If she wanted to keep him alive and rid herself of the curse, the best way to do it would be to leave. And if she was going to leave, she ought to hurry and do it before the sirens woke up.

“Let’s go,” Gemma said, and Alex smiled widely at her. He pulled her close to him again, kissing her quickly. “But we really do need to hurry.”

Alex pulled her toward the shore, but when the water got shallow enough that her tail began to tingle, she stopped him.

“You need to go ahead and turn around,” Gemma said.

“What? Why?” Alex asked, alarmed.

“Because my tail doesn’t change into bikini bottoms when it turns back into legs,” Gemma told him.

“Oh.” Alex blushed slightly when he realized what she meant and quickly turned around.

“What’s going on?” Harper asked. She was standing just far enough away that she hadn’t heard Gemma’s explanation.

“Turn around,” Alex said, walking over to where Harper and Daniel were standing. “Gemma’s naked and needs to put on bottoms.”

“Oh, crap,” Daniel said, and immediately turned around.

Harper turned away from Gemma more slowly, as if she didn’t trust Gemma not to disappear in the waves while they had their backs turned. But Gemma had no plans to do that.

She pulled herself out of the water, willing her legs to speed up. The transformation from tail to legs had never seemed so slow. Since she’d decided to leave, she wanted to get out of here as quickly as possible.

Gemma actually stood up before her legs had completely shifted back. One of her feet was still more fin than foot, and she almost tumbled in the sand, but she caught herself. She rushed over to her bikini bottoms, and by the time she’d slipped into them, her legs were normal.

“Okay,” Gemma said, and ran over to where Alex was waiting. “We need to get out of here.”

Alex took Gemma’s hand, and the four of them ran through the sand. They had to go a ways down the beach to get around the boulders. The house was sandwiched right between the rocky outcroppings, so the quickest way to the front road was through the house, but they weren’t about to take that path.

Daniel had parked in the grass about a quarter mile from the house. When they finally reached the car, Harper popped open the trunk and pulled out an old hoodie for Gemma to toss on so she wasn’t running around in a bikini.

Gemma was standing behind the car as she slipped it over her head, and Harper stood beside her. As soon as she had it on, Harper grabbed Gemma and hugged her.

“I’m so glad you’re safe,” Harper said, hugging her so tightly it actually hurt.

“Thank you,” Gemma said, her voice strained because of the intensity of Harper’s hug.