Page 48 of Sugar, Spice, and Magical Moonlight (Midlife Menace #2)

I couldn’t believe this was happening. After traversing a dangerous set of stairs carved into a steep cliff, Ric had taken us to a dark cove at the other end of the island that he said was protected from sirens by a locking system similar to the ones used in canals.

There was only one boat left, the smaller of the two, a center console fishing boat with three outboard motors that Ric assured me would haul ass. There was just one problem—I didn’t know how to drive a boat.

“How do I get out of here?”

Ric’s face was grim as he pointed toward the ocean on the horizon.

“There is a steel gate at the end of the cove that has sensors to keep out sirens. Once you reach the gate, the lock will automatically lower and let you out of the cove. This is a chart plotter.” He pointed toward a screen on the console that was lit up like a constellation.

“It shows all the Sirenum Scopuli Islands. Just punch in ‘home,’ and it will take you back to our island. The boat is enchanted to pass through the wards.”

I swallowed back bile while trying not to think of my boy all alone out in the ocean. I prayed those sirens weren’t lying when they’d said they wouldn’t eat the Phoenix. “I-I’ve never driven a boat before.”

“It’s a lot like driving my truck.” He pointed to the big thruster on the side of the console. “Except you brake by putting it in reverse. It’s sensitive,” he added, “so a little thrust goes a long way.”

In other words, don’t smash the boat into an island . Got it. Now I understood where the term “crash course” came from.

My stomach roiled and pitched and my bones rattled. “I don’t know if I can do this.”

“You have to.” He grasped my shoulders, desperately searching my gaze. “Des needs you.”

“Do you know how to drive a boat?” I called to the Enchantress, who stood on the dock. She’d transformed back into her lithe human form, though I knew she still easily weighed close to half a ton.

Ric grimaced. “She’s too heavy for this boat. She’ll slow you down or sink you.”

Surprisingly, the Enchantress didn’t act offended, just worried as she twisted her fingers in front of her.

Nimue had already left via the siren beach.

The Enchantress had reassured us her lover was a good swimmer.

Hopefully so, considering she had a tail and gills.

I prayed to the Goddess that she’d found Des and was keeping him safe.

“What do all these other buttons do?” I waved toward the console that resembled an airplane cockpit.

“Don’t worry about them. You’ll have to drive slowly through the islands. There are lots of rocks that can damage the boat.” He pointed to the screen, as if I was supposed to understand all those dots and lines. “The waypoints on the chart plotter will keep you off the rocks.”

“I don’t understand what I’m looking at.” Panic seized my mind, making me too terrified to think straight. “What if I crash?”

“Ethyl can be your lookout,” he said, motioning to the pixie who was sitting on the bow, gaping back at us. “She’ll also need to operate a dart gun in case you’re attacked.”

Ethyl’s squeal was our only warning before she poofed into her six-inch self and flew on top of the console’s hardtop.

“Ethyl, don’t you dare!” I clutched the wheel with whitened knuckles, panic sending my heart rate into overdrive. “I need you!”

“I’m not shooting anyone!” she squeaked back at me.

The boat began to vibrate, and I realized it was caused by my earth-splitting. I breathed out a slow breath, forcing myself to hold it together long enough to save Des. I sighed in relief when the boat slowly stopped vibrating.

“Does she have to shoot a gun?” I asked Ric, desperation puncturing my words.

“The darts aren’t deadly,” he argued. “They just put your enemies to sleep.”

“Did you hear that, Ethyl?” I called to her.

She answered with another terrified squeal.

“We don’t have time for this. Move over,” Ric grumbled, pushing me to the side and grabbing the wheel.

“You can’t come, Ric!” A mixture of relief and dread tightened my chest. “The sirens!” Was this what it had come down to? Putting Ric’s life at risk because I was too terrified to operate a boat? No, I had to get my act together, now!

He hastily unzipped a black bag and wrapped a pair of headphones around his neck. “You’ll end up killing yourself out there.”

“And the sirens will kill you! I’ll figure it out.”

“We don’t have time. All that matters right now is finding Des.”

What? Had he really said that his life didn’t matter? Not only was he willing to protect my son and the rest of my family without complaint, he was actually willing to die for Des. What an amazing boyfriend. And here I was foolishly worried about us moving too fast.

“But I don’t want you to die,” I breathed, my argument falling flat to my own ears. I needed Ric. Saving Des was the most important, and I’d be no use to my son if I crashed the boat.

“Luci, look at me.” He turned me toward him, digging his fingers into my shoulders.

