Page 43 of Until We Fall

Rory’s looking out toward the horizon, and I dip close to his ear as we wait for the guide to check our equipment, my fingersbarely brushing his wrist. I’ve never wanted to hold someone’s hand like I want to hold his. Not with this intense distraction that tightens in my stomach, that keeps dropping my gaze to his fingers loose at his side.

“Are you nervous?” I ask.

He turns to face me, inches away, gray eyes vibrant. “Yes. But I’m pretty sure anticipatory anxiety is normal for an activity like this.”

I smile, rolling my thumb under the pineapple tattoo on his arm, partly worn off from saltwater and sun. “I like my anticipatory anxiety.”

And him. So fucking much.

Would it surprise me if I was in love?

No.

It wouldn’t.

And maybe I just need to go with that.

Maybe I need to go with my gut. When it comes to decisions about my future, I need to go with whatfeelsright.

“I like my anticipatory anxiety too.” Rory smiles so widely that his nose crinkles, laugh lines appearing at the corners of his eyes. Deeply colored freckles, dark from the sun, cross his nose and cheeks, his glasses tucked safely away.

I just keep staring at him.

A few minutes later, the guide brings us harnesses. Rory pulls his up, tugging it over his shorts, and then he buckles it around his waist, snug around his narrow hips and those lean upper thighs.

My eyes are all over him. The way the harness catches around his legs. The way that it fits. And heislitt?—

No.

Don’t fucking think it.Shit.I’m a dickface.

Why did my mind go there?

He doesn’t like that word. It doesn’t matter that I don’t think of it as a negative. It matters what he thinks. The boundaries he’s set.

What would I think if he was calling me ‘stupid’ in his head? Jesus, it would hurt so bad.

I focus on buckling on my harness, a heat swelling in my eyes at just the thought of Rory calling me a word I don’t want to be called. I’d never do that to him.

“D?”

My attention snaps back to him. “Yeah?”

“Go tandem with me?” he asks.

My heart thumpshard. “Oh fuck, yes.”

I can’t wait to be closer to him. Nerves bite at me as the guide double checks my harness, tugging on it by my thighs and junk.

Rory watches me. Gray eyes thoughtful, lips soft.

I wonder what he’s thinking.

But he breaks into a smile as I step across from him at the very edge of the platform, the river far below. The guide works around us, clicking on different straps as we stand there, the breeze tickling, that floral scent of the island all around us.

The guide pushes us closer together, our bodies snug.

“You’re hard, D,” Rory whispers.

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