Page 30 of Echoes of the Tide

“I can hear your thoughts as though you are saying them. You are a loud thinker, Ace.”

“I do not think loud.” She almost sounded insulted before she sighed. “I’m just wondering about your life outside of all this. You’re here with me, but you must have something or someone to go back to.”

Did he tell her the truth? That he’d been wasting away with nothing for so long, and that he’d leapt at the opportunity for adventure with her? Or did he try to play this off as though he had another life?

Maketes was an honest man. He had no interest in lying to her.

“I have nothing to get back to, kefi. Don’t worry about me so much.” He shifted, his hand coming down on her hip because he couldn’t resist the roundness there that called to him. “I have nothing and no one waiting on me.”

“That’s hard to believe. You’re so...” Her words trailed off.

A glimmer of pride glowed inside of his chest. “Handsome?”

“Well, I wasn’t going to say it like that.”

“Like what?”

Her hand slapped down on his chest, and he grinned up at the ceiling. She hated it when he goaded her, but he loved these moments between them. He enjoyed nothing more than antagonizing her.

“My people believe me to be very handsome as well. You can say it if you wish. It’s not the first time someone has told me that I would make a good mate.”

She made a garbled sound in the back of her throat. “I said nothing about being a mate!”

“You didn’t have to. All the females in our pod are very interested in me. I have even had strangers approach me and ask if I would be interested in being the father of their children. Mates are hard to come by, especially ones who look like me.”With his free hand, he grabbed hers on his chest and rubbed her palm up and down his chest. “This coloring is rare, you know.”

Her breath stuttered, and he wondered if touching him was affecting her just as much as it affected him. He wanted her hand to keep rubbing his chest and stomach. His skin was soft there, not quite so covered in scales. He could feel the heat of her palm as if she were made of fire.

Then she spoke, and he felt every muscle in his body tense.

“Why are you not with someone, then? If you wanted a mate, you could have had one by now.”

“I suppose I could have.” Did he tell her? Did he bare his soul in a way that he had been afraid to do since he was nothing but a small fry?

Her leg shifted, that hand moving over his chest all on her own. He couldn’t think. Couldn’t breathe. She was touching him willingly, and all he wanted was for more of that touch. But then he froze as she continued to speak into the darkness where secrets were easier to breathe into life.

“I can tell you that no one wanted me.” Her words were haunting in the room where they slept, neither of them looking at each other in the dark. “My sister is gorgeous. She’s got this long dark hair that’s never frizzy, and a smile that lights up an entire room. So many people wanted her. I was just her ugly sister. Growing up, I was always a little overweight. I wore glasses, my hair never had pretty curls. And I was loud. So loud. Opinionated, with a mouth on me that would send even the most hardened of engineers reeling.”

He could see it now. This brash, unaware young woman who had walked into a room and demanded that everyone give her attention. Because she was right. Because her words had meaning and no one ever listened to her. How he wished he could see her do that right now. He’d watch her withrapt attention and tear into anyone who didn’t give her the recognition she deserved.

The click of her throat suggested she’d swallowed. “I’ll be honest, I think I just settled into that. People thought of me as the ugly sister, and it was safe that way. I didn’t have to hope that boys would like me, or find me pretty. I took that persona on, and it served me well. Look at Gamma? Do you know what usually happens to women when they end up in that city? Not good things. Not at all.”

Which only served to make him angry. Because she’d been alone. No one had been there to protect her, and he’d been talking to her through a stupid little droid when he should have been here. For her. Making sure that, of all things, she was safe.

He hadn’t known that she wasn’t safe, though. Now, all he could do was make up for that which he had not known.

He tightened his hold on her and decided he, too, would bare his soul. “Our people perform to prove that we are interested in someone. We call it fluttering. The gills on our neck, our sides, they all move when we see someone that we like. It is an essential part of who we are and what mates we find. Unfortunately for me, I cannot flutter very well. The display that I create is... lackluster. To say the least.”

Her fingers had paused, as though she realized that he’d fluttered for her before. And then those fingers moved again, slowly trailing down his stomach to the ab muscles that flexed at her touch. “I don’t see why that would affect whether or not you would find a mate.”

“Well, and then there is the uh...” He coughed. Even now, the words stuck in his throat as though there was something wrong with even admitting this. “Some colorings of our people are a prediction of what they can do. Blue generally shows an ability for reason. Red colorings are always more aggressive and have a harder time controlling their anger. But me? I… Well, yellowsare usually where the line stops. A golden child, as my mother used to say, a sign that the ancients are pleased with our family line and that we have done enough to end it. I am a mate for fun, and that is all. But if anyone wants something serious or a future with children? I am not the one for that.”

And it still hurt. A lot.

He didn’t enjoy thinking about these difficult things, because then he didn’t have to admit how much it hurt. He wanted children. He wanted a mate who would look at him with affection while playing with yellow bellied children that laughed as he chased them through the waves.

Her hand had frozen on his belly. “I’m sorry to hear that, Maketes. I can only imagine it’s been very hard for you to deal with.”

“It comes with the coloring, I guess. Us yellow finned bastards sure are pretty, but most of us cannot pass that color on to anyone else.” And it killed him every single day to admit it. He hated knowing that he wasn’t what females wanted, other than for his looks. He wasn’t worthy enough for a long term relationship. They looked at him as funny, hilarious to be around, but not worth more than that.

---