Finn hopped the stairs into the plane two at a time, then ducked inside, nodding to the pilot as he did. “Hey, Steve. Thanks for waiting.”
The older man just smiled and tipped his fingers to his forehead. “Ready when you are.”
Finn grinned. “I’m always ready.”
Steve just chuckled, shook his head, then closed the door to the cockpit. Finn shuffled the bags in his hands, then made his way into the main section of the small private jet.
Felicity was seated in the central area, where there was a large round table surrounded by four cushy leather chairs. There were also seats along either side of the plane, situated next to the windows. He happened to know that in the back, there was a small private meeting area, a fairly nicely appointed bathroom, and a bedroom, which was pretty much all bed.
He smiled at Felicity, who had both her arms and legs crossed, and didn’t look particularly happy with him. She glared at the closed cockpit door, then back at Finn. “A grandmother, huh?”
“I didn’t say it was Stacy, just that it could have been. As it happens, Steve doesn’t play for your team either.”
She tried to maintain her frosty expression, but he saw her fight the smile. “No wonder I couldn’t get him to move the plane one hangar over.”
Finn shoved the bags into a bin under the table and extended his hand to her. “We need to buckle in for takeoff; then we can get cozy.”
“Cozy?”
“Here,” he said, motioning to the table. “No reason to stay shackled into those little seats when we can fly in comfort.”
“Yes, further shackling I could do without.”
Finn barked a laugh, and took her offered hand in his. She was such an interesting mix of blue blood and street smart, he never knew quite what to expect from her. He drew her up, but resisted the temptation to pull her directly into his arms. They had a five-hour flight ahead of them. Pacing was everything.
“Window or aisle?” he asked.
“Either is fine with me.”
He led her to a window seat and waited until she got comfortable, but rather than taking the seat next to her, he sat next to the window on the opposite side of the plane. She looked surprised, and perhaps even a little disappointed. He smiled to himself and buckled up.
They were rolling toward the runway when she finally spoke. “So, I take it you know Steve? Lucky coincidence he was here.”
“I fly in and out of here a lot, so I know several of the pilots.”
“You always fly privately? Why not have your own plane?”
“I fly my own helicopter. We have several. In fact, one of them is parked on the roof of a certain hotel in town, as we speak.”
“I suppose that shouldn’t surprise me.”
“Meaning?”
Her lips did curve slightly. “You do like your toys.”
He tried very hard not to look at the bag stowed under the table. “Work hard, play harder. After all, what’s the point of work if you never get to appreciate play?”
“Some would say their work is their play.”
“Some would. Is that how you view your…occupation?”
She looked at him and parroted an earlier response, slightly modified. “My work for the Foundation is very involved and rewarding, but I don’t consider it play.”
“I wasn’t referring to that occupation.”
She looked back out the window as they taxied around to prepare for takeoff. She was smiling. “I know.”
Finn was just about done with the enigmatic responses and Mona Lisa smiles. He just couldn’t put the two sides of her together. She was understandably proud of one career…and so blatantly unrepentant about the other.
“Why didn’t you invest in a private plane?” she asked.
“Too much to maintain. It’s easier to just keep a few pilots on call and work things out when needed. I know it comes as a shock, but we still fly commercial a lot of the time.”
“So do I.”
He looked surprised; he couldn’t help it. She laughed.
The pilot interrupted them with instructions for takeoff, and they fell silent as the plane accelerated, then lifted into the night sky. Finn loved this part, leaving the pull of the earth and gliding freely into the empty skies. He’d gotten a pilot’s license when he was quite young, but it had been only a handful of years since he’d gotten his license for the helicopter. It was still a thrill, taking off in that thing, like he was flying himself, free of restrictions.
He glanced over at Felicity. Her hands were relaxed on the arm rests, and she was peering out of the window. No fear of flying. He wondered what she’d think of taking a ride in his new little black bird. He imagined it, taking off on a clear spring day, showing off a little, earning a few eye rolls from her, but also, hopefully a laugh or two, and an honest smile. He wondered what that would take.
Despite the intimacy they’d shared, he had no idea who she really was. Her background was so intensely privileged, far more so than his State-side version of the same. Her education was impeccable. She was sharp, smart, fearless. Which was both impressive and, he imagined, potentially quite intimidating when she wanted it to be. But that was the part of her he knew, the part the whole world knew, if they cared to. What he wanted to know—was suddenly dying to know—was who she was, and what she’d be like on a regular, everyday level. Then he laughed at himself. Felicity Jane Trent didn’t have a regular, everyday level.
