The McKinley on the ground would have politely declined. But this airborne McKinley? The one who was soaring over the beach city she loved? She was a badass thrill-seeker ready for her next adrenaline rush.

“Tell me what to do,” she said, wrapping her eager fingers around the yoke.

Colton gave her gentle instructions that she followed to a T and was delighted when she felt the plane react to her movements.

“Perfect,” Colton’s voice purred in her ear. “Now why don’t you bank to the right. Keep your eyes on the altimeter. Beautiful.”

She glanced in his direction as she executed the turn and found him recording her with his phone.

“What are you doing?” she asked, her attention returning to the horizon.

“Recording our first official date so I can play this at our wedding.”

She laughed with pure, unadulterated joy. “You’re insane.”

“And you’re flying a plane,” he pointed out.

“Thanks, Colt,” she said, softening.

He put his phone away. “I like seeing you smile like this.”

His confession, low and raspy, had her skin and blood and muscle firing up. She was flying a plane with a sexy, smart, sweet man who had respectfully pursued her for the better part of a year. Just what was she so damn afraid of?

Of failing again? Or of flying?

---

---

When the wheels touched the earth, smooth as butter—under Colton’s control—McKinley felt the twin pangs of disappointment and elation. She was also suddenly ravenous. And not for the tacos Colton had promised her.

“What did you think?” Colton asked after they’d both exited the plane. The sun was shining down on them. A strong breeze lifted her hair, welcoming her back to the earth. And those clouds, the ones she’d touched, billowed above them. Colton was grinning at her behind his aviators like he already knew what she thought.

She closed the distance between them and didn’t stop until she was pressed against him. His lean, hard body to her soft curves. He lost his easy grin when she planted her lips against his. McKinley was tired of careful and safe. She wanted to hang on to this feeling. Alive, electric, enamored.

She felt him tense against her, felt his muscles coil and knew he was fighting nature. Fighting to stay gentle, to not overwhelm her. Kissing her the way the sun kissed the ocean every night. Their mouths melded, and the breath she sucked in when she parted her lips was a shaky one. But there was no time for breath, not with Colton’s tongue sweeping past her lips to claim.

He pulled her in until she couldn’t tell where he ended and she began. McKinley pushed her busy fingers into his hair shoving his hat off his head. It fell to the tarmac along with the beating heart she’d wrenched from her own chest.

“McKinley,” he gasped.

But she wasn’t interested in talking. She dove back into the kiss with ferocity.

Colton’s hands skimmed her body, exploring. She loved the feel of his work-roughened palms cruising her curves, dragging through her hair. He wrapped her heavy curls around his fist and held her there.

“We need to slow down, Kinley,” he warned with a soft laugh of wonder. But neither of their bodies were interested in listening.

“No, thanks,” she said politely as she dug her fingers into the cotton of his polo, dragging him back to her.

He swore under his breath. And then they were moving. He hustled her backward. She was too busy kissing him to wonder where they were going until the hot Florida sun disappeared from her skin. She must not have moved fast enough for his liking, because Colton picked her up, wrapping her legs around his slim hips and carrying her further into the open hangar.

They made it as far as the box of an office that jutted out into the space. He pressed her back against the wall. “I’ve thought about doing this for a very long time,” he breathed, nipping at the stubborn line of her jaw.

She tilted, offering him better access.

“I want to touch you,” he murmured, brushing his lips over her hair, her face.

“Yes,” she breathed.

Colton let out the breath that sounded like a groan and dropped his forehead to hers. But still, he hesitated. McKinley grabbed the wrist of his right hand and watched his face as she slowly slipped it under the hem of her tank.

Her stomach pulled a double back flip at his touch. She wanted him. Ached for him. Eight months of flirting, of playing it safe, and this had been simmering under the surface. Life. Lust. They made her heart beat faster.

“Is this okay?” he asked softly, his palm brushing over her belly button and higher over her ribs.

She grinned up at him. “It’s better than okay, Colt.”

“You’re beautiful, Kinley. The most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.”

“You can say that after being up there?” she pointed toward the sky that they’d just explored together.

“Oh, yeah.” His hot fingers trailed paths over her skin, skirting the edge of her bra. “No contest.”

“Can I touch you?” McKinley asked him breathlessly.

Colton’s knees buckled momentarily and she laughed softly.

“God, yes,” he whispered.

She knew he wanted to go slow. To sample and savor. But she wanted something different, a fiery feast. A fast fall into the fire that had been burning low for so long. She slipped her hand beneath the waistband of his shorts and reveled in the way the muscles of his stomach tensed to solid rock.

She waited for the little voice to scream at her for being irresponsible. To remind her of what happened last time she’d allowed herself to get swept up. But there was nothing but her own blood pumping hotly through her system. Her fingers met his battle-ready shaft through the thin material of his underwear. And she found herself shoved hard against the wall, her leg looping over his hip while his erection grinded into her stomach.

Need pulsed, and throbbed, and shredded its way through her. If Colton were to move his hand up an inch, that rough palm grazing her nipple, she’d go off like the finale of fireworks on the 4^th of July. And, right now, there wasn’t anything else she wanted more than that.

“Sorry. Sorry,” he panted. “Lost control for a second.”

Wide-eyed, she glanced down at where he pressed so intimately to her. “I liked it,” she confessed.

“God, McKinley. You are killing me. I’m trying to be a good guy here.”

He was. Colton Hayes was a good guy and he was proving it again, when it mattered most, first by not killing her in a plane crash and now by not fucking her against the wall. And nothing else could have convinced her more quickly that the man she’d spent the last months getting to know was indeed good.

She took a deep breath and gathered her last scrap of sanity. “Okay. I know. I got… carried away.”

He didn’t move back from her and she didn’t push him. They stood like that, rooted together, bodies begging for more.

“I’m gonna need more than a first date, Kinley,” Colton said finally.

“Okay.” She nodded, her head loose on a neck that seemed like it had lost its muscle. “What are you doing tomorrow?”

He kissed her again. This time softly, sweetly. Like a promise of what was to come.

“Oh, hey, Colt! Didn’t know you were work— Oh, shit. Sorry.”

Colton whirled, stepping in front of McKinley, leaving her shaking and disheveled.

Sonny was looking everywhere but at them, the tips of his ears a shade of scarlet Colton had never seen on him before. “I’m just going to…” Sonny pointed over his shoulder and walked out, tripping over a toolbox on his way. “Nice to see you, McKinley!” he called.

“You too, Sonny.”

Colton turned back to McKinley.

“Listen,” McKinley began.

“If you start saying anything that sounds like ‘that was a mistake’ you’re going to break my heart.”

Her swollen lips curved. “I’m saying this has been one hell of a first date. But maybe we should get something to eat and talk… fully clothed. Maybe with a table between us.”

“How do you feel about tacos?”

She grinned, blinding him again. “As long as you don’t complain about me eating five of them in one sitting, I feel really good about them.”

“You are the sexiest woman I’ve ever met. How do you feel about avocados?”