Chapter 16
NOAH
This must be what Miles felt when he fell.
The moment seemed to stretch far longer than physics allowed, but maybe that was the nature of fear. It could play tricks on the mind and seem to stop time. That moment between Xavier telling me to trust him and when he let go of my hand? A lifetime stretched out before and after me.
Then came the drop. The rush of air, and the feeling of utter weightlessness…
It was a feeling I was so incredibly used to that it was hard to feel real terror, even when my logical brain reminded me that this time there was no parachute to save me at the last moment.
No wingsuit. No counterweight. No safety nets.
I was such an arrogant fool for thinking I could cheat death for even as long as I had.
This had been coming for a long time, but contrary to what I’d convinced myself, I wasn’t ready.
I didn’t want to die. I had people that I cared about now…
more than just Miles and Mom. I had the team.
All of them. And this would break them, which was insanely selfish on my part.
For the first time since I’d started my adrenaline-fueled stunts, I had to admit that I now had a reason to live.
Then I hit the ground. All the air whooshed out of my lungs and my head rattled, causing everything to go fuzzy. But only for a moment, and then…confusion. Did it hurt? Yes. But not the agonizing pain of breaking every bone in my body and dying.
My head rang and my body ached, but I was alive. How? And why the fuck did it feel like I was at sea?
Groaning, I reached a shaking hand up to pull off the blindfold and blinked up at the sky. Rain pelted down on me, but it was very much real rain…
“What the fuck?” I whispered aloud, swiping a hand over my face to clear some raindrops. Fuck. My arm hurt, my head hurt, my neck and back… Wait, why was I still moving up and down like…
Like I was on a trampoline.
Or a net.
Motherfucker. There was a safety net? Since when? How?
Ugh. Fucking Xavier! I need you to trust me… Because the asshole knew about the net. He knew I wouldn’t die because he already made sure there was a safety net in place!
Rolling over onto my stomach, a flash of white-hot pain flared through my back and I whimpered pathetically.
I might not have died, but I’d still fallen a long way.
And to make matters worse, there were hundreds of people below me with cameras pointed my way.
Fuck. I was going to murder Xavier Stone when I got my hands on him.
Then again…would I really rather be dead right now? If not for the safety net, I’d be little more than human ketchup in the middle of that crowd.
“Fuck,” I huffed, rolling onto my back once more so I could catch my breath without staring at the people below. They likely already had enough footage to keep me in the media until I was old and gray.
Eventually, I’d have to crawl off the net.
But right now I had very little faith that I could do that act gracefully.
Not while my back was flashing with pain and my limbs felt like they were made of electric eels.
So I closed my eyes and lay there in the pouring rain until the net wobbled and tilted dramatically as my rescue party arrived.
“Noah, are you with us?” a vaguely familiar voice called out, and I peeled my eyes open to see one of the high-wire technicians crawling across the net toward me.
“Hey, Barry,” I replied, having spent plenty of time chatting with him during the practice course setup days. “Thanks for the save.”
“Don’t thank me, kid, that was all Ace.” Ace, too? Traitor. “Fucking lucky, too. Are you hurt?”
“Maybe,” I admitted, knowing it would be stupid to lie after a fall like that. “I’m not paralyzed though.”
Barry huffed a coughing laugh. “Well, shit, that’s something. You need me to call in a stretcher to get you down?” He was closer now, so we didn’t need to speak so loudly.
I wrinkled my nose, shaking my head. “I think I’ve suffered enough embarrassment for one day. I’ll survive getting myself down and just sit in an ice bath when we get home.” That seemed like the only viable option, since they didn’t make gel ice packs big enough for everything that hurt.
“Maybe it’d be a better idea to—” Barry started to say, but I forced myself to sit up with an agonized wince before he could continue. “Yeah, okay, sure. Just take it slow, Noah. These nets will save you from dying, but that landing would still hurt like a bitch.”
“No shit,” I growled, starting across the net toward the ladder he’d come up.
I needed to get off the net, down the ladder, and out of the fucking public eye so I could fall apart quietly.
It was slow going, with my limbs trembling as I crawled.
Nearly dying had smacked me with more adrenaline than I’d ever felt, but my body was processing it just as fast, and that left me physically shaking and weak.
Dimly I realized that Olympus security was hard at work to keep random spectators away from the base of the ladder so Barry and I could get down safely.
It was kind of nice, knowing we had the support—and staff—that came with a major corporation.
It meant that no one jostled the ladder as I made my cautious way down to the ground, where an Olympus private paramedic waited with a gear bag in hand.
“Noah, hi,” the woman greeted me when my feet found the solid ground and I swayed a little. “I’m Samantha. We met this morning. Do you remember?”
I forced a smile at the clearly probing question. “Yeah, I remember. I’m okay, just—”
“Noah!” someone bellowed, jerking my attention away from the medic.
From across the cleared area—thanks to security—I spotted my team bursting out of the building lobby.
Minho was in the lead, sprinting toward me shirtless.
Why the fuck was he shirtless? Not that I really minded the view, he looked fucking incredible shirtless, but it was confusing nonetheless.
