Water Under the Bridge

By Holley Trent

River Williams is good at two things: swimming and conflict. Becoming the king of the underwater dominion his mermaid mother abandoned should be right up his alley. It is, until he learns what kind of mess his deposed uncle left for him to clean up. And with his little sister recently married and coronated in the family’s other ancestral territory, he feels has to be everywhere at once to help smooth the transitions of power.

The absolute last thing he needs at the moment is to have to deal with his human ex.

Since childhood, Aliah pictured herself settling down with a wealthy go-getter who could guarantee her a stable future. Her fling with fellow military brat River as a teen was the one relationship she stumbled into without premeditation. She had to outgrow him, but she could never forget him.

She can't.

The same magic that allows River to hurl and shape water decided long ago that she would be his.

Despite what the magic says, Aliah's not prepared for the tumultuous world the Williams family now lives in, and River refuses to be one more stepping stone for Aliah's upward climb. If she can't convince him that her intentions are different than before, and if he can't recognize the strength the extroverted socialite could bring to a healing kingdom, the two will live forever adrift, lacking the equilibrium both desperately need.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bryant Street Publishing
• Release date: May 23, 2023
• ISBN: 9781094457895

Holley Trent

Holley Trent is an award-winning author of contemporary and paranormal romance. She writes stories filled with dark humor, and characters and situations that are just as complicated and unpredictable as real life. Although she earned an English literature degree by studying the classics, the appeal of satisfying and emotionally fulfilling conclusions guided her toward the romance genre.She resides on the Colorado Front Range with her family.

Book preview

1

D on’t you dare come up in this place acting like you ain’t been raised right, Auntie Tina mumbled as she fixed River’s tie for the third time. "You ain’t gonna embarrass me. No, sir , you are not. You better get the idea out your head right now if you were thinking it." She gave the bowtie a punishing tug that could have left a horizontal indentation in the windpipe of a less supernatural nephew.

I can’t breathe, he wheezed. Being semi-sea creature only got him so far when his opponent was a retired postal clerk who’d clawed her way to the head usher position at church through sheer opinionatedness.

There was no escaping her.

You’re not here to breathe, she said in her anti-pep talk grumble. You’re here to stand near your sister and look handsome, and you’re not even doing that right. Bay’s doing it right. Why can’t you stand there and smile pretty like Bay?

River growled uncharitably and rolled his eyes.

He knew the reflex had been a critical error as soon as Auntie raised her pinching fingers into striking position. His frantic backward step was the only thing saving him, the supposed king of the merfolk domain of Klaufindt, from being publicly on the receiving end of a traumatic deep tissue bruise.

There was a small chance River hadn’t quite grown out of his boundary-pushing-with-elders stage. He often found himself on the wrong side of Auntie’s moods, but he couldn’t fully bear the blame for his rebelliousness. By no stretch of the imagination had his childhood been typical in more than the most superficial ways.

Most little boys didn’t have ancient runaway mermaid queens for mothers, much less Missionary Baptist aunties with supersonic hearing and eyes on the backs of their heads.

His younger brother, Bay—the most typical of the four Williams siblings—positioned himself between Auntie Tina and River and gave his throat a subtle clearing. No antics. We have to be impeccably mannered. Let’s not create any outlet for criticism.

What do you think I’m trying to do? Auntie craned her neck to peer up at her much taller nephews. Behind her postal counter, she’d had a crate to stand on to intensify her dominance, but as a pensioner, she had to rely purely on attitude. "You think I got on those planes and flew over the ocean for my own good? No. I’m here because your momma asked me to keep you fish-blooded ingrates on the straight and narrow."

Fish-blooded ingrates. That’s a new one. River huffed and straightened his lapels.

Not new, Bay said defeatedly. You just hadn’t heard it.

Well, he’s hearing it now, that’s for sure. Auntie punctuated that I-said-what-I-said statement with a meaty harrumph.

River opted to turn off the spigot of smart remarks that tended to run constantly in his brain. He was going to do what the woman said and try to look pretty for his sister’s sake.

