Chapter 30
Tink
“Good morning, love.”
A rock dug into her leg. At some point she’d rolled on a wing, and it ached something fierce.
But as she cracked open her sleep-heavy lids and gazed into James’s smiling face, none of that mattered.
One leg was twined with his, so much warmer than the other.
Color raced to her cheeks as she registered the hardness pressed against her thigh.
James’s arm flexed around her waist as he tugged her closer.
“Good morning.” She bit her lip, holding in a sheepish smile. It didn’t matter how many times they woke up together. Each time was a wonder, a joy, a moment she wanted to last forever. The damp cave had to be one of the worst places she’d ever slept, yet she had no desire to leave.
Birdcalls teased her ears. Light spilled into their dwelling, reflecting against the wetness of one wall. “The storm passed?”
“Looks like it.” His legs rubbed hers, eliciting a small whimper.
Tink glanced toward the entrance. The crew would be looking for them. The flood of light said it was past dawn. She sighed and dropped her cheek to his chest. “I wish we could just stay here.”
Calloused fingers trailed up her side, leaving gooseflesh in their wake. They twisted a lock of hair, traced one ear. “Me too, love. Me too.”
Slowly, reluctantly, he slid out from under her. Cold rushed into the vacated space.
Tink twisted around, watching with unabashed interest as Hook inspected their clothes.
His tight ass could inspire sonnets. Not to mention the strong arms, powerful legs, and lean hips.
Her thighs squeezed together as she took stock of the man before her.
She had half a mind to drag him back down to the hard, rocky ground and have her way with him.
James looked back at her over one shoulder, an upward twist to his kiss-bruised lips. “Little minx.”
She grinned in return. Why deny it?
“Still a little damp.” He balled up her clothes and tossed them to her.
A little damp was an understatement. They’d barely dried at all.
Tink sighed and glanced back toward the cave opening. At least the sun would be warm. Already it crept along the cave wall—
“James!” She jumped to her feet. Her wings gave a slight flutter.
“What?” He whirled around, still stark naked, searching for a danger that didn’t exist.
“Look!” she nearly squealed.
“Aye, it’s sunny today.”
“Not that.” She rushed toward the carving she’d spied, not caring about the hard rocks under her soles. “There!” She flung out her arm toward the cave wall.
“Wha—” His eyes flew wide. “The eagle.”
Laughter spilled out as she bounced with glee. The clue. It had to be.
James’s chest rose and fell before he whipped around toward the back of the cave. “There’s a pool back there.” He turned back to her. “A shallow pool.”
“In shallow pool the scale is found,” she repeated the witch’s words.
James grinned like a man who’d just been declared king of all, and he waved her to him.
Tink fluttered across the ground, her toes barely touching. He’d already hefted a torch from the remnants of their fire. Its smoke curled up toward a narrow opening above that dripped rainwater into the cave.
Still naked as the day they were born, they picked their way over the rocky ground toward the back of the cave. What did clothes matter when the object they sought was within reach? Besides, the witch said it would be in the shallow pool—no sense getting everything wet or stripping down yet again.
Cool air raised gooseflesh along Tink’s skin, but she barely noticed, not with the tingle of excitement already running through her veins and joy practically pouring off the man at her side.
A pool of clear water stretched toward the edges of the cave at the end of the tunnel. Narrow strands of light filtered in from a crevice in the roof.
“It’s deeper than before.” James frowned as he wedged the torch between two nearby rocks.
The storm’s fault, no doubt. Of course it would make this last part harder too. Didn’t it always?
Small pebbles littered the bottom of the clear pool. “How will we find the scale in all this? Do you even know what it looks like?”
James shook his head. “No idea.” He looked her up and down. “Though it might be a good thing we left our clothes behind.”
Heat rushed to the tips of her ears. As if she needed another reminder of his nudity.
She’d stubbed her toe twice on the short walk there because she’d been too preoccupied with her view of James.
Their goal within reach or not, he was a huge distraction.
