Page 6 of Hook, Line, and Tentacle

Near the Water

I end up back at the water. I’m not exactly sure why, it just feels like I have to be. Something pulls on me until I move toward it, and when I do, the riot inside me ebbs away.

The waves are choppy. There’s a storm coming in, but I don’t back up. Wind tugs at my clothes and whips my hair around my face until I can hardly see. The tide is rising fast, crawling up the beach and licking at my bare feet like it knows I want to be dragged closer.

I should go inside. That’s what someone sensible would do. But I’m not sensible, and the storm doesn’t scare me.

I take a step into the water. It’s cold enough to sting, and my toes go numb almost instantly, but I don’t flinch.

The sensation cuts clean through me, and for a second, I think I can breathe better with it.

My pulse steadies and my limbs feel heavy, but not in a bad way—like that peaceful moment right before you fall asleep.

I don’t realize I’m moving further into the tide until the next wave hits my knees. Another, my thighs. Salt and foam lap against my skin, and the hem of my dress clings soaked and dragging against my legs. It’s too deep. I know that, but I keep walking.

I can’t hear much over the wind, but I swear something calls to me below the surface—low and slow and ancient. It curls around my ankles, pulls at my calves. I don’t fight it.

I don’t panic, even as the current drags harder, even as the shelf underfoot drops out, and I’m plunged into the cold.

It’s black down here.

The silence is silence the way the aftermath of a grenade jammed in your teeth is silent. It roars until nothing else can scream over it.

I stop kicking. My hair lifts like seaweed around my face, and everything in me goes quiet. Like this is right where I’m meant to be.

Then a hand—nope, arms, really fucking big ones—grab hold of me.

I’m ripped out of the water so fast it makes my teeth rattle. My lungs seize as I’m hauled into the air, choking and coughing. I blink rain and sea spray out of my eyes. Salt stings my skin as warmth wraps around me, smooth and slick and holding tightly.

Cal’sstormy eyes are wild as he heaves a breath, stomping out of the water with me cradled against his chest. His jaw clenches so tight it could crack. His arms are folded around me, and his tentacles wrap over top, I guess to try and warm me up.

Fair, because I’m freezing.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” His voice isn’t just furious—it’s panicked. Frantic and high-pitched in a thin, shaky way I’ve never heard from him. It’s the type of emotional volatility I’d deemed him incapable of, honestly.

I open my mouth to respond, but it’s just another cough. My throat burns. I’m still in his arms even when he’s trudged all the way out of the water, still clutched to his chest like he physically can’t put me down.

“I told you—” His voice breaks, and something in my chest goes cold and hollow, as if I can feel his panic too. “I told you not to go near the water. And you— What, you thought that meant going for a fucking swim during a storm sounded like a good idea?”

My legs dangle uselessly. I’m soaked, freezing, and weirdly calm in a way I absolutely should not be after definitely almost drowning.

“It didn’t feel dangerous,” I rasp. My voice sounds so charred it’s barely human. “I wasn’t afraid.”

An irritated growl rolls out of him, low and animal. “That doesn’t mean it wouldn’t have killed you.”

His tentacles retract slightly, but in a conflicted sort of way. They jitter in agitation. I can feel the pulse of them over his shoulders and under my legs. He still doesn’t let me go.

“I felt like—” I clear my throat, because it sounds stupid even inside my own head, but I force myself to say it anyway, because I think he might be the only person who would understand. “I felt like I needed to be close to the water.”

He snorts a derisive little sound.

The sound of it races through me in a hot crack of annoyance, setting my skin on fire even though I’m still freezing. I shove hard against his chest. It has no effect on him at all. “Put me down. ”

He hesitates.

“Put me down, Cal.” I shove again, pushing my body away from his like a cat that doesn’t want to be picked up. “ Now .”

His jaw works once, then again, like he wants to argue—but he sets me down carefully on the sand.

I sway, teeth chattering. My skin burns with cold, but my blood is boiling.

I stagger a step back and wrap my arms tight around myself.

I physically cannot stand still. My body jolts violently from the chill.

“You left me,” I snap. My throat tightens as I say it.

I hate the hot feeling in the back of my mouth like I’m about to cry.

“You touched me, you— We did what we did, and I didn’t know what—” My voice makes a humiliating wobbling crack, and the rest of the words come out whispered. “And then you made me leave .”

He flinches.

“You made me feel like—like I did something wrong.” I sound childish, and I hate it.

He takes a step toward me, then stops. His eyes shine weirdly in the stormlight, and there’s something desperate in his face.