“I won’t die, so long as we’re careful. I shouldn’t be able to hear the sirens with my noise-canceling headphones, but if I start to go crazy, you need to shoot me with a dart.

” He slapped a gun that looked like a rifle, with colored darts in the chamber, into my hands. “Understood?”

I gaped down at the gun, squeezing the metal while my mind reeled. “Y-yes. What are you doing?” I asked as he handcuffed one of his ankles to the bottom of the console.

“Preventing the sirens from luring me into the water,” he said grimly.

I nodded my agreement. This was happening. This was really happening!

Shu jumped into the boat in a cloud of heavy cologne. I didn’t know when he’d had time to change, but he wore a blue sailor uniform that looked like it was from last century, complete with the Dixie Cup white hat. “You’ll need to chain me, too, because you’re not going out there without me.”

Emotion clogged my throat as my eyes misted. “Shu, no.”

“My family needs me. I’m going, and that’s final,” he said while reaching into the bag and thrusting a pair of noise-canceling headphones onto his head.

“Besides, I’m a fairly decent sharpshooter.

” His voice rose as if he was trying to hear himself speak.

“We’re wasting time.” He smacked the side of the boat. “Let’s go, captain!”

I swallowed back my fear when the Enchantress untied the boat and Ric hit the thruster. We lurched into the channel, inky waters surrounding us and a full blood moon hanging low in the sky. Dragon balls. The sirens were feasting. Hopefully, they were filling up on demons and not on my son.

AS SOON AS WE LEFT the safety of the cove, I felt my magic slipping away until I was nothing but an empty husk, with no more power than a human. The hollow feeling was overwhelmingly depressing, though none of that mattered, so long as we saved my son.

Ethyl cried out, and I looked on top of the boat to see she’d shifted to full size. She still had her wings but no longer had access to her miniaturizing magic.

She stomped the hardtop like a child throwing a tantrum. “I can’t shift anymore!”

“Neither can I,” Ric said. “It’s the Sirenum coral blocking our magic.”

He held a hand up to her and helped her climb onto his seat. She slipped off and joined me at the bow.

Ric put on his headphones, which meant I could only talk to him through hand signals as he navigated us around so many rocks that I’d lost count.

I was grateful that he’d captained the boat, for I would’ve surely crashed.

And then what? I shuddered to think of my son losing his only lifeline.

Goddess, I didn’t know how I’d be able to go on if anything happened to Des.

Ethyl and I searched the eerily smooth and inky waters with just one low fog light, my heart plummeting when I didn’t see any signs of my son.

With only a blood moon to light the sky, the night fell like a curtain around us, blanketing the waters until I couldn’t tell where the sea ended and the sky began.

I froze, my heart pounding a thunderstorm in my ears when I heard a giggle and saw a splash.

“Luci!” Ric hissed, motioning toward my weapon.

I gathered enough of my senses to raise my gun while scanning the waters. Shu sat in the passenger seat, his leg handcuffed to the metal bar beneath him, and pointed his gun the other direction while we drove through what looked like an oil slick turned red beneath the siren moon’s crimson light.

But, no, that wasn’t an oil slick.

Eww! I nearly lost my supper, lunch, and meals from the last week when I saw a severed arm floating among the “oil,” which I now realized was blood.

“Red sky in the morning, sailors’ warning,” Shu whispered loudly. “Red moon at night, sirens’ delight.”

“Holy hex-a-mole!” I said to Shu. “Are you trying to make me crap my pants?”

But of course he didn’t answer, because he couldn’t hear a single thing I said with those headphones.

Ducking her head, Ethyl pressed against me. “We’re in deep voodoo doo-doo.”

Another giggle, another splash, several more severed body parts floating in a thicker film of blood, until we spied a large piece of debris in the distance with two shadowy figures hovered together on top of it. It took a moment for me to realize it was a capsized boat hull.

“Freddie!” Ethyl cried out.

Bile burned my throat. The shadows appeared too small to be Frederica and Des.

I stilled, my heart beating against my chest, when Ric aimed a light at the pair—Aunt Serena and a sobbing child.

Serena held a blade to the child’s neck when the light blinded her eyes. “Back off, or the child dies!”

My heart broke for the child when she cried out for her mommies. Little Astra looked just like the Enchantress in her beautiful human form, though she had gills on her neck and webbed hands and feet.

A splash and a giggle sounded nearby, and I saw the flick of a tail and a tangle of hair before the siren disappeared beneath the bloody water.