With an effort of supreme will, Nigel dragged his voice up from the abyss and forced it through the tightened passage of his throat. “I don’t know. It looks fairly deep to—”
A wild shriek burst through his ears. The next moment, Nigel’s staring eyes glimpsed a blur of pink, followed by a splash and a surge of white bubbles. Water hit him in the face, and he gasped and put up both hands ineffectively to protect himself. Then, leaning out over the dark water, he sought for some sign of a sinking body. “Miss Talbot!” he cried.
She emerged in a spatter of droplets, eyes blinking, mouth laughing, hair sticking to her face in dark coils. “Brrrrrrh! It’s nothalfcold, is it?” she cried, her teeth chattering. Her arms moved gracefully, treading water with ease, and she beckoned with one hand. “Come on in, Mr. Grimm!” she yelled, her voice loud enough to be heard over the waterfall. “It’s just the thing to beat the heat!”
“Errrrrh.” Nigel gulped, his chest spasming for lack of air. He couldn’t see much of her. Everything but her head, neck, shoulders, and arms was an indistinct blur, hidden by the murky waves. But his imagination performed magnificently, filling in all the blanks where it really, truly oughtn’t. Her pink slip certainly wasn’t helping. It was close enough to flesh color to lead the mind to believe she was, in fact, completely naked, and . . .
There was no way in any hell he was getting into that water with her. Not with these sudden, powerfulurgescoursing through every vein.
Luna tipped her head to one side. Then she opened her mouth and said something. Nigel frowned. He couldn’t hear her. She’d been clear enough a moment ago, but now the roar of the waterfall, combined with the throb of his own pulse, seemed to drown out her words. “What was that?” he called out.
She swam toward him, speaking again, but not loud enough. Nigel shook his head and pointed at his ear. Shrugging, she drew in closer to the shore, and he tried valiantly not to notice the lovely, lithe length of her legs kicking behind her. Her hands gripped the rocky edge beside him, and she pulled herself partway out of the water, and motioned for him to bend down.
Nigel grimaced. His heart seemed to have thickened into a knot and lodged itself in his airway. But he leaned over anyway, drawing his head closer so that she could put her lips near to his ear.
“It’s not deep,” she said. “You can stand on the bottom here.”
“Oh, Miss Talbot.” He shook his head, beginning to draw away again. “I really don’t think I should—”
Her hand darted out, arm extending from the water. She latched hold of his suspender strap and, before he could quite register her intentions, pushed with her legs away from theshore, surging out into the pool. Nigel had just enough time to utter a yelp of surprise.
Then icy cold waves closed over his head.
It was so cold and so dark and so sudden.
Nigel experienced a moment of panic before his feet found the ground, and he realized that, indeed, it was actually shallow near the pool’s edge. He found his footing and surged up out of the water, his head emerging with a great gasp. Streams poured through his hair, down his face and shoulders, plastering his unbuttoned shirt to his skin. It was bracingly cold! But when he stood, his upper chest and shoulders were well above the waterline, and he immediately felt the contrast with the overwarm air.
Spinning in place, he cast about. Luna splashed a little ways from him, performing a backstroke and laughing, her smile so brilliant it nearly blinded him. Nigel shook water from his eyes, blinking fast. “Why, you littleminx!”he roared.
Luna laughed again, her mouth moving, saying something he couldn’t hear through the water in his ears. Then she swept her hand across the surface of the pool and sent a wave splashing in his face. Nigel put up both hands to defend himself before setting his teeth and swiping a wave of his own in her direction.
Luna shrieked with delighted terror and immediately sank under the water and vanished.
“Miss Talbot?” Nigel’s eyes widened. He shook his head again, flinging droplets every which way. “Miss Talbot!” The pool was very dark here. It would be all too easy to imagine secret aquatic horrors lurking in those depths and—
A pair of hands gripped his ankles.
Nigel had just enough time to picture an image of deep-sea tentacles (which, even in the moment, he recognized was ridiculous) before he went over backwards once more. His bum hit the pool floor, but he surged upright almost immediately, sputtering and shaking his head and . . .
And was he laughing? Actuallylaughing?It felt so strange on his face, in his chest, in his heart. He hardly recognized the sensation. But it was there. And it was real.
Luna popped back into sight like a mischievous mermaid. She pushed hair from her eyes and blinked around, searching for her victim. When she spotted him, she raised her eyebrows, her smile tilting dangerously.
“All right, Miss Talbot,” Nigel said, uncertain if she could hear him over the waterfall’s noise, “you asked for it!”
Standing up out of the water, he ripped the outer shirt from his body and tossed it onto the rocky ledge. Then, turning to face her, he began wading out as fast as he could go with his sodden trousers dragging him down. Luna looked suddenly alarmed and shook her head swiftly, motioning with one hand. She didn’t think he was really going todoanything to her, did she?
His foot came down.
And kept on going down over the lip of a steep drop-off.
A hideously unmanly sound burst from Nigel’s lips as he sank suddenly, horribly, back into the dark water. Only this time, there was no place for his feet to plant, and his arms flailed uselessly, sending up a stream of bubbles. Darkness closed in,and it was not unlike the sensation of falling into the Dire, only with fewer screaming eldritch horrors and more lakeweed around his toes.
Before fear could entirely set in, however, a pair of arms locked around his chest. In the same moment, he felt his feet touch bottom, and he managed to give a little push up. Between that and the assistance of his would-be rescuer, he surged back toward daylight and broke the water’s surface with a gasp and a splash of both arms.
“Don’t flail about!” Luna’s voice spoke close to his ear. “Relax and try to go limp. I’ve got you, Mr. Grimm.”
There was no relaxing to be had, however. Not with her lips just brushing against his ear, not with her arms wrapped around him, and his shoulders leaning back against her chest. Nigel felt tension shoot through every muscle of his body.
