Blown Away (A Romantic Comedy) (Five More Wishes Book 1) (4 page)

“No,” Samba says.

“No,” I say, a little louder, getting in Cade’s face. “This is my interview, and I’m going to fly in the balloon.” What am I saying? Has the surge of hormones made me flip my lid? Am I having a stroke? The words are coming out of my mouth, but it’s like they have a mind of their own. They’re imposter words that some jerk has put into my mouth. They’re usurper, poser, infiltrator words.

Cade is angry at my words, too. He stares me down, his tall frame bent over to give me his best he-man scary face. It’s pretty scary. Cade is built like a lumberjack, like he cuts down trees with his bare hands all day long. I get side-tracked, staring at his strong arms with bulging muscles. I’ve felt all his muscles, and they all feel really good.

Finally I blink, remembering where I am. “I’m going in the balloon,” I repeat like the moron I am.

Cade grinds his teeth. I can hear them grinding. “You’re afraid of heights.”

“I’m not afraid,” I say, embarrassed. “I just have a healthy respect for heights.” I respect them from afar, from the ground. And even from the ground, heights make my heart race and my armpits sweat like they’re the fountain at the Las Vegas Bellagio Hotel. But I’m a driven reporter, and I’m especially driven when it comes to getting the story before Cade. Nothing is going to stop me from getting the exclusive, not even a horrible death.

Samba puts his arm around my waist and pulls me close to his side for a squeeze. “Good. So we go.”

“We go,” I agree, trying to swallow. There seems to be something stuck in my throat. It’s probably my foot.

“I'll go, too,” Cade insists. I see my exclusive fly away, and I panic. I start to protest, but he puts his hand up. “I go too, but it’s your story.”

“You swear?”

“Pinkie promise, double swear. It’s your story. I’ll just go along for the ride.”

I search his face for a lie, but I know Cade well enough to know that he’s telling the truth. For some reason, he’s handing me the story and is requesting to fly in the balloon. I nod. To tell the truth, I’m relieved that he’s going, too. Maybe he can break my fall.

“No electronic devices,” Samba says, smiling. “Just your notebooks and pens.” I’m used to all kinds of crazy requests from interviewees. As long as there’s no restraint on telling the whole, true story, I usually comply. I toss my purse on the ground, and Cade tosses his phone on top of it. It’ll be there when we get back. The last theft on Summer Island was the high school mascot in 1973, and it was given back two hours later.

We walk to the balloon, as the butler is finally able to untie the ropes. It’s a breezy day, and even though the butler is managing the ropes now, the balloon is fighting against him, trying to free itself. As soon as he gets it untied, it starts dragging him across the field. We watch in shock while the butler digs his heels in, but it’s no use. He begins to waterski on the ground with the tails of his suit jacket flying behind him.

“That was unexpected,” Cade mumbles.

Samba speeds up, running to catch up to the balloon with Cade and me right behind him. As he runs, he’s talking a mile a minute, giving a loud speech to the protestors, who he seems to mistake for his fans. “So, I’m about to take my leave of you to suffer this beautiful country’s penal system because I’m a law abiding citizen of the planet, who… holy shit!”

The balloon is taking off for real. Samba takes a running jump and climbs up, making the basket bounce on the ground. Cade gives me a hard shove on my rear end, and I fly forward, slipping out of my shoes again and landing face first against the balloon’s basket. Cade heaves me over the side, like I’m a sack of potatoes. I manage to get upright just as Samba falls on top of me.

“Get off of her,” I hear Cade say. I peek around Samba to see Cade straddling the top of the basket. Samba pushes away from me, and I pull myself up. Cade hops down, and now all three of us are standing in the large balloon basket. It reminds me of the nursery rhyme the three men in a tub. “Well, that was a smooth takeoff,” Cade says.

“Takeoff?” I ask and look down. Below us on the ground, the butler is staring up at us, giving us the finger. It’s his final salute to his boss, I guess. His finger gets smaller and smaller, as we get higher and higher off the ground. The island seems to float below us, and the ocean is getting closer. I’m gripped with horrible vertigo, and I drop to a crouching position so that the basket blocks my view.

“How’s your respect for heights doing?” Cade asks, looking down at me with a satisfied grin on his face. “It looks like you’ve got a lot of respect happening.”

“Yep,” I say and throw up on his shoes.

