Page 147 of Cruel Tides

“You’re wonderful,” I whispered, leaning up to press my forehead against his. “No one has ever made me feel as safe and protected as you do.”

“Protected?” His chest shook with a suppressed laugh. He kissed me again with a slow and tender touch that felt both new and familiar all at once. Then he pressed a soft kiss against the bump on the top of my head. “I hurt you.”

I huffed, squirming underneath him. “You know that was an accident. And honestly, I should have waited for a time when we weren’t moving to ask you…” My voice trailed off as I remembered how he’d mentioned Leander only moments ago. “You… you said you were going to let Leanderhaveme?I’m not sure I understand.”

Barren’s hard features softened as he looked down at me. He answered my question with a simple nod, and I felt an unexpected pang when he didn’t elaborate.

“What do you mean by that?”

He moved above me, causing my arms to slip from around his neck as he rose from the bed with a grunt. “Barren!” I called out, my brows furrowing as I propped myself up on my elbows.

Barren walked over to his dresser, then paused, and when he turned around, a long, glittering chain dangled from his fingers. He retraced his path back to the bed with hesitant steps, his mouth pitched in uncertainty as he extended his hand, offering me the chain.

The pink pearl in its silver cage glimmered as I reached for it.

“You don’t remember,” he said, taking a seat beside me on the bed.

“No, I remember.” The mattress shifted under his weight, and I let myself rest against him. “You teased me that your mate had given it to you.” Just the memory of it was enough to make my stomach churn.

“Mmh.” A forceful swallow worked his throat. “Only, I wasn’t teasing you. My mate gave this to me.”

“Oh. I—I see,” I sputtered. There went my insides. My heart disintegrated. My lungs collapsed, my life force shriveling away to nothing.

I could feel the bed shift as Barren turned to face me, but I couldn’t look up at him, couldn’t do anything but gasp and fight for my next breath.

“You gave it to me.”

I—what?

“You don’t remember,” he went on as his hand met the bump on the top of my head, soothing it with a tender brush of his thumb. “I traveled to the Atlantic once, as a merfry. For a banquet Leander’s father arranged in celebration of the expected death of my father.”

That… Well, that did sound like something King Eamon would do. But a banquet? Papa hadn’t allowed me to attend banquets, except for?—

Wait.

My eyes widened as I turned the silver cage around in my palm. “Holy crap,” I whispered, staring down at the perfect pink pearl.

I’d kept one just like it tucked in the seagrass where I slept, too valuable to store in the bag with my other pearls. Most of them ended up scuffed or lost from playing rounds of Shooters, but not that pearl—that pearl I’d wanted to keep safe.

Because I knew that somewhere out there, it had a twin.Doubles, Papa used to call them. I’d opened hundreds of oysters, but only ever found one pair.

My hand tightened around the necklace. He’d kept his safe, after all this time. “That was you?” I said weakly.

I stared at him, awestruck, my mind replaying what I could remember of the banquet and of the merfry with the red tail who’d helped me open the oyster Papa had brought me.

That shy young merfry seemed so different from the Barren before me now.

It had been so long since I’d thought of that banquet—it was one of the last happy memories I’d had from my life under the waves. I hadn’t wanted to think about the bad times, and I’d wanted to think of the good times even less. Once, I’d done everything in my power to leave that life behind me. But now…

Barren’s hand cupped my jaw, bringing me over to him. “We were young, yes. But I knew.” His warm palm found its way to my chest, resting over my heart before he pressed it against his own. “Right here. I knew.”

He’d knownthenthat we were mates? “Did you read my mind or something?” I leaned in closer to whisper, “You can’t see all of my mates in there, can you?”

A chuckle rattled through him. “No,” he said, retrieving the necklace from my hand. “I didn’t read your mind that day.”

“Why not?” I frowned at his bare back as he got up to put the pearl safely away.

“I didn’t need to.” After setting it back in its glass container, he shrugged. “You spoke to me. No one ever spoke to me.”

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