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“Do you have any fucking clue what you’re doing?”

She shrugged, looking at me in challenge. “No. Do you?”

“Good point.”

Something crackled from the headset, but just as I reached for it, Chase was rushing up behind me, pointing at the sky.

“Look out!”

My gaze shot up just in time to see another plane on a collision course with us. In my panic, I yanked the yoke to the right, which turned out to be a bad thing. Alarms blared, everyone—including me—fell sideways from the force of the turn, and we were headed right toward a fucking mountain.

“Oh, fuck!” I shouted, raising the yoke with all my might. I had no fucking clue what I was doing, but doing something was better than nothing. We were flying higher and higher, cresting over mountains and leaving the airport in the dust, but nothing about this flight was okay.

Every fucking red light was blinking and alarms were sounding everywhere. “Scottie, what the fuck do I do?”

I started hitting buttons, desperately trying to figure out something that would reset the fucking plane.

“Abandon ship!” Chase shouted, hauling me out of my seat.

“This isn’t a ship!”

A parachute was thrust into my arms and I quickly pulled it on, then rushed over to get one for Nick.

“We’re out of chutes!” Nick shouted, holding up the last one that was for him, leaving Piper with nothing.

“Keep it.”

“Hey!” Piper snapped, glaring at me. “Am I supposed to fly?”

“You’re not flying. You’re hitching with me.”

I quickly found a strap and made a makeshift harness, wrapping it around Piper in double time.

She lifted her arms, her eyes wide with terror. “This isn’t a parachute!”

“It’ll hold.”

“You swear?”

“It should,” I said, continuing to tighten the strap. “Whatever you do, don’t wiggle.”

Her eyes widened in horror. “What the fuck does that mean?”

I grabbed her hand and tugged her to the door, snatching the briefcase at the last second and shoving it into Nick’s hands. We stared out into the open abyss for all of two seconds before she started pulling away from me.

“I changed my mind! I don’t want to do this!”

“You can die in a fiery crash or jump out of the plane.”

She looked outside again and then back to me. “Fiery crash!”

I smirked, then grabbed her around the waist and tucked her into me as I dove out of the plane.

Her screams echoed off the mountains, piercing my eardrums. You would have thought the lack of oxygen would have shut her up, but somehow, she was immune to it.

I tightened my hold on her, glad the makeshift harness was holding for the time being.

The real test would be when I pulled the cord.

If it didn’t hold, she’d plummet to the earth, but at least she’d die faster than in a plane crash.

“Hold on!” I shouted, pulling the chute.

We jerked hard as the canopy opened and came to a rough halt.

My fingers bit into her harness as I held her to me, but thankfully, it held for the time being.

Her face was buried against my chest and her whimpers could be heard over the air whooshing around us.

“Now’s the time to take in the view!” I shouted.

Slowly, she raised her head, looking out over the landscape. She sucked in a breath and shivered in my hold. “I’m freezing! And I think I lost my shoe!”

I couldn’t see jack shit from how I was holding her, but it didn’t matter. Heels wouldn’t do a damn bit of good in the mountains. “Bet you didn’t plan on learning to skydive today.”

“This is not skydiving,” she shouted. “This is gracefully falling to your death! I would have preferred the fiery plane crash!”

I looked around, spotting Chase and Nick in the distance. They were further to the left, having jumped out after me. We’d have to hike through the mountains to get to them, but at least we were alive. For now.

“I have a confession to make!” she shouted over the roar of the wind.

“What’s that?”

“I really don’t like heights!”

I chuckled, holding her tighter to me. “It’s a little late to change your mind about taking that flight.”

“I have another confession,” she yelled. “I think you’re really sexy!” She looked up into my eyes, her cheeks bright red from the wind whipping at us. “I just thought I should say that in case I plummet to my death! I can’t have anything hanging over my head!”

“That’s alright,” I laughed.

“And I also didn’t pay my taxes last year!”

“Well, I think you’ll be okay.”

“And I accidentally called my fiancé Big Bad Dick in an email once. Except, I was responding to a group email and sent it to everyone instead of him!”

I guided us to the right, hoping to make it to a clearing, laughing the whole fucking time as she spilled her guts to me.

“And when I was in college, I stuck my roommate’s hand in water while she was sleeping because she told me I looked fat in my jeans. She wet the bed and was made fun of for three months!”

“That’s—”

“And when I was in high school, I was working at this shop and I really had to go to the bathroom. The toilet wouldn’t flush and I’d gone number two. I was so scared about them finding my poop that I pulled it out with toilet paper and stuffed it in the trash!”

I choked on a laugh. “You did what?”

“They were going to see my shit! But then the garbage didn’t get emptied and it smelled like shit in the bathroom. I was mortified!”

“I think confession time is done?—”

“And I always told James I liked it when he fingered me, but he was horrible at it! I was just too chicken to tell him!”

Now, that was interesting, but I didn’t have time to discuss it further as we soared toward our landing.

“Hold on!”

The trees came up at us fast. I tracked where everyone else was landing, but unfortunately for us, I couldn’t maneuver us to a safer location when I was trying to keep her ass from falling to the ground.

Branches bit at my skin as we crashed through the trees.

Her screams once again drowned out all other sound, and when we jerked to a stop fifteen feet off the ground, everything went silent.

“You okay?” I asked, still clutching her body to mine. Her harsh breaths filled the silence for a good minute before she finally responded.

“Sure. You know, my vagina has a giant strap pressing against my clit, and my legs feel numb, but other than that, I could be worse.”

I tried to ignore the fact that a strap was pressing against her pussy. I did not need to start having sexual fantasies about a woman that I literally met under an hour ago.

