Which was a foolish thing to do when under the water, and he sat up, coughing and sputtering as he cleared the water from his lungs. He shook wet hair from his forehead.
“Are you alright?” Lindy was ankle-deep in the water, her brows drawn low in concern. She held out a hand to help him, and he clasped her slender fingers in his own.
And pulled.
Lindy shrieked as she fell forward with a splash, and he immediately lost sight of her as more than a dozen feathery wings converged upon him in a storm of swan aggression. He batted away the nipping beaks. “Lindy, call your birds off.”
“I don’t think I will,” she answered coolly. “You pulled me into the lake.”
“You pushed me in first,” he pointed out. The princes, apparently satisfied that he meant no further harm, slowly backed off.
“You were rude.” She crossed her arms, standing in water just deep enough to lap against her elbows.
“You told me to go home.”
“You said you were miserable.”
“Miserable beingalone.”
She rolled her eyes. “I still don’t buy it. You live like a hermit.”
“Hermits can still be lonely.” The words left his mouth almost without thinking, and he realized as he said them how true they were.
Ms. Fumley had been right. Hewaslonely.
It had just taken a thieving prince, an outcast queen, and a ridiculous counter-curse to show him exactly what he was missing.
Lindy.
Lindy and her sharp, sarcastic wit.
Lindy and her damaged heart that still offered kindness and compassion even while it bled.
Lindy and her stubborn, unrelenting insistence on standing on her own, because she had never been shown that she was safe being held.
“Why are you looking at me like that?”
He blinked, shoving the sudden revelations aside for consideration at a later time. “Like what?”
“Like there’s something wrong with my face.”
“There’s absolutely nothing wrong with your face,” he answered honestly. “Though it is looking a little dry.”
He swept his hand through the water, sending a wave her way. She sputtered as the water hit her, then laughed. The sound was even more beautiful than Atlas had imagined, and he was so distracted by the sparkling sound and the wide, beaming smile on her face that he missed the moment when she launched a counter attack of her own. He splashed back, then pushed off from thebottom of the lake, retreating into deeper waters. She squealed and jumped after him, but her laughter quickly turned into panic as she floundered in the water and gasped, “I can’t swim.”
He was by her side in an instant, gripping her about the waist and treading water as she clung to his shoulders with shaking arms. “Why didn’t you say so?” He pulled through the water with one arm until his feet could reach the bottom again.
“I didn’t think it was that deep. And…I was having fun.”
His heart cracked at the timid, whispered words, as if she felt she should be punished for experiencing a moment of joy. He moved his arm from her waist, intending to let her exit on the water on her own, but she tightened her arms around his neck. “Don’t. Please.”
Atlas resumed his hold and looped his other arm under her legs, hitching her higher. She melted into him, and he closed his eyes, taking a moment to breathe. “I’ve got you, Lindy. You’re safe.”
“I have to admit,I questioned the practicality of carrying around a hooded cloak in the summertime, but I get it now. You were prepared for unexpected dips in the lake.”
Lindy lifted her brows, the action almost imperceptible in the dark shadows of her hood. Now that she was no longer shivering and had a warm meal in her belly, some of her sass seemed to have returned. “Or perhaps I didn’t want anyone to know who I was when I left.”
He tilted his head. “But wouldn’t wearing a cloak in the summertime be more conspicuous than just putting on a hat?”
