Chapter 1
The buckle clicked before I understood what it meant.
His thumb found the center button of the black harness where it crossed my pink dress, pressed straight down, and the straps went slack all at once. The silver metal made a clean, small sound, too soft for what it did. Wind hit my legs from the open door at the same time, cold off the water below, and my stomach dropped before my body moved. He was calm. His gray suit didn't wrinkle when he leaned in. That was the contradiction that stuck — how neat he looked while my chest strap fell loose across my lap.
We were hovering over the lake. Midday, bright overcast light coming through the skylight and straight in the open side door, the water dark blue and choppy under us with the treed shoreline a pale line in the distance. That was our context, the reason for being up there at all, a short hop he'd said would be good for photos for the foundation. The pilot sat forward in his dark flight suit and gray helmet, facing his instruments, and the rotor beat hard enough I felt it in my teeth.
That morning I had put on this dress because he asked me to.
He'd laid it on the bed in the dressing suite, the light pink sheer floral embroidered one with short sleeves, and said the photographer liked light colors against the helicopter interior. I remembered standing in front of the mirror while he straightened the harness after I sat down, his hands efficient on the four black straps, pulling them snug over my shoulders and across my hips, clicking the central buckle himself. I didn't think anything of it then. The leather seat was cold. The overhead skylight made his hair look darker.
Now his hand stayed on that buckle a second too long after he pressed it. The straps loosened and slid. A gust lifted the edge of my dress and my hair straight back toward the door.
I felt my face do something before I could control it — mouth opening, eyes wide — air catching in my throat. My hand shot up without a decision and grabbed the upper door frame, fingers curling around cold metal. The wind roared louder with the door wide open right next to me, and the lake moved slowly beneath us.
He didn't pull his hand back. He shifted it to my side, gripping my torso through the thin dress, his other hand finding my arm just above the elbow. His face came close, intense and focused, eyes locked on mine, breathing even.
The pilot didn't turn around.
He pulled. Not a hard yank, a steady, controlled force that slid me across the leather toward the edge. I twisted and pressed my shoulder into his chest to resist, and my hair whipped across my face and his. My dress rippled up my thighs. I got both hands to the frame for a second, knuckles white, then he adjusted his grip and my right hand slipped. I was leaning out, one hand left holding the frame, my body angled over the water, his hands still on my ribs and my left arm, holding me there in that bright, loud air.
We were face-to-face that close. I could see the line of his tie, the grain of his suit, the small crease between his eyebrows. My mouth was open and I was making a sound that wasn't words, a thin gasp the wind took. He stared at me like he was waiting for me to let go.
May you like
The water was right there under my feet, dark and far enough to kill me if I hit it wrong. The frame bit into my palm. His fingers tightened.
I didn't fall yet. I hung there, one-handed, his weight against me, the helicopter holding steady in the diffuse daylight, the shoreline waiting behind us while the wind kept blowing my dress flat against my legs.