“Don’t—” Samantha the paramedic tried to protest as he crashed into me, sweeping me up in a hug that took my feet totally off the ground.
Whatever else she said faded into background noise as my chest tightened and my breath whooshed out of me once more. Words totally fled my brain as he squeezed me against his wet and naked chest.
“I thought you were dead!” he exclaimed, putting me back on my feet but not letting me go. Someone—maybe Barry—handed him an open umbrella, and all of a sudden we were in our own world. The black umbrella canopy blanketed us in privacy, hiding us away and then…
He kissed me.
Or did I kiss him? It was all a blur.
My brain short-circuited and I reacted purely on instinct, returning his kiss with hungry desperation as his fingertips bit into the already aching muscles of my back, pulling me closer until—
“Noah!” someone else yelled, and reality came crashing back down almost as intensely as Minnie’s initial embrace.
Shocked, horrified, and overwhelmingly embarrassed, I wrenched myself out of Minho’s grip and stumbled backward out of the protection of the umbrella. For one heart-aching moment, we locked eyes, and I saw in painful clarity how bewildered and confused he was.
Shit.
Ace had reached us, though, as had the rest of the team, and chaos erupted. My cheeks burning and my stomach twisted up in absolute knots, I let them fuss for a bit before willingly subjecting myself to Paramedic Samantha’s care.
“Are you okay to walk?” she asked me quietly, holding another umbrella over us both. “I’d prefer to take you indoors to check you over.”
I nodded, having totally lost my tongue, and let her brush the team aside as she led the way into the building that they’d all just come streaming out of.
It had a sterile sort of seating area near the reception desks, and Samantha guided me over to sit before dropping her medical kit to the floor beside me.
“Okay, where do we even begin?” she asked with a heavy exhale, pulling out a penlight and checking my pupil dilation.
“He’s got a preexisting back injury,” Minho said from behind me, and I stiffened.
What the fuck just happened back there? Did he start that or did I? Everything was so fuzzy.
Samantha raised her eyebrow at me in question, and I gritted my teeth, searching for a plausible explanation. Trouble was, all I could think about was how soft Minho’s lips were, and how my whole body had melted in his arms, and how—
“Can I take a look at your back?” Samantha asked, shocking me out of my train of thought.
“N-no,” I stuttered, shaking my head and then wincing. Something hurt in my neck, and yeah I really should get it looked at, but not here. Not in front of the team. Not while I was still pretending that I wore a back brace for a previous nonexistent injury rather than a binder to disguise my tits.
Samantha’s brow creased at my refusal, confusion etched across her face, but she didn’t push the issue. Instead she shifted her focus to checking my neck, getting me to turn my head and check the range of motion and so on, asking me quiet questions about what still hurt and where.
Eventually, she sat back on her heels and gave me a shrug. “I think you’re okay. Bruised and sore, definitely. You’ll need to take it easy for a few days but…nothing broken, no obvious signs of concussion. I do need to look at your back, though. Is it a disc or—”
“Noah, you can probably get that checked with your specialist, right?” Skye interjected, placing a hand on my shoulder to give a light, reassuring squeeze. All seven of them had been hovering behind me the whole time Samantha had been doing her job, and it was starting to suffocate me.
I nodded, wetting my lips. “Yep, I can do that. I really just want a hot shower right now, but I promise to see my specialist tomorrow.” Mustering up my most convincing smile, I silently pleaded with the paramedic to just let it go.
After a beat, she sighed and shrugged. “It’s your call, Noah. But if the pain gets any worse, if you have any dizziness, loss of consciousness, or vomiting, I want you to go straight to the emergency room, okay?”
“Yes, absolutely,” I agreed. “Understood.”
The second Samantha nodded her agreement, I grabbed on to Skye’s hand and rose to my feet, letting my roommate pull me into a protective side hug.
He didn’t need me to tell him how I was feeling, instead just swiftly guiding me across to the elevators where some of the Olympus staff were waiting to head back down to the parking lot.
“You scared the life out of me, Twin,” he murmured, leaning down to press a quick kiss on my wet hair. “I’m really glad you’re not dead.”
A hollow laugh escaped me as I wrapped my arm around his waist to steal some body warmth. “Same, dude. Same.”
We stayed like that, linked together, the whole way down to the parking lot and totally ignored the producer who tried asking questions with a camera pointed our way. Fuck that. But as we headed for the waiting vans, Minho grabbed my arm gently.
“Chicken, can we—” he started to ask, and I flexed my fingers on Skye’s waist.
“Later, Minnie,” Skye interrupted, understanding me perfectly even if he didn’t know why. “Noah nearly died today. Let’s let him process that, yeah?”
Minho didn’t argue that fact, but he did climb into the same van as us, and I was fairly certain he stared at the back of my head the whole way home.
It took every ounce of my willpower not to look back, but…
Fucking hell. Maybe it was me that’d started that kiss, and he was disgusted right now.
Horrified. Or worse, maybe he was uncomfortable and felt the need to let me down gently because he wasn’t into guys.
I couldn’t bear that rejection. Not from him. So I tucked myself into Skye’s side and tried to pretend nothing had happened.
Denial was my most faithful best friend.