Page 4 of Hook, Line, and Tentacle

Craving

I t’s late when the wind starts screaming again. I’m not sure if I was asleep or not, but I’m definitely not now. I should be used to it, the storms—it’s been over a week in Easthaven—but I’m still city-soft and unaccustomed to this kind of noise.

The whole attic shudders around me. Lights flicker. My phone buzzes once with a weather alert, but I don’t check it. I already know. The storm’s breaking, and it’s not subtle about it.

My skin feels too tight. My clothes cling damp to my body even though I’m dry, and I don’t think it’s sweat, either.

Every nerve is strung out and lit up like a line pulled taut, humming with static.

I pace the attic once, then again, my bare feet slapping old wood.

I sit, then stand, then sit again, restless and aching and wet in a way that isn’t anything to do with the rain.

The light overhead flickers twice. I stare at it like I can will it to stay on. Then it dies with a sad little buzz.

Shit .

My teeth sink into my bottom lip, and I glance at the window, then the door. No. I should stay up here. I don’t need the light. It’s late, and I’m only going to sleep anyway.

I keep staring at the door anyway. I’m sure Cal has a flashlight, or candles. He seems like a practical kind of guy. Good with his hands.

My thighs clench almost involuntarily.

I know it’s a bad idea, especially after what I saw earlier—whatever the hell that was—but I can’t stop myself moving.

The stairs are even louder in the dark. Each step creaks under my weight like it’s specifically trying to tell on me, but I keep going, barefoot and careful, hands skimming the walls on either side for balance.

At the bottom, I pause. The door that leads to Cal’s space—the black one that screams stay away —is cracked open. Both deadbolts hang loose.

There’s a thin line of light spilling out across the floor. Not bright enough to see clearly, but enough to know it’s there. Warm, green-gold, alive.

Something slides over my toes, and I jerk back instinctively, hitting my heel hard on the bottom step. My breath hisses out between my teeth at the pain, and I press a hand to my chest as I look down.

Seawater. A tiny rivulet winding from under the door like it found a crack in a hull. It curls around the balls of my feet, then pulls back again, slow and very deliberate.

It moves like breath, or the tide.

The air is thick. Not just humid but heavy in a stormy kind of way, enough that I can feel it settle on my skin.

It’s warm and charged. There’s something behind the door pulling at me, drawing me closer by the ribs.

I’m not in control of it, the same way it felt like I wasn’t in control when I came downstairs in the first place.

I don’t knock—I just push as lightly as I can. The door creaks open wider beneath my hand, and I step inside without being invited.

This space isn’t anything like the bait shop.

It’s something older, carved out of stone and salt, dark with shadow.

It’s not what I expected, somehow, although I didn’t expect any of this.

The walls are slick with condensation. My fingertips ghost over rough stone as I step lightly over uneven floorboards.

Dim light filters from somewhere overhead, the same green-gold that spilled under the door.

Cal is on the floor.

At first, I don’t understand what I’m seeing. He’s shirtless, crouched low, muscles cut in sharp relief under wet skin. Seawater drips from him in long rivulets. And from somewhere deeper—his back, his hips, his sides—tentacles rise and twist and unfurl.

They’re long and slick, dark as oil and moving like they have minds of their own. Which… maybe they do. I’m no tentacle expert, regardless of my background. One drags along the floor and coils in on itself. Another flinches, jolting back toward his skin as if it’s been injured.

Did it just… sense me?

Cal’s head jerks up and our eyes meet. He stills .

It feels like this is the moment I should scream, butI don’t. I’m not sure there’s air left in my lungs. His face is twisted in something that looks like pain. When his mouth opens, it takes him a second to speak, like he has to consciously articulate the words.

“Leave,” he growls. “Get out. Now .”

I’m rooted to the spot. I couldn’t move if I tried. I’m not in control of my body. My eyes scan over him. Tension coils impossibly tighter in his frame until he’s almost vibrating.

“Please, Neviah.” His voice is strained, verging on something like shame. “ Please go.”

My stomach drops.

I step forward. Just one slow, careful pace across the damp floor. A floorboard sinks under my foot, giving a soft whine that lingers in the quiet.“Are you okay?”

He huffs a low, sharp sound, almost like a laugh. “Do I look okay?”

“I don’t know,” I admit. “This is… new to me. But I’d like to know if you’re not.”

He stares at me but doesn’t answer. Maybe he doesn’t know how, which is fair, because this is a little surreal. For me, at least. Maybe not for him. Who knows how many unsuspecting marine biology dropouts he’s ensnared.

