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“I don’t know what’s going on in your head,” Ben said. “But we’re not going to repeat Austin and Dominic’s dipshit story. Alright? This is a professional relationship. You aren’t going to come back in a month with a boyfriend.”
Levi’s grin widened, like he was delighted that Ben had brought it up. Ben made himself keep his hand on Levi’s chest, hoping he looked intimidating. Then he removed it and sat back, staring straight ahead where the cabin crew was getting ready to depart.
“I don’t know,” Levi said. “I can be pretty persuasive. And we’ll be stuck in that cabin for so long, with nothing to do…”
“I’m sure you’ll find something in one of your endless bags,” Ben said flatly. He was already questioning how the hell they were going to transport all that luggage to the cabin. Levi might have to leave some of it behind.
Ben ignored Levi until the plane took off. He watched the hangar grow smaller and continued to ignore Levi as the man leaned over Ben again to wave to Austin and Dominic as they vanished from view.
Levi waved a while longer and then settled back into his seat, looking utterly unbothered by flying. Unlike Ben, who used to take sleeping pills right before takeoff. He was better these days, but he still had to grip the armrest that he wasn’t sharing with Levi.
A flight attendant came down the aisle with a tray, beaming in a way that made Ben uncomfortable. She was perfectly professional, but Ben hated fake smiles. The bigger it was, the more he hated it. Why couldn’t they be allowed to act normal?
“Would either of you like any champagne?” the flight attendant asked.
Levi agreed. His hand dangled lazily as the flight attendant filled his glass, and Ben had to tear his gaze from those long fingers yet again. Those hands were going to be a problem. Luckily, Ben was good at compartmentalizing. He’d been in the closet until he was thirty. He had repressed his crushes on his squadmates during his army days. He could handle being vaguely attracted to the twenty-something brat he was protecting for the next month, even if they were sharing suffocatingly close quarters.
Ben waited for the flight attendant to head back down the plane, then said, “Don’t get used to people bringing shit to you. There’s no service in the cabin. Speaking of service, give me your phone.”
Levi’s smile dimmed. “Wait, Dom was serious about that? No phone, no laptop, no fucking Netflix?”
“Hope you brought books,” Ben said. “Phone.”
He held his hand out. Levi’s full lips twisted as he looked at it. For a moment, Ben thought Levi might fight him on this. He almost hoped Levi did. Which made no sense. He should want Levi to do whatever he said, not bitch about it.
Levi rolled his eyes and handed his phone over. Ben gave it to the flight attendant as she came back around, who took it with another too-wide smile.
Levi watched her walk away with it, clearly unhappy. But he didn’t whine as Ben expected. He only turned to Ben and gave him a tight smile. “At least this will mean we’ll have more time to devote to each other, Daddy.”
The title scratched an old itch in Ben’s brain that he hadn’t thought about in a long time. A hundred images ran through his head. Levi’s long, graceful fingers wrapped around Ben’s cock. Levi with eyeliner streaming down his cheeks. Levi’s ass turning red as Ben spanked him, just like Levi suggested. Levi would make Ben work for every inch of obedience. If Levi was someone else, Ben might be tempted to take him up on it. Levi wanted to be good for someone. Ben could tell. But he was also an annoying little shit.
Ben pointed to the seat across the aisle where Levi had been sitting when Ben got on the plane. “Go sit over there.”
Levi’s pristine brows lifted. “What?”
“Go,” Ben repeated. “You’re pissing me off.”
Levi rolled his tongue in his mouth, like he was considering telling Ben where he could shove it. Then, as if he knew what this would do to Ben, he gave him a defiant look before getting up and moving to the other seat. He immediately threw his long legs up to rest on the seat opposite him, watching Ben the whole time.
His cocky smirk sparked something deep in Ben’s belly. Ben violently smothered it and turned to the window, preferring flight jitters to whatever that brat was awakening in him.
Fuck. It really was going to be a long few weeks.
CHAPTER 5
“What the fuck do you mean I can’t take all of it?”
Ben acted like Levi’s perfectly reasonable request was the dumbest thing he’d ever heard. He glared at Levi, then gestured at the mostly full trunk of the Volvo that was taking them to the cabin. They didn’t even have a driver, just Ben. Once they pulled away from this landing strip—and there wasn’t even a hangar or an airport, just a snowy landing strip—it was going to be Ben and Levi, stuck together in this icy hellscape of a state.
“Do you see any more space in that trunk?” Ben demanded.
“Yes! Right there!”
Ben’s glare intensified. “You mean the space I need to look out when I’m reversing?”
An icy wind blew over the landing strip. The cabin crew shivered in their uniforms as they stood in the snow, waiting to see if they were going to unpack the rest of Levi’s luggage.
Levi ignored the gooseflesh breaking out under his clothes, which were, admittedly, not built for the Alaskan winter. He was freezing and tired, and they still had hours of driving ahead of them. He didn’t want a screaming match with his hot new bodyguard, especially when other people were waiting on his say-so to get out of the cold.
