Right? Right?
And then my fingers slip and a whole crowd of people gasp in unison.
“I’m gonna die,” I whisper. “Fall and break my neck in like two seconds.”
“No, you’re not,” Andrew says.
Somehow, in the last five seconds, he’s climbed all the way up to where I’m barely hanging on. His thigh behind me, pressing against my ass, like he’s trying to pin me to the wall.
“I got you,” he says. “Just relax.” His breath is warm against my neck and his words are soft. “You’re OK.”
“Um… I don’t think I am.” I turn my head and look down and instantly regret it. Like all two hundred Le Man employees are down there, faces upturned, watching me make a fool of myself.
“Don’t look down,” he says, his hand slipping between my stomach and the wall. My shirt lifts up a little and his fingers brush against my bare skin for a brief moment. Then his other arm is reaching around behind me.
“I got you,” he says again. “Just relax. We’re gonna go down now.”
“Nope!” I say. “Nope. I can’t go down.”
“O-kaaay,” he says. “Then we’ll go up.”
I tilt my head up to the sheer wall in front of me and my heart sinks down into my stomach. “I don’t think I can do that either,” I whisper.
He chuckles a little behind me. His laugh cools the back of my sweaty neck and feels oddly comforting.
I take a deep breath. “Can someone just… lower me down?”
“No,” Andrew says. “I have you so you probably won’t break your neck if you fall.”
“Probably won’t?”
“But you don’t have a harness on, so no. We cannot lower you.”
“Get a harness!”
“It’s a gym. Not the Alps.”
And at that moment, as if the universe is striving to emphasize the point, someone’s ten-year-old goes flying up the wall beside us.
“Coming through,” he says in his snotty ten-year-old voice.
“Who brought their kid?” I say, loudly. “Fire that person!”
“Eden, hi, hey, over here,” Andrew whispers and I turn my attention back to him. “Here’s the deal. We climb up”—he points up—“or we climb down.” He points…the other way. “You choose.”
I think about that. For a little too long, I guess, because he says, “Listen to me. Either way is fine. I can help you up this wall and I will not let you fall. But every step down is one step closer to the ground. And if you do fall—”
“You just said I wasn’t gonna fall!”
“You won’t. But if you do, we’re that much closer to the ground and you’ll just land on the mat.”
“What if I miss the mat and hit the concrete?”
“OK, well, physically impossible, but if somehow you manage to defy science, I bet someone would catch you.”
“Catch me?” I’m suddenly mortified picturing myself falling on top of all my co-workers. Toppling them all over like a bowling ball. And his arm around me is tight. It’s pressing up underneath my tits. Which should feel good but right now is just making me self-conscious.
Jesus. Fucking big tits. They are the bane of my existence.
“Eden—”
“Up,” I say. Because I can’t deal with down right now. If I make it to the top I can rest. Hide, even. Everyone down on the floor will go back to their team-building bullshit and forget about me. “Up,” I say again. “I can do this. Let’s go up.”
“OK,” he says. And is he maybe… a little bit impressed with me?
Oh, my God, I’m delusional. He’s thinking, This Sexpert bitch is crazy. That’s what he’s thinking. Because I know he knows. And he did tell Pierce. And Pierce is probably down there right now hoping I’ll fall. So much for my sexy new career. I’m gonna be stuck making stupid hashtags for eternity.
Oh, no. No I won’t. Because the second I get off this stupid climbing wall he’s gonna fire me.
“Look at my foot. See where it is?”
I glance down, see the toe of his shoe tapping at a foothold, and say, “Yeah, I see it.”
“OK. You put your foot there.”
“But what about you? Where will your foot go?”
“Don’t worry,” he says. “I’m gonna use this one so I can box you in with my body.”
When he says that he rubs his chest against my back. Probably to let me know that he’s here. To comfort me and make me feel safe.
But it actually kinda makes me hot for him.
I roll my eyes at myself. Because really? I’m thinking about sex as I’m about to fall to my death? Although that actually makes a lot of sense. I hear people think of crazy things before they die and there are worse things to think about than sex with this guy, so—
“OK, ready?” Andrew asks.
Oh, right. Still here on the wall.
I nod. Swallow hard. And then whisper, “OK. I’m ready.”
“This wall has a forty-five-degree angle at the top, so we’re gonna just scoot over a little to that wall.”