I glance at the nearest tentacle. It twitches near his hip, anchored there. I swallow, but my throat feels like it’s filled with sand. “Can I touch you?”

The breath he drags in is audible. He tenses even further, somehow, the muscles in his jaw pulling so tight they jump. “Why would you want to do that?”

I roll my shoulders in a slow shrug. “I don’t know. I just do. Can I?”

He moves first, instead of giving me an answer. I stay stock still as one of the tentacles stretches out from his hip and brushes against my fingertips, warm and smooth. It’s not slimy in a gross way, which surprises me a little.

It’s not what I expect, which is an absurd thing to think in and of itself, since I’ve never really expected to encounter tentacles in my life at all outside work, let alone physically attached to and controlled by a man who looks like Cal.

Is he even a man?

I file the question away for later.

“They’re soft.” I turn my hand over slowly, flattening my palm. “Can you feel me?”

He lets out a breath that sounds more like a groan. “I can feel you even when you’re not touching me.”

My pulse kicks. “And when I am?” I sound out of breath, although I’m certain I’ve never stayed still this long in my life. The tentacle smooths over my palm, over the fluttering beat at the inside of my wrist, gliding up my forearm.

His answer is barely a whisper. “Yes.”

I take another step toward him, slow and careful. I don’t know if I need to be worried about spooking him. My thighs are slick; I notice it as I move, and my breath hitches high in my chest. “Will you keep going?”

He glances at me almost reprovingly, but another tentacle curls toward me. This one seems to come from behind him, maybe anchored in his spine. It moves as if it’s reaching for my face. I tip my chin up slightly, baring my neck on purpose.

Cal makes a tiny, tortured sound I can’t decipher.

He strokes across my cheek, slow and soft, then trails that feather-light touch down the column of my neck. Goosebumps erupt all over me, prickling over my scalp. The hair on the back of my neck lifts.

The tentacle probing my arm slides back down to wrap around my wrist. Now it’s my turn to make my own needy little sound. Cal’s breath stalls.

I move closer, almost against my will at this point—except it isn’t at all. I don’t know why I want this, or even what this is. But I do. I do want it. I want him .

He rises to his feet. It’s not fast or sudden, just huge . He’s so big. The movement draws shadows across the walls and makes my lungs cinch tight in my chest.

One thick tentacle wraps around my waist and reels me in—flush against the heat of him. The air freezes in my lungs. His skin of his chest is damp and fever-warm, and the hot, firm line pressed against my belly is absolutely not subtle.

“Is this okay?” he whispers.

“Yes.” It comes out like a gasp, which is fucking humiliating, but he doesn’t seem to care.

I press my hands to his bare chest. He doesn’t flinch, and he doesn’t touch me back with his hands—he hasn’t used his hands at all yet—but the tentacles don’t hesitate.

One slides carefully around my back, curling under my breasts, but going no further.

Another traces the dip of my spine, and another, bolder now, slips between my legs.

Not quite touching me where I need it, just enough to feel the wet heat there.

Categorically enough to make me squirm. My thighs clench involuntarily, and I lift up onto the balls of my feet with the movement.

Another tentacle brushes my lips before I realize it’s back at my face. I blink twice, then open my mouth on reflex, tongue darting out. It tastes like salt and heat and him . I don’t know how I already seem familiar with his taste, just that I am, and I want more.

When I lift my gaze to Cal’s, his eyes are that same lightless black as earlier, pupils blown so wide they swallow the gray of his irises. He’s fixated on my mouth.

“Do you—” I choke on the words, because I can’t believe I’m about to ask. “Do you have a tentacle penis?”

His whole body stills—and then, like something cracking through a storm front, he smiles. A real one. Teeth and everything. It hits like a lightning strike, bright and sudden and absolutely fucking life-altering.

“I like your smile,” I say dumbly.

That only makes it widen, smug and sharp and gorgeous.He rolls his hips forward, pressing that hard, obvious shape against my stomach, and I make a noise that isn’t quite a word.

“The—the dick,” I stammer. “Is it a tentacle?”

He laughs. A full sound rumbling from his chest, all low and pleased. “No.”

There’s an unreasonable flare of annoyance in my gut, and I know instantly that he sees it.

Cal leans down, breath ghosting my cheek. “Does that disappoint you, little trespasser?”

My throat works around a dry, sticky swallow.

He just smirks. “You want me to fuck you with my tentacles?”