when Sydney turned in his arms, aligned her rear to his crotch and leaned forward to peer over the edge of the balloon.
“So cute!” she squealed. “A deer! You see it? That’s a totally a deer!”
Damn, was all Mike could think as he was unable to drum up images of a surgery for the first time.
“Right there! See its rack?”
That earned a snicker from Mike’s left. When he looked over he saw both Luke and Rori looking at him. They looked quite cozy themselves, with Rori leaning up against Luke’s chest while Luke loosely wrapped his hands around her waist. There was an easy comfort between them.
“That’s actually a moose,” the pilot said. “Much larger than a deer. You’re probably not as tall as that bull moose’s leg.”
“No shit?” Sydney said, looking at the pilot in disbelief.
He nodded. “No shit.”
She blinked her doe eyes. “And he just looks small because we’re way up here and he’s way down there?”
“Yep. And trust me, you’d rather see him from up here than face to face.”
“I’ll bet,” she said, spinning in Mike’s arms. “I can’t believe I haven’t done this before. It’s so fun!” Then, without warning, she pressed a kiss to his mouth. Contrary to everything else she’d done, the kiss felt honest, unchoreographed. Thoughtless. Mike couldn’t help but smile when she pulled away.
“You’re welcome,” he said.
Then the old Sydney was back to being dramatic. “But it’s kind of freaky to think how high we are. We could totally die! I mean, what it a woodpecker landed on the balloon and drilled a hole in it. We’d be goners!”
Luke was the one who laughed at that one. “Can you imagine? Sitting helpless down here in the basket while some bird went to town on this thing? So. Helpless!”
“Woodpeckers don’t fly at this altitude,” the pilot said officiously.
“Oh, I’m sure,” Sydney said. “I’m just saying that there’s like 1,001 ways to die in this thing. I mean, one stiff breeze while that flame is going and poof! We fall to the ground in flames, screaming like children on a runaway school bus.”
This time Mike joined in on the laughing. Even Rori smiled, which had left the pilot as the only stern faced one in the bunch.
“Also not possible,” he snapped.
“What if I tried to take us to Oz?” Luke asked him. “Conked you out and pulled on that rope until we hit the stratosphere. Then would we drop like a rock?”
The pilot’s eyes narrowed. “Do I need to take us down?”
“Don’t worry,” Rori said, sending Luke a narrow look. “I’ll keep him under control.”
The pilot gave a gaming laugh, but Mike could tell he was still tense. Apparently plotting ways to crash a hot air balloon was not his idea of fun conversation. Behind him, Mike watched as Luke squeezed his arms more tightly around Rori.
“Are you seriously not even scared a little?” Luke asked her.
“No,” Rori said, glancing over the side. “Although I’m not entirely comforted by the fact that at present the only standing between me and death is wicker.”
“Seriously!” Sydney laughed. “That’s totally what’s weird about this whole thing, huh? Fucking wicker. That’s totally it.”
It hadn’t taken long to realize Sydney swore like a sailor. Women with foul mouths didn’t turn Mike on as a rule, but Sydney was just so perky with it. It was like listening to a British or Irish person swearing. Sometimes bad language just flowed so well that it didn’t even really count.
All in all, Sydney was just an easy girl to like. Or maybe she was just easy. Mike wasn’t sure which, but he was grateful that she wasn’t trying to turn the date into anything it wasn’t. She wasn’t trying to create some faux intimacy or insta-bond. She was just a girl who liked men and liked fun and was trying to have both at the same time.
How could a man hate a woman like that? How could he not want a woman like that? Why was Mike trying not to want her?
Mike shook his head when the answer came to him. Mostly because the answer was so stupid. He was pushing Sydney away because he didn’t want to ruin his chances with Rori.
What chances? Rori was engaged to Luke—his best friend. Basically his brother. On top of that, Mike hadn’t even known Rori seventy-two hours and they’d only spoken a handful of times. There was absolutely no reason to imagine the press of Rori’s body against his rather than Sydney’s. There was