The Mermaid and the Murders by Rachel Graves

Author:Rachel Graves [Graves, Rachel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Contemporary, Paranormal, Fantasy, Vampires and Shapeshifters
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Published: 2016-05-20T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Twelve

The pain exhausted me and the waves rocked me to sleep. Somehow in the night, Mom knew to come find me. She lifted me up and pulled me to the shore. We sat on the rocks, our tails drying in the night air.

“I think we need to talk about some stuff,” Mom started, but then she stopped. I cried and for once, Mom held me close. Rubbed my back as if I were a little kid, telling me it was okay. I didn’t know how to tell her it wasn’t, how to tell her about any of it. She didn’t push me, but by the time our tails dried to legs, she propped me up and took me into the house.

“That’ll get me drunk.” Okay, not the best way to respond when your Mom offers you a cup of hot cocoa, but it would and I didn’t think being drunk would help the situation any. It sure hadn’t helped on the beach.

“Not this much. This will just help you relax.”

I looked at the steaming mug warily.

“Trust your mother for once.”

I took a sip. It did taste good. In fact, it tasted great, but I knew all about what chocolate could do to mermaids. Like make us forget what it felt like to get our tail.

“Let’s start with the basics,” Mom said her back toward me. She was cleaning the kitchen, something she never did. Heck, I didn’t even know she knew how. “Every time you have sex, I mean every single time, you’re going to get pregnant.”

My mouth hung open in shock. “But, what about protection or…”

“Birth control pills won’t work. Nothing that’s developed for humans does—well, except condoms. But no one brings those out into the water.”

I nodded and sipped more cocoa. If we were finally going to have the big talk about the birds and the bees and mermaids, I was going to need it.

“But it’s not so bad, because most of those pregnancies won’t last.”

“Most?”

“Ninety-five percent. I’ve been pregnant like a hundred times, and I’ve only got you.”

“But you lost all those babies.” Tears came in the corners of my eyes and I had to blink a lot to stop myself from crying.

“It’s easier if you don’t think of them as babies. They’re not yet, not really anyway, and usually it’s only for a few hours. Your body takes what it needs from your partner, but if something goes wrong, it ends the pregnancy. It’s not something you have to get upset about.”

“Not something…to get upset about?” I couldn’t speak. My mother had just told me I was going to miscarry nearly every time I got pregnant. How could I stop myself from getting upset about that?

“It’s our way.” Mom faced me now, putting her own mug down. She came around the counter and looked me in the eyes. “I know I spoil you. I let you play human, but you’re not. You’re a mermaid. This is who we are. This is what we do. You need to accept that.

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