Page 29 of The Merman’s Betrothal (Outcast Hearts #2)

F ionn was fully unravelled. All because of Rory.

Rory and his perfectly tight, perfectly hot little mouth and his velvety tongue and the quivering vibration of his moans drilling into Fionn’s flesh.

His knot was burning; it had never been confined so exquisitely before.

The sensitive nerve endings in the tip of his cock were completely overwhelmed, causing Fionn’s muscles to spasm over and over as his orgasm stretched longer and deeper than he’d ever thought possible.

At some point he realised they were upside-down. The water around them churned, spurred into agitation by the sounds pouring out of Fionn’s own mouth.

We are underwater.

Rory is in danger.

The thought cut through his pleasure like a knife. In an instant Fionn was alert and assessing the situation.

Their heads were angled toward the ocean floor; the sky at their feet. Rory appeared to be struggling against where they were joined, spluttering against Fionn’s cock—surely drowning.

‘ Be calm, I have you, ’ Fionn sang urgently, hoping he’d understand. He needed to untangle his legs from Rory so he could kick them both to the surface—

Rory stopped struggling instantly. His eyes met Fionn’s, faintly puzzled but much calmer than Fionn thought he should be.

Only now did Fionn perceive that Rory had been furiously stroking his own cock and that the colour in his cheeks and the hunger in his eyes suggested exhilaration rather than panic.

‘Hmf?’ Rory uttered around Fionn’s cock, sending a flush of bubbles from the gap in his mouth.

The sight of the bubbles seemed to faze him. ‘Wugh?’ Rory gurgled. Tentatively, he touched the side of his throat. His eyes popped. ‘ Igh! ’

Could it be? Fionn curled over to see what Rory was poking at.

Gills, he comprehended with a burst of joy. Rory’s chest rose and fell normally while water rushed in and out of it as naturally—presumably—as breathing.

Now Rory seemed to panic. He grasped Fionn’s hips with both hands, trying to push himself away.

‘ Careful, let me help you… ’ Fionn tried to soothe him.

The abrupt shock had done a lot to quell Fionn’s arousal. As his body calmed down, his knot receded in Rory’s mouth until they could finally separate.

Rory stretched his jaw, looking utterly stunned.

‘ Will you believe me now? ’ Fionn asked, bright with hope and the satisfying knowledge that he’d been right.

‘Ug up.’ Rory burbled back. He watched the bubbles float from his mouth to the surface.

His gills, like Fionn’s, were comprised of three narrow slits on each side of his neck. They subtly expanded and contracted with the flow of water moving through them.

Rory seemed to awake from his shell-shocked state and began kicking for the surface. Fionn followed him up.

‘What the fuck? ’ Rory exclaimed upon breaking into the air. Or rather, Fionn gathered that’s what he tried to say, but instead choked out a series of coughs and splutters.

‘You need to let the water drain first,’ Fionn said helpfully. ‘Your body needs a moment to adjust between lungs and gills. Doubtless you will find the transition gets faster with practice.’

Rory inhaled a raspy lungful of air and clutched at his gills. They had closed up, as they should, becoming imperceptible from more than a few feet away.

‘What the fuck is happening to me?’ Rory wheezed.

‘It is obvious that you are a—’

‘Don’t answer. I know. I think I fucking know and I hate it.’

Fionn found his cheerfulness deflating. This wasn’t the reaction he wanted. He watched Rory carefully, both of them treading water some fifty yards from the shore where the current had carried them.

‘Why do you hate me so much, Rory Douglas?’

Rory didn’t look at him. ‘I don’t— I don’t hate you.’

‘Then why…’

Fionn stopped himself. He recalled with sudden clarity his argument with Neacel.

He was about to act on an assumption of Rory’s feelings, yet again.

But perhaps he always fared so badly because he only measured Rory’s reactions to himself, rather than…

digging to find the truth of what Rory was feeling. Was that what Neacel meant?

Fionn tried to understand now. The soul bond ebbed and flowed between them, somewhat dormant and satisfied by their sexual encounter. But it also carried sounds in the current, wisps of thought and emotion if Fionn cared to look for them.

And what he discovered was that the current didn’t so much flow from Rory; rather it swirled and eddied like an anxious whirlpool. It carried restless waves of insecurity and confusion that frothed against each other, churning into a deep, deep well of self-doubt…

Rory’s head jerked up. ‘What are you doing?’

‘I am not doing anything,’ Fionn replied honestly. ‘Just listening.’

He felt Rory shrink away, like the tide pulling back from the shore.

‘I feel like you can see into me. It’s awful.’