Still…he tried to picture her back at his home in Virginia. Dalton Downs had a lavish main house, stables, and enough acreage to satisfy an earl or two, and yet he really couldn’t bring her into focus there. Partly because he’d worked very hard to remove the lord-of-the-manor vibe of the place after his father had died and left it to him. His partner, Mac, had moved his significant other, Kate, onto the property over a year ago, along with her school for seriously challenged young children. His other partner, Rafe, who typically involved himself with high-powered supermodel types, had apparently fallen for Kate’s new head horse trainer. He couldn’t wait to get back and witness that interesting union in action.
But he couldn’t see Felicity Jane being in tow with him.
It shouldn’t have dispirited him. After all, she’d always been more fantasy than reality. Larger than life. Certainly not part of anything having to do with his normal one. If you could call anything about his life normal, either.
“Quite the scowl you have over there. Something amiss?”
He glanced over at her, and found her staring at him in that intent, open way she sometimes did. He could imagine others found it a tad unnerving, that sort of overt directness. And that she’d intended it to be. For him it was more unsettling than unnerving. Despite the fact that they’d once again found themselves on a little adventure together, where, for a brief span of time, they’d be in each other’s orbit, and more than likely each other’s bed, only to drift apart once the adventure came to its natural conclusion…this time he wasn’t so willing to leave it at that. The problem was, he had no earthly idea how he did want to leave it.
Or if he wanted to leave it at all.
The two intervening years since he’d seen her had vanished the moment he’d laid eyes on her again, and yet, he had no desire to repeat that cycle. Now that she was part of his world again, he found he wanted to keep her there indefinitely.
“No,” he said. “Nothing’s amiss.” Frustrating, intriguing, and confusing as all hell…but not amiss.
He thought about the bag he’d stowed in the compartment under the table. He’d been quite happy with himself as he’d assembled his array of goodies, thinking about the various directions the following five hours could go, and how prepared he was going to be for any eventual outcome. Now his mood had shifted. Inexplicably so, really, as nothing had changed between them.
The captain’s voice filtered into the cabin, announcing they had reached altitude and could move freely around the cabin.
She was still staring at him, clearly not appeased by his less than enthusiastically delivered response. But what was he going to say? He could hardly reveal his actual thoughts. Hell, he didn’t even understand them himself.
“I know we have plenty of time to get down to business,” she said, quite crisply, “but if it’s all right with you, I’d like to go over possible scenarios on how we’re going to proceed once we land, now, rather than later. I’m thinking it would be a good idea to get some rest before we push onward, and I know I’ll rest better if there is a plan in place.” When he didn’t immediately respond, she smiled a little and added, “You do have a plan, I presume? Or are you going to depend on me to do everything in this partnership?”
She was teasing, but as he looked at her, all he could think about was the bed in the back, and how little rest he’d planned on either of them getting. And how much he’d counted on their partnership being quite equal. At least for the next five hours. Now…he had no idea what he wanted. “I don’t know if you investigated when you boarded, but there is a small bedroom in the back, if you want some rest. I can bunk out here. The seats in the center recline.”
She lifted her eyebrow at that, but didn’t bait him any further. He knew he was confusing her. Welcome to the club, he wanted to say.
“I was going to link up and connect in with my partners back home,” he said by way of explanation, though they both knew it was hardly that. “I want to see what they can dig up for me—us—while we’re in the air. I can do some research on the unit I have with me, but they have access to far better equipment and can retrieve it far more swiftly.”
Now it was her turn not to immediately respond. Instead, she looked merely bemused.
“What?” he finally asked, although he knew damn well what. Given their past history, by now, confined to close quarters with nothing else to do for some time, one or the other of them would have instigated something that required the removal of most of their clothes…and the other would have gone along quite willingly with the suggestion.
“While I would like to think that the gentleman in you listened to my repeated pleas to focus on the issue at hand, and steer our attention away from the rather explosive chemistry we share, our history precludes me from drawing that conclusion.”
“You feel I’m not a gentleman?”
“You once left me chained, naked, to my bed—our bed, actually.”
“I sent a bellman,” he responded.
“My point is that you are a man who goes after what he wants. You can be both courtly and aggressive, depending on the situation, but—”
“You don’t think I’d put your desires before my own? I’m wounded. I thought I was rather adept at meeting your…needs.”
“I am merely saying—”
“That I’m a selfish bastard who can’t keep his hands off of you, so if I am keeping them off now, something must be terribly wrong. You don’t think, perhaps, that, like you, I’m wanting to focus on the case at hand?”
“There is a bed in the back of this plane. Can you look me straight in the eye and tell me you didn’t think of, or at least imagine, in great detail most likely, spending a few minutes there during this flight? And not for the purposes of rest.”
“Of course I thought about it.”
“And that bag you brought aboard…?”
“Again, my thoughts might have strayed beyond satisfying my immediate hunger. Would you like to see what I brought?”
