Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Chapter Text

Much to Zane's frustration, Rikki grinned widely in response to the worried expression on his face. 

She knew what she was doing too, beaming up at him as she settled more comfortably on the leather seat. "Would you stop being so dramatic? It's not like I'm going to crash it." 

If possible, he turned even more serious than before, coming to stand in front of her with his hands planted firmly on his hips. "I shouldn't even be letting you attempt this. It's dangerous." 

She couldn't help but roll her eyes dramatically at that. He was a self-proclaimed bad boy, yet here he was, being all stern and forbidding.

Secretly, she was glad that he was so concerned for her safety and well-being. But she also found it to be a bit insulting, because clearly he didn't think she was capable of riding a stupid dirt bike without hurting herself.

Well, she was more than capable and she was going to prove just that.

"Hey, I didn't have any prior experience when I stole your zodiac and I didn't run into any problems." She replied loftily, raising her eyebrows.

He crossed his arms over his chest in a clear disagreement with her statement. "You literally got lost at sea and had to be rescued by the water police." 

Damn. He had her there. Still, she'd never willingly backed down from an argument before and she wasn't going to start now.

"Er, yeah, but only because your stupid boat ran out of petrol. It had nothing to do with my navigational skills." 

He chuckled at that, but made no move to start the engine. She let go of the handlebar to cross her arms right back at him. "I haven't got all day, Zane. Are we going to do this or not?" 

He let out a sigh but conceded anyway, even though he knew he probably shouldn't. 

He'd never been very good at saying no to her, after all.

Her smile returned as he settled behind her and kickstarted the bike. She excitedly revved the engine a couple of times, earning herself such a disapproving look from her boyfriend she could feel it through her helmet.

"You need to let go of the clutch as you accelerate, ok? But you need to do it slowly." 

She huffed, hating that she was caught. Of course he knew she was going to do her best to speed off the first chance she got. "I know. I'm not completely stupid." 

"You're not at all stupid." He told her seriously and she softened at his words, turning her head to give him her best smile. If she wasn't wearing this stupid helmet, she would have kissed him. "I just need you to be careful." 

"I always am." 

She turned her attention back to the grassy trail in front of her. Zane had said this part of the woods was the best place for a beginner to start, as the ground was smooth and there weren't many hills. At first, he’d suggested his usual race track but she'd refused. There were probably boring rules and she imagined there would be too many people around for her to practice properly. (Plus, if she did do something mortifying, like fall off the bike, she would much rather do so without any witnesses).

She let out a deep breath and looked ahead determinedly. "Ok, I'm ready." 

He leant forwards, resting his hands next to hers on the handlebar. 

" Seriously ?" 

"Just at the beginning." 

"Fine." She said, though by her tone it was obvious she meant quite the opposite. "You can be so dramatic sometimes." She added playfully, before releasing the clutch and riding off. 

She would never tell him, but she was grateful he'd insisted on putting his hands next to hers, because they kept the bike steady when she got distracted with the laughter bubbling in her throat. 

She knew he would chide her later for not taking it seriously enough, but it was such a freeing feeling, she couldn’t help but express her joy. It was just so much fun . 

She supposed she could compare it to swimming in the ocean, but in a way this was better, because it was something she could share with him.

Perhaps it could be their thing.

She didn’t have long to dwell on it, though, because Zane nudged her gently. “I’m going to let go now, are you ready?”

“Yes.” She said, with a nod in case he hadn’t heard her.

And she was. 

Well, she was for approximately thirty seconds until she nearly steered them into a tree.

“Are you ok?” He asked instantly, as soon as he’d stopped the bike.

“We didn’t actually hit it, you know.” She said coyly, hoping she was doing a good job of hiding her embarrassment. She slid off the seat to give the tree a dirty look before turning to him with a sheepish smile. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It takes time.”

“I know. But I really wanted to be a natural!”

He laughed at that. “You can’t be good at everything.”

She cocked her head to the side. “So what you’re saying is that I’m good at everything but riding a dirt bike.”

“I meant in general, actually...”

