Waking the Deep Read online

  Legs meant human. Human meant he needed to hide.

  No one was supposed to use this side of the lake. It was forbidden. Even tourists were well aware of the dangers of swimming near the North Shore. Rumors of the serpent and mysterious disappearances usually kept people away. But occasionally, one wandered where they weren’t supposed to. And when they did, they always ended up in the water. Usually naked. Because swimming in forbidden waters held some sort of excitement for them.

  He eased backward, into a shadow where some Black Ash trees hung over the bank, his head barely above water. He would wait for them to leave before going to shore on the other side of the lake.

  But as he watched, that feeling of foreboding didn’t leave him. It only grew. Because the pale slip of skin that protruded from the water looked like a face and it didn’t move. Not anymore than the water around it did.

  Floating. The human was floating. That’s all.

  But instinct was rising within him, urging him to act. Something felt… off.

  Mansen ducked under the water again, squinting through the shards of moonlight that broke darkness. He saw legs, like before. One set. And they didn’t move.

  He swam forward to investigate, keeping himself hidden below the surface and moving carefully so as not to disturb the water and alert the human to his presence. As he drew near, he surmised that the legs belonged to a female. Slender at the ankle, sloping up to curvy hips.

  Even closer he drifted. Until he was close enough to touch. Looking up through the water he took notice of the female’s form. She was plump, with thick thighs that cradled a sexy V. Her waist dipped in at her naval before flaring out again to create the perfect foundation for her round tits.

  A familiar stirring below his waist had him nearly growling. He shouldn’t be this close to her. It wasn’t wise. If she spotted him beneath the water, the tales of beasts in the lake would grow even more, and put his people at risk.

  And besides. If she saw him, he’d want to fuck her.

  Mansen backed away from the pretty female, putting a sparse amount of distance between them. Maybe he would find her again once he was on land. Track her and seduce her. Maybe she would be his first bit of true living. Three sex-fueled days and nights with a human goddess before he was sent back to the lake… yeah, he could handle that.

  Decided, he readied to swim deeper, away from the female, except she began to sink. Mansen watched as her head dipped under and the lake seemed to swallow her up in its depths.

  The hell?

  He kept still, waiting for her eyes to open and catch a glimpse of him under the full moon. He wondered what color they were. Would she hit the surface screaming over what she saw?

  But they didn’t blink open.

  And no stream of bubbles left her nose when she should be releasing her breath.

  Mouth agape.

  Chest still.

  Wrong. Something was wrong.

  Lower she sank until they were nearly face to face. And that was when he realized what his instinct was screaming at him.

  She was unconscious.

  Not breathing.

  Shit.

  Mansen opened his mouth and let out a sharp, high pitched sound that his people had perfected over the years. It meant someone needed help. It meant come fast. It meant danger.

  It meant a lot of things, but he didn’t know if anyone was left in the lake to hear it. Surely at least Elder was around still. He didn’t leave the lake much.

  Mansen counted off the seconds, seven of them, before the responding sound came back to him on the water.

  Send. Help. North Shore.

  As soon as the message was out, he lunged forward, wrapping one arm around the limp female’s waist and arrowing his body for the surface. He swung his fin in powerful thrusts, propelling them forward until he broke the surface of the water with a splash.

  He paused only long enough to try and shake the female awake. When she didn’t respond and no air filled her lungs, he began swimming for the shore. He couldn’t bring her up on the one closest to them. There was no road for an ambulance to reach it. He’d have to get her more north.

  He pushed through the water, keeping her head above it as he crossed the miles of the lake in record time.

  As he neared the beach, he could see the faint flow of approaching lights. Red and blue once. And a siren wailed in the distance.

  One of his people had come through.

  But he had to beat the authorities to the beach. Otherwise they’d see a hell of a lot more of him than they ever wanted to.

  Mansen pushed harder, putting thoughts of the female’s condition out of his mind. He couldn’t help her until they were ashore.

  Goddamn it.

  He reached the sloping sand of the shore just as the flashing lights of a sheriff’s cruiser turned off the small dirt road twisting through the trees to the waterside.

  Mansen’s fin touched the earth and a shiver ran through his body as he began to shift to human form. He never liked the feeling of his fin separating and becoming legs, of shedding his scales. But he did like having limbs and the ability to walk. He liked the way dry land felt after too long in the water.

  He carried his female up the bank and laid her carefully by the water’s edge as the sheriff’s car skidded to a stop on the rocky shore. Mansen ignored it and the sirens of the approaching ambulance and began pumping her sternum with compressions that would hopefully get her breathing again.

  How long had she been there, in the water?

  How did she get there?

  Nothing could be answered until she woke.

  If she woke.

  Fuck.

  Mansen growled the thought away and went harder at the compressions as the sound of heavy boots approached.

  “What happened?” Sheriff Holmes’ voice was rough and alert as he kneeled beside them and removed his jacket, tossing it over her waist.

  “Found her in the lake,” Mansen explained. “Just like this. Not breathing. Don’t know how long.”

