The gondola bounced and she gasped, flinging her hands out in front of her like a cat trying to gain traction on linoleum. She was covered from head to toe in heavy winter gear, the only thing visible being the long strands of her wavy dark red hair sticking out from under her ski cap.
As the gondola made the turn and began heading down the mountain now, she brought her legs up on the bench and dropped her head to her knees.
“You okay?” Levi asked.
“Absolutely,” she said to her knees. “Just very busy having a freak-out here.”
“About?”
“About leaving my lunch—a triple-decker peanut butter and jelly sandwich—in my locker back there. I don’t want to die on an empty stomach.”
“We’re not going to die. At least not today.”
Not lifting her head, she made a snort of disbelief.
Okay, so the unannounced storm had muted nearly all daylight, and the snow looked like white lines slashing through the air like spears. It was stunning, but he could admit it might also be construed as terrifying to some. “It’s actually far less scary if you watch.”
“I’ll take your word on that. We’re a million feet up.”
“Five hundred and fifty.”
“What?”
“We’re five hundred and fifty feet above ground. Approximately the same as five and a half stories, or the height of a roller-coaster ride, at least a good one—”
“Oh my God.” Her head jerked up, hitting him with some seriously green eyes. “Why would you tell me that?”
“Sometimes, if you’re afraid of something like heights, knowing all the facts helps.”
She stared at him as if he’d grown a second head, but her spine snapped ramrod straight. “Do I look like I’m afraid of heights?” she asked, just as the gondola jerked so hard that she gasped and grabbed for the oh-holy-shit bars on the side closest to her.
“You’re right,” Levi said. “You’re clearly not afraid of heights at all.”
She tightened her grip on the bar and glared at him. “Hey. For your information, it’s not heights that get me. It’s tight, enclosed spaces. Especially tight, enclosed spaces that are swinging five and a half stories above ground.”
“Shift to the middle of the bench,” he said. “Away from the windows. You’ll feel better.”
This got him a vehement shake of her head that had her hair flying about her face. “I’ve got to be at the window so I don’t miss the crash.” She grimaced. “Don’t even try to make sense of that, or me for that matter—you’ll just hurt yourself.”
The next gust hit hard. Everything in the gondola flew to one side, including his companion. He caught her and pulled her down onto the bench at his side, keeping ahold of her for a minute. “You okay?”
“No! Not even close! We’re an inch from falling and dying, and I don’t know about you, but I had things to do today. Like live.”
“A gondola fall is extremely unlikely,” he said. “Maybe one in a million.”
They rocked again and she drew a deep, shaky breath. “You know what I need? Silence. So if you could just stop talking, that’d be great.”
He laughed, because having come from a family of talkers, he was often mocked for being the silent one.
“I don’t see how this is funny—” She broke off with a startled scream as the next gust hit violently, knocking them both off the bench and into each other on the floor. On their knees, swinging wildly, they turned in unison to look out the window just in time to see . . .