“I’m certain you’ll show me regardless.”
“Your high regard of me is so challenging. How will I ever maintain such a vaunted image?”
“Everything I’m saying is true, is it not?”
He conceded her point with a nod. It shouldn’t bother him, either. In fact, he had no idea why he wasn’t pushing this repartee to its natural and all but foregone conclusion.
“But now…you’re all business. And so I asked, and I shall ask again, why the sudden shift?”
He had no answer for that. Getting naked with Felicity Jane would be a great way to spend time, especially now as neither one of them had the stone nor could have it in the next half dozen hours, so neither was in danger of being poisoned or shackled, or God knew what else. It was as trustworthy a position as they were ever likely to be in. And yet, he found himself not overly interested in getting naked with her for the sake of getting naked. Oh, he wanted her. Kind of hard to deny that one, given the ongoing rock-hard state of his body. He just didn’t want her casually. Which was ridiculous, considering there was no other basis for them to be together.
“You don’t seem particularly dismayed, one way or the other,” he said, going on the defensive rather than trying to come up with a suitable answer when he had none. “Perhaps my ego couldn’t take the constant threat of rejection.”
“Yes,” she said drolly, “I can see where that’s so often an issue with you.”
“You have to admit, you have been rather fickle. Tormenting me one moment, pushing me away the next. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you were a tease.”
Her smile was slow, knowing, and did things to him that were impossible to ignore. Which she likely knew and was quite enjoying.
“You, of all men, should know the answer to that.”
The hell with it, he wanted to say. Just do it already. The sexual tension between them was all but shrieking, as it always was. He’d be doing them both a favor by taking her to bed, where they could take the edge off for a prolonged and quite gratifying length of time, thereby enabling them to focus more clearly on the task at hand afterward.
And yet…
He held her gaze for a moment, then said, “If you had, say, an afternoon. No appointments, no grants to award, no gems to steal. Nothing on your agenda at all. You’re alone, without anyone observing you, completely private. How would you spend the time? If you could be doing anything you wanted.”
She tilted her head, as apparently surprised by his sudden question as he’d surprised himself by asking it. “Is this a trick question? Am I supposed to fawn, and bat my eyelashes, and say, ‘Oh, my darling, of course I’d choose to be naked, in bed, with you’?”
“No, you’re supposed to be absolutely honest. In fact, I’ll alter the question to add, if you had to spend the afternoon alone, doing something just for you, by yourself, that you enjoy, what would it be?”
She frowned, then looked somewhat pensive. Gone was the teasing, knowing smile. It was the first time he’d ever seen her look uncertain. About anything. Finally, he thought, finally he was getting a glimpse of the real Felicity Jane. And he realized that that was exactly what he was after. That was what he wanted. To know her. In ways that had nothing to do with carnal knowledge and everything to do with becoming more intimate than they’d ever been before. It was a dangerous path to pursue. Mostly because, rather than hope her answers diminished her appeal, thereby giving him the eventual easy exit he’d like to think he wanted, he was hoping a better understanding of her would give him a clue as to what to do about his already impossible attraction to her. Somehow he doubted there was going to be anything easy about any of it.
But then, that was part of her charm.
He waited, as patient as he knew how to be, but just watching the play of emotions across her face, he was already more interested in her than he’d ever been before. Which was saying quite a lot.
“The truth?” she asked, looking at him, for once, like the stranger he truly still was to her.
“Please.”
“Gardening,” she said without hesitation, then looked back toward the window, as if she didn’t want to face the ridicule she was certain was about to follow. “Followed by a nice tea, made and served by myself, out amongst my flowers. Then reading. An entire afternoon of it. A grand adventure of the mind, while never having to leave your own patio chaise.”
Finn had no idea what he’d expected her to say. Shopping in Milan with friends. Jetting off to the Amalfi coast. A visit with the Queen. An afternoon safari in Africa, followed by pearl diving in Madagascar. He thought she could have said pretty much anything, and he would easily be able to imagine her doing it. Nothing would be out of bounds for a woman who had access to the world, and often took advantage of it.
He’d never expected it would be something so simple, so…basic. Essential, even. He was having an even harder time envisioning it. She was a woman who had gardeners to tend her flowers, and butlers to serve tea. And what could she possibly read that would be more adventurous than the exploits she herself had experienced?
He continued to watch her, as intrigued by her obvious discomfort as he was charmed by her honesty. “Vegetables or flowers?”
She darted a look at him, and for the first time he saw past the perfectly arched brows and expertly applied makeup, to the core of the woman beneath. It was barely a glimpse, and only the beginning. But he couldn’t have been more intrigued, wanting to uncover even more.
“What?” she queried, blinking at him.
