Page 14 of Plus Size Player

“Let’s have a seat,” Russ suggested, pointing to the leather couch. His tone was back to normal, but his expression was still perplexing.

“Are you okay?” I wondered as I took a seat.

“Yes, of course. How are you feeling? Are you surprised?”

“I’m so surprised. And I’m excited. How did you even come up with something like this?”

“I know how much you love the sky, so I’ve been planning this for a little while now.”

My heart skipped a beat.

“This is…” I let my sentence trail off as I shook my head. “I had no idea what to expect, and you just continue to blow my mind.”

He slipped his arm around my shoulder and leaned over to me. With his lips against my ear, he whispered, “I plan to do that repeatedly over the course of tonight.”

My lower body clenched. Turning my head so our lips touched, I let out a soft whimper that I knew drove him crazy. “Promise?”

He cleared his throat and placed the clipboard in his lap to cover the growing bulge. “We need to sign these consent forms before they’ll let us fly and then I’m taking you home.”

I smirked. “What about dinner?”

“Fuck dinner.”

Laughing, I focused my attention on the rules of the aircraft. Everything seemed pretty standard, and I signed the waiver.

“I’m going to run to the restroom before we take off,” I told him after we gave our clipboards to the man who’d greeted us when we walked in.

“Yeah, I should probably do the same.” He rose to his feet and then helped me to mine.

The restroom sign was not far from where we were. The men’s room was first. Russ disappeared through the door. Around the corner, the women’s room was waiting for me. It didn’t take me very long, and after washing my hands and lathering on lotion, I exited. I’d barely gotten out the door when I was stopped by the older Sky High Tours employee.

“Hi, Ms. Ford. Just wanted to catch you while you were alone.”

Instantly, I was uncomfortable. “Oh, really?” Continuing to walk until I was in the main part of the hangar, I waited until I could be seen by others before I turned to him. “What’s up?”

“I’ve reached out to my supervisor. He should be getting back to me at any minute now. I just need to verify something—you wrote down that you weigh two hundred fifty pounds. Is that accurate, or would you like to use our scale located in the women’s room?”

“I read the rules and regulations and I wrote down my height and weight. I don’t understand what the issue is.”

“Well, I know a lot of people round their weight down, so I just wanted to double-check. If you’re two fifty, we shouldn’t have an issue. It’s still on the heavier side, but if you’re well over that number, that’s when we run into problems. We don’t want to overload the aircraft. That’s why I wanted to touch base with my supervisor to make sure you can fly with us.”

My eyebrow quirked. “Why wouldn’t I be able to fly?”

“What’s going on here?” Russ asked, coming up beside us. Heput his hand on my lower back and assessed me. “Is everything okay?”

I cocked my head to the side. “This man was about to explain why I might not be able to fly today, even though I qualify.”

Before Russ could say anything, the man tried to explain himself. “Our tours have a weight and size restriction due to the helicopter’s design. My supervisor should be calling me back in the next couple of minutes to let me know if she can fly. I’m just verifying that the helicopter assigned to you is one that can accommodate her size.”

I made a face. “No—”

“I spoke to your supervisor and made sure everything was good before booking this tour,” Russ informed him in a low tone. “Maybe you should’ve waited on that call before coming over here and saying anything without all the information. Not knowing what you’re doing and then not getting clarity first is a problem. And I don’t like problems.”

“I wasn’t trying to make a problem,” the man explained. “I was just—”

“Overstepping,” Russ interjected.

“The aircraft can only accommodate passengers under two hundred seventy-five pounds. I just wanted to make sure she was in line with our guidelines.”

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