She shook her head, still smiling widely. “You can’t take it back, Zane. I heard you the first time, loud and clear.”

“I’m surprised you can still fit that helmet on your head.”

She yanked it off, proving that the size of her head was unaltered by her cocky words. Her hair, on the other hand, was another matter.

He reached forward to move the hairs out of her face, and the moment grew serious all of a sudden. “I would never let anything happen to you.”

And by the way he said it, she knew he wasn’t referring to their earlier near-miss. He was referring to her secret, to what would happen to her if anyone ever found out that she was a mermaid. She wondered whether this stemmed from his guilt at his father’s involvement with Dr Denman. They’d never really spoken about it, but she knew that he felt awful about it still.

“I’m fine, Zane. You don’t have to get all sappy on me.”

He rolled his eyes, but kept on cradling her face in his hands. “Didn’t mean to be sappy. I just wanted to make myself clear.”

“No clarification needed. You’ve always pulled through in the end, when it counts.” 

“I always will.”

It was rather unsettling that his words made her feel reassured and safe. Not because that hadn’t been his intention when he'd said them, but because usually if someone tried to assure her they’d never let her down, she'd feel the wild urge to run. Because it was all a lie. Everyone always ended up leaving. Well, truth be told, she’d done most of the leaving in recent years. But only because it hurt less to leave than to be left. 

When she’d discovered her transformation into a mermaid, she’d been ecstatic, blind to everything but the new possibilities it opened up for her. This newfound joy had been slightly dimmed when she understood that she really couldn’t let anyone in now, even if she'd wanted to. Her fate had been decided for her.

That was what she’d thought at the time, anyway.

She’d made the decision to not care. It was what she'd set out to do in the first place, anyway.

Zane interrupted her thoughts as he brought her in for a kiss, and she realised that she’d been very wrong about her previous line of thinking.  She’d never let herself fall this deeply and it was the scariest thing. But as he pulled away and smiled at her, she realised something else. She wanted this. No, she needed this, and she wasn't going to leave.

He waited for her to climb on the bike behind him, while she made a silent vow that she would do whatever it took to keep him close. 

And as she wrapped her arms around him and leant her head on his shoulder, she had the most comforting feeling that he would do the same for her too.

Chapter Text

At first, Zane had thought he was dreaming of the sound.

Well, perhaps not dreaming exactly, but since he was still half asleep, he was doing his best to ignore the incessant taps on his window. He didn't get up, he just readjusted himself under the covers and willed himself back to sleep.

Then, when it was clear that the noise wasn't going away - and it had become too annoying to bear - he threw his covers off and stalked over to the window.

He snatched the curtain away to peer down onto the patio, the thunderous expression wiped from his face at the sight that greeted him.

He really shouldn't have been surprised to see Rikki standing in his garden, arm raised and about to throw another stone by the looks of it.

Because really, who else would it have been?

"What are you doing?" He hissed, in an attempt to keep his voice down. His father slept on the other side of the house, but he wasn't about to risk waking him by yelling.

While it was true that Harrison Bennett had been making progress to become a better father, he still wouldn't react kindly to finding Rikki and Zane together at these hours on a school night.

"I'm throwing rocks at your window." She replied simply, as if that hadn't been obvious already.

He paused to take a deep breath. If she was here in the middle of the night then something must be wrong and though he was tired, he wasn't going to be impatient with her, regardless of how frustrating she was being with her deliberately vague answers. "Yes, but why? It's really late."

"I know, I just didn't know where else to go." She shuffled awkwardly. "I'm sorry, this was stupid." She looked so broken that it hurt his heart. Then, she turned away to leave.

He hadn't meant to imply that he didn't want her here. But he'd been too busy trying to keep the tiredness from his voice to consider the actual words that came out of his mouth.

"Rikki, wait!"

Without thinking, he put his leg through the window, then the other one, and sat on the ledge. Slowly (and without looking down for he was sure to have a panic attack if he did) he turned around and began his clumsy descent to the patio below.

His heart was racing as his feet touched the ground safely. "Jesus, I'm never doing that again."

