Stolen by the Sea Lord Audiobook

Elan was a respected warrior of a traditional mer city until he met his bride. Then he began to have a rebellious dream. A dream where he wouldn’t be forced to send her back to the surface after she gave him a son. A dream where they could have a family and stay together forever…

A full year has passed since the terrible night his dream turned into a nightmare. Elan’s finally escaped from his shackles and gone on the run. Now he’s on a mission to find his wife and reforge the family they always planned.

But the wounds of the past don’t always heal with time, and Elan’s people will stop at nothing to get him and his son back. If they are recaptured, the status quo returns and all hope for the future is lost…

Contains steamy mer-shifter love scenes, a warrior in search of redemption, and an emotional second-chance romance with an adorable baby mer! 2025 UPDATE

CHAPTER ONE

Elan, former First Lieutenant of the undersea city Dragao Azul, floated just beneath the dazzling waves in a state of exhaustion mixed with terror.

Before him spread the crowded shoreline of the island chain the humans called the Azores.

This was the second time he’d surfaced here. The first time had been in a sacred ceremony with only a few witnesses, as it should be. This time was vastly different. He’d never wanted to expose himself to many people. Even though the mer’s existence was no longer a secret, the rules around remaining hidden beat in his blood, and it took him a moment to steel himself.

The precious bundle in his arms shifted, increasing both his terror and his determination. He’d come all this way. He didn’t know how close his pursuers were behind him. He couldn’t hesitate long. His time was running out.

Elan kicked forward, breaking through the final barrier into the air. He let the water gush out the gills in his back and then coughed the remainder from his lungs as the gills sealed over, transforming his torso into fully human. He kicked his two mer legs, his foot fins propelling him toward the shallows. Then he retracted his fins, shifting them to human toes, and put his weight onto the shifting sands.

As he emerged from the water, the humans became aware of him. Humans shied away, summoned their children, and drew back in fear.

Lights glowed in their chests, some brighter and some dimmer, based on their shock. Humans were unable to control their soul lights they way mer were, probably because they couldn’t see them as warriors could.
Waves smashed against his thighs, and he dropped his trident out of the tucked position against his body and gripped the smooth-gnarled coral, using it for balance. Normally he wouldn’t need it, but he couldn’t risk his precious bundle.

That precious bundle grew much heavier above the water. It shook and coughed, made a wail that cut off, then wailed again. He bounced the bundle, and the discordant sound quieted. Elan took his own deep breaths, grateful. Although he hadn’t thought there would be any problems with shifting, he’d worried all the same.

He stumbled, exhausted, across the sands toward the grassy headland. He approached humans intending to ask his questions, but they scattered in fear before he could make any sound. He kept going doggedly.

Everything would be fine as soon as he found her. He just had to find her. She would happily embrace him and the past year would melt away. Everything would be right again.

These were the thoughts that had driven and sustained him across the ocean from the battlefields to here.

He just had to find her. She would be so happy to see him. She would throw her arms around him and kiss him and be so violently happy...

A group of blue-uniformed human warriors surrounded him.

He stopped.

“What are you?” an officer asked him in a familiar language. “What are you doing here?”

Elan formulated his answer. Portuguese was the second language he’d learned, after the native language of the long-gone sacred brides who had once dwelled on these islands. He was more practiced with the more recent addition to their training, English, but he knew Portuguese well enough.

“I am a warrior of Dragao Azul, and I seek the woman known as Zara Robertson.” He straightened and threw out his scarred chest, the aquamarine tattoos gleaming. “She is my bride.”

* * *

Zara Robertson hung her newest “art therapy” watercolor in the window. Light shone through the thin paper. The dramatic splashes of red and blue were abstract enough that only her therapist would be able to guess it was titled, “Mermen Don’t Exist, Part 14.” She tilted it and stepped back, appreciating the placement.

The problem with living in the Azores was that almost everywhere had a sea view. But with this, her most recent masterpiece, she’d now completely blocked any hint of the ocean from the living room.

“Um, Zara…” Her younger sister Milly came to the doorway. “Didn’t you hear the phone?”

Zara had ignored the ancient landline. “No one needs to talk to me.”

“Well, in this case, actually…oh, that’s new.”

The art was a new thing. Her therapist was frustrated with her, and Zara understood why. When she’d first shown up in the psych ward, everyone had thought she was bonkers for insisting she’d been kidnapped and held hostage by a fantasy creature.

It never happened, they’d told her. Your brain is tricking you. Mermen don’t exist.

She’d wanted to believe it.

If it had been a nightmare, then no real person had ever gotten hurt. The screaming, blood, and clinging onto tridents begging for her husband’s life were figments of her imagination. She’d been in a boating accident, hit her head on a rock, and hallucinated everything. She could forget the bad images—which had never happened!—and move on with her life.

But a few months into her recuperation, mermen had surfaced off the Gulf of Mexico. Everyone had realized they were real, including her doctors. She’d been forced to relive the truth, not fantasy, and to go through the trauma all over again. And after the second time, she’d developed a bit of a chip on her shoulder.

If healing required her to relive the worst moments of her life over and over again, Zara gave up on it. She rejected “getting closure” and “moving on.” Her current plan was total avoidance. In an ideal world, she’d move to Nebraska or North Dakota or some completely landlocked state.

But Milly didn’t want to move. Her reasons were suspicious but Zara owed her little sister a lot, so she sucked it up. Blocking out the ocean would make avoidance a little easier, she reasoned.

Zara missed the era when she’d almost been talked into believing it had never happened. For hours at a time, she’d had some peace.

Milly gestured behind her. “Anyway, the phone call was from the polícia actually.”

“They can’t catch the perpetrators underwater, so I don’t see any point in going down to the station to describe them again.” Zara crossed her arms proudly. “These watercolors are okay, right? They let in the light, so I’m not hiding away in total darkness.”

“Yeah, they’re okay.” Milly’s tone implied the opposite, however. “What’s the theme this time?”

“‘Mermen Don’t Exist, Part 14’.”

“Ah.” Milly bit her lip. “About that…the polícia called because they’ve caught a merman on our shore.”

Zara froze.

Nerves jangled across her torso like live electrical wires yanked apart and arcing electricity through her organs. They sparked in every direction, making her muscles twitch and spasm. A dull ache thudded in her head and the phantom pains coiled in her belly.

She hugged herself to keep everything contained, forcing it all in with sheer will. “They’ve been surfacing all over the world. That has nothing to do with me.”

“It does, actually.” Milly held her gaze with worried eyes. “He’s asking for you by name.”

He’d come for her.

Elan.

The past year ripped away from her like thin tissue paper. It had all just happened. All of it. It was real.

Shock and horror welled up like a tidal wave. She couldn’t breathe. Zara stood frozen, unable to even blink away the tears forming in the corners of her eyes.

She held her ground until the wave receded.

“…can tell them you can’t come right now,” Milly was saying as Zara came back into her body and consciousness. “You’re so pale. Are you listening to me? I really think you should lie down.”

Lying down sounded good. She could pretend to be sleeping instead of disassociating.

Zara didn’t need to heal. She didn’t need closure. She wanted to avoid everything.

But there was a pulse inside her, a little seed hidden inside the cage of lightning, that pressed outward.

You can’t live this way. It’s been a year. For good or ill, this is your chance for change.

She’d suffered so much.

But apparently it wasn’t enough.

Zara sucked in a long breath, strode forward, and ripped down the watercolors.

Milly gasped.

The papers crumpled and tore, dropping from her fingers in shreds.

Zara stared at the distant ocean. If art therapy didn’t work, maybe shock therapy would. “Take me to him.”