He, Auntie, and Bay had been standing at the end of the long receiving line for twenty minutes, waiting for the new king and queen of Souersland to make their post-coronation appearances. River wasn’t precisely on tenterhooks about seeing them. He’d spoken with both over breakfast. Brook had been complaining about underwires and PMS backne, and Cooper had been grousing about the pile of paperwork he needed to immediately sign after the enthroning. On principle, River couldn’t stand the man. Cooper had done some snaky shit to peel Brook out of her formerly quiet life. Without knowing what he was doing, the erstwhile prince had undone the careful knots Audrey Williams had tied around her children to protect them from the world she’d escaped. He’d sailed Brook across an ocean that hadn’t known its lost queen had an heir, all the way to a European state the Williamses held an ancient entitlement to.

Of course, Cooper didn’t understand any of those things when he’d married her. He’d been trying to unmake himself a prince, but the problem with falling in love with mermaid queens was that doing so could fuck with other grimy plans.

Not only had Souersland regained a Klaufindtian monarch because of Cooper, but Klaufindt was thrust into transition, as well. The linked domains were always meant to be ruled by a sibling pair—one brother, one sister. That had made River a king, and he’d been on a plane heading to the Old World even before he had a valid visa or a plan to evict the uncle who’d been ruling in his mother’s stead since her disappearance.

Being careful not to breathe out his frustration too loudly, River tried to force thoughts of his furtive and pitilessly paternalistic uncle out of his mind. He needed to have his head in the soiree game and not revert back to the early afternoon’s anxiety that his threatening uncle had been too quiet in his departure.

River could admit that Cooper’s intentions for the kingdom his family had been ruling for the past several centuries were pure. He also appreciated that Cooper consulted him for gut checks on some of the policies he intended to immediately undo. Since their domains were linked and they technically shared a populace, it might have been the least he could do.

Here they come. Bay pushed his glasses up his nose and tilted his head toward the royal entourage.

Seeing as how they had to pause to greet every dignitary in the long line, River’s impatience remained at a simmer.

Keep her moving, Cooper, Auntie said through unmoving lips. Don’t let her linger.

River bent impertinently forward to better survey his brother-in-law’s efforts at deflecting the guests’ interests. Most of the people standing in the receiving line were pure human and had no innate sense of Brook’s genealogy. Still, by nature of being who and what she was, she carried an incredible amount of magic in her. Her energy had evolved to cool and soothe an agitated populace, but it had the frustrating side effect of mesmerizing and making human people too curious about her.

River, fortunately, did not exude such charm. That was what people in the know had told him. His energy was different.

It’s actually offensive, the youngest Williams, Lake, had cheerily told him the day prior when looking from one royal sibling to the other over a private breakfast.

She’s one to talk, River muttered, squinting at the rude baby sibling clutching Brook’s arm. Lake was supposed to be providing moral support for the extreme social event, but River had a hunch she was making the human people’s curiosity ten times worse. If not for the few strands of melanin that had mission-impossibled itself into her DNA and her tremendously curly hair, she could have been a clone of their mother. Lake’s magic wasn’t what Brook’s was, but it had its own distracting quirks.

What are you complaining about? Bay asked in a low tone. He smiled and waved at a dignitary on the other side of the aisle who’d dragged him into an engrossing discussion about oligarchs and oil tariffs two days prior.

Just thinking about how Lake was clowning me about my energy when she’s the one who can walk through a room and make a litter of kittens cry.

I’ve never been gladder I don’t have the issues you three have.

Y’all stop that mess, Auntie whispered, getting between them again. Everything ain’t for everybody to hear.

River snorted. No one else was listening. They were too busy ogling the new queen in her bespoke ocean blue sequined ball gown, probably Lake in the mutinous low-cut abomination she was wearing, and certainly Cooper’s sister, Mia, who was bringing up the rear of the royal bubble holding a glass of champagne in one hand and a tea sandwich in the other. The woman could find a snack on Mars if she set her mind to it.

By the time Brook and Cooper made it to their end of the line, River was practically thrumming with discomfort and was ready to peel off his tuxedo and do literally anything else.

Such as rolling in glass.

With a royal reporter’s camera lens practically jammed into their faces, Brook straightened his bowtie and whispered, Try to smile at least once, so the kids back at the swimming school don’t think we hate each other.

But don’t we, little sister? River murmured.

When the reporter drifted far enough away, Brook crossed her dark-as-midnight eyes and then uncrossed them.

Legitimate question, though, River pressed. You’re the one who ran away from home to marry a prince for cash without even bothering to tell us what you were up to.