  Sheriff nodded. “You count and I’ll breathe.” He tilted her head back, but something in Mansen rose up at the thought of any male touching her lips. Even for something so innocent as performing CPR.

  No. Should be me.

  Mansen finished the compression and moved to her head, wasting no time pressing his mouth to hers and breathing air into her body. And then the sheriff took over compressions, counting them off before it was time for Mansen to breathe again.

  “Come on, female,” he snarled, when he’d given her two more breaths and there was still nothing.

  Her soaked hair tangled in his fist as he pushed her head back for yet another puff of air.

  And then, like a damn miracle from the gods, she let out a garbled gasp and choked.

  Mansen pulled back, rolling her to the side so she could cough out lake water.

  The ambulance arrived, stopping just beyond the shore.

  “Whew,” Sheriff Holmes breathed as the female sucked in breath after breath. “Close call, missy.”

  Relief hit Mansen in the sternum like a goddamn wrecking hammer.

  She lived. His female lived.

  Blinking over and over, she finally tipped her head up to him, her gaze stopping on his face like he was a ghost. Maybe he looked like one. She’d scared the fucking life out of him.

  And blue. Her eyes were blue. Like the water of the lake in the deep of summer.

  “What’s your name, hun?” Sheriff asked as the medics wrapped a blanket around her, and another around Mansen. He didn’t need it. His body adjusted to chill just like it did being wet all the time. But he took it anyway, to cover up his naked hips.

  The female dragged her gaze away from him and found the sheriff’s. She shook her head like she hadn’t heard him.

  “Name. Need your name so we can get your family notified.”

  “I… I…” Her voice was raspy from the coughing, but Mansen hung to it like a desperate kitten on a
branch. Her name, he wanted it bad. Because she felt like a gift. One from the gods. “I… my name?”

  Sheriff nodded. “Start with your first.”

  She squeezed her eyes closed, her brow furrowing hard. “My name is… my… I…”

  Sheriff Holmes frowned, looking to the medics for help. But they were busy getting her vitals.

  “What is your name, female?” Mansen asked.

  She stared at him, looking frightened and confused. But when she finally spoke, it was with a broken, tragic whisper that sent a chill straight to his heart.

  “I don’t know.”

  Chapter 2

  There was no wind, there was no sound. Only a black void that felt like nothing and everything all at once. She couldn’t see, couldn’t feel. Was she even a she? Maybe she was a whisper or a sigh. Maybe she was the color black that was all around her.

  She blinked—maybe it was a blink—and found herself looking down at the scene below.

  It was still dark, but not black. The full white moon lit the space, showing her an expanse of water surrounded on one side by thick trees and a rocky shore.

  But she was high above. Nearly as high as the moon, but not quite.

  Was she floating? Flying? Was she a bird?

  She tried to become aware of her body, but it was as if she didn’t have one.

  There were no wings. No arms. No fingers or toes or skin or hair or claws or fur.

  She was a star. She must be a star in the night sky above a lake.

  Temporarily satisfied with that conclusion, she settled in to watch the scene below her unfold.

  Mist from the nearby waterfall rose up and over the lake, creating a moody glow, and beyond the rough white froth, the water was calmer. Serene.

  That’s where she saw him.

  A… man? But more.

  His muscular upper half was mostly above the surface but below, deep in the shadows, she could see he had a tail. Like a fish’s except it shimmered and the fin was graceful, all at odds with his ruggedly handsome features.

  He glistened under the moonlight, water slicking off his tanned skin and dripping from the dark hair that covered his head.

  She watched as he dove beneath the surface and swam deep enough she couldn’t see him anymore… only to come up again several feet away.

  He was magnificent.

  He took cover under the branches of a tree that hung low over the water and went very still.

  How strange. He seemed to be… watching. Like she was watching. But what was his target?

  A new being came into view, this one a woman. Familiar, yet not. A normal woman, with legs instead of a fin. The woman didn’t move. Not even an inch.

  Dead. The woman was dead.

  Sadness was everywhere. Like a cocoon of despair. The way the blackness had been only moments ago.

  Did stars get sad? Was that normal?

  The man ducked below the water again, swimming deep. She could see hints of his shimmery turquoise fin as he closed the distance between him and the woman.

  Dead. Sad.

  The woman began to slip below the surface, her body limp.

  No!

  Why did the thought hurt so bad? Why did she feel like it was a great loss?

  But before she could decide whether a star should care for a dying… dead… woman, the magnificent man lifted her back to the surface with a splash. A growl ripped from his throat and he shook the woman, trying to wake her.

  It wouldn’t work.

  Somehow, she knew it. Star’s intuition.

  When the woman didn’t respond, the man sprung into action, swimming with her at breakneck speed toward the shore.

  But she didn’t lose sight of them. She was a star. She could see the whole world if she wanted.

  So she watched as he made his way swiftly across the lake. In the distance, she could see flashing colors of blue and red.

  Someone was coming.

  As the man swam up onto the beach something magical happened. Something unbelievable. But then again, she was only just finding it believable that she was a star in the sky.