‘You can see all of me, too. Here…’ Fionn was struck by a wonderful idea.

He endeavoured to reach out through the soul bond, imagining a great wave rolling out from his chest into Rory’s.

Rory gasped, knocked back by an invisible force. ‘The fu—’

‘This is me,’ Fionn said, trying to sound encouraging. ‘You can look at any piece of me you like. So you understand we are equal, and I do not have some power over you that you do not have over me.’

Fionn squared his shoulders proudly, sure that this, finally, might be the gesture that brought Rory closer to him.

Rory would see what it could feel like to be held fast by Fionn’s strength and conviction.

That he wouldn’t need to feel so anxious with Fionn providing a rock in his troubled current.

Hesitantly, Rory dipped his metaphorical toes in. Fionn closed his eyes and sensed Rory probing their soul bond.

There, Fionn sent forth a great swell of noble purpose, so Rory would see how wholeheartedly Fionn wished to serve his kingdom.

Then a wave of courage, backed up by his martial skill and hunting prowess.

Then a ripple of disillusionment, buoyed by his vast collection of disappointments to the people around him, like how he’d ruined things with Neacel.

Fionn’s eyes snapped open. ‘Wait—’

Dread rose in his chest as other truths surfaced in the current.

Flashes of intense loneliness. The great weight of royal responsibility that in equal parts lifted him and crushed him.

The constant striving for achievement, improvement, fulfillment —and of still never quite measuring up to the person, the warrior, the prince, he thought he was supposed to be.

His utter failure in allowing Rory to see this part of him.

Fionn hastily pulled away, pouring defensive distance into the bond.

Rory shook his head, flinging droplets from his hair. ‘Jesus. That was one hell of a brain bath.’

‘I am sorry to have burdened you,’ Fionn said stiffly. He was humiliated. How weak Rory must think he was.

‘Don’t be. We’ve all got our baggage. At least yours is some meaningful shit.

’ Rory’s fingers hovered around his closed gills.

He seemed to be thinking out loud. ‘You’re an actual prince.

With a whole kingdom and responsibilities and all that.

I’m just a fisherman who doesn’t want to be a fisherman. I guess I’ve got my wish.’

He trailed off, looking down at his reflection while silently treading water in the calm waves.

Just a fisherman? Was that all Rory saw in himself?

For a moment Fionn’s own worries dropped away.

‘You are not just a fisherman, Rory Douglas,’ Fionn announced imperiously, startling Rory out of his reverie. ‘You are a lobster guardian and reef adventurer. Seal friend and turtle saviour.’

For some reason, Rory laughed. ‘Christ, you’re weird.’

Fionn didn’t see what was funny or weird about it. He was only listing facts, and carried on earnestly. ‘I have seen that you are a man of duty and determination. A man with admirably strong resolve, especially if your rejection of our bond is any indication.’

‘Duty… Ha.’

They had continued to drift on the current and were now nearly a hundred yards from the beach. Rory turned his gaze to the buildings of Ullapool. Its inhabitants were likely waking up for the day. Fionn gleaned from the soul bond that Rory’s thoughts were on someone in the town.

‘You mentioned your father before,’ Fionn said tentatively. ‘That he is the reason you never returned to the great reef.’

‘I… Yeah. I wanted to leave Ullapool, once. To go far away. To learn and travel. Ultimately do something worthwhile in the world.’

‘How did he stop you?’

‘Have you ever…’ Rory closed his eyes. ‘Have you ever had someone you love, despite them giving you every reason not to love them… Have you ever had them look at you like you’ve let them down so completely, so irrefutably by merely existing, that you spend the rest of your life trying to make up for it? ’

Without meaning to, Fionn gasped. It was like Rory had shot a barb into his heart, resonating with all the stony stares of the Blue King.

It twanged across the soul bond, causing Rory’s eyes to snap open and meet Fionn’s.

‘I do,’ Fionn murmured, a little breathless. He closed the gap between them, taking hold of Rory’s shoulders. Rory didn’t shrink away. ‘I do know, and I understand the awful limbo of living in that shadow.’

Treading water, it was easier to sink to meet Rory’s eyeline. Fionn noticed the way Rory’s gaze dropped to his lips before dancing back up again.

To his surprise, Rory bumped his forehead gently to Fionn’s.

‘That’s how it’s been ever since my mum died.

I was only five, right? I don’t even remember her much.

’ Rory spoke so quietly Fionn had to strain to hear him.

Like these were words that Rory almost daren’t admit.

‘It was like it was my fault. Suddenly he looked at me like I could never fill the hole that she’d left. ’