Okay, well, now that prince is your brother-in-law. Cry about it more.

He huffed. I’ll save my tears for Lake. She cares about me.

Brook gave him a kiss on the chin and then plucked it hard. No, she doesn’t.

Ow! You—

She wagged her finger at him and clucked her tongue before he could enunciate any of his preferred F-words. Civility, River. Act like a king even if most people don’t know you are one.

He rubbed his chin and scowled at her. You just assaulted me.

Just a little positive reinforcement.

That’s positive?

"Yes. I will positively do that every time you try to play guilt games with me. I’m done with being manipulated by people."

I hardly consider that manipulation, but if you want to argue it out, we can do that later where there’s better soundproofing. Registering the deep hue of his sister’s lips, River pressed his hand against his face again. Is your lipstick color-stay?

It’s not, Cooper said in a jocular chuckle. And you’re smearing it in and making it worse.

River did not want to punch him for the smug sound he made, but the little voice at the back of his mind did suggest that doing so might be an option. River’s merperson nature, or perhaps the nature of being one descended from a long line of ruling ones, was to punch first and ask questions later. Once upon a time, before Momma died, his warring instincts had been much quieter. When she left, she took with her the disappointed sighs and slow shakes of the head that affected him far more than any punishment had. Not even Auntie’s scolds came close.

Bay pressed a wet wipe into River’s palm and discreetly stashed the trash into his jacket pocket. Always ready to save the day, hmm? River gave his chin a scrubbing using his phone camera to guide him.

Coincidence this time, Bay said. I think that wipe has been in my pocket since Enoch’s wedding. Remember, they had the crab boil?

River grunted in acknowledgment as he casually took stock of their position.

Most of the visitors from both sides of the receiving line had dispersed into the ballroom to find their dinner seats. A few lingered from the royal bubble at a respectful distance, likely waiting to solicit access to either the king or queen.

Cooper had hired a small but phenomenal staff since firing the holdovers from his father’s reign. They would know precisely how to get the clusters of ass-kissers to drift and were already swooping over in their distinctive dark blue suits to charm them into doing so.

Daddy made a gap for himself between Auntie and Brook and looked around at all four of his children. His gazes on Brook and Lake were always so tender. On his golden boy, his basically-human child, Bay, it was prideful. On River, his look was an elegant pastiche of Williams-ish don’t-screw-this-up.

River gritted his teeth. The others would never truly understand the pitfalls of being the eldest. Children like him could never be scored a perfect ten because the scales they were rated on were automatically capped at 8.2. Most of the time, he felt like 8.2 was enough. He could be a reasonable king at 8.2.

At the moment, he was feeling about a six.

Not what she wanted, but it’s what she got, Daddy said obliquely.

River’s tense jaw softened as he breathed stale air through his parted lips.

The she Daddy referenced was his late wife and his children’s mother—the runaway mermaid queen who’d wanted to leave it all behind, who’d probably thought she died a success.

Did the best we could, Auntie said. She would have agreed with that.

I think she would have blamed herself.

Auntie plopped her hands onto her hips and grunted hostilely at her older brother. Truly, Air Force officers were no match for postal employees. They’d both seen some shit, but the lady behind the counter had been trained to bottle it all up rather than to make a plan and respond to it. All that angst had to come out eventually.

Whether she would have or wouldn’t have doesn’t matter, she said. It’s all in how they handle it. She didn’t want it for them, but they got it, and they’re half-Williams, and that’ll make it all different.

Cooper and Mia knew better than to add anything to coded Williams conversations, likely because they had intuitions that the discussions could be too revealing without them meaning for them to be. They knew that Brook, Lake, River, and Bay’s mother had been the last mermaid queen of Klaufindt. They knew that Brook, Lake, and River possessed the ability to shift into merfolk forms and swim for hours in the deep without needing to emerge for air. They also knew the nature of their mother Audrey’s defection from her world and who took over after she’d left.

It was River’s job to fix that part of things. Brook’s was dealing with their people who lived on land. Whether their mother had wanted them to be ensnared in the chaos of supernatural secret worlds or not, they’d already been installed into the works. The ocean had claimed them as leaders, and their people understood that the Williamses had a unique authority to lead. It was the same authority their mother had crumbled beneath.

She’d been so lonely surrounded by all those people for all those centuries.

