An Elemental Tail (7 page)

****

Daylight was barely peeking through her
window, but Isla was awake. Her heart beat was settling and her
skin cooling. She leaned over and kissed him on those lush lips
that had done so much damage. She hadn’t expected fireworks the
first time. Hadn’t expected Nik to do much at all, and yet he
hadn’t left her behind. And it had been better, much better, the
second time. Although she was extra sore now, she wouldn’t change a
thing. Not a moment of last night or this morning.

She slipped from under his arm and out of bed
then threw on a T-shirt and some underwear. It didn’t feel right to
make phone calls in the nude. Especially not to the dean’s
secretary. With her back turned to the naked man still in her bed,
she made the appointment. The sooner this was sorted, the sooner
she would know where she stood. The sooner Nik would move on. She
swallowed down the lump that formed in her throat and forced
herself to think of the scholarship.

If she lost the scholarship, she had few
options. Maybe she could travel, backpack like Nik. A few clothes
and a sketchbook in her bag as she soaked up the details of life
around the globe. She could live with being poor, but she would die
if she went back home.

Isla put her cell phone down and turned
around. “Two p.m.”

Nik propped himself up on one elbow. “I
heard.”

“That’s okay with you?” She should’ve
checked; she’d just assumed he had nothing better to do than be
with her between classes.

He nodded. So easy and elegant in her rumpled
bed, but his gaze was on the bookshelf. “For an artist, you have an
awful lot of commerce books.”

“That would be plan B.” And why college
consumed so much of her time. She was doing a double degree. Isla
thumbed the pages of the leather-bound sketchbook. She knew the
odds of earning a living as an artist were small. “If I don’t make
it, at least I’ll be able to work around art in a gallery or
museum.”

“You’ll make it.” He didn’t say it like a
false platitude. There was a cold current of conviction in his
tone.

She gave him a small smile. To succeed, she
would have to sacrifice everything. Including Nik. Outside, the
clouds broke apart and spilled their contents on the earth. Rain
drummed against the window.

“To keep the scholarship, I need an eighty
percent average. Between work and studying, I have no time for
anything else.” She hoped he’d understand what she was saying.

Even if he stuck around for months, she
wouldn’t be available. They were on the clock. The idea that had
given her the confidence to pursue him now undermined her. It
wasn’t fair on either them to expect more. They couldn’t date. They
would just be strangers who met during the night and drifted away
in the morning.

Nik’s eyebrows drew together. “Why do you
need to work if you have a free ride?”

She worried at her lower lip. How much did he
need to know about her life? Enough so that he understood why it
could never work between them.

“I send money home for my sisters. If I
don’t, they miss out on school camps, excursions, and sometimes
books.” Sometimes shoes, clothes. The list went on. If she wasn’t
putting money aside, they’d have no chance at college either. She
looked away and changed the topic. Dirty laundry was best left in
the hamper, not hung out in public. “What about you?”

He watched the rain streak down the window.
“My parents died when I was young. I grew up in boarding schools.”
He stayed silent for several breaths. The rise and fall of his
chest marked time.

When he didn’t elaborate, Isla pried a little
deeper. “And now you travel. What about college?”

“Not for me. I can’t put down roots. I move
around on a whim with what I can carry.” He turned his gaze back to
her and gave her a rueful smile. “I’m not the man your parents
would want you to marry.”

A peal of thunder shook the building. Isla
laughed, easing the tension that had been building. True, her
mother wanted her to marry someone with money. At least they both
knew this was never going to be a relationship. It was a fling. No
matter how lovely he looked lying in her bed, she couldn’t keep
him. She should’ve been happy, or at least relieved they were on
the same page. So why did she feel so hollow? She opened the red
leather book and picked up a pencil as a distraction.

Nik flinched. “What are you doing?”

“Adding another sketch.” Of Nik lying in her
messed-up bed. His hair a splash of crimson against the white of
his skin. His body lean and lithe. “So I never forget our time
together.”

