Need You Now (1001 Dark Nights) (7 page)
Looking up, I stare at myself in the mirror, swiping at the wild mess that is my long blonde hair, wishing I had on more than the barely-there outline of lipstick that remains. I start to dig out the tube from my purse and stop myself. I don’t want to seem like I’m trying to look good for Jensen. And who else would I look good for on this plane? I zip my purse again and give myself another inspection in the mirror, trying to find the woman I know as me who would not let herself be this out of control. She’s sure not on the plane right now and she needs to get her ass on board.
Inhaling, I open the door, willing myself to focus on the business at hand. Jobs are on the line. My job is on the line. I don’t know how I became the person convincing Jensen to stay invested in the hotels, but I have, and the pressure is immense.
Moving down the aisle again, I find Jensen sitting in the lounge area where I’d dropped my bag, and I know I should sit with him. I know I should, but I’m hoping to reach Katie before we take off and need at least a little privacy. Snatching my bag, I don’t look at him as I sit in the opposite lounge area, buckling up and digging my iPad from my briefcase.
“Afraid I’ll bite?”
I glance over at him. “No, but I do and I figure that might get me kicked off the plane.”
“Depends on why you do it and how hard.”
My lips part in surprise and he laughs, and I try to be scandalized—after all, he still could be married and now he’s my boss, even if he doesn’t claim that title. Sort of. Isn’t he? Either way, it doesn’t seem to matter, though. I love his laugh too much. It’s deep. It’s raw and male, and it’s sexy. The effect has me hyperaware of him, and I have to cross my arms in front of my chest when, to my complete and utter disbelief, my nipples suddenly tighten all over again, my body seemingly no longer under my control but his. Even with “Mad Max,” who I was really attracted to at first, I was never out of sorts like this. Desperate for a distraction, I power up my iPad, trying to tune out the sensations I’m feeling.
“No response?” he queries.
“No response,” I confirm, pulling up my e-mail to start answering what I can before we’re in the air, but my brain is such mush, I only manage to clear four queries from my box before we’re moving.
We start to taxi down the runway and I change my screen to my MCAT study guide. The moment we lift off in the air, I dare to glance in Jensen’s direction to find him deeply immersed in some document he’s studying. His profile is strong, his personality stronger. Maybe he’s a bastard like Meredith accused him of being, but I’m not so sure. Why does being successful and having drive mean you’re a bastard? I’m not naïve. My mother has assured that, and I don’t believe in fairy tales, but I still really need to believe in people the way my father always did.
Jensen looks up as if he senses my attention, and for several seconds we just look at each other. We seem to do a lot of that, but then we aren’t touching each other, so what else is there? I guess that’s why I don’t look away. I can’t say really. I just...don’t. And he doesn’t and everything I’d felt just looking at him last night gets more clear and present every time we do this. There is something about this man that drags me into the center of some erotic spell and wraps me up all tight and warm. And it’s dangerous. So very dangerous. I don’t know if he’s that bastard. I don’t know what his agenda is. I don’t know if he’s really married. That’s the one that gets to me.
Forcefully, I cut my gaze and lean my seat back, rolling my body toward the window and trying to focus on the material I’ve spent every evening studying for weeks, at the expense of sleep. Almost instantly my lashes are heavy and when the plane levels off to a smooth sail, I am officially sleepy. Reluctantly, I straighten my seat to stay alert, but still I shut my eyes, and for just a moment I let them, promising I’ll read another chapter in a minute.
* * * *
I wake with a jolt and sit up to find Jensen squatted down on the floor beside me, and if that isn’t a shock enough, the way the plane is shaking around us sure is. I glance out of the window, tensing with the flicker of lightning in the not so distance sky. “Oh God. Are we crashing?”
Jensen chuckles. “No. We aren’t crashing or I wouldn’t be sitting here as calmly as I am. I’d be up front, trying to do the pilot’s job.”
“You know how to fly?”
“Yes. I know how to fly. And believe me, this is all normal. We just hit some bad weather.”
“Then why are you on the floor?”
“Because despite all of the shaking, you didn’t wake up.” He holds up my iPad. “Not even when this flew onto the ground. I didn’t want it to take a slide down the aisle and end up get broken.”
