Quotes by T. D. Hamm

“Sighing, she tilted her head away from them a bit and looked up through the glass. At least she got a glimpse of Daios every day. He swam by the glass dome often. Whenever she caught his eye, he would nod at her and angle his body away from her sight. Just like he used to. All that forward momentum was lost. She worried maybe he didn’t even want to see her. He’d delivered her like a package he’d wanted to get rid of. Then he’d disappeared into the ocean. How was she supposed to feel? After that kiss, the way he’d touched her, and how she’d come apart in his arms… He’d dumped her and left, like he hadn’t wanted to be around her anymore. After everything they’d talked about and everything... Well, maybe she’d just been entertainment while they laid low so her father’s ships couldn’t find them. Maybe she was the only weird one who saw a man who had needed someone to see him.””

“When it was just the two of them, it was easier. He didn’t think about all the things her people had done to his. He barely even noticed their differences when she was laughing or locking his gaze on hers. She had a way about her that made him forget to be uncomfortable. But here? All of that was different. Everyone looked at him all the time. Like they were just waiting for him to explode and murder her. And he didn’t like that. He didn’t want people to think that he could ever hurt her, let alone that he’d thought about it. Yes, he hated the achromos. Her people were a plague upon this sea and he would gladly see them all dead. Just not... her. And that was a strange emotion to even get through on his own, regardless of everyone judging him while he did it.””

“How did he show her how he felt? That seemed like an impossible ask from a woman who should have known just from his body language. Daios wasn’t good at telling anyone anything. He’d never been a talker, even when he was just a boy. His mother used to say that he was as stoic as a stone wall, immovable, and sometimes a little cold. He didn’t see the value in chatting with people when he could show them what he wanted. Of course, that hadn’t gotten him very far with women. And it would not get him very far with his little achromo. After all, Anya had settled in rather nicely.””

“Leaning down, he pressed his lips to that graceful arch of her neck. He let his mouth linger, and then couldn’t stop himself from flicking his tongue against her skin. Her moan vibrated in his ear as her taste burst on his tongue. She tasted so fucking good. Warm and sweet, her pulse throbbing against his tongue where her heart raced as though she knew how much danger she was in. No, not danger. He shoved the haze away from his mind to realize she had arched in front of him. Her back bowing, she presented herself to him like she had no restraint either. A low growl rumbling through his chest. He laved her pulse with his tongue. Slow and methodical, he drew the entire bumpy texture down her neck to her collarbone. Drawing back, he knew his sharp exhale would send cold goosebumps dancing down her flesh. And he couldn’t stop himself now. He’d had a taste, but it wasn’t enough. It wasn’t nearly enough. Another growl rumbled through him as he curved his clawed hand around her waist. The blanket still separated them, and he didn’t dare move it. The barrier was good. The barrier reminded him that he couldn’t go too far with this, no matter how much they both wished for it.””

“He didn’t know when he became so comfortable around her. It was probably the first moment when he saw her in the water and realized how weak she was. The achromos were dangerous creatures who could surprise him with their violence. But Anya? Anya didn’t have a violent bone in her body. Not even when she’d leapt on top of him, and he was quite certain she wanted to hurt him. He had, after all, kidnapped her from her home. He’d dragged her down into the frigid depths where she shivered every night. Instead, she’d asked him to touch her. Even thinking about it made his cocks press against the scales that held them in place.””

“She was so small and delicate. So easy for him to hurt and he didn’t want to hurt her. He shouldn’t want to mate a weak creature. He should search for the strongest, the most powerful, the best. Someone he couldn’t best or overcome in a fight. The People of Water valued strength, not delicacy. So while she turned her attention to stopping the alarm and freeing them from that gods awful noise, he’d fled. He couldn’t look at her when he feared what he might do if he stayed for even a moment longer. What if, for the briefest of moments, he fell to weakness like he had before? Daios had spent his entire life knowing that he was a weapon. He was proud of the danger that his body posed for almost anyone who was around him. That was his role.””

“She’d never had so many panic attacks in a row. Her father had put so many people around her house, she felt like she couldn’t breathe. Anya had only seen this many people all constantly walking by her door when there was a festival going on in town. But now? It felt like every time someone walked by her door they were pausing to listen in on what she was doing. The cameras kept moving. Even when she was sleeping, she would hear them shift and creak as someone constantly monitored her.””