Nik swallowed but remained still as her hand
danced over the pages of his skin. Filling in details he didn’t
see, only felt. Lust, joy, and sadness poured over him, raising
goose bumps. He drew in breaths saturated with her scent and the
lingering musk of loving.

With Isla he could forget what he wanted,
what he needed, and think only about what she required. The
slippery taste of the lie still lay on his tongue. He’d lied to
give her a reason to want him around, promised to help her, and
faked an upbringing that never existed. She’d shoved back. Made it
clear she had no time for anyone. And she was right—they would
never have worked. He didn’t age; he was immortal, if not
Elemental.

She glanced up from her drawing, lips parted
as she concentrated lost in her work. More content with pencils
than people. He clamped his teeth shut as another swell of aching
sorrow broke over him. Her emotions didn’t match her tough words.
She was drawing to remember in the book he would take. He would
leave her with nothing but a memory. If he was lucky, she would
dredge it up when she was lonely.

Nik closed his eyes. He needed to set a
deadline, or he’d hang around until she kicked him out for ruining
her life and all her thoughts of him were tainted with bitterness.
He didn’t want to be remembered that way, not by Isla. He forced
himself to speak. “I was thinking of leaving when your class was
done with me.” He was hoping for an invitation to stay, an excuse
to let her hold the book a little longer. He knew he wouldn’t get
one.

Her head snapped up, but she said nothing.
She didn’t need to. Shock stabbed him in the gut and twisted. He
glanced down to make sure his innards hadn’t become out-ards. She
didn’t want him to leave, but she wouldn’t ask him to stay. She
schooled her features, her face as blank as a Victorian
portrait.

No strings. No demands. No complication. He
was free, so why couldn’t he rejoice?

He didn’t belong in her life any more than
she should hold the power of the oceans in her palm.

“Ready?” She turned the book around, not
waiting for an answer.

The man on the page was relaxed and happy,
like he was waiting for his lover to rejoin him, not anxious to
reclaim his lost tail and return to the sea.

“It’s beautiful. Can you make me a copy and
sign it? That way, when you make it big I can say I knew Isla
Williams.” But he knew he would leave it for her, so she would have
something after he and the book were gone. He wanted to be
remembered by her with fondness, even though he would go on long
after her short human life had expired.

She looked down, pink staining her cheeks
like a deepening sunset. “I was planning to use your sketches with
diatom structures to make a series of drawings…” Isla shook her
head. “I’m drifting, and you don’t care.”

Diatoms were the intricate algal snowflakes
of the sea, visible only by microscope to humans. She’d linked him
to water without realizing. “They sound beautiful. I’ll look for
them at your first show.”

“Where you’ll tell everyone you were the
model and become the talk of the town.” She pressed her lips
together in a cheeky smile. He tried to imprint it in his memory.
How many centuries would it take before he forgot her? No, he would
never let himself forget Isla.

“That can be our secret.” He sat up and
pulled her to him. The book tumbled to the floor with a slap that
stung his skin and was soon forgotten as they twisted together on
the bed.

Isla rubbed her palms on her pants. Beside
her sat Nik as they waited for the dean’s secretary to usher them
in to his office. In her satchel were her sketchbooks, her only
proof she had been in the class. In a separate folder were
photocopies because she didn’t want the originals lost in
bureaucracy.

The door opened. Nik squeezed her hand, and
then she went in alone. Nik was here as backup in case the dean
didn’t take her seriously and placed his faith in Mr. Gardner. She
hoped whispers of Mr. Gardner’s activities had reached the dean’s
ears, that he would believe her and this would be easy, but she
knew the odds were against her. The dean would back his staff. He
had to.

She perched on the edge of the chair,
opposite a man in his fifties who looked like he’d spent his whole
life at college cushioned from the real world. None of his lines
were hard etched; they were more like scratches from accidental
brushes with hardship.

The dean smiled and folded his hands. “How
can I help you today, Ms. Williams?” He glanced at his notes. “You
are enjoying your course?”

