Page 17 of Ruthless Scoundrel
Her eyes go wide and she looks down.
“Selkie,” she says in quiet reverence.
I hum in confirmation.
Her wide eyes draw back to my face and she whispers, “You’re a selkie.”
“I am.”
She looks down at my tail again, her feet gently rubbing against my soft pelt and hard plates. “Wow…”
“If I’d known it’d be this easy to pacify you, I would’ve shifted ages ago.”
The wonder in her eyes goes hard and cold like the snap of a winter frost. “Why did you steal me?”
“The money,” I say. “Do you know how much someone would pay for a powerful princess like you? A wealthy man could become a king.”
Her jaw works. “I realize I’ve only been at court for nineteen years, but you do me a great disservice by thinking I can’t spot a lie.”
My pulse spikes, but I hide it with a quirk of my brow. “And growing up in the cradle of wealth, you can’t possibly imagine what a bounty like you could earn me, or why I’m so willing to take you.”
She holds my gaze for a painfully long moment, her blue eyes spearing into mine like tridents. Finally, she lifts her chin, her nostrils flaring. “Are you going to take me to safety then, since you need the money so much?”
My magic surges out from the tip of my tail and a perfect map of the space returns to me, illuminating in my mind’s eye. I swish through the water with ease and bring her to the beach under the covering of a volcanic cave. The moss and fungi glow here,creating an enchanting setting. If Reina didn’t hate me, this might be romantic.
I shift back to my legs as I carry her to shore.
“Let me down,” she demands when we get to the shallows.
I release her chain and she pulls her arms back, then flails out of my grasp and struggles up toward the rocky land. She scoops up handfuls of water as she goes, drinking and washing her face. I don’t know what’s in this water, and while my gut could probably handle it, I doubt a sheltered princess’s could.
“You might get sick—”
“Oh, fuck off,” she says, then takes another deep drink.
“Such a mouth on you. Did your mother teach you that?” I ask.
Reina glares at me. “No.”
“Then where did you learn to curse like a sailor?”
“None of your concern,” she says, then drinks again.
“Your rebellion?” I ask.
She gurgles some curse at me through her mouthful of water. She was truly dehydrated on that ship. I should’ve checked on her more frequently. I should’ve kept her with me. Fucking pirate captain and his squid ink rules.
I take a drink from my cupped hands and her eyes snag on my lips—no, my fingers. Her jaw flexes as she schools her expression into something uncaring. “Can you heal?”
My gaze drops to my digits and I suddenly feel the grizzly sight that meets me. Pain surges up my hands to my elbows from my ruined fingers. The flesh is shredded from our panicked descent.
I hiss in a breath and reach for my well of magic, but it’s completely drained. I used the last of it on shifting between my half-selkie and man forms.
“You can’t,” she says.
I can, but I don’t need her knowing otherwise.
She holds her wrists out. “Release my binds and I’ll heal you.”
