I lean over him to glance at the form. “Is that really a question?”
He points to the question. “Yep. Right here.”
I read the question, then give him a blunt answer. “I guess because I’m dying. I have a long bucket list of things I’ve always wanted to do.”
His eyes harden a little, almost as if my answer upset him. He returns his attention to the forms, so I tilt my head and lean over his shoulder again and watch as he writes down an answer that isn’t at all the one I gave him.
“I want to skydive because I want to experience life to the fullest.”
He hands me the form and the pen. “Sign here,” he says, pointing to the bottom of the page. After I sign the form and give it back to him, he stands up and reaches out for my hand. “Let’s go pack our chutes, Five Hundred.”
???
“Are you really a doctor?” I yell over the roar of the engines. We’re seated directly across from one another in the small airplane. His smile is huge and full of teeth so straight and white, I would bet money he’s actually a dentist.
“Cardiologist!” he yells. He waves a hand around the interior of the airplane. “I do this for fun!”
A cardiologist who skydives in his spare time? Impressive.
“Your wife doesn’t get upset that you’re so busy all the time?” I yell. Oh, God. That was such an obvious, cheesy question. I cringe that I even asked that out loud. I’ve never been good at flirting.
He leans forward and yells, “What?”
He’s really going to make me repeat myself? “I asked if your wife gets upset that you’re so busy all the time!”
He shakes his head and unbuckles his safety harness, then moves to the seat next to me. “It’s too loud in here!” he yells, waving his hand around the interior of the airplane. “Say it one more time!”
I roll my eyes and begin to ask him again. “Does…your…wife…”
He laughs and presses a finger to my lips, but only briefly. He pulls his hand away and leans toward me. My heart reacts more to this quick movement of his than it does from the fact that I’m about to jump out of this airplane.
“I’m kidding,” he says. “You looked so embarrassed after the first time you said it, I wanted to make you say it again.”
I slap him on the arm. “Asshole!”
He laughs and stands up, then reaches for my safety harness and presses the release latch. He pulls me up. “You ready for this?”
I nod, but it’s a lie. I am absolutely terrified, and if it weren’t for the fact that this guy is a doctor and he does things like this for fun—and he’s really hot—I’d probably be backing out right about now.
He turns me until my back is to his chest and connects our safety harnesses together until I’m securely fastened to him. My eyes are closed when I feel him pull my goggles on. After several minutes of waiting for him to finish prepping us, he walks me forward toward the opening of the airplane and presses his hands against either side of the opening. I am literally staring down at clouds.
I squeeze my eyes shut again, just as he brings his mouth close to my ear. “I don’t have a wife, Maggie. The only thing I’m in love with is my life.”
I’m somehow smiling during one of the scariest moments of my life. His comment makes the question worth the three times he had me repeat it. I tighten my grip around my safety harness. He reaches around me and takes both of my hands, then lowers them to my side. “Sixty more seconds,” he says. “Can you do me a favor?”
I nod, too scared to disagree with him right now since I’ve practically placed my fate in his hands.
“If we make it to the ground alive, will you let me take you to dinner? To celebrate being my five-hundredth time?”
I laugh at the sexual undertone in his question and look over my shoulder. “Are tandem instructors allowed to date their students?”
“I don’t know,” he says with a laugh. “Most of my students are men and I’ve never had the desire to ask one of them out.”
I stare straight ahead again. “I’ll let you know my answer when we land safely.”
“Fair enough.” He pushes me a step forward, then intertwines his fingers with mine, spreading our arms out. “This is it, Five Hundred. You ready?”
I nod as my pulse somehow begins to beat even more rapidly than before, and my chest tightens with the fear consuming me, knowing what I’m about to willingly do. I feel his breath and the wind against my neck as he inches us to the very edge of the plane’s opening.