“What’s wrong with you?” I demand. “You look like you’re in pain.”

“I am in pain,” he says quietly.

All the air shoots out of my lungs on a sharp laugh, and he winces at the sound. “What the fuck could possibly be causing you pain? I’m the one who’s furious. I’m the one who’s confused. You hurt me .”

He nods once, slow and utterly miserable. “I know. That’s why I’m in pain.”

I blink at him, totally uncomprehending.

He rakes a hand through his hair, dark and dripping with sea water.

“I can feel you. Your emotions. Especially the strong ones. Like these.” He gestures vaguely to me, like I’m one big walking example of a strong emotion .

“Because of... what we did. The touching. The—” He clears his throat, averting his gaze. “The open-mouthed kissing.”

A beat of pseudo-silence rolls between us.

I bark a laugh. “What, like mono?”

To my surprise, he huffs a contrite, disbelieving little sound. It’s not quite a chuckle, but it’s in the neighborhood. “Uh, yeah, I guess. A little like mono,” he admits sheepishly.

I drag both hands through my hair and then let them fall. “Okay,” I say, slowly. “What else does it mean?”

Cal’s gaze drops to the sand. His throat works once before he answers. “You smell different.”

I feel my face contort, though just barely. It’s still half numb from the cold. “I—what?”

“To me,” he clarifies, still not meeting my eyes. “It’s not bad. It’s not… It’s not even physical, really. It’s emotional. You feel different, so your scent changes. It’s ancient… like, primal.” He shifts his weight, then adds, low and reluctant, “It means you’re mine now.”

I stare at him. The wind howls. My dress clings wetly to my ribs, my arms, my chest.

What in the fuck am I supposed to say to that?

“Okay.” I look off into the middle distance, like I’m on a TV show and I’m making a vacant face at the camera. “Anything else I should know while we’re laying all the weird, supernatural bonding cards on the table?”

He glances up at me, cautious, but his eyes have lightened. “You’re taking this quite well.”

“How else should I take it?” I ask. “You said it wasn’t a choice, right?”

He hesitates. “It wasn’t… deliberate. But it’s real. And I’ve never—” His voice falters for a second. “I’ve never bonded with anyone else.”

Something strange and primitive shifts inside of me. A low, deep, possessive hum, like a string pulled taut in my sternum. My chest tightens, and I’m ashamed of the heat that comes with it. I shake my head sharply.

“Wait. Does this affect me? Like… physiologically? Psychologically? Are you doing something to me?” My voice wavers, because even as I say it, I don’t want it to be true. “Is that why I want you? Are you screwing with my head or something?”

Cal’s lips part, and the pain flickers in his face, naked and plain, like I struck him. I feel its keen sting a heartbeat later. A ghost of the same pain, like a blade slicing straight through me .

“No,” he says hoarsely. He drops his gaze, and his tentacles practically wilt around him. “I— God, no, Neviah. It’s not like that. Your wants are your own. But if you don’t wish to act on those wants, then you should probably keep your distance from me.”

I hate that he won’t look at me.

I step forward and let my hand slide over his hip, soft and slow and instinctual, like we’ve done this a hundred times. Like I already know how he likes to be touched. His body leans into it without hesitation, as if I’ve called on something in him.

His tentacles move toward me like vines reaching toward light, and they seem less sad. It’s fucking absurd, because I’m not sure how a tentacle can be sad, or how I’d know—but it feels like I do.

“I felt that,” I say softly. “What I said… I hurt you. I didn’t mean to. I’m sorry.”

I press a kiss to his collarbone through the fabric of his hoodie. His body is warm, radiating heat like a furnace, and he’s trembling slightly.

“I don’t want to stay away from you,” I whisper. “But what you want is important too. Do you want me to keep my distance? Do you want to be alone?”

“No, it—” His teeth click as his mouth snaps shut.

I bring my other hand to rest gently on his other hip, slipping under the damp hem of his hoodie, and my thumbs roll circles over the soft skin there as I nose along the line of his jaw. Stubble scrapes, but I like the feeling. “Tell me.”

He exhales, long and quiet. “It hurts when you’re not close.”

I still.

“The pull is constant,” he murmurs. “If you’re too far, if I can’t feel you nearby—it’s like my skin doesn’t fit right. I can’t think. I can’t focus. It’s… painful.”

My heart kicks so hard behind my ribs it makes me lightheaded. “I think I feel it too. Maybe… maybe that’s why I was drawn to the water. Even in the storm.”

His eyes flick to mine, sharp and searching.

I hold his gaze. “That’s where you were, right? In the water.”