I folded my arms and leaned back in the chair. The seat swallowed me, plush and ridiculous. Everything in the cabin gleamed. Soft lighting. Polished wood. A couch at the back.
The kind of environment where people discussed mergers and drank whisky.
I watched him instead.
Elijah had changed into dark jeans and a navy shirt rolled to the elbows. His hair still carried the faint disorder from where I’d dragged my fingers through it earlier. The sight stirred a slow, familiar heat low in my stomach.
God, I was predictable.
He caught me looking. “Something on your mind?”
“You’re very casual about huge outlays of money.”
“I told you I don’t own the plane.”
“You’re sitting in it. And I’m pretty sure this isn’t Ryanair.”
A quiet laugh escaped him. “Their bathrooms are too small for what I want to do to you on this flight.”
The engines hummed to life, vibration running through the floor beneath my shoes. I gripped the armrest, then forced myself to relax.
“Nervous?” he asked.
“No.”
“Death grip says otherwise.”
“I’m not nervous about flying. I’m nervous about the fact I’m dating a man who treats long-distance travel as a morning errand.”
His gaze softened. “Ah, honey. We’re not dating.”
“Excuse me?” I loved it when he called me ‘honey’. I’d never had a nickname given by a boyfriend, if that’s what he was to me.
“Thirty days is just a number, and dating is far too polite a word. Plus dates have an end to them. We don’t.”
I rolled my eyes, but warmth spread through my chest anyway. Doubt and insecurity be gone. Elijah had put them to bed.
The plane lifted smoothly into the sky. Deadwater shrank beneath us. Clouds swallowed the view, and suddenly the world outside vanished, leaving only the quiet cabin and the steady presence of the man beside me.
For a while, we sat in comfortable silence.
Then Elijah set the tablet aside. “So. Tell me about your business.”
I whipped my head around. “I thought we agreed not to talk about work.”
“That was week one. Week two has different rules.”
I considered him carefully. “You’re not going to interrogate me about profit margins, are you?”
“Depends. Do you have any cool stories about them?”
I snorted.
“Rude. Just give me the basics.”
The corner of my mouth lifted, a familiar joy swirling in my belly at the dream I’d set aside since the disaster. “Fine. It’s lingerie. As if you don’t know.”
His eyebrows rose a fraction. “Let’s pretend I don’t. Your knowledge explains the guided tour in Crowley’s.”