Even the cold didn’t detract from that…much.
Water splashed as James stepped into the pool. “Bloody cold!” he yelped.
Tink sighed. They were going into the water. Of course. Why, oh why, do I always have to get in the water? She stuck a toe in and nearly shrieked. Bloody cold is right.
Calm pool. No waves. Not that much different than the streams at home, she repeated silently to herself, trying to calm her racing thoughts. But the streams at home were warm and much less deep. Shallow pool, her ass. Maybe it had been before the rain.
Her foot slipped. Tink yelped as her arms flailed in the air and her wings beat behind her, barely keeping her upright.
“Got you.” James grabbed her arm, steadying her.
Tink gasped, but it wasn’t just his touch that had her heart racing and the cold melting away. Out in the deepest part of the pool, something glowed a pale, eerie blue. “Look.”
He followed her line of sight. His eyes widened, and he stepped in front of her.
“The scale?” She peeked around him.
“Don’t know.” His voice held a hard edge, as if an enemy had just dropped from the roof. “Stay here.” No sooner had he let her go to venture into the deeper water than the glow vanished.
“Bloody—”
“Where’d it go?” Tink splashed forward, heedless of his words or the water rising up her thighs. She brushed against James, and the glow flared back to life.
Breath caught in her throat. “Every time we touch…”
James turned toward her. “Two bound as one.” The last of the witch’s words. He took her hand in his. “We have to get it together.”
Tink swallowed the sudden tightness in her throat. She’d have to go into that deep water with him.
“And one more thing…” He glanced down at the stump of his hand where he’d yet to reattach his hook.
Her stomach dropped. “If you’re holding my hand, you can’t pick up the scale.”
“Aye.”
“I could hold your arm…maybe…” She looked away. Blast it, that water would be over her head.
He pulled her close in a comforting embrace. “I’ll swim for us and get us down there. You just have to grab it.”
Easier said than done.
Tink practically clung to James like a monkey in a tree as they walked out into the depths. True to his word, all she had to do was hold on. And hold her breath. James plunged below the surface with Tink wrapped in his arms.
The icy water closing over her face nearly made her screech out all the air she’d sucked in before he dove.
Water everywhere. Can’t swim. Lungs burning.
James gave her a little shake.
Scale. Right. Get it together.
Small stones littered the pool floor, but only one emitted the eerie blue glow that surrounded them. The scale?
Tink grasped it, but the slimy sensation she expected didn’t greet her fingers. It was smooth and flat, like a triangle-shaped rock. Before she could wonder at it more, James kicked off the bottom and hauled them to the surface.
“Perfect, love. Don’t drop it.”
She barely heard him over her gasps for air. They’d only been down there a moment, but it could have been a lifetime.
When they reached waist-deep water, James set her on her feet.
She shook the water off her wings. Tink unfurled her hand to reveal the small object she’d clutched for dear life.
“It doesn’t look much like a scale.” Not that she had a ton of experience with fish, but she was pretty sure scales weren’t stones.
“Aye, but it fits the witch’s words.”
Tink frowned. “Unless she led us to a rock.”
“Something like this…” James picked up the stone whose glow had faded. Out of the water, Tink could see finely engraved marks across its surface. “It has to be what Titania wants.”
Please, please, let it be. “Then we can lift your curse,” she said, in an effort to be optimistic.
A sad smile touched his face. “And you can go home.”
Her chest ached. Home. Right. She could no longer meet his gaze. James placed the scale back into her palm and turned away.
“Wai—” Tink reached for him, but he dived back into the pool.
A minute later, he returned bearing a handful of the other rocks. “Just in case,” he said, shaking the water from his hair like a dog.
Tink raised her arm against the splatter. “In case what?”
He shrugged. “Well, we didn’t know what it looked like. I’d wager no one else does either. Can’t be too careful with treasure.”
His grin sent a whole mess of feelings sloshing inside her that she couldn’t deal with, especially as his gaze dropped to her chest, barely hidden by her sodden hair, then lower. Tink coughed and turned away. They needed clothes. Now.