It’s awkward flying in a hot air balloon with two other people, once you throw up on one of their shoes. “Well, these are toast,” Cade says and carefully takes his shoes off and dumps them over the edge. I’m still terrified, but I’m getting used to the height. That doesn’t do me any good once we’ve reached the edge of the island and we’re going over the ocean. I’m still scared of drowning and getting eaten by a shark.

“We’re going over the ocean,” I say, my voice hitching up like I’ve sucked helium. “We’re going to be lost at sea. We’re going to wind up the subject of a cable news show. I don’t want to end up that way.” Cade pats my back.

“It’s okay. We’re going east, not west.”

“What the hell does that matter?” I ask.

“Because we’re heading toward the mainland. Not out to sea.”

I take a deep breath. This is good news. We’re not going to float out over the largest body of water on the planet, destined to die. However, even though we’re flying in the right direction, there’s still quite a distance between Summer Island and the coast of California. We could die in a million ways before we reach safety.

And besides, how does Cade know that we're going east? He was never a Boy Scout.

“How do you know were going east?” I demand.

“I’m reasonably sure were going east, Millie.” He avoids my eyes and works his jaw like he’s gnawing through leather. Cade can’t lie to my face, so he’s doing what he does whenever he tells me that there were only four Pop Tarts in a box. He’s looking away and grinds his teeth.

If I had any more food in my stomach, I’d throw up again. I turn my attention to Samba, who seems enraptured by the balloon. He’s studying every aspect of it, the beautiful colors of the balloon itself, the flame in the center, and the ropes that hang below.

“Forget the interview,” I urge. “Take us back to the island. We need to be over land, or we’re going to die. I don’t care what you have to say. Do it now.”

I’m only five-foot-three, but I can get pretty ornery when I’m floating thousands of feet up in the air. “Just a minute, Millie,” Cade says. “Let’s not waste this chance. Mr. Samba, what was it that you wanted to talk about?”

Samba furrows his eyebrows. “Are you kidding? I’m not giving any interview. I’m fleeing.”

“What do you mean, you’re peeing?” I ask. Although I really shouldn’t judge, since I just threw up on Cade’s shoes.

“Not peeing,” Cade says. “He’s fleeing. You’re fleeing?”

Samba nods and bends down, riffling through some stuff in the corner of the basket. He stands up with a backpack in his hands and puts it on.

“I don’t understand,” I say. “I’m not getting the interview?”

“To be fair,” Cade says. “You just forfeited the interview, remember? You said you didn’t want it anymore and that he should just land the balloon. So, technically, this is my interview.”

I want to stab Cade in the neck, but I don’t have a knife. “I don’t care what I said. The interview’s mine.”

“Nuh-uh. Mine.”

“Mine!”

“No interview,” Samba says. “I don’t give interviews. Although, it would’ve been nice to spend more time with you, pretty girl.” He glides his fingers over my cheek. With the interview gone, the reality of being stuck in the balloon comes back to me.

“Okay, whatever,” I say. “No interview. But how about you land this balloon?”

Cade and I lock eyes, and I know he’s thinking exactly what I’m thinking. We may not have the exclusive interview with a despot heading off to jail, but we do have the story of the century of a lunatic trying to escape prosecution via hot air balloon. It’s almost worth dying for.

 “”How about you land this balloon?” Samba says.

“I think you should talk to him,” I tell Cade. “He’s speaking your language. You know, five-year-old boy.”

“Mr. Samba,” Cade says in his best grownup professional voice. “When are you planning on landing the balloon?”

Samba shakes his head and smiles. “Don’t you understand? This is the genius of my plan. The balloon keeps going, and the authorities look for it. Meanwhile, I’m enjoying mojitos in the company of two very young and beautiful women.”

Cade turns to me. “Nope. I don’t think that’s five-year-old he’s speaking. That’s more like…” He points at his head and makes little circles. I get the picture. We’re trapped in a balloon high above the ocean with a lunatic. “At least I was right about going east,” Cade continues, pointing behind me.

I turn and look. Land. I’ve never been so happy to see Los Angeles smog. “Good,” I say. “How do we get this baby down?”

Samba ignores me, but no matter what he said, I’m convinced that he’s working on getting the balloon down. As we fly over Los Angeles and up into the mountains, he pulls on a cord, and I wait for the balloon to lower. It doesn’t. Instead of landing, the balloon soars even higher.

