Page 101 of Spies Don’t Fall for Their Best Friend

My gaze whips to Charlie, but before I can ask about Jace and Mackenzie, Charlie says, “You guys go. Have fun! Make interesting choices!”

I walk with Miles down my stairs and to his car, which is parked at the curb. He opens the door for me, and I get in. I watch him walk around the front of the car and have the disorienting realization that I’m checking him out. On purpose.

I look around the inside of his car. It’s very clean. There is no gym bag on the floor. No empty water bottle rolling beneath the passenger seat. No hoodie tossed in the back seat. Not a speck of dust or piece of lint in sight.

When he gets in, I say, “You super cleaned your car.”

He smiles. “Of course I cleaned it extra well. This is a date.”

Apparently, flowers are not the only evidence.

As he pulls away from the curb, I say, “So, where are we going?”

“You’ll see.”

“We’re on the date, and I still don’t get to know?”

“Nope.” He is smiling way too much.

I decide it’s pointless to keep trying to get information out of him, so instead, we spend the next forty minutes heading toward Baltimore, discussing everything except the plans he’s refusing to reveal, including whether the fern thief from Monday successfully escaped.

At four ten, he turns into a commercial complex, and a large blue-and-red sign comes into view that reads, iFLY Indoor Skydiving. I sit forward so abruptly that my seat belt locks. “No.”

Miles parks. “No?”

“I can’t believe we are here.”

“You’ve wanted to try it for three years.”

“I mentioned it what? One time?”

“Three times.”

“That sounds exaggerated.”

“The first was after seeing a video of a seventy-year-old woman flying in the wind tunnel at a place like this. The second was when Jace described rappelling from a helicopter—although at the time you believed he was describing a team-building retreat. And the third time was during that episode of The Village Detective with the Fourth of July celebration, when the stuntman dressed as Uncle Sam floated down in the middle of the town square with a red, white, and blue parachute and landed ten feet from the body.”

I look at the building again. “I cannot believe you remembered.”

He glances at me. “Of course I remembered.”

Of course. He says it as though remembering every small wish I’ve voiced over five years is the most ordinary thing in the world. As though this date isn’t already becoming something much more dangerous than indoor skydiving.

Inside, we check in, sign waivers, and join six other people for a training session. Our instructor, Devon, explains body position and hand signals before giving us flight suits, helmets, goggles, and lace-up shoes.

Once we’re dressed, we file into the tunnel area. The wind roars behind the curved plexiglass while the first two members of our group wobble and flail through their flights.

Then it’s Miles’s turn. He enters the tunnel, settles into position, and immediately becomes weightless. No wobbling. No frantic arm movements. No expression suggesting he has made a serious mistake.

He lifts as smoothly as though he belongs in the air, adjusting his body with movements so small I barely see them. Devon signals something. Miles responds. A moment later, they shoot upward in a rapid spiral.

I press both hands against the glass, watching in awe. Miles circles the tunnel, controlled and effortless, before descending again and landing with grace. I’ve always known that Miles is athletic. Watching him move like this is an entirely different category of information, and my brain is filing that tidbit somewhere less platonic than usual. When he exits, everyone applauds.

Devon flips open the glass of his helmet and says, “You’ve done this before.”

“A bit.”

Miles glances at me through the glass, and I point at him accusingly. He just grins. The traitor made this look easy.