Sliding the cold, wet garments over her skin was more of a travesty than diving in the pool. Well, almost.
James slid the fake scales into his pack but brought the real one back to her. “I want you to hold onto this.”
“Me?” Tink squeaked, rocking onto the balls of her feet.
He took her hand and pressed it into her palm. “I like to have the things I value most in one place.” The look in his eyes nearly stripped her bare—again.
Words failed to reach her tongue. All she could manage was a soft “oh” as her skin heated in a rush.
The stone was oddly warm in her hand as she slid it into one of the little inner pockets sewn into the waistband of her breeches.
No one would get it there…except maybe James.
Damn, if she didn’t look forward to his attempts to seek that plunder.
Spending so much time without their clothes had not dulled her desire to see him without them again—not at all.
Tink blinked against the bright sunlight and shielded her eyes as they emerged from the cave.
Blessed warm, beautiful sun! The storm had passed all right, leaving blue skies above.
A haze of fog lingered just below them on the mountainside that the day had yet to burn away—if it even could on this cursed island.
Birds chirped and squawked. A monkey chittered off to her left. But the crew was nowhere to be found.
“Maybe they camped a ways down the path,” James said as if reading her thoughts.
“Maybe,” she echoed, but something felt wrong. The scene was too happy. Too…normal. And wouldn’t they have come right back? “You think they went for supplies to repair the bridge?”
“Maybe. Come on.” His words were clipped, but it wasn’t frustration. He was worried. The stiff set of shoulders gave him away, even as he held his hand out to her.
She took it, following him over the uneven rocks until they reached the narrow section of gorge she’d nearly plunged into the day before.
“If we find a thick vine, we might—”
“No, I’ve got this.” Her wings fluttered. She stretched and rolled her shoulders.
He’d argue against it. She’d told him how weak her wings were outside the vale.
Yesterday it’d taken all she had to haul him up the cliffside in the pounding rain.
Dust had returned. So much of it, more than she dared hope, and she hadn’t shed a bit of it to use for other purposes.
It was because of him, their time together.
Despite the hardships, she was happy in his arms, his presence. Each smile…
His jaw shifted, and she rushed to explain. “I can—” she began.
“I trust you.”
Her eyes widened. “You…”
“I trust you,” he repeated.
“All right. I can do it,” she added, more for herself than him. “I’ll just, um…” She stretched on her tiptoes, lacing her arms around his neck. “Lift me—oh!”
James palmed her ass, lifting her up and pressing her tight against him as she wrapped her legs around his waist. He tipped his forehead against hers. “You have my life in your hands again, love.”
No pressure or anything. One deep breath filled her lungs, then another. “Back to the edge of the cliff.”
One careful step after the other, he complied.
Wings, don’t fail me now.
Lifting them was easy. There was solid ground below their feet.
Flying out over the gorge, breeze battling against her wings, was another story.
Each beat and flutter ached. Pain raced down her back.
James was utterly still in her arms. She didn’t dare look at him.
Or speak. Her heart thundered in her chest. Sweat broke out on her neck.
Almost there. Almost…
Tink cried out in a mix of pain and relief as James’s boots touched the other side. Immediately he leaped back from the edge and spun her around to safety. She sagged against him, her feet sliding to the ground and her wings folding against her back. They’d made it. Thank all the holy elders.
James tilted her face up as she heaved in one breath after another. “Brilliant, love.”
A humorless laugh bubbled out. She could do without trying to lift her lover over another deadly drop. “Let’s go.” She turned away, unwilling to confess how hard the flight had been. “They’ve got to be close.”
Twenty minutes of stumbling down the rough pathway, and they’d seen nothing more than a scrap of cloth on a branch—which could have come from their trek up.
Tink halted. “Maybe we should go back.”
“Smee!” Hook called. Only the birds answered. “You’re right, let’s—” He turned, his eyes widening.
A beefy hand clamped over her mouth.