I straighten, bringing him into focus, finding his jacket and tie missing, two buttons on his white shirt loose, and a dark sprinkle of hair peeking from the top. My brain can’t seem to process proper word usage, but I manage, “That was...nice of you.”
He arches a brow. “Enough with the nice already.” The plane jolts and he falls forward, one of his hands going to the arm of my seat, the other to my knee.
Our gazes collide, and the plane jolts so badly that I actually grab his arm and hold on. “You need to buckle in,” I hiss. ”You’re going to get hurt.”
“Yes,” he agrees at the same moment we hit an air pocket and drop several feet, and I don’t even think about what I’m doing. I cling to him, holding him down and just holding on period. His arm slides around me, and somehow when we level off again, I end up with my face in his shoulder. “It’s okay,” he murmurs, his hand stroking my hair, sending a shiver down my spine. “We’re okay.”
“You can’t know that.” I lean back, but I can’t seem to move. I don’t move my hands, despite the realization that we are far too intimate. “You have to buckle up. What is the pilot saying? You should talk to him.”
“I already did. We’ll be fine.” The plane seems to steady a bit. “See. Already the air is improving.” He hands me my iPad again. “You keep throwing this at me.”
“I’m a thrower. I got it from my mother. Stepfathers numbers two and four have stitches she gave them.”
“I think I should be scared.”
“Just don’t piss me off.”
“I’m pretty sure I already have.”
“You have,” I assure him. “But seeing you at my place of work had me too flustered to throw things.”
“I guess I got lucky.”
I swipe the screen to make sure it works, bringing the MCAT study guide to life on my screen. “Thankfully it still works.”
“So it’s true.”
“What’s true?”
“You’re going to med school in six months.”
“How did you know that?”
“You don’t keep it a secret and I have a way of getting people to talk.”
The plane jerks and tension curls in my belly. “Yes. I’m going to medical school. I guess that makes me disposable.”
“As far as I’m concerned, it makes you more valuable. You might be loyal to Meredith and the other employees, but you aren’t trying to jockey for some corporate position either.”
Relief washes over me. “No. Of course not. I never intended to be where I’m at now. I came in as a temp and just clicked with Meredith.”
“Why leave in six months, instead of last year or next year?”
“That’s when I’ll feel like I can go to school full time and not work.”
“In New York?”
“Yes. Well, I hope so. I was accepted right out of college, and in-state tuition is a must for me. I need to retake the MCAT next month and reapply though, since it’s been so long. I’m hopeful that means starting school in January, but it could get pushed back depending on admissions backlog, in which case, I’ll keep working.”
“Even with in-state tuition, medical school isn’t cheap and neither is living in New York.”
“My father left me a trust fund and my grandmother left me her apartment.”
“What did your father do for a living?”
“Doctor.”
“Of course,” he says. “And your mother?”
“She was his nurse. Now, she’s traveling with my stepfather.”
“Stepfather number four.”
“Yes.”
“And you’re making me glad my stepfather is the one and only for the past decade.”
“I’m glad my number one didn’t stay around. Actually, I haven’t been fond of any of them. I think my mother picks men as opposite from my father as possible and everything she really wants in a man. I’m not sure if it’s intentional or some psychological thing. And I really don’t know why I’m telling you this. I don’t talk about it.”
The plane jerks and he moves to the seat in front of me, buckling himself in. “It’s keeping your mind off the turbulence.”
“And you have a way of making people talk,” I say, reminding him of his comment.
“I do,” he agrees, studying me a moment. “So thanks to a strong financial position, you could walk away from this job at any moment.”
It’s not a question, but my instant unease has me answering. “If I want to put off medical school longer, yes, but I don’t.” I hesitate and add, “But please know this. If I need to walk away to spare someone else’s job who really needs to feed their family, I will.”
“Like I already said. If I walk away from the board, I won’t be around to make that decision. But your friend Katie would be advised to make peace with her manager, who will be the one to submit a list of who stays and who goes for his department.”
“You’re thinking she’s a bad employee, but she’s not. She’s a hard worker and she loves her job. She’s just alone in this world and her boyfriend is confusing her.”
