LITMIR.BIZ

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      The Manhattan Mermaids: Believed to be the most beautiful women in the city, they entertain wealthy, powerful men in an exclusive club called Fathoms…. and are all virgins. Derek Prince doesn’t believe they really exist, until he meets the stunningly sensual Xenia. She drives him wild with desire, but giving in to temptation means losing her position at Fathoms. Derek is incredibly turned on by the thought of being Xenia’s first…but will he be willing to wait for her?

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      “I’m telling you, guys, they’re mythical creatures. They’re, like, I don’t know…unicorns or mermaids,” Christian said.

      At the mention of mermaids, Derek started paying attention to the conversation again. For the last five minutes as Mark and Christian discussed their women troubles—specifically how many ex-boyfriends their current girlfriends had—Derek tuned them out and stared at an empty table across the nightclub.

      “They are real actually.” Derek raised his old fashioned to his lips. “I knew one once.”

      “A virgin?” Mark asked. “A virgin over the age of twenty-one? I don’t buy it. They don’t exist.”

      Derek smiled into his drink.

      “Yes, she was a virgin,” Derek said. “And a mermaid.”

      “Bullshit.” Christian threw his napkin at Derek.

      “No, he means it.” Mark leaned back and gave Derek a long look. “Plus, he’s the pretty one. If any of us were going to bag a virgin mermaid, it would be Derek Prince.”

      Derek half laughed and rubbed his forehead. She’d called him pretty too. God, had it really been a whole year? He reached into his pocket and pulled something out. He didn’t show it to Mark and Christian, merely held it in the palm of his hand before tucking it into his pocket again.

      “Believe it or not, it’s true. And I saw her first right over there…”

      Derek pointed to the table he’d been staring at earlier.

      “Over there?” Christian asked, a note of real concern in his voice. “At the VIP table? Kingsley Edge’s table?”

      Kingsley Edge, a wealthy half-French businessman of both renown and ill-repute, owned Cirque du Nuit, the club Derek, Mark and Christian frequented at least once a week. According to rumor, catacombs resided under Cirque du Nuit, catacombs that started under the club and stretched out into New York City like underground tentacles. Legend had it that all of Kingsley Edge’s various clubs could be reached through the catacombs.

      “Didn’t know that then,” Derek said. “It was a year ago. I was waiting for Ireland to show up—”

      “Dude, I’m so glad you got rid of her,” Mark interjected.

      “And I saw this girl,” Derek continued and felt his mind leaving the present and swimming back into the past. “This amazing girl with wet hair.”

      At his first glance of the girl he thought she was one of those women who went bat-shit crazy with the hair gel. But when she moved, her hair moved with her. Not hair gel, just water. The white camisole she wore reached only to the bottom of her rib cage and had gone nearly transparent from the water in her hair. When she stepped into the blue light, he could just make out her pale pink nipples under the fabric. That alone would have held his attention all night except for one thing—she wasn’t just wet and wearing transparent clothes, she was beautiful. Her dark brown hair hung in dripping ringlets over her face and down her back. She looked young, maybe only twenty or twenty-one, too young for this club anyway. Her large dark eyes and light olive skin sported no makeup that he could discern. Watching her, he noticed she moved uneasily. A noise came from the edge of the club and she flinched, her eyes flashing wide open like a startled animal’s. Twisting her hands together, she seemed uncomfortable in her surroundings and utterly out of her element.

      Derek hadn’t been able to take his eyes off her. Other than her little white camisole, she wore a white skirt that rested low on her hips and revealed the full expanse of her flat stomach and lower back. The skirt clung tightly around her slim legs all the way to her ankles.

      She must have sensed his stare, because she turned his direction and stared back. Derek knew he shouldn’t be staring, that he must seem like a psycho to her. But the stare she returned wasn’t angry, only inquisitive. Cocking her head to the side like a curious cat, she watched him watch her.

      “So she was wearing all white and was wet from head to toe?” Christian asked.

      Derek nodded. “I know. Sounds crazy, right? Gets crazier.”

      “What happened?”

      “My table caught on fire,” Derek said. “She saved me.”

      A man of about thirty-five with dark hair pulled back into a roguish ponytail sat with the girl. He wore a dark gray Victorian-era suit and riding boots. Derek rarely noticed other men, but he couldn’t deny that the unusually handsome man the wet-haired girl sat with had an aura of power and mystery about him. The man snapped his fingers and the girl immediately turned her head to the sound. She drew close to him and the man whispered something in her ear.

      Smiling, the girl pulled away. Derek’s stomach tightened as she left the VIP area and walked gingerly down the steps headed toward his table. In her skintight skirt she came to him, her steps nervous and delicate. As she walked, he noticed for the first time that she wore no shoes.

      “Hello,” Derek said as she sat across from him.

      The girl stared at him for a moment.

      “Your table’s on fire,” she said. Derek tried to discern if she was joking. He saw nothing in her eyes but innocent sincerity.

      “What?”

      She pointed at his centerpiece. A black candle and a blue rose decorated every table in the club. His rose had dipped its head too near the flame and now quietly smoldered.

      “Holy shit.” Looking around wildly, he started to reach for his glass, but it contained an old fashioned. Alcohol plus fire equaled a nightclub in ashes.

      The girl laughed a soft tinkling laugh. Slowly she rose and leaned over the table. Taking her long brown hair into her hands, she twisted it, wringing just enough water out to douse the burning rose.

      Because he didn’t know what else to do, he laughed.

      “I’m glad this club has such gorgeous firefighters on duty.”

      She ran her hands through her wet hair and separated it into three sections.

      “I’m not a firefighter.” She hummed as she braided her long hair with nimble fingers.

      “What are you then?”

      “I’m a mermaid.”

      She stretched out her leg toward him. Derek didn’t know what he was supposed to be looking at, but then he saw them. At first he thought her feet sported silver foot jewelry of some kind. But no, metallic silver tattoos of fins adorned the tops of her small, pale feet.

      “No way,” Mark interrupted. “She was one of those mermaids?”

      “She was,” Derek said, taking a sip of his drink. “I didn’t think they were real either. Not until that night.”

      The Manhattan Mermaids. Believed to be the most beautiful women in the city, they entertained the wealthiest, most powerful men in the world. Kingsley Edge didn’t just own Cirque du Nuit, he owned four or five other clubs, some of them so secretive they didn’t even have names. One of the most exclusive was known as Fathoms. Fathoms supposedly had

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