"Did you really just climb out of a window because I looked a bit sad?"

He turned around to face her, glad to see she was grinning. "I meant it when I said I'd do anything for you."

She reached up to hug him. "Conquering your fears isn't a bad thing."

Zane very much wanted to disagree as he hugged her back. He wondered whether something had happened with her dad or with the girls, but didn't know how to ask without upsetting her.

Rikki certainly had no plans to talk about it. "Do you want to come for a swim?"

He pulled back in surprise. "Now?"

The cheeky grin on her face had him wondering whether she was moonstruck. He actually tore his gaze away to check the moon, even though he'd memorized the dates of the full moons for the next year and knew it wouldn't happen for another week.

"Why not?"

He could think of a few reasons why going with her now was a bad idea. The first being that he was still in his pyjamas.

"I'm not even dressed."

"No one's going to see us. It's the middle of the night, no one will be suspecting anyone to be going for a random midnight swim."

Yeah, especially not on a Tuesday night, he added silently. Instead of pointing that fact out, he shot her a cheeky smile of his own. "Rikki Chadwick, I hope you aren't implying what I think you are."

"No, Zane." She replied, her raised eyebrows letting him know that she wasn't at all impressed with him. "I'm not saying you should go skinny dipping."

"Well not all of us have scales to cover our modesty."

She laughed, then nodded towards the water with her head. "Are you coming or not?"

He leant forward to brush a kiss on her hairline. "You already know that I am." Then he took her hand and let her lead him out of the garden and into the cold canal water.

"Fuck!" He exclaimed as he flailed around trying to get warm. It wasn't even Summer, he really should've considered the temperature of the water before diving in.

The situation wasn't helped by Rikki's smug expression as she swam around him in circles. "I said we weren't going to be heard by anyone, but I didn't realize you'd be crying like a little baby."

He shivered, sending her an annoyed glare. "Are you seriously not cold?"

"Are you actually freezing?" She countered. "Or being a bit dramatic?"

Her comment earned her a splash of water to the face. "Well that wasn't very nice. And to think I was going to ask whether you wanted me to warm the water for you!"

"I can't believe I'm in the canal in the middle of the night." He huffed, already dreading the early morning he was going to have to endure tomorrow. "I'm going to get so sick."

She looped her arms around his shoulders and hugged him close. He closed his eyes at the sensation. "That feels nice, your hands are warm."

"Yeah, well I'd feel awful if you actually got sick because of me."

He wrapped one arm around her, using the other to keep afloat. "You didn't force me into the water."

She smiled into his shoulder at that. Because it was true, she never needed to force him to do anything - if she asked for something, he'd do it just to make her happy.

"I know, but I didn't think it through either." She admitted, then she broke out into a grin so contagious that it didn't take long for him to mirror her expression. "Sorry Zane, but a cold swim in the canal will have to suffice for now."

"Anything I do with you is sufficient, you know that.”

She rolled her eyes but didn’t pull away from him (or stop grinning).

“I will deny this if you ever tell anyone, but the feeling’s mutual.”

He pulled away slightly so he could look into her eyes. “I happen to be quite good at keeping secrets."

“I know. I’m very lucky to have you.”

“Is that something else you’ll deny if ever questioned?”

She swatted him on the arm. “See, this is why I’m not nice to you more often.”

He chuckled in response. “You’re plenty nice to me.” Then he paused to take her hand in his. “And trust me, I’m the lucky one.”

She averted her gaze, fighting the blush she could feel creeping into her cheeks. “Stop it Zane, I have a reputation to uphold.”

“Not here you don’t. This is just a random midnight swim in the canal, remember?”

Chapter Text

It was no secret that Rikki  was the tomboy of her friend group – Cleo was by far the girliest out of the trio, while Emma seemed to be the middle ground between the two opposite mermaids – though if one were to take a look at her now, they could be forgiven for thinking otherwise.

Rikki didn't know why she'd agreed to this. It wasn't even like she'd lost a bet or anything. But when Cleo had suggested they all dress up together for Miriam's Halloween party, she'd been in a good mood and she'd let her friend convince her that it would be a brilliant idea. 