Looking around us at the ground, it was clear there was no soft landing in store for us. If it was winter, or even fall, there would be something on the ground to soften the impact. But it was the dead of summer and nothing but fallen twigs laid at our feet.

“We have a sort of problem,” I said as I tried to figure out how to get us down without breaking our necks. If it was just me, I’d go for it. But not only did she not have enough clothing on, she probably didn’t know how to brace for a landing.

“Other than the fact that we’re hanging from a tree?”

“How good are you at landing on your ass?”

She snorted, tilting her head up to look at me. “I’ve been knocked down a time or two.”

“I really hope that’s metaphorical,” I muttered.

“What’s the problem?”

“The problem is that you don’t know how to land and you aren’t wearing the right clothing.”

“It’s not like it can get much worse from here,” she countered. “How do I release this?”

Before I could warn her not to do anything, she unclipped the harness I’d made and screamed as she fell to the leaf-covered ground. Landing with an oomph, she rolled to her back and stared up at me, giving me a thumbs up.

“I’m okay! I’m not dead!”

“Fucking fantastic,” I muttered.

I pulled the quick release and braced for impact, grunting as I landed with a roll, avoiding breaking my face on anything.

I sat up, eyeing the woman’s gorgeous legs that didn’t have anything but a short skirt covering them.

Damn, this was not what I intended when I got on that plane, or when I chose her out of the crowd.

I just wanted a quick escape and some cover. Was that too much to ask for?

I sighed when I saw she was most definitely missing one heel.

Not that heels would be of any use out here.

They’d get stuck in the ground and probably make her twist her ankle.

There was nothing to do but carry her. I got to my feet and swung her up into my arms, ignoring the yelp that came from her beautiful, full lips.

Not that I was paying attention to her mouth.

“What are you doing?”

“Getting us out of here before you somehow manage to puncture a lung or something. Are you even a stewardess?”

“Are you a pilot?” she countered, tugging herself into a better position as I hoisted her to my back. “Ugh, this skirt was not made for piggyback rides.”

My dick agreed. Her thighs were wrapped around my waist, and my hands were clinging to her very bare legs. “Where are your tights?”

“Tights?”

“Pantyhose things. Don’t you wear them?”

“The girl I traded outfits with didn’t exactly have time to give me hers. Not that anyone really wears pantyhose anymore.”

I hiked through the mountain of leaves, adjusting my grip on her as I tried to spot anyone else from our group. “So, are you gonna tell me why you were hiding?”

She huffed in my ear, holding tighter than she needed to. “I was running from my asshole fiancé.”

That immediately had me stiffening. “Did he attack you?”

She burst out laughing at that. “Like he could lay a finger on me.”

“Then why is he an asshole?”

“Well, after two years living together, he finally proposed and the world was wonderful.” She held out her left hand for me to see the sparkling diamond on her ring finger.

“Nice,” I grunted, not really caring about the size or shape of her ring.

“That’s what I thought, too. We spent the whole night talking about the wedding and where we wanted it. Everything was perfect.”

“I hate to tell you this, but if a guy stays up all night talking about wedding details, there’s definitely something wrong.”

My thighs burned as I carted her up the mountain toward the only clearing I had spotted when we were soaring over the trees.

I was used to hauling around extra weight, but I hadn’t done it on a mountain in a long time.

Not since the last time I jumped out of a plane, which just so happened to be with Asher, the first time we met Scottie.

“What’s wrong with discussing wedding details?”

That had me chuckling. “What guy actually sits around talking about wedding venues and flowers?”

“Maybe not a lot, but some like to.”

“Yeah? What did you say happened with this asshole ex?”

She huffed irritatedly in my ear. “I walked into work the next day and found him screwing some London bitch on a table.”

I was not one to judge, but I could already see the way this was headed. “Let me guess, corporate asshole?”

“Maybe,” she hedged.

“And I’m guessing that wasn’t her first visit.”

“She hadn’t been back to the States in years. Not since they broke up, but he’s been taking trips to the London office.”

“And you never suspected?”

“Call me crazy, but I don’t typically assume the worst of my boyfriends.”

“I’m guessing that will change now that you found him cheating on you.”

She squeezed her arms tighter around my neck, nearly choking me.

“You wanna ease up on your grip,” I said, my voice turning scratchy. “You’re choking the hell out of me.”

“Oops.” She loosened her grip, holding onto my shoulders instead of wrapping her arms around me. “So, now that we’ve crashed, where are we going? You can’t carry me all over creation.”

“Sweetheart, I think you strongly underestimate my strength.”

“Okay, big man,” she teased. “I’m sure you’re all strong and powerful, but nobody can tote around another human for hours on end without tiring.”

“I never said I wouldn’t tire, but trust me, I could carry you all over this mountain. So, that chick at the airport that you said was your fake niece…”

“Never met her until this morning.”

“Then why did she save your ass?”

“I’m not sure,” she sighed. “I don’t even know her name. I just gave her the name Celia so I wasn’t calling her the girl . I gave her a hundred dollars to get me through security. After that, shit happened.”

Like her boyfriend coming after her, though I wasn’t sure it was his men chasing us down. It could have just as easily been Masterson’s goons. She shifted behind me, rubbing her breasts against my back. This was not going to work. I stopped and lowered her to the ground.

“Tired already?” she smirked.

Little did she know that the only reason I was setting her down was because the trip was becoming uncomfortable. My dick could only handle so much temptation, and having her boobs pressed against me the whole time was making the walk uncomfortable.

“I’m sure you can keep up,” I muttered, walking away.