Page 21 of The Rusalka and Mr. Right

You don’t know her that well. Youthinkyou do. It’s not real. Yet.

Yetis getting a lot of mileage in my head.

“Magical. Feels magical.”

“Oh, man. You got bit bad. Are you going to tell Mom?”

“Not for a few months.”

I stop and lean on the wall, shook. Not that I was some commitment-shy asshole before, but I tended to think realistically. I knew the likelihood of any of my high school or college girlfriends lasting months was slim. I met Marina yesterday, and I easily envision us exchanging Christmas gifts, holding hands as we hike these mountains in the spring, ogling that made-for-a-bikini body of hers next summer.

“Not to take your job as responsible big brother away from you, but don’t rush into anything. Be careful. Use protection. Don’t give her your keys or your credit cards. Make sure she’s not a gold digger.”

Irrational anger flares up in me.Marina’s not like that!I bite down the yell itching to exit my lips. The truth is, she could be exactly like that. “I’ll be careful,” I say in a low voice.

“Dude, I’m sorry to kill your buzz. You would have told me the same things.”

“I know. I know. Uh. I have to go finish up some of my mandatory virtual training stuff for work. Talk to you soon.”

I split before my brother can point out that I’m acting odd. I’m aware.

Funny thing is, I don’t think I want to stop.

I pat my chest. Feel my pulse. Everything is normal. Steady. Maybe a little elevated when I think of her eyes and how she looked up at me last night...

You’re happy, amoeba brain. Maybe it’s the sweet job, the friendly locals, the bomb coffee that Ingrid brings in from ThePine Loft, the fact that your parents aren’t micromanaging you...

Or Marina. And Marina.

Maybe it’s just getting epic sex three times in twenty-four hours.

I think back to some of the women in my life, the girls I thought I loved, the girls I was with the longest. I think about making love with them and... Nah.

It’s not just sex. It’s not just the town.

There’s something about Marina.

“ARE YOU FEELING BETTER?” Calder swims up to the peeling green houseboat I call home when necessity dictates. Its white trim falls and cracks in flakes as he joins me on deck, flicking long tendrils of seaweed from the edges of the splintering floor.

“Much.” I pat my stomach with a contented sigh.

“And I’m sure the local frat boys rejoice,” Calder laughs.

I laugh, too, but I hurriedly turn from my friend and slip inside.

I didn’t eat over the weekend—unless you count Saturday morning’s sleepy lovemaking with Kev.

I wince inside. Lovemaking. Fucking.

No. It didn’t feel like mere physical coupling. “Lemonade?” I shout out.

Calder ducks his head in and flops down the stairs to the poorly lit belly of the boat. A small bed, a table and chair, my charging station, a chest of clothes, and a few books are all I possess—or at least all I bother to keep here. “What did you do?”

“I bought some lemonade? It was on sale.”

“No, no. I mean, why are you slithering away like a woman with a guilty secret?”

I sigh. “I have a guilty secret. I found...” I don’t want to tell—but Calder has helped me more times than I can count. Water dwellers stick together—and there aren’t too many of us in Pine Ridge. Even though there are some kelpies and selkies in town, they tend to stay hidden, keep in their “herds.”

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