Daddy steeled his spine and drew in a deep breath. Let’s be of good cheer, hmm? This is for Brook and Cooper. Let’s support them and make sure these folks know that even when we’re not all here, we Williamses roll deep.

Auntie studied her crimson nails and huffed. Who’s going somewhere? I’m not going nowhere.

Yay! Mia beamed.

Brook glowered. "What?"

I’m not going nowhere until you get all that mess sorted with you-know-who, Auntie said.

Yay! Mia tapped her fingertips in applause. She was the number-one fan of Aunt Tina’s pork chop sandwiches. She could have been bribed to do anything with just the corner of one.

If Cooper doesn’t isolate her as a national security risk, I will.

Don’t you have children at home to tend to? Brook asked hopefully.

Daddy snorted. They’re grown men. They don’t need their mother breathing down their necks.

And yet…

Mm-hmm. Auntie gave her mouthy niece an instructive stare. And yet.

Losing social energy fast, River rocked back onto the heels of his dress shoes and shoved his hands into his pockets.

Better her than me.

He wasn’t entirely certain his aunt could swim, so her ability to meddle in his underwater domain would be somewhat limited unless she wore Cooper down enough to commission her a personal submarine. River was under no delusion that she wouldn’t try to entangle herself in the underwater affairs despite her anatomical deficiencies. She’d never even met her sister-in-law’s estranged brother, but she still hated Niklas—or at least the idea of him, anyway.

The circumstances surrounding her career military officer brother and mermaid sister-in-law’s marriage had been strange and precipitous, but Auntie had figured out the whats and whys even before Daddy had. She was the one who’d gone out to smooth things over ahead of the questions from folks back at home. She’d made up a plausible story about how staid and regimented Edwin Williams of Theapoke, North Carolina returned from his overseas stationing with a strange white woman who he’d never mentioned but was somehow living and expecting a child with. She’d been hyper-vigilant about ensuring no one paid undue attention to Audrey and Edwin’s unusual children, and she exerted special energy in ensuring that Audrey herself wasn’t a magnet for rumors and whispers.

Audrey Williams never precisely fit in, but Auntie had the sort of social magic—extroversion and Head Usher Assertiveness—that guaranteed no one noticed how different the newcomer was. She’d held Momma’s secrets close to her heart and, in fact, knew the things Momma had chosen not to tell her children as well.

She’d thought they’d be safer that way, but the ocean hadn’t been content with her gone. It never stopped churning where she’d last stepped out of it until it discovered Brook.

Your cousins can come visit, can’t they? Mia beamed. I’m sure they’ll be loads of fun, yeah?

Oh, they’re fun, all right. Brook gave Mia’s hand a squeeze, then took a deep breath, much like Daddy had. All right. We must go pay our respects to the former king and queen. Have to do the happy family, no ill feelings commemorative photo thing and pretend they don’t want to eliminate me as I sleep.

Not just you, Cooper said in an undertone. The two of us. You for having superseding authority in the kingdom charter to rule and me for marrying you without knowing that you did. And, well, also me for simply being me in general.

Don’t make those murder faces when you go over there, Cooper. I know how you do, Auntie said. You go over there and play the game they expect you to and do it better. You from Florida, ain’t you? Your momma might not have taught you how to be slick, but you’re sneaky as a gator anyway, so you might as well make some good of it.

Cooper had developed a tic since his first encounter with Auntie—a peculiar twitching of just his left nostril.

River supposed Cooper couldn’t tell if any of the words Auntie had said were meant to be compliments. River usually couldn’t tell either.

Don’t let my niece drift out of your sight, she warned. You hear me?

Yes, ma’am.

Cooper gathered his wife’s arm and, with their security crew close at their heels, led her toward the table of honor.

Shall we go with them? Mia asked Lake.

I think we’d better, Lake said. Strength in numbers.

Or misery in it.

Daddy waited until the conspirators were out of earshot and the security detail around them had cleared enough to say, I know you boys get annoyed when I suggest I know anything at all, and especially if I say I know folks you might know. I try to keep my mouth shut to keep the grumbling to a minimum, but just because I choose not to ask questions doesn’t mean I’m not curious. I simply respect that you’re grown men and mind my business.

River scowled, having no earthly idea what his father was talking about and being more than a little unsettled by the change of subject. "Are we about to have the talk? Here? And right now?"

