“Come out of there,” he said, sounding distressingly like a nursemaid, even to his own ears. “This instant.”
“Why?”
“Because it’s April. And freezing.” And because I’m suddenly curious to see you wet, without the mud. I didn’t have a chance to appreciate the view the other night.
Her shoulders lifted in a shrug. “It’s not so bad, once you grow used to it.”
For God’s sake, look at the girl. Teeth chattering, lips turning blue. Beneath that horrid garment, her ni**les were probably freezing to little icicles. And she seriously expected him to join her? Him, and all his precious, highly-susceptible-to-extreme-temperatures bits?
“Listen, Madeline. There’s been some misunderstanding. I’m not here for a swim. We need to talk.”
“And I need to show you an inlet, around those rocks. There’s no other way to get there but to swim. We’ll talk when we arrive.” She cocked her head. “You’re not frightened, are you?”
Frightened. Ha. What was that he heard, splashing into the water? Must have been a gauntlet.
“No.”
Colin pried off his boots. He laid aside his coat. Then he rolled up his trouser legs, cuffing them at the knees, and likewise turned up his sleeves to the elbow.
He girded his loins.
“Very well. Here I come.” He winced, plowing into the frigid depths. When the waterline reached his navel, he swore aloud. “This is true valor, I hope you know. Legends have sprung from less. All Lancelot did was paddle about in a balmy lake.”
She smiled. “Lancelot was a knight. You’re a viscount. The bar is higher.”
He gave a raspy chuckle, breathless from the cold. “Why is it,” he asked, nearing her, “that you only display that delightfully wicked sense of humor when you’re chilled and wet through?”
“I . . .” Her eyelashes fluttered so fast and so hard, she might have been trying to take flight with them. “I don’t know.”
Even though she was submerged in icy water, she blushed crimson. All her invisible barriers went back up, instantly. So odd. Most women of his acquaintance relied on physical beauty and charm to mask their less-pleasant traits. This girl did the opposite, hiding everything interesting about herself behind a prim, plain façade.
What other surprises was she concealing?
“Let’s keep moving,” she said. “Follow me.”
Swimming in easy, unhurried strokes, she led him around an archipelago of boulders, into a small inlet bounded by steep cliffs.
Colin craned his neck, looking up at the rocky bluffs. And he knew, right then, that so long as he lived, he would never understand what made a man—or woman—look at a stone wall and think, I believe I’d enjoy attending a symposium on these.
“So, what are we looking at?”
“Not up there,” she said. “Down here.”
“Down where?” He looked around him. He saw nothing but water.
“There’s a cave. The entrance is hidden at high tide. I’ll show you. Hold my arm.”
She extended her arm, and he clasped it above the elbow. She clasped his arm in similar fashion.
She said, “Now take a deep breath.”
“Wait. What are we—”
He never took that deep breath she’d suggested. Down she went, before he had any chance. Colin found himself being dragged by his arm, completely submerged beneath the water’s surface. She propelled them forward, kicking her feet like little fins.
They’d entered some sort of tunnel, it seemed.
He felt rock scrape against his back. He kicked, and bashed rock with his foot. He reached up, where the water’s surface ought to be.
Rock there, too. He was trapped.
He opened his eyes underwater. All was dark. Nothing to see. Murky as pitch. Walled in by stone. No air. No air, only water.
He tried to swim back. She pulled him forward. Then they stopped altogether, trapped in that narrow passage of rock. His lungs burned. His limbs tingled. His ears filled with the roar of water and the frantic pounding of his heart, trapped and thrashing against his ribs.
He could die here.
Perversely, his greatest fear was that he wouldn’t. That his lungs would somehow learn to do without air, and he would simply remain down here—trapped in an endless, dark, watery silence. Reliving that hellish night forever.
This is death. I am alone.
But he wasn’t alone. Her grip locked around his arm, like a manacle. Her other hand closed around his wrist, and she gave a hard pull. He shot through the remainder of the rock tunnel and surfaced, gasping, on the other side.
More darkness greeted him. There was air to breathe, but he had to work for it.
“It’s all right,” she said. “You’re through.”
“Jesus,” he finally managed, pushing water off his face. “Jesus Christ and John the Baptist. For that matter, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John.” Still not enough. He needed to reach back to the Old Testament for this. “Obadiah. Nebuchadnezzar. Methuselah and Job.”
“Be calm,” she said, taking him by the shoulders. “Be calm. And there are women in the Bible, you know.”
“Yes. As I recall it, they were trouble, every last one. What is this place? I can’t see a bloody thing.”
“There’s light. Give it a moment, and you’ll see.”
He tilted his head. Light shone through a few lacy openings in the rock overhead. Meager white pinpricks against a blanket of jet.
She grasped his chin and swiveled his face away from the light, down to meet hers. “Don’t look directly at it, or your eyes will never adjust. Just focus on me and take slow breaths. That’s it. In . . . and out.”
She spoke in a calm, soothing voice. Likely the same tone she employed to soothe her sister through a breathing crisis. Colin’s pride bristled. He didn’t need coddling. But he quite enjoyed the smoky, entrancing quality of her voice and her tender touch against his cheek. His pounding heart began to slow.
Eventually the white specks overhead diffused to a faint, milky glow that illuminated her features. Soft, dark calf eyes with inky lashes. Rounded cheeks and pale skin. Those lips, wet with seawater.
“You see me now?” she whispered.
He nodded. And it was surely that brush with death coloring his perception, or perhaps the dim light—but he found her lovely.
“I see you.” Sliding his arms around her waist, he pulled her close.
“What happened? Did you lose your bearings underwater?” She pushed a damp strand of hair from his brow. “Should I be worried about you?”