Three Rings (The Fairytail Saga) (10 page)

‘Whoa.’ Ivyanne said, her thumb scrolling across the screen. ‘That’s odd. I hope nothing’s wrong…’

‘Maybe he just thought of another joke.’ Lincoln muttered.

Ivyanne’s head snapped up. ‘I hope he
did
.’ She slung her bag over her arm. ‘I’m going home, and I’m going to call him back. And when I come back in the morning, I hope you’ve come to terms with what you claimed to understand two weeks ago-that my obligations really do overrule everything, even my heart. And if I’m obligated to him…’ She dropped the phone back into her bag. ‘Then I’ll do what’s right by the kingdom-not by you, and certainly, not by me.’ She stepped up, planted a gentle kiss against his jawline. ‘Goodnight, Lincoln, and I’m sorry. But not as sorry as I am for the way you handled this today. Because you broke my heart right back.’

His hands reached for her, drawn despite his frustration, but she moved quickly, stepping out between the doors as Sherri barged in.

The new girl took one look at his expression and winced. ‘Rum, right?’

Lincoln nodded miserably, and when Sherri left to get him his poison, he shifted to face the wall, wiping a tear from the corner of his eye before it could drop to his cheek.

⁓

Ivyanne hurried towards the shore, scanning her phone for an actual message from Tristan instead of a notification, wondering what on earth had come about to make him call her repeatedly for four hours. But there were none.

‘Ivyanne?! Is that you?’

Ivyanne did an about face, looking up the blackened beach in the direction where the call had come from.
The night was almost moonless, and so when part of the air before her began to shimmer like spun gold, she immediately realized who was pursuing her.

‘Tristan?’ she asked, her words as clearly loaded with surprise to her ears as they would have been to his. ‘What are you
doing
here? I just saw your calls-’

‘I was going to ask you the same thing!’ He loped towards her, his silhouette beginning to separate itself from the night around them. ‘I was just coming up to the bar, when I saw you...
stomp
...out?’ He smiled, teeth gleaming. ‘Care to fill me in? I’m always here to lend a supportive ear, you know.’

Ivyanne rolled her eyes. ‘Same as last night. He’s still pissed, and deciding to take the situation and handle it like a monkey throwing poo.’ But she regretted the insult almost immediately, and decided to get off the topic before Tristan thought she was open to mocking Lincoln. ‘But I’d much rather talk about why you’re here, and not in Sydney!’

Tristan grinned broadly. ‘I’m about to make a deal with one of
the
biggest housing contractors in California, Ivyanne.
Absalom
! Mark, their CEO, called me today and practically begged me for my services, which is unreal considering how many times I’ve tried to arrange a meeting with him and been rebuffed!’

Ivyanne smiled. ‘Wow! I heard you mention that last night, when you were talking to Sven...this is terrific!’ She paused. ‘But couldn’t you tell me this over the
phone
? It seems like a long way to travel just to share some good news.’

‘It is.’ Tristan said, dimpling prettily. ‘But I didn’t come here just to
tell
you about it.’

Ivyanne lifted an eyebrow. ‘Then….?’

He grinned. ‘I came here to ask you to come
with
me.’

Ivyanne’s shift in mood sprung back to darkness like a released rubber band.

⁓

‘Come
with
you?’

When Ivyanne’s face froze somewhere between a smile of congratulations and a grimace of horror, Tristan knew he was about to take a knife to the heart. And yet he couldn’t stop his mouth from moving anymore than he could prevent his heart from wanting what it wanted. He took a deep breath and pressed forward. This was it. Sink or swim.

‘He wants to fly me over for a meeting-tomorrow. And I’d probably need to be there for a week. And because I said that I had a beautiful girl I couldn’t bear to part with-he offered to buy you a ticket too! Isn’t that great? I mean, you could get away from all of this depressing shit...’

Ivyanne appeared to snap out of her shock. She gave him a long-suffering look before responding : ‘Oh yeah, nothing like an eighteen hour flight to cheer a mermaid up! Air-con and no water while soaring up in the atmosphere? Sounds
awesome
.’

