Page 19 of Once Bitten

We’d spent the last 3 hours going over the schedule for the Paris meetings and had reached a comfortable, if not entirely business-like, rhythm. Finn turned out to know more about the business than I had thought, and just needed to be updated on the financials and the logistics of how to close the deal. He surprised me with some suggestions to take to Larry and proved he’d actually taken the time to read through my notes and do his own research. I was burning with curiosity about his relationship to the new CEO but would have rather died than break my own rule of keeping everything purely business.

“Do you have any other questions?” I asked Finn.

“Yeah,” his handsome face deep in thought, “who do you have to flirt with around here to get some champagne?” he asked loudly as a flight attendant walked passed and she threw her hands up in pretend exasperation before gesturing that she’d be back with our drinks.

I giggled, unable to resist his jovial demeanor. Some things hadn’t changed about him, but he did seem to be more open, carefree, not walking around with a self imposed chip on his shoulder the whole time. And to think I used to think his grumpiness was so hot.

I watched him wink at the FA as she brought two glasses and left the champagne bottle on his tray and I couldn’t help but picture his teenage face all cold and distant behind sunglasses and chuckled at the memory.

“What?” he handed me a glass and turned his full attention to me.

“Oh, er, nothing.” I pretended to be busy drinking and downed almost the entire glass of Veuve, licking my lips of the tingling liquid.

“No, really, tell me. It’s the first time I’ve heard you laugh in ... well, 15 years, I want to know what caused it.”

He sounded so earnest, or it might’ve been the bubbles already fogging up my brain but I gave in. “I was laughing...at what...a douche you used to be.” I said, trying to swallow my giggles.

He opened his mouth in a look of offense, “I was...not...a...” He stopped and then started laughing himself, “oh my god, even I couldn’t get through that with a straight face. I was a douche, wasn’t I?”

“Uh huh,” I nodded, “a douchey ...vampire!” I burst out into a guffaw.

“What? Take that back! What does that even mean?”

I felt his eyes watching me, but I couldn’t stop laughing at the memory of the petulant adolescent he was compared to the sexy and sophisticated adult sitting here talking to me about a multimillion dollar business deal.

“You...and the...” I gasped for breath, “the leather jacket even in the heat of summer...and sunglasses! Hahaha! The sunglasses even when we went to the movies!” I bent over sucking in breath, tipsy and more relaxed than I’d felt all day.

“Harumph!” He folded his arms in front of his chest and leant back in the seat, trying to look unimpressed with my laughter at his expense, but with a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth.

Fuck, he looked so delicious. That...had not changed. I mean, he’d always been the most good looking man I’d ever seen, but now everything was so much... more. He was so much more. His body was more, his face, his smile...he’d grown into every promise that his adolescent body had made. I couldn’t imagine any woman ever denying him anything.

You did, a small shrill voice inside my head whispered. And I took another sip of my champagne to quieten it.

Finn sat forward in his seat and took the empty glass from my hand.

Another static buzz sparked between our fingers and this time I didn’t pull away. I couldn’t even if I’d wanted to, and I didn’t want to.

“Kara,” my name suddenly sounded foreign spoken from his lips, more elegant, sexier, grown up. “I’m...I’m not the douche I used to be.”

“No?”

“No. I...I did a lot of things I’m so ashamed of. To everyone, especially, to you.”

I didn’t say anything and waited for him to pour me another glass.

“Kara?” He prompted me for a response.

I shrugged, “what do you want me to say?”

“Do you think you can forgive me?”

I put the glass down and turned to him. Despite how I felt about him, I knew that he was trying to be sincere, so I wanted him to really hear what I was going to say.

“Will I ever forgive you, Finn? No. Never. Not ever. They say forgiveness is about moving on, but you broke my heart beyond repair. Forever. So, no. I won’t ever, ever forgive you.”

And then the lights of the plane went out.