Bastian couldn’t disbelieve Saina when she said she loved his hoard. There was no falsifying the admiration in her eyes, no way that her words could have been lies.

She didn’t want it, which confused both Bastian and his dragon, but perhaps they’d only chosen the wrong piece; his treasure sense was haywire and he doubted his own understanding of value.

But she wanted him.

He knew it in the way she kissed him, and the way she looked at him when she thought he didn’t notice.

It wasn’t her practiced smiles or her careful eyelashes, it was the other look - the puzzled, tender look she had when she thought he wasn’t looking. The crooked smile when something truly amused her. The way she hummed happily to herself when she liked something.

That was the Saina he kissed.

And to his heartbreak, she still pulled away. “I… I can’t do this,” she said.

“We can take it as slow as you want,” he assured her, letting her retreat.

“Oh, Bastian, you deserve so much better than this.”

There were tears in her green eyes.

“I’m not your mate, Bastian. Sirens don’t have mates. It’s just my magic, you only think you feel this way, and when I leave, you…” she gave a little sob. “You’ll look back at these few days and it will feel like a dream, because that’s all it is. It’s just a happy little fantasy that I never should have indulged in. I’m so sorry. There isn’t anything here, between us. It’s not… real. It never was.”

She turned and fled through the door, and Bastian let her go, too baffled to stop her.

After a moment, he left his lackluster hoard, locking the door behind him.

He walked to the pool deck in a daze, and stared at the “Lifeguard Off Duty” sign for a long, confused moment. He almost took it down, then reconsidered, and realized what he had to do.

Tex called down to him from the bar deck above, but Bastian ignored the bartender and stalked to the beach, not pausing at the little beach bar or the lifeguard tower. He walked straight into the water, shifted, and swam out the same way that he’d gone the day before.

It took several hours of swimming to reach the spot he’d found Saina. There were no features above the waves once the island was out of sight, but beneath the water, he could follow the landmarks of the ocean floor, and if he concentrated very carefully, he could feel a faint tingle of his treasure sense, leading him back to her sunken luggage.

While he swam, he tried to sort out his confused feelings. Saina was his mate. She was his everything. It didn’t matter what she said, he knew to the core of his heart that she was his, meant for him in every way.

He loved the charm she could easily turn on, and the vulnerable confusion she so rarely let him see. He loved the way she moved, and the way she swam.

He missed the way she let him breathe underwater and surfaced to suck in a breath of air. The ocean looked like a different place today, smooth and sparkling cheerfully. It wanted to play, today.

He dived again. The ocean floor was hundreds of meters down here; his chest protested the pressure and his tail ached with the effort. It was dark, too, but between his luminous eyes and the faint tug of the treasure sense, he knew he could find his target.

Confidence swelled in him again, tingling through his limbs as he approached the treasure.

She was wrong, he thought, with increasing resolution. He wasn’t under her spell. He was too strong and powerful a dragon to be caught in any web of enchantment.

He was too magnificent to be snared by magic, he thought as his treasure sense flared and began to burn with more intensity than it had except for the time he had found Saina.

He was stronger than any siren, his will was harder.

There must be some other reason she was refusing his hoard, but it was of no consequence. He was a dragon, and she was his mate. He would make her the prize of his nest; she would be his finest treasure. There would be no more running from him.

If he had the air to spare, he would have roared, because there, half-buried in shifting sand, was Saina’s suitcase, its lurid color washed away by the murkiness of the depths.

He put a claw around the handle and kicked off from the floor of the ocean, making a swift, determined beeline for the surface.

He was not built for water liftoffs; he needed to kick off with his strong hindlegs from something solid to get enough lift to get him into the air, but knowing that he’d never been able to before didn’t stop Bastian from believing he could now as a strange resolution crept over him.

He darted for the surface, and just as he broke through it, spread his wings and gave a tremendously powerful beat that took him into the air.

A triumphant laugh turned into a roar of celebratory fire as he escaped the distasteful draw of the saltwater and returned to the air where he belonged, his prize safe in his claws.

He soared through the salty air, snapping at seabirds who dared get in his way, and flew back to Shifting Sands with sure, strong wing strokes.

He circled the resort twice, gratified when the people sunbathing below looked up to admire his big, gleaming body. Then he landed at the back entrance to the kitchen, closest to where he sensed his mate.

Saina! he roared, calling her.

Saina! I have your tribute! You will be mine!

Obediently, as she should, Saina came to the door, Breck and Chef right behind her, staring curiously. Chef was holding a wicked knife, and Breck had a dish towel. Neither of them was any threat.

Bastian dropped the sodden suitcase at his mate’s feet. I have won you, he snarled.

Her spoken voice was sharp and unexpectedly clear. “You have done nothing of the sort, you idiot.”

He opened his jaws and roared flame into the air.