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“It’s two hundred and fifty feet down to the beach, Tildi.”

“Wow, I’ve never even seen that many steps. We’d better get started. The guards who are left have to be tracking us by now. We have to hurry.”

“We will, but there are no steps.”

Confusion danced across her face. “No steps? Then how are we supposed to get down there?”

He slid her from his lap and knelt next to his pack, unzipping the bottom before pulling out what looked like a flat backpack. After rezipping the bag, he stood and held it up to her.

“We get down with this,” he said.

Her confusion vanished, replaced by fear. “It looks like an awfully small bag to hold two hundred and fifty steps.”

Ignoring her sarcasm, he asked, “Tildi, do you know what base jumping is?”

She shook her head. “I’ve heard of it, but I’m not exactly sure.”

That was probably a good thing. He explained while he took out his chute and harness. “It’s not a big deal,” he said. “I’ve done this hundreds of times. It will only last about ten seconds, and I’ll be holding you almost the entire time.”

She shook her head. “Wait, what will only last about ten seconds? No, strike that. What do you meanalmostthe entire time?”

How could he word this in a way that wouldn’t freak her out? Nothing came to mind. “I’m going to need you to take off my coat, Bluebell.”

“But it’s cold,” she replied.

“I know, babygirl, but the coat will get too heavy when we get into the water. It will weigh you down. You have to take it off so we can add it to the backpack. I have a blanket on the boat that will warm you up.”

“Okay, I guess.”

The petulance in her tone almost made him smile as he slipped his coat from her shoulders and stuffed it into the backpack. He was about to make her jump off a two hundred and fifty foot cliff, and she was whiny because she had to do it without his coat.

Kneeling in front of her, he snapped the leg straps together before holding them out. “Step,” he said. She didn’t move, but one pointed glance back at the boulder had her grabbing his shoulder to steady herself as she stepped into the leg straps.

Her legs were smooth and toned, and he had the sudden urge to run his tongue up her inner thigh as she stood before him with her legs slightly spread. His cock began to swell again, obviously on board with that plan.

Get a grip, for fucks sake. You’re not in junior high.

He hadn’t had this kind of reaction to a woman in three years. He stood, pulled the canvas loops up her gorgeous legs, and secured the chest straps in place.

“This is bringing back less than pleasant memories of my backpack in middle school,” she said as he pulled the shoulder straps in place. “At least this isn’t as heavy as my trig and chemistry books.”

He paused. “You took trig and chemistry in middle school?”

She blushed as if being smart was something to be ashamed of and shrugged. “It’s not hard when you have personal tutors every day.”

Why would she downplay her intelligence? “Sounds hard to me,” he said.

He was no slouch in the academic department, but it seemed his babygirl was on an entirely different level.

“Well, it wasn’t,” she said. “But it was something that made me different from everyone else. It’s hard to make friends when you’re twelve, taking classes with sixteen and seventeen-year-olds. I had to fail things on purpose so people would stop calling me a freak.”

He cracked his neck to each side to give himself time to calm down. He was all for allowing a child to live up to their full potential, but it sounded like Tildi’s parents hadn’t considered her overall well being. He could picture her sitting alone at lunch with no one to talk to. How isolated had she felt?

He let that drop for now but filed it away to bring up on the trip home. They would need many topics to make conversation on the nearly three week journey. That was one of the many things they could do to pass the time. Something to look forward to.

Now for the hard part. Placing his hands on her shoulders, he said, “This is how it’s going to go. We are jumping down into the water. You are wearing a parachute designed for jumping exactly this distance. You are strapped in, so there is no way for you to fall. It will feel like you are floating for ten to fifteen seconds. I’ll be holding on to you the whole way.”

“How are you going to be holding onto me if I’m falling off a cliff?” she asked, and her voice sounded so small. It killed him that he had to put her through this, but there was no other way.