Page 30 of Shiver Me Satyr

“Visiting the island—Chevelle in particular—isn’t for the crew, Chub, Catalina, or me.” He rises from his seat and drapes his jacket over the back of it. With each name, he steps toward me. My instincts flatten my body against the wall. I press my sweaty palms against the cool planks.

“Then why?” I barely get the words out between pants. He reaches his arm over me and leans so that my breasts brush his chest with each labored inhale. His scent of salt, cedar, and something uniquely him threatens to drown me in lust. My lashes fan downward to watch his hand lift from his side.

“For you,” he whispers, against my lips. “I’m taking you to her to make your wish come true. Then we’re sorting out our crew and dropping off Chub and Catalina in Mexico. Next, you’re going to wish on another star, and I’m going to make that wish come true, too. Can you guess what happens next? It’s not a secret. You will wish a third time, a fourth. For the rest of our lives, I’ll work my fingers to the bone to make your wishes come true.”

“Wishes? I thought you said you didn’t hear my wish?” Bile churns in my stomach as his sweet words wash over me. It’s sweet words and promises of forever that took my tentacles…wait…

“All I heard wastentacles,” he says with a smile that I want to wipe off his gob and mount to the mast. “If the lady wants her tentacles back, I will go to the ends of the earth to find a witch who can restore her tentacles.”

Bastard is as serious as the plague. He’s pretty smug about it, too. I may want the carefree lifestyle I had under the sea—before I was traumatized—but I love my body the way it is. He may beOtherand feel differently, but I’m fine as a human.

“Listen clearly, for we are only having this conversation once,” I sneer through clenched jaws. “I am whole as I am. Tentacles, legs, stumps, or pegs I fashion myself as legs do not define me. Before you acted like a puddinghead on my behalf, you should have asked me to clear the waters. I love my body and who I am. I wished for fewer problems, likewhenI had tentacles. The wish wasn’t to change me but to give me a day off! Now you’ve taken half the mateys with enough sense to cover for me!”

“I love your body too. I just—”

“Thought it could be better? What’s in it for you? Oh, I get it. You’ve been obsessed with Magda’s journals, so I bet you want to be the next Captain Teeth. Is that it? With tentacles, I’ll be a replica of my sister and confined to the sea most of the time. You can play Teeth and be the captain—”

“It’s not like that at all,” he says, stroking a finger down my cheek. I slap his hand away and glare at him. Bastard smiles so wide, his eyes squint. “I want us to beus—not Captain Betts and lowlife, philanderer Hybris. I want Flint and Bettina to be anus.”

“You thought I’d gratefully open my tentacles for you when I wouldn’t open my legs? How dare you try to manipulate me!”

I push him away with both hands, but he doesn’t move more than a sway. With a feminine shriek, I slide out from under him and storm away. He grabs my wrist, and my fist connects with his shoulder as I whirl around. The momentum wraps my arm behind me, locked to my lower back by his grip. He’s stronger than I thought. My bare feet slide on the oiled wooden floor as he hauls me against his muscular body.

“I wouldn’t do such a thing for two reasons—” he pauses to inhale my scent on the sensitive place where my neck meets my left shoulder, “—mostly because I’d never force my intentions on a woman. I never need to—”

“Ego,” I spit. I feel his masculine chuckle in my bones like he’s crawled inside my skin to share it with me.

“Reality. The second reason is a confession. I’d break all my colonial morals and civilized veneer for a night with you. You toyed with me to the point where I’ve snapped. I would force you, Bettina, not manipulate you with sweet promises. What I feel for you isn’t a calculated seduction where I’m in control. I’m that crazy about you. The more you push me away, the harder I want to fight for you. Your smiles will be mine, your sneers, too. If I have my way, I will occupy your thoughts from sunup to sundown when I burn your prim little dreams to ashes.”

I gasp at his confession and the way his fingers close around my buttocks to squeeze me. Do I dare tell him the filthy things we did together in my dreams last night? Or do I protect my shredded heart?

“Bettina, if I didn’t suspect you’d be dry as sand in your dainty short trousers, I’d pry your legs open right now. You fog my brain with desire, but your surrender will only satisfy me if it’s given freely. I know how you tick. You won’t be wet unlessI’ve proven I can love you—that I’m falling for you—because your past makes it impossible for you to believe my words.”

“You lie,” I reply, running my hands up his chest. Whether it’s a statement of his character or how I feel about his words is immaterial. Warning bells ring in my head, but I ignore them. My arms twine around his neck as I rub against him shamelessly. The ties on my top lose the battle against the friction and allow the garment to flutter to the floor.

“I know sex and love are on a singular path in your heart, so I’m trying to change my ways for you. I want you, but I want forever more.”

Richard said those words. He said we could continue forever, and I guess we could have…if I’d been okay hiding from his wife. I savored his words of love and flattery. Hybris says sweet words to every woman and admits they’re lies. As Flint, he flirts shamelessly with my crew, but he hasn’t made the beast with two backs with any of them. It’s possible that with the rise of Flint, a new man emerged who is loyal to one woman, or it could be the same routine as with the old Hybris. In my heart of hearts…

I don’t care.

My virginity is gone. My destiny is written in the stars. I want what he offers.

No turning back. I jump and wrap my legs around his waist, holding a breath of daylight between our sexes.

“You lie when you say the passage between my thighs is dry as sand,” I whisper.

His lips don’t move from their shocked, round shape as I nip at them. I grab his wrist and tug his arm between us. My arousal has soaked through the linen, but I thread his fingersinto the opening around my thigh anyway. When he reaches deep into my slit, I rock my hips so his fingertips breach my marriage entrance. He bends his wrist severely to press his palm against me as I take what I need. Grinding, moaning, and digging my heels into his back, I race for my climax.

It’s hot because he watches me like I’m an exotic creature that he doesn’t know what to do with. The known liar who wants to spew words of forever is speechless. He’s pleasured countless women in this fashion, but for some reason, I’ve stunned him into a statue. Is it because he thought I was too cold, proper, or detached to feel passion? I’ll show him what I’m capable of! I squirt and drench his hand, shirt, waistcoat, and trousers with reckless abandon.

He shifts just right, and I detonate. I throw my head back and my arms toward the ceiling. My scream rattles the walls and makes the pawns dance across the map. I pump my hips to milk every last drop of my peak into his palm. Trembling and gulping for air, I flop onto his chest with a sigh.

“Eyes open,” he commands, removing his hand from between us. He presses me closer, so my hypersensitive folds envelop his hard bar of arousal through our clothes. His fingers rise to my eye level. I smell myself on them. In silent question, I ask him with my eyes what he’s going to do next. Maintaining our locked gaze, he licks between his index and middle fingers. His moan awakens something primal in me as he sucks my climax off his hand. Each flick of his tongue and flutter of his eyelashes brings my arousal out of its slumber.

“You will get more,” he says in a dark, growly whisper I’ve never heard him use. It’s not a question. He’s not checking on the well-being of my marriage box. He’s quelling my fears by telling me what’s next. “I don’t just stick my marriage rod into any whore’s box. You aren’t my first, but today you will be mylast partner. Next time, I will enjoy you fully. This time is to inform you of whom you belong.”

Before I can reply, he bends me backward. I cling for dear life, smashing my breasts against his chest. Papers fly to the side. Pawns clatter to the floor as he sweeps his arm across the table. His hand cushions my head as he lays me upon it. I will never look at this table the same way again. This is a sacred strategy spot that has been used by generations of captains to plan battles, plot escape routes, and sail the high seas.

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