There were some things that Sam didn't tell Mike.

There were some things he would tell him if he asked, but Mike never asked.

That made it easy to talk around the truth or just not talk about it.

For a recent example, Mike knew he had date nights with Veronica and never came back to the loft until the early hours of the morning when he did. He did not know that those date nights involved Sam overriding Aquatica's security cameras, using a stolen key to get in the door, and spending the night in her tank.

And Mike definitely did not know that Ronnie never left the park.

It was one of the reasons Sam was so driven to go see her when he could. She didn't have anybody else, and she hadn't since her lifemate was murdered. It was her own choice to stay there, and Sam understood it. She was frightened of the human world outside the glass walls, but she was just as scared to back to the ocean. She hated the fact that he spent most of his time out there.

In the time between his discharge and Mike getting burned, he'd rarely gone out because he saw how overwrought Ronnie got about it. She'd calm down some, knowing that he was with Mike, that he wasn't out there alone, but he wasn't sure how long it'd be before the carefully balanced peace broke. As it was, he'd missed one date night waiting for his injuries to heal. If she'd seen him in that kind of shape, it only would've enforced her fears.

She met him at the surface of the water and waited while he stripped. During open hours, they made her wear a bikini top, as soon as the doors closed, it came off. He tried not to stare too much as he took off his prosthetics at the edge. He could go in with them, but not if he was planning to spend the whole night.

Once they were off, he rolled into the water. It was always a little difficult to adjust on these nights. His instinct said to use his tail, but his tail wasn't there, it made things harder, agility was reduced, and he couldn't swim as fast with just his arms.

But once he got himself settled under the water, none of that mattered as Ronnie drew him in.

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"It's almost morning." The staff would be arriving at work soon, he couldn't be here for that.

Even with the FBI off Mike's case, and with a little information trade-off to get them to talk to the park director, they still didn't want him on the property. It had been a hard sell to get them to accept him the first time, but the director's respect for service members had outweighed his distrust of having a militarily trained Mer--regular Mers were dangerous enough, one trained to fight and kill had to be even more so.

Ronnie hummed, her head resting on his chest as they floated lazily just under the surface, her tail wrapped protectively around his partially regrown one, not a drop of water between them. He was going to have to shed that when he got out and get rid of it.

It probably wasn't healthy for him to keep doing that as often as he was. It didn't hurt to stay tailless, but a continuous cycle of regrowth and detachment was hard on the body.

"Stay."

"I wish I could."

Her fingers trailed across his skin. "I can't believe how happy I am when you're here," she raised her head, hair flowing out like a blond halo around her face, "and you make me feel so good." Her hand suddenly clamped down a whole lot lower than she'd been stoking, and Sam jerked slightly in surprise.

It was a common misperception that because Mers had the lower half of a fish, they mated like fish--the females lying eggs that the males would then fertilize. This myth disregarded the fact that Mers were mammals and, like all mammals apart from monotremes, bore live young.

While Mers don't fall under the infraorder--due to not being fully aquatic, being omnivores, and being arguably unstreamlined--their reproductive system most closely resembles that of Cetaceas.¹

"You're not alone on that." His hands roamed her back, downwards, and found purchase where her tail was bent, and he pulled her up so their faces met. He nuzzled his nose against her cheek. "I've been all over the oceans, Ronnie, so when I tell you, without a doubt, you are one in a million, you can believe it."

"Sam," she giggled. She moved back slightly, smiling but serious. "Sam, mate with me."

"I thought we were about to do that." He started to move for her again when she grabbed his shoulders, keeping him back. Sam frowned.

"No, mate with me."

"Lifemate?" He couldn't keep the incredibly out of his voice but tried to play it off with a chuckle. "Wow, that is, uh, that is... a question..."

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"Fi, I need some advice. What's a gift that says, 'I love you, but I can't mate with you?' And not too expensive, that'll last underwater." Flipping through the jewelry magazine wasn't helping.

Fi smirked even as she kept her eyes on Carla's building--there wasn't much they could do at this stage of the plan, except wait in the car and keep a watch out while Mike made his move. "Why, Sam, I didn't think you had that problem."

"I don't, thank you." Sam snapped the magazine shut. "Ronnie wants to lifemate."

"Ah," she dragged it out, "and you don't?"

"It's not that simple."

"Lifemate," she said the word like she was examining a new bomb ingredient. "Too much of a commitment for you?"

"Yeah, well, we don't exactly do clean divorce."

Fi's eyebrows went up as she finally looked at him. "And what is a Mer divorce then, if not clean?"

Sam hesitated. It wasn't exactly something you talked about with humans. But he didn't have anybody else to talk to about this stuff, and he didn't think Fi would use it against him--she seemed to have gotten over wanting to string him up by his tailfin.

"I won't help you if you don't tell me why I should."

"Bloody. It's bloody." He'd only seen one once, and it-- "It's called a lifemate because you're mated until one of you dies. So if two mates decide down the line that they really can't stand each other anymore, they gather some witness, declare their intent, and..." He licked his lips. "And they, uh, they fight to see who can rip the other's throat out first." He risked a glance at Fi. "Close your mouth, you're gonna get flies in there."

"A fight to the death." She blinked a few times. "How fun."

He genuinely couldn't tell if she was serious or not.

"So you're worried that if you and Veronica don't work out, you'll have to fight her?" Fiona paused. "It's obvious how much you care for her, I can see why you wouldn't want to risk it."

That was a possibility. Ronnie had a temper on her, and he wasn't sure she wouldn't reach that point if he pissed her off badly enough but... "No. That's not it."

"Then why can't you?"

"I'm already lifemated." He reached over and closed her jaw this time. "Think you got a loose hinge, Fi."

She batted his hand away. "You just said it was for life."

"Yeah, but just 'cause you can't get divorced without bloodshed doesn't mean you can't cheat." He held up a hand to stall any comments. "Look, I was young and thinking about enlisting, but my parents wanted me to give 'em a daughter-in-law and a grandkid beforehand in case anything happened to me."

"You have kids?"

"No, not--No." He didn't like the way she was looking at him, and he focused on the magazine in his lap. "Things didn't work out for a lot of reasons, but we didn't hate each other," he wouldn't even say they didn't love each other anymore, "we just... didn't work. So we," he raised his hands, pressed them together then separated them, "just swam in different directions." And when the opportunity came up to get out of the marine mammals program and into the Navy SEALs, he jumped on it and never looked back.

Fiona was silent for a few seconds. "How do you know she's still alive?"

"I just know."

"How?"

"I just do, okay?" Sam focused a minute, sticking his tongue out slightly as he searched to give a little... shove. And got a vaguely curious but mostly annoyed shove in return. "She's in the Indian Ocean right now." At Fi's questing glance, he shrugged. He wasn't about to get into the ins and outs of how lifemates kept track of each other.

Fi sighed. "Forget the gift, Sam. Just tell Veronica the truth. She'll understand."

"You don't get it, Fi."

"No, I don't." She turned away from him. "But we all have skeletons--terrible, terrible skeletons. You can't hide them from her forever."