Now, as Cleo fussed over her hair and makeup, she couldn't help but regret her decision. It wasn’t that she thought she was ugly, in fact, she quite liked the way she looked. She liked that she could make herself look presentable with minimal effort. She didn't know what she'd look like when Cleo was done with her, and it worried her. Would she look like she was trying too hard - or even worse, would she look stupid ?

"Chill out, Rikki." Cleo said cheerfully, as if she were reading her thoughts. "You're going to look amazing. And who knows, you might even meet someone!" 

Rikki's stomach clenched at Cleo's comment. Not that it was her friend's fault – she had no way of knowing that Rikki was absolutely not interested in meeting someone new - after all, she still hadn't told anyone that she was back together with Zane.

"Yeah and you'll look super hot in front of Zane." Emma added with a smirk, making Rikki roll her eyes. 

"Can you not do that while I'm trying to apply your eyeliner please!" Cleo all but shrieked, making the other girls chuckle. 

"I'm sorry, Cleo." Rikki said, pressing a hand over her heart. "I swear not to move so much as an inch until you're finished." 

"Speaking of that, can you hurry up?" Emma fretted, her frilly blue Alice in Wonderland frock bouncing with her. "We're going to be late!" 

"We're not going to be late." Cleo huffed. "Besides, would you rather be early and look too eager to see a certain someone?" 

Emma blushed furiously. "I don't know what you're talking about." 

"Of course you don't." Cleo replied evenly, sticking her tongue out in concentration as she finished applying Rikki's makeup. "We're not leaving yet. Only losers get to the party early."

By all accounts they were losers anyway, regardless of the time they arrived at the party, but Cleo'd always had high hopes of becoming popular, and she took the invitation to Miriam's party as proof that she was getting closer to the in crowd. Rikki was not about to shatter that dream, and certainly not when Cleo was in charge of what her face would look like. 

Cleo gestured for Rikki to turn her face various ways so she could inspect her art. Once satisfied it was up to her standards, she clapped gleefully. Rikki got up to inspect herself in the mirror and instantly felt bad for having ever doubted Cleo. She looked good, a lot better than anything she could have managed herself. "Besides, I haven't even gotten Rikki dressed yet!" 

At the mention of her name, Rikki snapped her head to glance quizzically at Cleo. "What do you mean? I am dressed." 

"Please, Rikki. You're wearing clothes, sure! But you're not dressed up enough for Halloween. Especially not for Miriam's party!"

Rikki looked down at her offending clothes. Since she hadn't allowed Cleo to buy her a costume, she'd settled for going as a devil. It was basic as hell, but she'd reasoned that she had any number of black and red clothes that would work. Apparently not.

She could only imagine the girly outfit Cleo would pick out for her. 

"No, actually, I'm good." Rikki protested, though something about the look in Cleo's eye told her that she wasn't going to get her way this time.

"I promise that if you hate it, I won't make you wear it."

Rikki suddenly found that she didn't have the energy to argue (and if she were being really honest, she was curious to see what she'd look like. Zane would be there after all, and it wasn't that wrong of her to want to impress him).

She caught the clothes Cleo pulled out of her wardrobe and threw at her, before shutting herself in the bathroom to change.

Despite having spent copious amounts of time at Zane's house, Rikki always felt out of place whenever she came to one of these big mansions.

She dawdled behind her friends as they confidently made their way up the path to the front door, feeling completely lost. Cleo shot her a smile over her shoulder as they waited for the door to open.

"You doing ok, Rikki? Are the heels too much?" 

"I'm fine." Rikki replied, despite her tone suggesting otherwise. Her feet hurt already, her dress was entirely too short and she suddenly found that she didn't want to be there.

"You look great." Emma whispered encouragingly. But Rikki was in no mood for encouragement, and her brain interpreted Emma's smile to be patronizing instead. However, her biting retort was cut short as the door swung open to reveal Miriam, looking very on brand in a pink fairy outfit. Her corset was so revealing that it made Rikki feel a lot less self conscious about the length of her own black dress. 

