irritable. She glanced between the guards and Connor as if they had some inside joke at her expense. Connor saw her suspicion.

“I didn’t mean—actually, never mind. Dad gave me his keys to drop by his house and pick up some things,”

Connor said. He double-checked that their weight was in his pocket. Mom’s house had a spare set hidden at the front door, but dad had one key that was kept on his person. Given that his dad often left equipment and tech lying around at home, Connor had always assumed there were too many valuable things at home to risk a key being somewhere nearby.

Mom pursed her lips. “He should have brought you himself,”

she said, irritated.

In all honesty, Connor had expected an entire argument to get her to bring him to his dad’s place, but she had decided on silent hate for the car ride today. The driveway to Ben’s house was paved and lined with stone walls, and the house itself was giant. There was even an indoor hot tub, in Ireland, where people didn’t have hot tubs. Connor could see now why someone studying the ocean made so much money; the fish were more interesting than anyone realised.

Connor thought back to the face he’d seen in the ocean. The top half had looked human. Did that mean it had the intelligence of a human? Was it just like a person, except part fish and living in the sea? It was stupidly intriguing.

“Be quick,”

his mom snapped.

Connor jumped at the sudden raised voice. He’d been zoned out, not moving toward the house even though they’d stopped. He glared at her, hating that she’d made his heart skip a beat in surprise. “I can’t wait to see Trevor’s face when he hears you using that tone.”

The look she gave him was lethal. “Two minutes, and then I’m leaving.”

Connor resisted rolling his eyes at the drama of it all. If she was serious, Connor didn’t reckon he’d find a lift home after that. His dad wouldn’t leave the lab, even if Connor could get a hold of him, and this early in the season meant no taxi services were running.

He left the car without a word and went to the house, unlocking the door and keying in the house alarm code before alarms started blaring. Connor paused at the keypad, touched for a moment that his dad had set it to Connor’s birthday. Though it had probably been a throwaway thought at best, he had still been thought of.

Connor sighed. He walked through the empty house, going straight to the living room. It was entirely unlike the living room at home with its rustic furniture; here, it was white couches and a fireplace of grey marble that didn’t look as though it had ever been used. Along the walls were tall bookcases all filled to the brim. Connor stared at the large tomes, uncertain for a moment about where to start, and picked a spot at random on the nearest shelf.

His gaze skittered across the spines of the books until his eyes caught on a cover of bubbles and green waves. He deposited it into his bag and collected several other books about biodiversity, the ocean, and sea creatures. His ribs tweaked in complaint as he lifted the heavy bag.

Connor left the house, priming the alarm and locking the door behind him. He’d been over two minutes, barely, yet his mom was still parked in the drive. Connor took her in, considering.

Trevor was a game-changer for this dynamic.