“Too many people depend on me for me to be distracted by my personal life. Exactly why I keep things simple.”
Either he’s not married or he’s a total jerk. I don’t know which, but more and more I don’t want him to be a jerk. “My plan for medical school as well. No distractions and pure focus.”
“No boyfriend, then.”
“No. No boyfriend.”
Several beats pass, the plane rumbling around us and slowly calming before he surprises me. “Why’d you run last night?”
“I didn’t run.”
“You left without saying good-bye. That’s running in my boat. Why?”
“I made a decision to leave. Period.”
“Why?”
“You aren’t going to let this go, are you?”
“Not a chance.”
“What happened to you not fucking where you work?”
“A question isn’t an orgasm. Why’d you leave?”
His frankness blisters my pride for reasons I don’t understand, and I blurt out, “Who calls at that time of night but a wife or a girlfriend?”
“My uncle, who sits on the board and despises Meredith.”
The fast explanation is a crushing blow of embarrassment, and all I manage in reply is a sheepish, “Oh.”
“Oh,” he repeats, his jaw tight, eyes steady on my face. “You thought I was married.”
“Yes. And I didn’t want any part of that kind of betrayal.”
“And now you know you weren’t.”
“Yes,” I say, seeming to have the one word, same word, curse again.
“And I know why you left.”
“Yes. Now you know.”
“And you really didn’t know who I was.” I shake my head and he adds, “But you still aren’t certain I didn’t know who you were, are you?”
“I don’t know what to think.”
He leans forward as he had in the limo, elbows on his knees. “If I’d have wanted to seduce you for information, I would have done it smartly. A hotel room the night before we’re introduced isn’t smart.”
“And smart would have been what?”
“I’d take you on this trip with me, and then make damn sure you ended up in my bed. If I were trying to seduce you for information. But I’m not. I meant what I said earlier. My unbreakable rule is that I don’t fuck where I work.” His gaze drops to my lips, lingering and lifting, his expression wolfish as he adds, “Even when I wish I could.”
He unbuckles himself and stands and walks back to his seat.
Stunned by his confession and his departure, I can’t seem to move. I don’t know what he was trying to tell me or if he was trying to tell me anything at all. Seconds or minutes pass, I don’t really know, and I sink into my seat, rethinking every last second of the time I’d spent with him last night and today.
By the time we land in Jacksonville, Florida, an hour later, I’ve decided his words were as honest as they get. We could have, would have, should have, but we didn’t and our time has passed. There’s simply no way around it.
Five minutes later, I exit the plane into the humid Florida evening, the sun already long gone, and start down the stairs. Somehow, my shoe catches on the step, and embarrassingly, I tumble forward. Jensen’s strong hand catches me a moment before I go face first to the ground, and somehow I end up facing him, my body pressed to every hard line of his.
In that moment, I despise his “rule” and I despise even more how impossible it is for me to shut him out. “I should warn you, I’m clumsy,” I admit awkwardly.
“Then I guess I’d better keep a close eye on you.”
“I thought that was why you brought me here in the first place.” I think of his inference that I held Meredith’s secrets.
“Indeed it was,” he agrees, his voice a bit too low and gruff, but before I can push to find out his meaning versus mine, the sound of a car pulling up behind us has him glancing over my shoulder. “That will be our driver.” I try to pull away and for just a beat of a moment, he holds me, not letting me go. Or maybe I imagine it because an instant later, he is no longer touching me and I’m walking down the stairs, the warm Florida air nothing compared to the heat of Jensen Miller.
“Are you hungry?” Jensen asks as we settle into the back of the limo.
“Starving, actually.”
“It’s a short drive to the hotel. I’d like to grab drinks and food in the bar and talk through some things.”
I give a nod, replaying his words in my head. Talk through some things. I don’t begin to know what that means, but I’m worried. Confused. Unsure what his intent is where I’m concerned.
“Have you ever actually been to this location?” he asks.
“No. That’s exactly why I didn’t think I was qualified for this.”
“Actually it makes you more qualified. I don’t want them to be on guard. I want us to act like regular customers. We’ll make some special requests and see how they handle it all. Before we leave, we’ll meet with the management staff.”