Peering into her coaxing eyes, I have no choice. It just comes out. “My dad died, so we moved in with my grandparents.”
My eyes close for a moment, drifting back to that flight. Eleven-year-old Gillian sitting beside me, nudging my ribs and hissing, “Shut up.” Ten-year-old Finn, the spitting image of our mother with golden hair and blue eyes, presses tight to her side cooing, “It’s okay mam.” Her tear-logged stare fixes forward while saying, “Rowan, I’m sorry.”
“I get it,” Pen’s delicate fingers thread with mine, pulling my attention to her. A thoughtful expression etched in her lovely features. “We moved in with my Aunt Bea when I was three after my dad died.”
I squeeze her hand, allowing the action to bind me to her in this shared understanding of each other’s grief. In not just losing someone we loved far too soon – too soon to even really know them beyond the flicker of memories and stories from others – but in the loss of our entire world.
“What’s your favorite memory of him?” she asks, her thumb dancing along mine. Each caress is reminiscent of kisses across my skin.
“We had a pond behind our house where we’d swim in the summer and, in the winter when it iced over, we skated. My brothers didn’t like skating. Finn preferred being in the house with mam and Gillian…found me annoying.” I grin, knowing his feelings hadn’t changed over the years.
Though, Gillian wouldn’t use the word annoying. He has far more colorful words to describe me now.
“Dad and I would skate for hours. He’d been a hockey player at university until he hurt his knee. He never stopped loving the game. My brothers watched with him but didn’t share the same passion as he and I did. On our pond’s ice, it was our time just me and him. I wasn’t one of his boys buthisson.”
“Are you still into hockey?”
My gaze meets hers. “I am.”
“Good.” Her smile drips with acceptance.
The open admiration in her eyes unspools the tangled emotions in my chest. That sense of being alone – being unseen – dissolves in the way she looks at me. Like somehow, she sees me.The real me.The lonely boy forced to say goodbye to the father he loved and the life he knew. The guarded man that bought his childhood home to sit beside that pond in hopes to hear the whispered voice of the past.
“Just checking in to see if you need anything. Perhaps, a drink? I know you declined during our first pass,” The flight attendant asks, pulling my stare away from Pen.
“Ah.” I blink, not realizing there was an entire flight outside of the little bubble that Pen and I had fallen into. The rest of the world was drowned out by this woman. I’d not noticed anything. Not the safety announcements. Not the takeoff. Nothing.
Pen’s almost conspiratorial glance telegraphs that she’d been very much in that bubble with me.
“Tea, please. English Breakfast if you have it.”
The flight attendant nods. “And your wife? What would she like?” He tips his head to Pen.
My wife?The attraction between us is palpable, but we’ve just met. Even if the initial thought I had when first meeting her wasmine, mine, mine– as if I’m a fucking caveman – she’s not mine.
Though, I don’t like the way the flight attendant is looking at her, nor the dismissive way he referred to Pen. Mine or not, I’d expect him – or anyone – to address her directly. To meet her gaze.No. Fuck that.He should bow to this goddess beside me because God knows that’s all I want to do is prostrate myself at her feet.
I open my mouth….
But Pen steals my words. “His wife”—she clears her throat— “can answer herownquestions and would also like an EnglishBreakfast tea.” Somehow, she’s both sweet and fierce in the polite request, making me want her even more.
My gaze flicks from Pen to the flight attendant, flashing him a stern glare. A snarl building in my throat.
“Apologies.” He shifts foot-to-foot, the muscles of his throat working.
Her features are soft. “It’s totally fine. My hubby gives offmajoralpha vibes, so I get it. Don’t let the growly face fool you…” Raising her hands, she pinches my cheeks and coos, “He’s a total softy.”
I scowl, fighting the grin that curls my lips. Everything about this woman makes me smile. But the scowl is also for her, at the idea that this is not the first time she’s dealt with someone not speaking directly to her. That someone only saw her cane, not her.
“He is commanding.” The flight attendant blushes. “I’ll bring you both some warm chocolate chip cookies with your tea.” With a placating expression, he moves to the next row.
“Asshole,” I mutter under my breath.
She taps my cheek. “Easy, hubby, or I’ll make you give me your cookie.”
Fuck, she can have everything if she keeps looking at me that way.
“I guess he’s one of those assholes your Aunt Bea talks about.”