Auntie sucked her teeth and thumped the side of River’s thigh with her clutch bag. What are you talking about? You didn’t see that woman when you two was stomping into here? Standing near the staircase outside in the fur coat?

What, another present sent from some desperate new-money father looking for a foothold into the elite? River chuckled and bumped his brother with his elbow. Maybe I shouldn’t keep being so quick to say no.

Auntie thudded him harder with the bag, with the edge of it that time.

River couldn’t yelp in public the way his body wanted him to, so the next best thing he could do was hold his breath, clench his lower cheeks tightly, and curl his toes in his shoes.

Dignity? Who gets to have that? Sure as fuck not me.

I think that was a joke, Auntie, Bay said placatingly.

Don’t joke with me. Joke with your little friends, she said, stabbing a fingertip against River’s clavicle. If I’ve seen that woman before, then I know your daddy certainly has. I don’t know her name, though. You know it, Edwin?

Daddy grimaced and shook his head. Used to. Slips from my mind now, as does the context for me recognizing her.

Someone from the States? River asked. From swimming?

The Williams siblings owned one of the most prestigious young swimming schools on the East Coast. They’d networked with hundreds or even thousands in the decade or so since they’d filed the LLC paperwork.

Not from swimming, I don’t think, Daddy said after a moment of pondering. Yes, from the States. Maybe someone who interviewed you before for one of the papers or something.

Why would any reporter who’s had anything to do with us before be wearing fur? River asked. I’m reasonably sure fur would be a stretch with what she’s earning.

Could be fake. Or inherited. Bay pushed his glasses up his nose once again. Want me to go with you to see?

River lazily raised a shoulder. Why not? Between the two of us, we might actually figure out who she is.

Twice the likelihood of getting mobbed by weak-willed hussies who think they can snag themselves princes or whatever titles the paperwork said you were, Auntie commented in a low tone.

Princes per Souersland law, though neither would have been close to the throne if not for Brook. The kingdom’s charter was full of seeming contradictions because the last rightful holder of the throne was a man who should have been dead centuries ago. The semi-immortal ex-merfolk king had been chased out of Souersland by humans during a bloody tri-kingdom war many centuries back. Niklas had waited in his sister’s underwater domain to find a political means back to his terrestrial throne, but he never got his chance. His sister eloped, leaving him in charge of both their sea and land—should he ever be able to reclaim it—domains. When Brook had emerged from out of nowhere, Niklas had seen her as his chance to take back what he’d once had, even in a puppet-master capacity. While Niklas may have technically been entitled to rule, there was no way he could do so without revealing to the whole world that he had identical DNA to a man who should have been dead by the Crusades.

Cooper was working on nailing down the verbiage in the paperwork that forcefully enshrined Brook as having the valid kinship connection, bolstered by her marriage into the previous ruling house. Niklas wouldn’t have a leg to stand on, at least legally, but paperwork wasn’t necessarily going to stop him from causing problems.

They all knew he would. All of their supernatural subjects feared it. They just didn’t know when he’d re-emerge or how desperate he’d be to usurp the Williamses.

River had gone from champion swim coach to avenging king in a matter of a few breakneck-speed months, and his mother had prepared him for only one of those roles.

River waved off the security guards who were trying to remain in step with him and Bay. They were his, technically, not the palace’s, which meant they sometimes had fins and wore tails.

It wasn’t that he didn’t trust them. None had been among the holdovers who’d tried to be retained after River and Brook had magically strong-armed Niklas out of the underwater fortress.

The guards who worked nearest River had been thrust at him by the sea, or magic, or Brook. He actually didn’t know. All he knew was that they’d swum individually onto the coast the day River first intended to confront his uncle, wondering if they were needed for something. They’d claimed they’d been beckoned.

River didn’t try to make sense of it.

He stopped, turned to them, and pointed to his father and aunt. Chill with them. Not us. We’ll be right back.

The chief among the guards stilled the others behind him. Briefly, the processing, processing tension tugged at his features. Luther always looked like that when he was trying to translate English into the more instinctual merfolk language and then formulate a response in whatever land language he knew the most relevant words in. He hadn’t had as much exposure to humans as many of the men in their entourage.

Where are you going? Luther finally offered in German.

River swiveled his head to Bay and gave him a Williams look.

Go on, you tactful motherfucker. Give them something.

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