“Well, I don’t know many rich people, but for what it’s worth, you’re my favorite.”
I laugh. “Such high praise.”
“I know, right? Oh, hello.” Mimi turns her face to the purser.
“Miss Valente, Mr. Whittington. Can I get you any refreshments this morning?”
“No thanks, Gwen,” I reply.
“I could go for a juice,” Mimi says.
Gwen runs through the juices available on the in-flight menu, providing me with the opportunity to watch Mimi. To observe the tiniest flickers of enjoyment across her face. She is so fucking beautiful but it’s not just in her looks. She radiates joy—is sunshine personified. And while I’m sure, like everyone, she has her dark moments, she never seems to let them get her down. But I hope there’s a time in the not-too-distant future when she’ll let me share those moments with her. When she’ll lean on me as part of her team. I’ll introduce her to people by sayingthis is Mimi, my better half.And she’ll laugh like she’s amused, but we’ll secretly know it’s true because we’ll both be part of the other, the way all the best couples are.
“Six types of juice is some kind of fancy,” she says as Gwen retreats. “And that’s not even including the tomato juice, which, although technically made from a fruit, should not be included in a selection of juices.”
“It has seeds. Therefore, it’s a juice.”
“You would think, right?”
“Know so.”
“Then you’d be wrong. Tomato juice should be something you reserve for spaghetti sauce.”
“I’m sure there’s a little bit of logic in there somewhere.”
“Don’t hate me because you’re wrong.”
“Mimi,” I say with a chuckle, “hell would freeze over before I could ever hate you.”
She stares at me for a beat, and I swear whatever I see turns the blood in my veins into ice water. It’s like a switch has gone off, dimming the light inside her. It’s just a fleeting moment that lasts as long as a blink. A heartbeat. It’s gone in a second, though the residual energy seems to linger between us.
I want to ask,what was that?What were you thinking there, but it turns out, I’m a chickenshit when Gwen reappears.
“One pineapple juice,” she announces.
I glance at the glass of opaque juice balanced on a napkin on her silver tray. “I’ve changed my mind, Gwen. Could you rustle me up a Bloody Mary when you have a minute, please?”
“Certainly, Mr. Whittington.”
Mimi pulls a distasteful face. “If you think I’m kissing you after you drank spaghetti sauce—”
“I’d be right?”
She shrugs. “Probably.”
“Definitely. You know you can’t resist me.”
She turns her head to the window with a melancholy-sounding sigh. “Yeah, that’s true.”
My drink arrives, and I stare at it. I’m not the sort to try to numb the pain, but I drink the fucker anyway. Not that I’m in pain but I don’t know. I suppose I just want to chase away this sense of foreboding.
“We’ve been in the air a little over an hour, and the plane is beginning to descend.”
“Good deducing, Miss Marple.”
“So I’m gonna guess Scotland.”
“We’d already be on the ground if that were the case.”
