Tipping my head back, I chuckle. “Serial killers are narcissistic. I’d never kill myself to kill a victim. That doesn’t make any sense. Come on!” I cup her face, lean down, and kiss her. My stomach tilts as my eyes meet hers. Her arms lock around my waist, under my harness. “Don’t fuck with my harness, Black Widow.” My joke quells her nerves, her smile more genuine as each second passes.
Both of our nerves steeled, we board the plane. I connect her harness to mine. Her back to my front, we sit on the bench along the wall. She sits on my lap, her rapid pulse evident in her stomach where my hands are placed. The flight up to jumping altitude is the worst part. The pilot gives me a thumbs-up once we’re where we’re supposed to be altitude- and landing-zone wise. There’s a lit field to the left of the airport we use for night jumps so we know where to safely land. I lean into Malena’s ear and tell her we’re going to walk to the door. She nods once.
The pilot gives me another signal that we’re good to go. This is it. The adrenaline hits again but differently this time. A life is in my hands that is not my own. I have to go into business mode because it’s my autopilot, and that’s where I perform perfectly. There’s no room for error right now. The cabin is lit, so I check everything I can see.
“Toes on the edge,” I command, calling it loud enough for her to hear over the air and engines.
With both hands on the sides of the hatch door and Malena’s tiny frame in front of me, completely at my mercy, I start the countdown. To keep her calmer, I count three and two in my head.
“One,” I shout, and launch us out of the door.
Her scream pierces the darkness of night. I bet she doesn’t even realize she’s screaming. Once I adjust my arms and legs after the initial tumble from the aircraft, we’re steady.
“Open your eyes!” I yell, using a deep tone she’ll be able to hear.
I already told her that when I was explaining everything, but it’s the one thing most forget when they’re terrified. The ocean is visible off to the side, the bioluminescence lighting the deep ocean a neon blue. The landing zone is lit with lights, forming a circle. You can see the town from up here, the lights shining like little ants.
I move my arm methodically to check the altimeter on my wrist. We’re almost to the proper height to pull the chute. I don’t hear anything from Malena, and I wish I could see her face, wish I could see if she was loving this as much as I do. There’s a freedom up here. A recognition of how small we really are in this big, wide world. How impossible is it that one person actually finds the other one they are meant for? How impossible it seems. Except, at this moment, that one human is strapped to my chest. A part of me.
I pull the chute, and silence follows, the wind of falling changes to a soft whooshing as we begin our descent under the chute. Malena’s giggles cut through the quiet.
“I’m not dead!” she squeals out. “Do you see that?” She points to the ocean, and then the town, and the horizon where we can see the next city over.
My hands are busy holding the toggles to control where we glide. “It’s beautiful,” I call out. “Remember what I said about landing. It’s the toughest part of tandem. Feet straight out in front of you. Just let me do the landing.”
Her reply is another burst of laughter. I pull the left handle hard to spin us toward the lighted landing zone, the spotlights surrounding the grassy circle like an alien spacecraft imprint.“Brace,” I tell her. Her body tenses, and we glide into the center of the circle far faster than anyone ever expects. I try to protect my knees by waiting until the last possible moment to place my feet on land. It’s smooth. Easy. The way every landing is supposed to be. I unhook her from my chest as quickly as I can. She turns to look at me. The lights are lighting her smile like she’s some Hollywood star on stage—ready to give her acceptance speech.
“I can’t believe you get to do that for work. That is so unfair.” She bends down and hops up and down, as if she’s testing the earth’s solidity.
I grin. “Safe to say you enjoyed yourself. I love doing it at night. You can see so much. The lights are always amazing.”
“That was surreal,” Malena says, shaking her head. “Nothing will ever compare to that feeling. I…I…it was the greatest, the freest I’ve ever felt in my life. That view. The rush—falling.”
Her lips are still calling to me—shining in the dim glow. “I need to kiss you right now.”
“Because I love what you do for work?” Her brown eyes turn an amber color with the way the light is reflecting on them. Her white smile the shade of I’ll-never-fucking-shake-this-woman-in-a-lifetime.
This isn’t adrenaline I’m feeling. My breaths push through my mouth fast—harried, irrational. “No.” I shake my head.
Malena tilts her head to the side. “No?”
“I need to kiss you right now because I’m so fucking in love with you that I need your kiss to breathe.”
Her mouth pops open, and I take that as my sign from God. Taking her face into my hands, running my hands into her wind-blown hair, I press my lips to hers, my tongue taking hers, my heart pounding against hers. Her hands wind up and around my neck. It’s comforting.
I imagine what we look like from where we just were, high up in the sky. A bird’s-eye view of us kissing in the middle of this lit circle. All signs pointing to what is now so blatantly obvious to me. I love Malena. And I’ll love her for as long as she’ll let me. The kissing turns into a frenzy of tossed clothing and our bodies colliding. I make love to her on top of the parachute that guided us safely from the sky.
Her skin against mine is the only feeling I’ve ever craved in such a perilous degree. Like I may die if I go too long without being inside her. When Malena comes this time, she doesn’t call out my name—she whispers three sweet words into my ear. Over and over.
Over and over.
TWELVE
Malena
Months passin an unbearably blissful pace with Leif at my side and involved in every facet of my world. He’s entwined himself into my group of friends and has been there for me in every single way a man in love is there for his woman. When I’m upset and missing my mother, he offers to drive me to Garden Breeze to visit her. When I’m stressing out over deadlines now that my event planning business is in full swing, he makes sure I have pints of ice cream waiting for me when I get home. Weddings are hopping, and I left the general store as soon as humanly possible. I am the most fulfilled I’ve ever been in my entire life—surrounded by love from all angles.
We went to NYC for Tahoe and Caroline’s joint bachelor/bachelorette party, which I planned all on my own. Dating Leif in a new setting was something that I never dreamed of. Don’t get me wrong, seeing him in a T-shirt and board shorts does indecent things to everything below my waist, but seeing him in a suit and tie, his hair coiffed, and his shoes shined makes my mouth water. In any situation or circumstance, he’s readyfor whatever—a chameleon in a human’s body. I took my party organizing duties seriously, but when we retreated to our hotel room at the end of the night, it was nothing but him and me and our explosive connection. It’s been like that for months, an undying spark that usually only exists in a new relationship.
