Away in a Tentacle Lair

23. Leo

Chapter twenty-three

Leo

W e sit in the cave as the sun sinks into the bay. This is the best Christmas of my life, my arms entwined with the man I've only just met but has stolen my heart already.

“Are you sure you want this life? I’ll never be able to spend the night with you like a normal couple.”

“I don't mind. I get all the amazing perks of being in love with an octopus man.”

“Yes, that is a good perk,” he chuckles.

I want to explore what else he can do to me while we make love at sunset.

“We should be heading inside now,” Kai sighs.

“Right, you are, Captain.”

We push the boat back into the bay and climb in, with Kai taking the oars. We've made it halfway around the bay before a collection of small motorboats come into sight.

“We need to hurry,” Kai warns me, but I just nod as he is the one powering the boat.

All the research hopefuls are in their boats, having nothing better to do on Christmas Night. Seeing us row towards them would be just the excitement they are looking for.

“You need to row,” Kai groans, his skin starting to shimmer in the rising moonlight. “Head to the rocks; there is a secret bay we can use.”

He points towards the rock face looming above us as I take the oars. A sheen of sweat glistens across his body as the last rays of the sun dip below the horizon.

“Shit,” he whimpers. “Get into the cave. I'll meet you there.”

His body stiffens and turns boneless. Instead of rowing, I lean forward to help the alien creature work his way out of the clothing around him. His eight legs reach out, pulling him effectively up the side of the boat, and then he enters the water with a plop. Instead of swimming off, his tentacles grip the boat's wood. Knowing he is coming with me, I start rowing towards the cave.

It's all a little too late.

I can't row as fast as the motorboat of my rival candidates, and soon, the leary group catches up with me.

“Hey, Rowland,” a guy called Thompson calls over. “Whatcha doing’?”

“Evening boat trip around the bay,” I reply, watching Kai's tentacles slide further under the boat. “There's nothing else to do.”

“Except we saw two of you in the boat.” Thompson pokes at Kai's clothes with his oar. “Do we have a naked free diver to search for?”

“No. What he does is none of your business.”

“You shouldn't skip work, Row; they talked about free diving in the bay. Did you know there is a boy who can hold his breath for twenty minutes?”

“No one can hold their breath that long,” I huff.

“Well, excuse us if we believe the centre manager over you. He's seen him.”

I bite back the urge to ask if it was while his mum was drowning under their intimating number of motor boats.

“Well, we'll leave you and your invisible boyfriend to it. Have fun.”

Their engines start to rev up, circling my little boat. Suddenly, one of them comes right at me. I'm positive they’ll swerve off at the last minute, but just as that option begins to look unlikely, I dive off the side of the boat just as they smash into it. I save myself, hoping Kai will too, but as I see him clinging to the overturned boat, I realise he didn't know what was happening. I should have stayed on the boat and given them an incentive to turn rather than happily smashing into an unoccupied boat.

“What is that?” Eggie asks, prodding Kai's motionless body.

He pulls Kai's tentacles from the wood, and the limbs curl around his arms. He's not unconscious, just sluggish and dazed. Kai can do nothing as he is thrown into a storage box. I can’t do anything to help. I don’t even know if there is water in the box.

“Let it go,” I yell, swimming towards the boat.

“You tried to hide it under the boat!” Eggie huffs, clearly annoyed by my assumed actions. “You've found what we've all been looking for.”

“No, please.” That's my boyfriend, but I can't exactly tell them that.

The boats manoeuvre away from me in a drinking ruckus, howling and laughing as they kidnap the man who turned my world upside down. True, they don't know who they are taking, and collecting specimens from the bay is what we do at the research centre. It's what I did.

I swim after them, but even if I still had a boat, I couldn't keep up.

My only hope is to head to Kai's house and beg for help from the non-octopus side of the family.

Pounding on the door gets me some attention when Rogan opens the door.

“Please help; I was with Kai, and the sun went down.”

“He'll be fine. The bay is safe enough for a line octopus.”

“The research team took him,” I pant.

“You'd best come in, Leo.” Rogan leads me down the corridor to a living room where half the family sit in front of the TV.

“Leo says the research centre has taken Kai.” Rogan thumps down into an armchair.

“None of you look worried,” I observe.

“We are worried,” Alice smiles at me, tapping the empty seat beside her. “But we can't go out and start breaking into the research centre after an octopus they are legally allowed to steal from the water around us.”

“It's wrong,” I groan.

“And tomorrow, we will get him back, I promise.”

This is the worst Christmas of my life.