  He transformed from extraordinary to normal. His fin separated, twisting into human legs. His scales becoming skin, until he could walk out of the water and carry the woman up the beach.

  He laid her down gently, carefully, like she was precious, and brushed her long hair away from her shoulders, revealing her naked chest. As more people arrived at the beach, the man pressed his hands to the woman’s chest and began pumping to make her lungs work.

  Oh, please. Oh, please.

  Could he make the dead woman live again? If he could, maybe he was a miracle.

  An older man with graying hair, and a brown tinted uniform rushed over to help. Others in dark blue clothing followed, carrying cases of supplies. But the one who’d transformed from a magical being before her very eyes bent to put his mouth to the woman’s.

  And that’s when things changed.

  A jolt of electricity went through her as she watched the scene below. Like she could feel the man’s lips on her own. What kind of star behavior was this? And how was she suddenly aware of her lips, where she’d felt no body before.

  As he continued blowing air into the woman’s mouth and the older man took over the chest compressions, she began to hurt. Her chest, her head. Her body.

  She had a body, it was true. One with arms and legs and a face and hands. A sinking feeling came over her as she realized she wasn’t a star in the sky. In fact, she didn’t belong here at all. She’d had a life, though she couldn’t recall it. And a purpose and a story.

  Stars didn’t have stories.

  Another breath, another jolt of electricity that seemed to give new life to her whole body.

  What was happening?

  She watched the woman intently, trying to understand the connection she clearly had with her. Trying to make herself believe what she suspected.

  And with the next press of the man’s lips, the next push of his air into her body, the next brutal crush of a stranger’s hands against her sternum… she knew.

  Me. She is me.

  A blink and she came awake, sputtering and grasping to understand where she’d landed. Because she’d fallen straight out of the sky. It wasn’t true exactly, but that’s what it felt like. One moment she was above the shore, looking down. The next, she was on the ground, coughing and very human.

  Very alive.

  Thank you, god.

  Her ears buzzed and everything sounded muffled. Like it was coming at her through a tunnel. Her chest burned so hot she wanted to beg for ice water. But she struggled to listen, to see anything but the gritty shoreline before her face where murky water from her mouth splashed back at her. Her body ached and she was cold. So damn cold.

  Gasping for more air, she looked up and into the eyes of an older man. She didn’t know him, but she’d dreamed of him, hadn’t she? Minutes ago… or ages ago? A man with a brown and tan uniform.

  “Your name?”

  Name, name… what was her name?

  She opened her mouth to answer but there was nothing to say. It was blank, nothing. What was her goddamn name?

  “What is your name, female?” a voice growled close to her ear.

  She turned to answer, but the new stranger was familiar too. And this time, she knew she’d dreamed him. How? She couldn’t explain that. Much like she couldn’t explain who she was.

  But she knew him.

  Magic-man. Part human and part other. A man with fins and scales… but only legs now.

  Because that part was a dream, right? Of course it was.

  Name. What was her name?

  There was only one answer she could give them. Because it was the truth. And she hoped someone else could answer for her soon.

  “I don’t know,” she croaked, hearing her voice for the first time and hating how broken it sounded. But she had no memory to tell her any different. She couldn’t remember a thing before she watched herself be
saved by the man in the water.

  “I… I don’t know.”

  “You don’t know your name?”

  She shook her head.

  “Okay. Well, I’m Sheriff Holmes. Why don’t you go ahead and tell me what you remember.”

  She nodded, digging deep to remember any detail. What day was it? How old was she? What was she doing in the lake at night? Did she walk there? Drive? Float on a damn cloud?

  Nothing.

  She knew nothing.

  Except what she’d seen from above. An out of body experience? And she sure as hell wasn’t sharing that strange information with the authorities.

  “I… there’s nothing,” she whispered.

  “You know what year it is?”

  Year. What year.

  “2016… no seventeen.”

  The Sheriff gave a worried look to the medic taking her blood pressure.

  “Close enough I suppose. How about your folks. You know their names?”

  “No.”

  “You have any friends around here?”

  “I can’t remember.”

  “You got nothing, huh?”

  She shook her head, glancing at the magic-man. He frowned hard, as if it was the expression his face used most often.

  Sheriff Holmes sighed. “Let’s get her up to the clinic,” he told the medic. “I’ll ask around about her and meet you back there.” He turned back to her. “We’ll get this figured out for you. No worries.”

  But how could she not worry when she knew nothing about herself. Not even her own name.

  They lifted her onto a stiff board and carried her out of the rocks to the waiting ambulance. All the while she dug through the dark recesses of her mind, grasping for any clue to her origins, and coming up with the same thing over and over.

  Nothing.

  After they loaded her into the ambulance, the magic-man climbed inside, blanket still wrapped around his waist, and sat on the bench beside her stretcher. He didn’t say a word as the medics continued to work on her, putting a mask over her mouth and starting an IV. He only stared.

  Scowled. He scowled.

  She wanted to glare back, but instead she closed her eyes.

  And that was the last thing she knew before awaking in a hospital bed later.