"Hi girls." She greeted them unenthusiastically. She took a long moment to look each one of them up and down in turn before opening the door wider to let them in. Then the blonde girl gestured to the kitchen. "Drinks are in there, help yourselves." 

"Thanks Miriam." Emma said happily, though the other girl had already vanished into the crowd of people in the living room. 

Rikki stepped into the house behind her friends, and followed them to the drinks table. "Can you guys see Lewis anywhere?" Cleo shouted over the music as she twisted around to peer into the different rooms. "He should be here already!" 

Rikki hid a smile as Cleo's boyfriend creeped up behind her with drinks for them both. Her friend squealed as Lewis surprised her, accepting the drink and letting him press a big kiss to her cheek. Even Rikki could admit that their couple's outfit was very cute, with Cleo dressed up as Princess Peach and Lewis as Super Mario. 

It made her feel a pang of guilt, and longing. Zane had dropped hints for weeks about dressing up together and she'd made an excuse every time; That she wasn't ready to go public with their relationship, that Halloween was stupid, that she'd look ridiculous and mismatched because she had nowhere near as much money as him, that she probably wasn't even going to go to the party anyway… 

As soon as Emma pushed through the crowd with their drinks, she downed hers. Anything to drown the guilt away.

She saw Emma raise an eyebrow, as Cleo bellowed, "Are you ok, Rikki? You haven't even teased Lewis about his mustache!" 

"I just need the toilet!" She shouted back, not waiting for their response before pushing through the crowd and up the stairs. She had no idea where the bathroom could be, but she knew that she had more chance of finding an unoccupied one upstairs. Then again, having already walked in on two couples in different rooms, she was beginning to doubt herself.

She was eyeing up the next door along when someone grabbed her hand and yanked her from the corridor. "What the fuck?" She yelped, barely stopping herself from burning whoever had dared to touch her. When she was met with her boyfriend's smirking face, his smile enhanced by fake vampire canines, her apprehension turned to irritation."What's wrong with you?" She hit him on the chest lightly. "I could've burnt you!" 

He wasn't put out by her annoyed glare, still smirking as he leant down slightly. "Now why would you do that?" 

She swallowed at his sudden proximity, but never one to admit defeat so easily, she jutted her chin out. "Why wouldn't I?" She managed to say. "I can't have random people grabbing me." 

"No." He agreed, his lips hovering above her own. "That just wouldn't do." 

He closed the distance between them, capturing her lips with his own. She relaxed into him, and didn't protest when he locked the door. Parties were meant to be fun and she wouldn't deny herself some alone time with him. She'd not seen him for a week, and she'd missed him.

He removed his fake teeth and she slid his cape from his shoulders. "I've missed you." He confessed as he pressed her harder against the door. She responded by bringing him down for another desperate kiss. It would be so easy to lose herself in him. But they didn't have enough time. She'd only told her friends she was going to use the bathroom, and they were too nosy (granted, they would also be concerned) to let her be for too long. The last thing she wanted was for them to come looking for her and have to explain herself.

When he started trailing kisses down her neck and began to hike the hem of her dress up, she knew she needed to put a stop to it. 

"Zane, we can't." She whispered, putting her hands firmly on his chest. He stopped momentarily, raising an eyebrow. 

"You're positive?" 

"You're asking me whether I'm positive I don't want to have sex in your ex girlfriend's bathroom?"

He broke away with a long suffering groan. "She's not my ex!" 

But Rikki just smiled victoriously, taking advantage of his reaction to put some space between them. 

Her smile soon faded once she caught sight of herself in the mirror. Her devil headband was dangling at the back of her head, her hair was falling out of its pins, and her red lipstick was smudged horribly. 

Cleo was going to kill her. 

She huffed as she pulled her dress strap back into place and got to work on removing her lipstick (which turned out to be a Herculean task without being able to use water). After making himself presentable again, Zane waited patiently for her, and once she was finished, he reached for her hand. 

"Are you crazy?" She asked.