He chuckled nervously. That wasn’t the reaction he’d wanted, and yet it was the reaction he’d anticipated, so he was prepared to argue his point. ‘There’s a stopover in Fiji. First class, of course.’

‘They die too,’ Ivyanne muttered.

He gave her a long, measured look. ‘Is Ivyanne Court seriously afraid of air travel?’

‘Like you wouldn’t believe,’ she admitted. ‘You know I’ve never actually
been
on a plane, right?’

His jaw dropped. ‘Seriously?’

She nodded. ‘Neither has mum. That’s where my paranoia comes from. It’s just...unnatural.’

He crossed his arms across his chest, like he could cut off the rising sense of unease in his stomach with pressure. ‘What if I told you, that this is me, calling in my favor? The one you promised last night?’

Ivyanne sagged dramatically. ‘You can’t mean that! Tristan, it’s too much to ask!’

‘No it’s not.’ He said quickly. ‘Whether you’re willing to accept it or not Ivyanne, you might be stuck with me. Why not come with me, just to get to know me better in preparation, if nothing else?’

‘And send Link off the deep end when it might not even be necessary? To cause more scandal? To get on a
plane
?’ She shook her head. ‘Sorry Tristan, but the answer is
no
. It probably always
will
be. You’re going to have to collect your favor some other way, because I’m not boarding one of those things anytime soon.’

It seemed to take forever for her words to resonate with his brain. She wasn’t merely unenthusiastic or hesitant-she’d just snapped a flat-out
no
and seemed less apologetic than even her empathetic apology eluded to.

‘Tristan?’ Ivyanne frowned as she adjusted her dark, comely top. ‘Are you in there?’

‘I can’t believe this!’ Tristan couldn’t stop the words from exploding out of his heart and into her face. ‘Ivyanne do you even get that I just took
two
planes and a cab to get to you and
beg
you to come with me? And you’re turning me down flat without even thinking it
over
?’

Ivyanne took his hand in both of hers, looking shocked. ‘Tristan please...don’t yell. I’m sorry that you went to so much trouble for nothing and I really appreciate the gesture so I’ll get mom to compensate you for it-but don’t
guilt trip
me here! It’s not your style. And the jet-setting thing isn’t
mine
.’

‘I don’t want
monetary
compensation!’ Tristan spat, yanking back his hand. ‘I want to know that you’re willing to overcome certain obstacles to be with me. I wish you’d just snap out of your comfort zone for two minutes and say
yes
instead of no
for once
!’

‘
I’m
not forcing you to leave!’ Ivyanne squeaked. ‘It’s
your
company,
your
choice! Just like it’s
my
comfort zone and
my call
!’

‘And it always will be, won’t it? Tristan gave a defeated sigh as he pondered what their future might end up looking like if the jet-setting millionaire married the girl who would sooner get on a three month trans-pacific barge ride than fly.

‘You’re thinking it’s gonna be a problem if we get married, aren’t you?’ Ivyanne suddenly said.

He looked at her, surprised, and wary, that she’d read him so easily. ‘Do
not
make an issue out of it,’ he said quickly, not wanting her to see the potential weak spot in their future. ‘I’m only going to be able to do this for another twenty years or so until I have to retire from the public eye anyway.’

Ivyanne clasped her hands together as though she was praying. ‘Tristan, you can’t shove problems into a corner and hope they get better. This is
exactly
the kind of thing we have to talk about realistically.’

He looked down at her hand, feeling that anger stirring up again. ‘You won’t give me twenty seconds to reflect on the good things about us, but you’re pretty eager to get a con list going, aren’t you?’

Ivyanne frowned at him, her face shadowy and disturbed in the watery moonlight. ‘Are you implying that I’m sabotaging our potential marriage before it gets off the ground so I can weasel out of it?’

He met her gaze with an unwavering one of his own. ‘
Are
you?’

Ivyanne turned her face towards the water, and it was as good as slamming a door between them.