Isla’s lips pulled back, tight over her
teeth. Anxiety crowding her chest, pushing down on her heart and
lungs. “Yes, it’s perfect. Everything I wanted.” More than she ever
thought she’d get.

“Yet you’re here.”

She gave the books in her lap a reassuring
squeeze, like they would be snatched away if she complained. “One
class is giving me problems.”

His face shifted from happy to concerned.
“What kind of problems?”

She swallowed and for a fleeting moment
considered staying silent. If she did, Mr. Gardner would win and
her future would die. So she forced the words out. “I’ve attended
every class, but I’ve been marked absent.”

“Practical?” The dean wrote something
down.

Was the conversation going in her file? Was
she being marked as a troublemaker already? It was too late to stop
now. “Life drawing.”

He paused before writing something else. “I’m
sure it’s just an error. Have you spoken to the teacher?”

Isla drew in a breath—this was it. She lifted
her chin and met her fate head-on. “He told me…he said if I didn’t
stay after classes for private tuition, he’d mark me absent.” Just
saying Mr. Gardner’s threats out loud made them less harmful.

The dean’s face hardened, freezing her in
place. She was helpless to do anything but wait for him to speak
and issue judgment. “You have Zachary Gardner.”

She wanted to speak, but her voice had dried
up. She managed weak nod.

“This is a serious accusation.”

The sketchbooks moved, forcing her hands to
rise with them. “I was there. The poses of the models and the play
of the light will match the other students’ sketches. The male
model will back me. He overheard.”

The dean flicked through the pages of both
books, his face a portrait of distaste. Was it her drawings or her
accusations that made him grimace? Maybe the dean was already
aware. Maybe Mr. Garner had even had a warning. Isla grew hopeful.
A splinter of sunlight broke through the storm clouds that had
surrounded her since Mr. Gardner had first singled her out.

The dean handed back her books. “Alone, these
sketches prove nothing.”

The sunlight vanished, and Isla’s world began
to sink. The dean went on, oblivious to her despair. “I will need
copies and statements if I’m going to launch an investigation into
improper behavior. Are you sure this is the path you want to
take?”

For a reply, Isla handed the dean the folder
of copies she’d prepared.

“Very well, I’ll look in to it. In the
meantime I suggest you attend his classes and refuse the extra
tuition
.” He spat out the last word like it burned his
tongue.

“What is the model’s name?”

“Nik.”

The dean raised his eyebrows, and Isla shrank
to the size of a minnow. She didn’t know Nik’s last name, and she
was sure the dean knew there was something going on. What kind of a
woman slept with a man without knowing his surname? The kind of
woman who didn’t want anything permanent.

“Just Nik,” she said with as much dignity as
she could find. This was the twenty-first century. If she wanted to
sleep with the class model and not know his full name, she could.
In the back of her mind she heard her mother laughing at her fall
from grace.

The dean nodded. “Send Nik in so I can get
his statement.”

****

Something was wrong. Her room was as she’d
left it before darting off to work for the evening, only emptier.
Like it had stopped breathing in her absence and only a shell
remained. Dread expanded in her stomach. Her satchel lay on the
floor, empty.

“No.” Isla dropped to her knees, fighting the
urge to be sick. Her sketchbooks were gone. The loss of both would
damage her degree, but the loss of the leather-bound book cut her
heart. It beat with no purpose; the blood never reached her
muscles. She leaned against the desk to stay upright.

How could they be gone? They were worthless
to anyone but her. Her stomach clenched again. What else was
missing?

Isla’s gaze skimmed her few CDs and her
laptop on the desk. Nothing else had been disturbed. The bookcase
hadn’t been touched—all her drawers were closed, her valuables
unmoved.

The only thing missing were her
drawings…drawings of Nik.

What a fool.

She barely knew the man and she’d invited him
into her home, her room, her life. She closed her eyes and fought
off the rising nausea. It was only a book. Sarah had given her many
books. She bit her lip to keep it from shaking and to stop herself
from crying. Why would a drifter take sketches over easily
re-saleable items?