AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“If I was stuck to you, you wouldn’t fall in a hole,” he complains. “Is there something down there you can stand on? I’ve no idea where the others got to.”
I snicker as I turn to look around. It never gets old when he misinterprets English sayings based on the translation. There are a few pieces of wood from the collapsed supports scattered around, so I collect and stack them beneath the hole. Then, fearing they might topple under me, I pry up a heavy stone slab from the edge of the pool and lug it over. Once I set it on top of my wood stack, its weight makes a decent stabilizer. When I climb directly on the center, it feels sturdy, but I know any false moves would have me wobbling.
At this height, I can tell that when I was dangling, my peril was mostly illusion. I was only a couple feet from the ground.
I remove the glove that remained and wipe my palms off on my thighs. There’ll be no slippery hand mistakes this time around.
“Ready?” Mak asks. He’s been watching my whole operation like a hawk. “Can you jump?”
“Jump?”
“If I pull you up by your arms, you could injure your shoulder. A little jump toward me, and I’ll catch you by your torso.”
“But if I fall again, I’m falling on top of this pile of hard objects,” I say, gesturing toward the wood and stone under my feet.
“But you won’t fall, because I will catch you,” he says with a sweet smile.
“Like you did the first time?” I cry.
“My wife doesn’t trust me,” he pouts, eyes still glimmering with amusement.
“If I crack my head open, just know I did it out of spite,” I warn him.
“You will not,” he assures me. “Now, are you ready?”
His arms are reaching out, steady and waiting for me to come within snatching distance.
“On three,” I say, bending my knees and getting my momentum going. “One, two, three!”
I jump as high as I can manage, and Mak swoops his wingspan down to clamp on my upper body. His strong grip pinches into my ribcage, but it doesn’t matter because he has me. My arms wind tight around his neck. I can feel his grunts of effort against my cheek as he pulls me up while carefully maintaining his own balance.
He clutches me tight, dragging me away from the edge, and I collapse into his arms in relief.
Then we’re suddenly laughing, our bodies shivering against one another from the sheer emotional release.
“I can’t believe you were shouting at me from the bottom of a pit to not ruin that silly mosaic,” he wheezes.
“I can’t believe you threw a fit about my safety and then told me to jump off a pile of rotted wood,” I snort back at him between giggles, wiping the corner of my eyes. I’m laughing so hard, my ribs are cramping.
Something about the moment makes me pause as the laughter fades, and I’m left with a dull ache in my abdomen. My legs straddle his waist, reminding me of our first real sexual encounter. My body remembers it vividly because the positioning stirs desire in my belly.
I want to do this forever with him, and not because of any of the things that drew me to sign our marriage contract. What he said about the past is true—why fear what’s already a part of me? I kept fearing more what that past would do to him, how it might stand between him and the happiness that he deserves.
But he’s the kind of man who would never hide from demons, whether they be real or imagined. I’ll have to ask him one day to teach me a thing or two about being that brave.
He clears his throat as the tension between our bodies gets too high.
“We should probably get out of this room and rope it off, don’t you think?”
“Right,” I agree, my voice pitched high. “Then we’ll find the others and warn them about the hazard.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
FRANKIE
Mak and I have a small tent to hide in away from the crowd as we prepare for the ritual. Someone is playing music in the meantime, an ethereal orchestral arrangement that suits the haunting aesthetic of the Proving Pool. He’s placing a special wristlet on me that will monitor my vitals while I’m under the water, all the while pouting in an adorably grumpy fashion.
“I won’t be able to see you, but this will let us know whether we need to pull you out.” He opens his palm to show me two contact lenses. “And these will protect your eyes so that you can see while you’re underwater.”
