Chapter 15 #2
‘Now, the fun bit,’ said Chad. ‘We’re going to hang out over the city.’
‘Okay,’ said Noah. I glanced at him and saw that his eyes were bright and his cheeks ruddy. All of a sudden, he was fizzing with excitement. Clearly on the way up, he’d acquired his skyscraper legs while I appeared to have acquired those of a newborn foal.
Chad attached a couple of extra safety ropes to our harnesses and told us what to do.
Lean out.
Lean out! He had to be kidding. Butterflies were dancing the salsa in my stomach.
I stood on the edge of the platform, my back to the view, gripping the nylon rope attached to my harness with both hands.
The rope gave just a little, and for a brief stomach-swirling moment I felt as if I were falling.
My pulse roared in my ears and I felt a little sick.
What the hell was I doing? One by careful one, I moved my hands from the rope to my harness, holding onto the shoulder straps for dear life.
I realised I had my eyes shut tight. When I finally summoned up the courage to open them, I discovered my feet, which were on the platform, were now a foot or so in front of me.
I was leaning backwards over the sheer drop.
My stomach did a couple of somersaults, backflips and belly flops and I sucked in a quick gasp of air.
‘You okay, Evie?’ asked Noah from beside me, his voice low and firm. It felt like an additional lifeline.
Slowly I turned my head, keeping the rest of my body very still. ‘I think so,’ I looked at him and he gave me an encouraging smile and then stretched out both arms. His fingers brushed mine and he took one of my hands, giving it a gentle squeeze.
‘I’m right here.’
I looked over at him and to my chagrin, he was the one embracing the experience, standing there with his other arm thrown out wide, looking happy. ‘It’s amazing. Take a look.’ He squeezed my hand again and then interweaved his fingers through mine, locking his hold on me. ‘I’ve got you.’
I nodded and, feeling a little braver, although that was relative, I peeped down.
‘Oh, wow,’ I said with a nervous giggle.
‘Awesome, isn’t it?’ said Noah. ‘Just awesome. We could be flying.’
‘Mmm,’ I said noncommittally, squinting to focus on the criss-cross of streets far below, just a little bit galled at our role reversal.
‘Give us a big smile,’ said Chad, who was filming everything because we weren’t allowed to have our phones up here.
Noah raised our arms as he grinned at the camera, as if we had just bloody topped the summit of Mount Everest. I squeezed his fingers, holding on tight while grimacing at the camera and hoping it looked as if I were smiling a little.
Noah squeezed my hand back and looked over at me.
‘You okay?’ he asked again.
I nodded even though my stomach was doing umpteen loop-the-loops in complaint.
We hung there for far too long although it was probably less than a minute, Noah marvelling at the view with far too much flaming enthusiasm – what happened to the killjoy I was used to – before we were winched back in, thank God.
Being vertical again felt so much better.
‘Right, time to turn around,’ said Chad, all too cheerily to my mind.
‘Sorry?’
‘This time you get to lean out forwards. Cool, huh?’
I glanced back over the edge. He had to be flipping kidding. But no, he was already adjusting the harnesses.
‘Are you sure this is safe?’ I muttered.
Noah slipped a hand in mine and I fully expected him to say, ‘What could possibly go wrong?’ or something to remind me of his earlier now completely understandable reservations, but instead of revelling in my terrified face, he said, ‘You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to, Evie. We can go back down now.’
‘But you want to,’ I said, aware of the glow of excitement and the shift in his body language.
‘Not if you don’t,’ he reassured me. ‘We can go back right now.’
I hauled in a deep breath realising that despite being scared, I was actually getting a kick out of seeing this side of Noah and him letting go a bit. He really was enjoying the experience.
‘No,’ I said. ‘Let’s do this.’
‘Sure?’ he asked.
‘Yeah. Like I always say, life is short, and what could possibly go wrong?’
He smiled at me and laced his fingers between mine. ‘We’ll go together.’
When Chad was happy that we were secure, we stepped onto the edge.
‘Look at me,’ said Noah. When I did, he pulled a funny face and it was so unexpected I laughed.
‘Now, lean forward,’ called Chad.
Just the very thought of it made my heart thud so hard, I thought it might burst out of my chest.
‘On the count of three,’ suggested Noah, giving my hand another one of those reassuring squeezes.
In that moment I knew I could rely on Noah.
It wasn’t an attribute I’d ever really valued in anyone before, but the knowledge came to me in a rush and made me feel unexpectedly warm.
He had an innate ability to make me feel safe. No one had ever made me feel like that.
‘One, two, three.’ He leaned forward and I followed a second behind him.
And oh, oh, oh. Amazing. The rush to my head that came with the brief sensation of falling. I looked down. Oh, my God. We were hanging off a building, hundreds and hundreds of feet up.
Noah’s hand moved in mine.
‘Amazing, isn’t it?’ he said, his arms spread wide again like an angel embracing the view.
I gingerly spread my arms out to copy him.
The weight of my body tugged at the harness, and I tried not to think that all that was holding me was the metal carabiner.
As I got used to the unfamiliar sensations and the wind gently buffeting me, I relaxed and took a few long slow breaths.
A sense of peace and euphoria began to fill me.
We were the only people up here and we might as well have been the only people in the city.
‘It’s like flying!’ I laughed with pure joy.
‘Isn’t it incredible?’ Noah grinned at me, his sparkling eyes lit up with enthusiasm.
‘It is incredible,’ I agreed and couldn’t resist adding, ‘bet you’re glad I talked you into it now.’
Noah laughed at me. ‘Evie Green. What are you like? I’m taking the fifth.’
‘You know I’m right,’ I teased.
Our eyes locked and something clicked inside me, sealing the magical moment.
‘I’m never going to forget this,’ I said.
‘Me neither,’ said Noah, more sombrely. ‘And yes, you were right.’ He pulled my hand to his mouth, opened my fingers and placed a soft kiss on my palm, his gaze holding mine the whole time. ‘It is fun.’
The intimate gaze and quick brush of his lips sent fifty gazillion volts through my body, frying every last one of my hormones. It was the sexiest thing ever and all I could do was stare at his mouth, even though we were hanging above the city.
I gave him a tremulous smile.
‘Incredible view,’ he said, his eyes warm and his mouth curving as he held my gaze for several of those heart-flopping seconds before he looked back down at the distant street below.
My heart expanded in my chest as I gazed at his profile. I’d never seen it coming. His unreserved reassurance had reinforced the initial attraction I’d felt for him, which throughout the day had been gently twining its way around me like ivy. Slow, steady and sure.
Suddenly I wanted him to like me. Not to be the annoying, pesky companion he was stuck with. I wanted a lot more. Way more. I wanted to know what those lips would feel like on mine. Did he feel the same way or was this just an adrenaline high, born of the exhilaration of the moment?