She saw a look that she couldn't quite read flitter across his face before he pasted on a smile. "No one will see us, I promise." 

It was hard to resist him, and since the hallway had been practically deserted before, she let him hold her hand in his as she opened the door.

What she saw outside made her want to slam it shut again.

Emma, Cleo and Lewis were chatting almost directly in front of the door, though they soon shut up at the sight of her and Zane. For a brief moment, she seriously debated hiding beneath her boyfriend's cape.

Her friend's expressions ranged from shock to anger, which in turn, made her own blood boil. Who were they to tell her who she could or couldn't date? 

The moment that Zane tried to pull away she made her decision. She grabbed onto his hand more firmly and brought it back to her side, where it belonged . 

She saw his questioning look out of the corner of her eye, and squeezed his hand as a way of response. 

He made her happy, he understood her, and most importantly of all, he knew her secret and accepted her for who she was. She wasn't going to hide anymore. She just wished it hadn't taken them stumbling out of a bathroom in front of her friends for her to realize that. 

Zane gestured to Cleo and Lewis. "You guys look great!" They stopped gawking long enough to thank him, but Emma was still staring stonily. "You too, Em."

She raised her eyebrows petulantly, and looked away, ignoring him all together. It was disrespectful, and childish, and it was all Rikki could do to stop herself from surging forward to slap some manners into her.

"Are you enjoying the party?" Rikki asked them instead, as casually as possible. 

"Clearly not as much as you are." Emma muttered into her drink. Zane's face fell, and he excused himself before Rikki could stop him. Anger swirled in her chest at the unfairness of it all, and she directed said anger squarely at Emma.

"Why do you have to be so fucking rude all of the time?" Rikki snapped as she shoved past her to follow after her boyfriend. " Zane!" She called, but it was impossible to hear her over the thumping music.

He was already nearing the bottom of the stairs, and by the looks of it, was about to leave the party all together. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Miriam make a beeline for him, and was overcome with jealousy as she saw him stop to speak to her. She would look desperate if she called out for him now, but that didn't mean she couldn't still catch up to him.

She would like to think that she was better than walking up to him while he was chatting to his ex. But it came down to more than the ugly, possessive feelings rising in her chest. There were other warm, underlying feelings too. A yearning to be with him, a need to make him see that she wasn't afraid of what anyone could say anymore… because she loved him. She felt shame burning in her cheeks at her treatment of him the past few weeks. He deserved better than being kept like some dirty secret, to be valued openly, and she would give him nothing less. 

She did her best to push past the crowded staircase, being extra mindful of the drinks in everyone's hands. 

"Zane!" She was reaching the bottom when she took an overenthusiastic step, and stumbled in her heels. If it hadn't been so embarrassing, it would've been funny. At least he'd turned around in time to grasp onto her arms and stop her from falling flat on her face. 

She glanced up at him meekly. "Hi." 

"Hi." He whispered back with a smile, and it had never felt more like home.

He helped her regain her footing, and once he did, she kept a firm grip on his hands. Even though she was aware of the crowd around them, as she looked into his eyes, she couldn't find it in her to be self conscious. 

Miriam, though, never to be outdone, tapped Zane roughly on the shoulder. 

"Really?" She demanded. "You're going to ignore me again to run after her?" 

Rikki was already angry from her falling out with Emma, and after witnessing their altercation over the necklace, Zane knew better than to let her confront Miriam. He held up a hand. "If you ever speak about my girlfriend like that again, we're going to have a problem." 

Miriam bristled at his rejection and quickly made herself scarce. Zane turned his full attention to Rikki.

"Is that alright?" He asked her, almost shyly.

"I don't need you to fight my battles for me." She said slowly. "But yeah, assuming you're referring to the girlfriend thing? That's fine." 

His eyes lit up and she reached up to kiss him. It felt freeing, until she heard the crowd of drunk teenagers cheering them on. There were, after all, only so many salacious jeers she could take. 

Zane seemed to think so too. "Do you want to get out of here?" 

"Absolutely." 

The devil and the vampire left the party together, and she felt lighter than she had in a very long time.