Water clung to my lashes as my eyes snapped open. Goosebumps pimpled my skin as I sank lower until the water reached my shoulders. I reached for my dagger, but my fingers brushed bare skin.

Dammit.

I’d left the iron blade on the rock, and that was most unfortunate because I knew what that feeling was. It was wholly recognizable, even if hard to explain, and it sent my pulse skittering.

I wasn’t alone.

I was being watched.

Chapter 10

I didn’t understand the inherent sense that alerted me to the fact that I wasn’t alone, but I knew to trust it.

Remaining crouched in the water, I scanned the dark banks around me and then quickly looked over my shoulder. I saw nothing, but that didn’t mean someone wasn’t there. The moonlight didn’t penetrate the deeper shadows clinging to large swaths of the shore and farther back among the trees to the cliffs.

No one ever came here, but the feeling continued, pressing against my bare shoulders. I knew it wasn’t my imagination. Someone was here, watching me, but for how long? The last couple of minutes? Or from the moment I undressed and slowly walked into the lake, naked as the day I was born? Anger flooded my system so fiercely, I was surprised the water didn’t start to boil around me.

Someone, getting over their fear of the woods, must have followed me. That same instinct warned me that wasn’t a good sign.

Muscles tensed as I called out, “I know you’re there. Show yourself.”

The only answer I received was the rush of water. I heard no night birds singing to one another nor the constant low hum of insects. I hadn’t since I entered the woods. A chill swept over me as my throat tightened. “Show yourself now!”

Silence.

My gaze skipped over the waterfall and snapped back to the sheet of falling water, turned white in the drenching moonlight. There was a deeper shadow behind the waterfall, a thickness that didn’t seem right.

And that tall shape was moving forward, coming through the fall of water. My stomach dipped like it did when I goaded a horse into running too fast.

A moment later, a deep and smooth voice came from within the waterfall. “Since you asked so nicely.”

That voice…

The shape became far too clear in the moonlight. Broad shoulders shattered the water, and then I saw him as he stepped out into the pool of moonlight.

I stopped breathing. My heart may have stopped beating.

The god.

Nothing about him seemed real. He stood there with the water pounding off the rocks behind him. More tiny bumps spread across my flesh as I stared at him in shock.

“Here I am,” he said. “Now, what?”

His question yanked me out of my stunned silence. “What are you doing here?”

Water stirred around him when he broke the surface and slicked back his hair, the spray lapping at the defined lines of his chest. I snapped my gaze to his face. He appeared to be studying me. “What does it look like?”

His blasé answer struck that reckless part of me. It didn’t matter that the pretend kiss in the vine tunnels had become very real, or that he hadn’t struck out at me when I stabbed him in the chest—something most would be furious about—or end up dead over. It didn’t matter that he was a powerful god that had continuously crept into my thoughts since I’d last seen him. He had been watching me when I’d been at my most vulnerable. “It looks like you shouldn’t be here.”

His head tilted slightly, and a lock of dark hair slipped over the hard line of his jaw. “And why would I not be allowed to?”

“Because it’s private property.” Why did I feel like we’d already established this?

“Is it?” Amusement crept into his tone. “I was unaware of any land prohibited to a god.”

“I imagine that there are many areas that would be off-limits to anyone, including a god.”

“What if I told you there aren’t?”

My stomach dipped. “I would be thoroughly irritated to learn that.”

A low chuckle rumbled from him. “So fearless.”

Common sense indicated that I should be experiencing some level of fear, but all I felt was anger. “None of that answers what you’re doing here.”

“I suppose it doesn’t.” He lifted an arm again, the one with the silver band, to brush back another strand of hair that had slipped against his jaw. “I was around, and since it was extremely warm, I thought I’d take a swim and cool off.”

Anger crowded out any tendrils of fear and potential wisdom. “And prey upon young women?”

“Prey upon young women?” There was a hint of incredulity in his tone. “What young women have I preyed upon this eve?”

“The one who is standing before you.”

“The one who is naked, standing before me?”

“Thank you for the unnecessary reminder. But, yes, the one you followed to the lake.”

“Followed?”

“Is there an echo here?” I demanded.

“I’m sorry—”

“You don’t sound sorry,” I snapped.

There was a soft, barely audible chuckle. “Let me rephrase. I don’t know how I followed you to this lake to prey upon you when I was here first. Trust me—”

“Not going to happen.”

A cloud slipped over the moon as his chin dropped again, casting his face in shadows. “Trust me when I say I was not expecting you to be here.”

In the back of my mind, where reason still existed, I knew he spoke the truth. I hadn’t been under the water long enough for even a god to undress, then enter the lake and the waterfall without me noticing. He must have been here first. But, frankly, I didn’t care.

This was my lake.

“I was minding my own business,” he said. “Taking a few moments to enjoy this beautiful night.”

“In a lake you do not belong in,” I muttered, not caring if no place was truly off-limits to a god.

“I swam underwater and ended up beyond the waterfall. It’s quite beautiful there, by the way,” he continued unrepentantly. “Can you, for one moment, imagine my surprise when a few seconds later, a young, very demanding mortal appeared out of the darkness and started removing her clothing? What was I supposed to do?”

Fire swept across my face. “Not watch me?”

“I wasn’t.” A pause. “At least, not intentionally.”

“Not intentionally?” I repeated in disbelief. “As if that makes it less inappropriate.”

That half-grin appeared again. “You do have a point there, but as it was unintentional, I would wager to say it is far less inappropriate than it would have been if it had been intentional.”

“No.” I shook my head. “No, it is not.”

“Anyway,” he stressed the word with such a highbrow air, my mother would’ve been impressed. “I was quite shocked, as this was not what I had been expecting.”

“Shocked or not, you could’ve announced yourself.” I couldn’t believe I had to explain this. “I don’t know what would be expected in Iliseeum, but here, that would’ve been the polite, less inappropriate thing to do.”

“True, but it all happened very fast. From the point of your arrival and, sadly, brief reveal of many, many unmentionable places, to when you decided to enjoy the lake. It was only a matter of seconds,” he said. “But I’m glad we’re now in agreement over my actions being less inappropriate. I will sleep better tonight.”

“What? We are not in agreement. I—” Wait. Sadly brief reveal of unmentionable places? My eyes narrowed. “You still could’ve said something so I wasn’t just standing there—”

“Like a goddess made of silver and moonbeams, rising from the depths of the darkest lake?” he finished.

I snapped my mouth shut. Like a…a goddess? Made of silver and moonbeams? That sounded incredibly… I didn’t even know what that sounded like or why my stomach was whooshing again. What he said was ridiculous because he knew actual goddesses.