Siren's Secret

“Beer sounds good.” He turned a curious sideways glance her way. “I was going to suggest we go back to my fishing cabin, but I’m sure your house is much nicer. From what I understand, not many around here have been invited inside the Bosarge home.”

Shelly followed him nervously back to the car. What had she done? Her physical desire for Tillman made her reckless. If she had been a little more patient, he would have invited her to his cabin where they could have been alone.

If she was lucky, Jet would be off for a swim, or in her bedroom immersed in her old undersea maps and shipwreck books. Her cousin could be tricky with humans—short-tempered, suspicious, condescending. No problem with Lily, she was all sweetness, unless someone bored her. Besides, Lily would be out on another flavor-of-the-month date.

Shelly drew steadying breaths as they drew nearer. Everything would be fine. Sure, they had valuable treasure scattered throughout the place, but a casual observer wouldn’t realize their china was from the Ming Dynasty or that the pottery on display was from ancient civilizations or that the various knickknacks lying about were rare maritime relics.

But when they walked in the den, Jet was sprawled on the sofa watching a Jacques Cousteau documentary.

“What are you doing back so early? Thought you’d—” She broke off at the sight of Tillman.

“Jet, this is Tillman Angier. He’s our sheriff, by the way.” Shelly waved a hand in the direction of the sofa. “Tillman, my cousin Jet.”

“Pleasure to meet you.” He crossed the room in three long strides and shook Jet’s hand.

Jet wasn’t the siren her sister was but was still a stunner with her tall, athletic frame and unusually dark irises that gave the impression her eyes were solid black pupils. Those eyes now flashed in irritation.

Tillman either didn’t notice or didn’t care. Jet shook his hand with the briefest of human contact.

“Surprised we haven’t met before.” He surveyed the room and let out a small whistle of appreciation. “Someone around here’s a collector.”

He crossed to the dozens of swords, mostly Confederate, which hung over the mantel. “Where’d you get all these?”

“Jet used to be an antiques dealer.” Shelly shot Jet a pointed look at the coffee table, its surface strewn with dozens of cartographic and monographic maps of known shipwrecks.

“Here in Bayou La Siryna?” Tillman asked with his back still to them. He strolled over to a mahogany étagère storing their better pieces of seventeenth-century French, Italian and English pottery and ceramics they couldn’t bear to sell on either the open or black market. The pieces were shipwreck finds of several generations of Bosarge mermaids from all seven seas.

“My business was wholesaling to other dealers,” Jet said, turning the treasure maps facedown on the table. “I didn’t have an actual store.” She stuffed her magnifying glass and cartographic measuring tools under the brown leather recliner.

“I know a bit about antiques myself,” Tillman said. “Mom dragged all of us to estate auctions when I was younger.”

Shelly inwardly groaned. Of all the rotten luck, Tillman actually knew something of the worth of these objects. She had brought a law enforcement officer right into their home and introduced him to her errant cousin.

Jet’s business was strictly to black-market vendors on a cash-only basis. That way, she avoided the pesky problem of explaining how the finds were retrieved with no treasure excavation expenses, and no worries of state and federal agents questioning the finds. In other words, it was all extremely illegal.

Jet shrugged and lifted both hands in a what-ya-gonna-do gesture.

Tillman continued his inspection of the room. This time he picked up a restored brass pocket watch from an end table, a pre–Civil War artifact etched with the date 1842.

“Where—?”

“Family heirloom,” Jet said. “We’re the sentimental sort.”

Shelly almost snickered. Jet and Lily didn’t have a sentimental bone or scale on their mermaid bodies. Unless you counted Jet’s unexplained preoccupation with Perry, her human lover and partner in shipwreck recovery crimes—who turned out to be a lying, self-serving scumbag, now serving time.

And good riddance, Shelly and Lily told each other. Unfortunately, Jet was still hung up on the guy, even if she refused to admit it. She probably mistook him for a swashbuckling pirate, à la Johnny Depp.

“Fascinating place you have here,” Tillman said, eyeing the large brass porthole above the fireplace. Shelly couldn’t help but feel a little surge of pride. That porthole had been a lucky discovery on her part when she was only sixteen years old and visiting the Bosarge family for the summer. She’d been swimming five miles from the house when her eyes picked up a reflective glint from a black sand bed. It had been a risky and difficult swim home with her prize, but she’d managed.

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