By the time the bar was closed and the last of the stragglers shooed out, Lincoln could barely see straight. He farewelled Sherri, closing the beach doors behind her, and thanked her for the day, then pressed his face against the cool glass, needing the chill to stimulate his eyes open.

‘How many drinks did
you
have?’ Lux slurred from behind him, where she still sat at her table by the window. She was too drunk to swim back to Bracken, so she’d booked one of the resort rooms for the night, calling a wary sounding Vana first to tell her not to worry.

‘Three.’ Lincoln heard the awe in his tone. ‘I’m such a lightweight now! No wonder mers don’t drink.’

‘Soft mers don’t drink.’ Lux muttered. ‘And that’s what the born ones are you know, Linky-baby.
Soft
. Not like
us
. Nothing’s harder, then living forever with a human soul.’

‘You’re right.’ He drawled, pushing off the door and staggering towards the opposite one. He needed to get out of the room. It felt claustrophobic, full of negative emotions. ‘But it’s only been two weeks for me, so it’s okay that I’m still soft, yeah?’

‘S’okay.’ Lux responded. She sat up, fanning her neck, her caramel blonde hair pooling between the wall and her shoulders. He marveled again at the lack of distinction between the shade of her skin, and her lustrous hair. She was like a golden statue, especially with the burnt-orange sarong twisted tightly around her curves on one side, leaving acres of leg exposed on the other.

‘You have time. Just don’t stop drinking.’ She pointed at him, smiling goofily. ‘Or I’ll have to crush on someone else.’

‘Crush? Pfft.’ Lincoln landed on, rather than grasped the thick steel bar to the door. He cranked it open with a screech of metal against metal.‘You’re just a deviant bitch, admit it. You’d shag me, and move on!’

‘You make that sound like it’s a
bad
thing!’ Lux rose as she said this, and teetered towards him. ‘Where we goin?’

‘Out of this box.’ He swept his arm out in a grand gesture for her to pass. ‘Ladies first.’

‘I’m no lady.’ She paused tugging on the collar of his shirt, looming forward until he could see little more than her lovely, heavily hooded eyes. ‘I’m a siren. There’s a big difference. And the sooner you learn that distinction, the sooner you can apply it to Ivyanne, and get some damn perspective.’

Lincoln blew a messy raspberry. ‘Don’t talk about her. I’m so sick of talking about her. Thinking about her.
Feeling
about her….’

Fresh air,
he thought, lunging out the door towards the pool.
Wait...does that make it better, or worse?

‘
Feeling
about her?’ Lux giggled, slinging her purse onto the table by the spa.‘As a former writer, I take offense to such bad grammar.’

‘You wrote about sex. I doubt the correct use of words played that big a role in your craft.’ He pointed out, watching her kick up her calf and wrestle off a leather sandal. The outdoor lights were off, and despite his drunken haze, his lingering lifeguard instincts penetrated his consciousness enough to sound an alarm. ‘Hey...you can’t go in Lux. You’re hammered.’

‘That’s why I
need
to go in.’ Lux tossed the shoe, then lifted the other foot, smiling at him over her shoulder. ‘Don’t be such a party pooper. You’re supposed to be wild now, Grey, not a school marm.’ She tossed that shoe, and reached for the knot in her sarong, at the back of her neck. ‘In fact, you should join me for a dip. The water looks warm.’

Lincoln didn’t know why, but her suggestion appealed to him. He wanted to duck under the surface and clear his head. ‘You can see the water?’ He asked, stepping out of his shoes and feeling the foot swell achingly as it was released from the constrictive leather. ‘You can see the
warmth
in the water?’

Lux giggled. ‘No. But if it’s cold, it’s probably for the best.’

‘You might be-’ Lincoln’s voice died in his throat at the sight of Lux’s sarong falling down her body, leaving her back and rump bare to his gaze. He stood, transfixed, realizing he’d never seen a larger woman naked before, and shocked at how lovely she was. Her legs were long, and though her proportions were wide, her waist scooped in like Ivyanne’s did, forcing the eye to skim around the curves.