“He wanted to hold her short little fingers, and what a curious thought that was. He’d never wanted to touch an achromo. If he was being honest, he had little interest in touching his own people, either. How strange that he looked at this one and wondered how soft her skin would be if he ran the back of his finger down her cheek. He could see the fluttering of her pulse on the side of her neck, and he wondered what it tasted like. A small part of him sent off warning signals, screaming that he shouldn’t want to know what she tasted like. Maybe there was something wrong with him, because what if he wanted to eat her? His fangs would so easily tear through her skin. He could hurt her like he had hurt everyone else, and he’d already thought about her blood. Daios made mistakes. That was his fate. He fucked everything up. Why did he think he wouldn’t hurt””

“Daios liked the sound of her voice. It was a little rough, a little raspy, slightly off key”

“Why hadn’t he grabbed her? She was right in front of him. She’d touched him. He could have grabbed onto her at any point, yanked her close to him, and then dragged her into the pipes. It would have been easy. Too easy, the more he thought about it. She was so weak compared to him. But her fingers feathering over his had made him feel... something. Daios wasn’t sure what that meant. His hearts had slowed down for a bit. All that rioting chaos calmed. He’d held his breath while she touched his fingers and he swore there was something going on with his gills that had never happened before.””

“What are you wearing?” he said, his mouth warping around the sound so she could only assume he hissed the words. “Bitsy, turn translation back on,” she said, certain that she was a little too loud. “I’m sorry, Dad, what did you say?” Again the nostril flare. Again, the pinched lips that surely meant he was about to explode. “I said, what are you wearing?” She liked to remind him whenever she could that she’d lost her hearing. It was, after all, his fault. And the man had been exposing her to situations that made her uncomfortable ever since. Oh, his poor baby girl was surely too fragile to do things on her own. That was the excuse he always said. But it wasn’t for that reason. No, he wanted to keep her under his thumb because he didn’t trust her. The old man was far too observant. “The clothes you sent me,” she replied. “You are wearing flat shoes!” Bitsy underlined and made the words shake in red.””

“He was going to get himself killed. Or his friend. The Commander had recently outfitted the entire city with weapons on the exterior. She knew, because she’d helped install a few of them. Her rage turned into concern. What did he think he was doing? He was going to get himself killed, and they had just survived. Together. The damned beast was likely attacking their city again, but even if he was… Even if Mira didn’t want to admit it to herself, he had saved her life. She’d gotten the story out of the other engineers. Their section of Beta had run out of air, and the undine came after that. If he hadn’t gotten her out of that hallway, or if he hadn’t been there at all, she would have died. Plain and simple. “Damn it,” she hissed through her teeth. “I owe you, you big blue bastard.””

“But the moment his lips had touched hers, as he’d breathed air into her lungs, he’d known it was the right choice. Deep in his bones, he felt the rightness. As though the ancients of the ocean had touched his heart and told him that she needed to live. The lights along his tail lit up when her tiny hand had rested on his shoulder, and then the other, frantically sucking up any air that he could spare for her. And his gills had fluttered along his ribs, even the ones that usually laid flat along his jaw burst out. He’d never fluttered in his life. Arges had always known his gills to remain flat and unaffected, no matter what female was around him. And yet, this one made him shake like a child. Like he’d never had a woman touch him before. As he watched the strange contraption take her up and away from him, he found the sight didn’t settle well, either. It wasn’t that he wanted to follow her. He couldn’t go into her realm any more than she could exist in the sea. But the muscles of his tail bunched, regardless. He wanted to touch her again.””

“A shadow passed over her hand. Strange, because she hadn’t seen any large animals since she’d started welding. Every now and then, she was treated to the sight of a massive whale in the distance. And sometimes at night she listened to their haunting songs as they swam by the city. It was beautiful, and for some reason, it always made tears sting in her eyes. Mouth full, still chewing, she looked up to find the source of the shadow and froze. A monster hovered in front of the glass. His black tail, so long it tangled in the kelp, was at least ten feet long. Blue slashes of fins, so deep they blended in with the water, undulated all along the black scales. It stretched up to his waist, seamlessly turning into that pale, almost gray skin. His body was as all the rumors claimed. So handsome it was painful to look at, and eerily like the gold sculptures that surrounded her.””

“So much that sometimes it hurts to breathe. I don’t know how you forced your way under my skin so firmly, witch, but I can’t let you go now. I love you more than life itself, more than this title, more than the kingdom. I’d burn the world to the ground for you and build it back into the one you wanted if I could.””