Free Fall
An erotic skydiving thrill ride
“Before this story concludes, you will be sighing, cheering, cursing, and wiping your eyes.” Just Erotic Romance Reviews
“Soar the skies; feel the wind and the heat with Cole and Deanna, you won’t regret it.” Sizzling Romance Reviews
If you’re a fan of Bella Andre, Lora Leigh, Maya Banks, Jaci Burton, and Shayla Black, then tantalize yourself with Free Fall. Packed with emotion and thrills, the story doesn’t disappoint!
Deanna Rain has always made the safe choice, taken the safe job, dated the safe guys. But now she just has to bust out of her self-imposed chains or she’ll die. She needs to do something wild and crazy. Something like skydiving. What could be riskier or more wild than jumping out of a plane? Jumping tandem with Cole Johnson, that’s what. But with Cole, the risk might very well be to her heart.
Jumpmaster Cole Johnson is barely keeping his head above water. He’s supported his passion for skydiving by starting a parachuting school. But his bills are stacking up and his calendar is empty. Soon, he’ll have to close his doors to return to a nine-to-five job.
When Deanna shows up for a tandem jump, Cole knows this is going to be his last lesson. And he plans to go out with a bang.
Ask yourself, how much can happen in sixty seconds of free fall? Deanna and Cole are about to find out.
[Previously published in 2003 in the anthology Resolutions]
Buy Now
What Readers Are Saying:
Excerpt
Free Fall
Copyright Jasmine Haynes
Chapter One Point Five
“Johnson Skydiving School.”
Silence for at least a couple of seconds, then a woman’s voice. “I wanted to inquire about skydiving.”
If she was calling about lessons, he was shit out of luck. “Well, you’ve called the right place. I’m Cole Johnson. What would you like to know?”
“Tandem.” Succinct, a little jumpy.
But tandem was his only way to go at this point, without Linc. Not a lot of money in the scheme of things, but a tandem would at least cover the next phone bill due on Monday. “Have you ever jumped before?”
“Not out of a plane.”
From where then? Odd question to come to mind when he should have been concentrating on piquing her interest and reeling her in. But there was something about that voice. Soft, low, it made a man’s cock vibrate.
Concentrate. “In a tandem jump, you’re securely harnessed to an experienced jumpmaster who wears a tandem parachute system.”
“You mean I won’t have my own parachute?”
“I’ll be wearing the chute.”
“You’ll be wearing it?”
“I’ll be your jumpmaster.”
She waited a beat. He could hear a soft exhale of breath. He could feel it. “Is it dangerous?”
Jesus, why did people always ask that question? She’d be jumping out of a plane almost three miles above the earth with nothing but a swatch of nylon the size of someone’s living room. What part of dangerous did she need to look up in the dictionary? “I’ve been doing this for over fifteen years, ma’am, so I’ve got a lot of experience. Since we’re harnessed together, where you go, I go. So you can be assured I’ll take all necessary precautions to keep us both as safe as humanly possible.” Under the circumstances.
They called it deceleration trauma, a very nice, clean, sanitized term for a jumper’s worst frigging nightmare, a main chute that didn’t deploy, and a reserve that failed. He’d never seen the aftermath, hoped never to see it, and he was man enough to admit, he’d cover his eyes if ever confronted by it. And he sure didn’t think about it.
“Statistically,” he added when she didn’t say anything, “you’re more likely to die in a car accident on the way to the airport than you are in a jump.”
“Comforting thought, thank you. Free fall?”
Why did her voice keep doing that to his insides? He was getting a hard-on from a voice on the phone that could belong to Godzilla, for all he knew. “I’ll take you up to 15,000 feet, and you’ll get about sixty seconds of free fall. Then about five minutes under the canopy to enjoy the view.”
“The canopy?”
“The parachute after it’s deployed.”
“Oh.”
She stopped, and he imagined her biting her lip, thinking, chewing. Damn, where the hell was his focus?
“Only a minute of free fall?” she said finally.
