A - Immortal Sea

“I have slightly more finesse than the cat, Elizabeth.” There was an edge to his voice now, sharp and dangerous. “I will not

pounce in front of your children.”

The focus in his eyes made her blood tingle. “And what happens later?”

“What is later? A year, a month, a week from now?” He shrugged. “I am here now with you. It is enough for me.”

She‟d told him she needed trust, tenderness, companionship, commitment. Could the first three be enough? Could passion

be enough?

Her heart pounded. She felt dizzy, as if she stood on a cliff above a raging sea. Step back from the edge? she wondered. Or

take the plunge?

Swallowing hard, she took one step closer to the fall. “I meant later tonight.”

His hot gaze locked with hers. “That is up to you.”

He could eat her up in a few hasty bites.

But he had promised her finesse, and he was experienced enough to know greed could be his undoing. So he controlled his

hunger with a hunter‟s patience, making himself useful, biding his time. He hauled a moving carton upstairs. While Elizabeth

unearthed bowls and her daughter shredded newspaper, he cut down the sides of the box so the kitten could not climb out and

the girl could not fall in.

He made Emily giggle, lying on her floor to inspect her room from a cat‟s eye perspective. Retrieving an elastic hair band

from under her dresser, he presented it to her with a bow. She rewarded him with a smile and a smacking kiss on the cheek

before bouncing into bed.

Morgan‟s empty hands curled into fists at his sides. The little girl‟s kiss left him gasping, struggling like a fish out of water.

With the fatalism of his kind, he accepted that he would eventually lose his battle for survival, that he would one day

surrender to the lure of the sea, lost finally and forever beneath the wave, without will or ability to take human form.

But he never imagined he could become stranded on land, snared by something as foolish as a child‟s affection, as

transitory as a woman‟s desire.

In its box, the kitten mewed and fretted, trapped by Emily‟s love and Elizabeth‟s care.

The children of the sea were solitary by nature and by choice. Perhaps with Morwenna . . . But his twin had turned her back

on him, and Morgan had never forgiven her defection. Even swimming with the whaleyn, the great, mild giants of the sea, he

had resisted the seductive security of the pod. He could survive longer as a shark: focused, ruthless, predatory.

Nothing lasted forever but the sea, not love or faith or hope or strength. The child‟s affection, like her memories, would

fade. His attachment to her and to her mother could only be temporary.

And yet . . .

He watched Elizabeth tuck her into bed, smoothing her hair and the covers with a tender hand, the murmur of their voices

like the rising and falling of the sea, and felt pieces of his heart slipping away, eroded by longing.

Elizabeth leaned over her daughter‟s pillow, the bend of her body graceful in the spill of light from the hall.

“Good night, Mommy.” Emily‟s gaze sought Morgan, waiting in the doorway. “ ‟ Night, Morgan.”

He had to clear his throat before he could speak. “Good night.”

“Sleep tight.” Elizabeth eased the door shut on the kitten‟s piercing cries. She smiled ruefully at Morgan. “Assuming they

can sleep at all.”

Before he could respond, she slipped by him, disappearing through a shadowed doorway at the other end of the house. Her

room? He wanted to follow, to ravage, to possess. But he did not think she would invite him into her bed, take him into her

body, with her wakeful child down the hall. He heard water running and the slide of a drawer before she reappeared, her

cheeks faintly flushed.

Avoiding his gaze, she preceded him down the stairs. The kitten‟s mews pursued them, stopping abruptly as they reached

the front hall.

Elizabeth cocked her head. “She has that cat in bed with her.”

“Almost certainly,” Morgan agreed, amused.

Indecision warred in her face. “I could go up.”

“You could.” Resting his hand on the small of her back, he steered her gently into the living room. “But you won‟t.”

She turned to face him. He liked looking at her, those clear, dark eyes, that long, mobile mouth, the slightly squared jaw.

“Why won‟t I?”

He brushed a strand of hair back from her face, pleased at the sudden intake of her breath. “Because you know they will

both be happier this way.”

“Em has camp in the morning.”

He tucked her hair behind her ear, letting his hand linger, letting her grow accustomed to his touch. “You said yourself she

would not sleep with the kitten crying across the room.”

He could feel her weakening, but she still argued. The woman would argue with the angels. “She could still have allergies.

Asthma.”

“Worrier.”

“Worrying goes with the job description, I‟m afraid.”

He cocked an eyebrow. “Doctor?”

“Mother.”

“You should not worry over what you cannot control.” He stroked his thumb down the side of her throat, pressed against

her rapidly beating pulse. “Let go, Elizabeth.”

Her breath sighed across his lips. “I suppose you‟re right. I just don‟t want this sleeping together thing to become a habit.”

He kept his face straight with an effort. Did she still think they spoke of her daughter and the cat? “One night,” he

murmured. “One night won‟t change anything.”

He covered her mouth with his, keeping his eyes open to gauge her response. Her lashes drifted shut. Her lips warmed and

yielded. The surrender in her kiss, the faint resistance in her muscles, combined to drive him wild. But when he deepened the

kiss, she turned her face away.

“Maybe you‟re right.” She retreated toward the kitchen.

He let her go. Elizabeth might let him take her, but only after the required preliminaries. Trust. Tenderness.

Conversation.

“You were good with her. Emily,” she said. “Good with both of them, really.”

He understood the change of subject was another step back, another way of regaining distance and control.

He leaned his hips against the counter, admiring the stretch of her back as she opened a cabinet. “It is because I am a

stranger. I see them differently.”

“I thought it was because you were . . .”

“Zachary‟s father?”

She bit her lip. Shot him a glance over her shoulder. “Male.”

“I am gratified you noticed.”

“Wine?” she offered.

Another preliminary.

“Whatever you want,” he said.

She stood on tiptoe to reach for glasses. “White or red?”

“Either.” He ran his tongue over his teeth. “Or we could have sex.”

She went still for one tiny, betraying moment before she turned. “Wine first.”

The spark of reaction caught him by surprise. Wine first. His patience was to be rewarded, then. His body stirred and

thickened in anticipation.

“The counselor said the children need a male role model,” Elizabeth continued. Her small, neat doctor‟s hands dealt

competently with bottle and corkscrew. “Before we moved here, I tried reestablishing contact with my parents in Philadelphia,

but things didn‟t work out.”

He pulled his mind back to the conversation. She was estranged from her parents, he remembered. “Because of Zachary.”

She poured the wine—red—into two glasses and handed him a glass. “Because of Zachary. And Ben.” Grabbing the bottle