“I don’t like how this is going,” I say. “This is way too many of my nightmares wrapped up into one. Somebody pinch me. Wake me up, quick.”

Cade grabs Samba’s arm, preventing him from pulling the cord again. “You’ve got to stop that, or I’m going to throw you overboard,” he growls.

“Good idea,” Samba says and climbs up on the side of the basket. He stands there, holding onto the ropes. He’s a sneeze away from plummeting to his death.

“Oh my God, he’s going to jump,” I shriek. “Don’t let him jump. He’s the only one who knows how to land this thing.”

Cade swipes at Samba but only manages to knock his chest. He doesn’t tap him hard, but it’s enough to send Samba flying into the air. For one brief moment, it looks like the deposed dictator is actually flying. Is it possible that he has a superpower? Can he fly? I’d love to have a superpower to fly, because I’m sure that today is going to end with me walking into the light. I don’t want to die this way. I’m not going to look pretty after falling thousands of feet to the ground. I should’ve eaten chocolate cake for breakfast. If I get out of this, I’m going to eat chocolate cake every day for breakfast for the rest of my life.

Who am I kidding? I’m never getting out of this alive.

Samba floats in the air with his arms outstretched. It’s a nightmare, like watching a real life horror movie. But there isn’t a speck of panic anywhere in his expression. In fact, he smiles and waves goodbye to us, like he’s had a nice visit, but now he has to go run errands. I gasp. I’ve never seen someone die before. There’s not a lot of death on Summer Island. People are disgustingly health-conscious. If you’re not drinking a green smoothie while doing downward facing dog, you’re an outcast.

Samba’s miraculous flying ability starts to fail him, and he dips down below us. I run to the side of the basket and look over the edge. There goes Samba, falling to his death onto the mountains below us. I want to say a prayer, but I don’t know what to say. It would take a bigger miracle than splitting the Red Sea for Samba to defy gravity and survive, and I’m not sure God wants to waste one of his biggies to save a war criminal.

It turns out that Samba doesn’t need my prayers. A second after I’m sure that he’s a goner, he tugs at his chest, and a parachute pops out of his backpack, throwing him up into the air above us.

“Today sure is full of surprises,” Cade says. I can hear Samba laughing. It’s the sound of triumph. Somehow, this man has evaded his capture, and now he’s sailing off into the sunset, while Cade and I are doomed in the balloon. If Samba didn’t know how to manipulate the balloon, he’s a pro at the parachute. He twists, turns, and pulls at it, and the parachute dives away from us. We watch, enthralled as Samba makes his escape. Meanwhile, we fly over the mountains.

Trapped.

Doomed.

I clutch a fistful of Cade’s shirt and pull him toward me. “I do not want to die like this. Do you hear me?” I spit from between my teeth. “Tell me you know how to get this balloon down safely.”

“I know how to get this balloon down safely,” he says. For a second I’m relieved, but then he shrugs. Shit. “Come on. Don’t look like that. There must be a way to do this. There’s probably instructions somewhere.”

The idea comes as much of a surprise to him as it does to me. We furiously search the basket and the ropes for some kind of tag with the words pull here. But there’s nothing. No way to adjust the fire that’s keeping the balloon afloat. It’s like Samba has erased any possibility of us landing the balloon.

“Maybe there’s another parachute,” Cade says. His optimism is starting to bother me. Doesn’t he understand that we’re going to die, die, die? Even though I’m fighting off the urge to pull out my hair and scream hysterically, I help Cade search the basket for more backpacks. We do find a small cooler with champagne and caviar in it, but there’s no other parachute.

“What kind of crazy person leaves champagne and caviar for his murder victims?” I ask.

“Did you notice there’s only one glass? That’s your glass.”

My glass. I was supposed to be here by myself. I can’t imagine being stuck up here, alone. At least now I have Cade to keep me company while I die. I swallow, but my throat has gotten thick like there’s something in there. I know what it is. It’s guilt. Not only am I going to die, but I’m going to kill Cade, too.

He grabs me and gives me a bear hug. “Don’t think that,” he says, reading my mind. “This isn’t your fault. It’s not even my fault. It’s the crazy guy’s fault. Remember that and don’t forget it. Somehow, we will get out of this.”

“You’re such a liar,” I say into his chest. It does feel better to have him hold me, and I’m filled with the need to be honest with him, to tell him everything before we die. “It’s not just you and me,” I mumble into his chest.