“It’ll seem like the longest sixty seconds of your life.” Even now, after fifteen years of jumping, it still felt like forever. That was part of the addiction.
Come on, baby, take me up on it.
“I want to do it tomorrow. Can you take me then?”
Yes! He punched the air, at the same time, feeling in his gut that he could take this woman any time, any place. “Let me check the schedule.” He looked at the blank page for Saturday, then rustled some papers, threw a few bills on the floor, then said, “I had a cancellation, so it seems I’ve got an opening tomorrow at eleven a.m.” The weather site said the spring-like temperatures and wind conditions should hold through at least Monday.
“Okay, I’ll be there. Bye.”
“Hey, wait a minute, I’ve got some questions.”
“Questions?” She sounded jumpy again, her voice slightly higher.
“I need to put a name in the schedule.”
“Oh.” Then she laughed, a sweet sound that entered his body and went straight to his ever-increasing hard-on. Damn. “What was I thinking?” she said. “Of course you do. It’s Deanna Rain.” She spelled it for him.
Deanna Rain. The name had a rhythm to it that rolled off the tongue. “And a phone number where I can reach you if something comes up?” Something was definitely up.
She gave him that, too, and he filled his empty schedule. “I usually have a twenty-four-hour cancellation policy to cover the cost of the plane, et cetera, but since it’s less than twenty-four hours, I’ll have to take your credit card number in case you don’t show.”
After a moment, she read off the numbers and expiration date. “Anything else?”
“How much do you weigh?”
“How much do I weigh?”
God, women, you had to love ‘em. She’d just given him her name, phone number and credit card info, but she balked at telling him her weight. “We’ve got a weight limit of 220 pounds per person for a tandem jump.”
“Oh. I didn’t think of that.”
Damn, he could just see her chewing her lip again. “If you prefer, we can weigh you in when you get here.” The scale was broken.
She exhaled in his ear. “120 pounds.”
“Thanks. That’ll do just fine.” That would be just damn perfect. “Birth date?”
“What do you need that for?”
What did he need that for? Oh yeah. “You have to be over eighteen to jump with me.” Over eighteen for some other interesting things, too.
She reluctantly released that information as well. Thirty-two. Not a sweet young thing, but then he liked a little bit of seasoning. Christ, he needed to get on track. He needed this woman’s two hundred dollars far more than he needed to get laid.
“I’ll need you to be here by nine o’clock. I’ve got some instructions to give you and there’s a video you’ll have to watch. Wear tennis shoes and jeans, nothing too bulky because you’ll be getting into a jumpsuit. Any questions?” Everyone had questions. Tons of them.
But not Deanna Rain. “No.”
“Do you need directions?”
“No, I got them off your website.”
His website. So that’s why she hadn’t asked about the cost. His website contained the basics, but for the most part, it sucked. A friend put it together for him for free, and he’d sure as hell gotten what he’d paid for. He’d written most of the verbiage himself, but typos and misplaced or missing words proliferated the text. “That’s where you found out about us?” He was hoping for a word-of-mouth referral.
“Yes.”
He was surprised she’d bothered to pick up the phone after looking at that piece of Internet junk. He’d wanted to get something better, but the money just hadn’t been there. Too many other setup costs.
“Well, alrighty-then, that’s it. We’ll see you tomorrow at nine.” But he didn’t want to let her go. He’d never talked to a woman of fewer words or gotten as hard in five minutes over the phone.
“Thanks.” Then she was gone, and the dial tone sounded in his ear instead of those soft, sexy tones.
Damn. What the hell was up with his reaction to just a voice? Sure it had an arousing quality he felt all the way down in his gonads. Christ, you’d think he hadn’t had sex in...okay, a while. But hell, the woman be married, with a bruiser of a jealous husband.
His cock, however, wasn’t listening, as evidenced by the almost painful bulge in his jeans.
“Jesus,” he said aloud, “get your head out of your pants.”
He reached for the phone to call Roger to arrange for the plane. He sure as hell hoped his friend hadn’t already booked someone else.
In any event, he’d make sure the little lady wasn’t disappointed.