“Your fantasy garden. Vegetables? Or flowers?”
“What makes you think it’s a fantasy?” She didn’t let him answer that. “Flowers. An abundance of them. Untamed, thriving naturally.”
“No formal English garden?”
She shook her head, then asked, “Does that surprise you?”
“I don’t know what surprises me about you. I don’t really know you.”
“Ah,” she said, understanding dawning. “Is that what this is, then? Let’s play twenty questions, get to know the real Felicity?”
“Would that be a bad thing?”
“Only if you’re doing so hoping to find a chink in my competitive armor. I should know better than to lower any defenses around you.”
She sat back in her seat, and he saw the moment she shifted gears, returning to the woman he did know. The knowing look was back, the confident attitude. She’d crossed her legs, and her arms. Her whole posture had shifted back into superwoman mode.
“Don’t,” he said, giving voice to the thought before he could think better of it.
“Don’t what?”
“That.” He gestured to how she was sitting. “It’s almost like a persona you adopt.”
“What in the world are you talking about?” She didn’t uncross her legs, but she did uncross her arms, looking a little self-conscious, even as she blustered a little. “This is exactly who I am.”
“When you’re running empires or taking possession of priceless antiquities, maybe.”
“And you think that is somehow not who I really am? I hate to break this to you, but that is very much a part of who I am.”
“It’s a large part of what you do. Not necessarily who you are.”
The walls were up in full force now, and the predatory gleam completely filled her eyes. How was it he’d never noticed that? That she used the tension between them almost like a shield. Like it was a safe place of sorts, working that attraction, working him, so she didn’t have to…What? Reveal herself? Be truly intimate? Intimate in a way that actually might mean something. Or compromise a part of her she couldn’t risk compromising?
“When did you become such an expert?”
“I’m not,” he said, but what he was thinking, what he was realizing, was that he was recognizing all this in her only because he was, and had been, doing the same thing with her. That had him sitting back in his seat, and he had to consciously not cross his arms, or put up his own shield. And he wasn’t liking the feeling, the feeling of being exposed somehow, even though she had no idea what he was thinking or the realizations he was making. But it was enough to understand why she wasn’t all that keen on pursuing the conversation. It was…threatening.
It would be so much easier to simply flirt back, play on the sexual attraction, seduce them both into bed. How interesting that that was turning out to be the safe place for them both. Naked and intimately entwined. Yet, not really vulnerable or intimate at all.
She held his gaze. “What brought all this on?”
He thought about deflecting the question, about making it easier on them both and going the expected route, by saying something intentionally provocative and flirtatious. With what they were likely going to be up against in the next day or two, the reality of the parameters of their temporary partnership should be at the forefront of his thoughts. The probable outcome of the mission they were on, and the fact that only one of them was going to be getting what they wanted, wasn’t exactly conducive to forming any kind of ongoing relationship. So deflect and seduce, enjoy what they could have, and be happy with that, would certainly be the wise course of action. It was certainly the course of action he’d have always expected himself to take in such a situation.
So, no one was more surprised than him, when, instead, he heard himself say, “What brought all this on is that I’m realizing that while I’d very much like to spend the next five hours naked and sweaty with you, and should be doing everything in my power to convince you of the same…I also know it’s going to frustrate the hell out of me. And I’m not sure I ultimately want that.”
“A man with a conscience?” she queried, trying to sound amused, but mostly looking a bit alarmed. “I don’t believe it. The next thing you’ll be saying is you want to—”
“I want to have you, don’t mistake that.” He unlatched and swiveled his seat so it angled directly toward her.
She stopped, then simply shut her mouth and stared at him.
“It’s been two years, and yet one look at you, one whiff of your scent, and it might as well have been yesterday when I had you last. I’m so distracted by the constant raging hard-on I’ve had since laying eyes on you in that hotel room that I can hardly think straight. So, clearly, the best course of action here is to get you naked and bury myself as deeply inside of you as I can, for as long as I can, until I can get myself back under control. Then, and only then, might I have a prayer of thinking only about the job I’m on, and how I’m going to accomplish my goals. And not how badly I want to hear that little gasp you make in the back of your throat before you come.”
Her lips parted slightly at that, and his body sprang even more fully and achingly to life. He wanted to taste those lips. Badly. He wanted to feel them on him. Every part of him. He wanted to watch, he wanted to participate. He wanted her. Fully, completely, and for as long as his body would hold up.
“So,” she said, her voice not remotely steady now as she gave voice to the very thought he was having, “what’s stopping you?”
“I don’t know you. And what I do know shouldn’t attract me as much as it does. I don’t know how to square myself with that. Because you’re right, I do have a conscience. One that shouldn’t allow me to want all the things I want, with someone who chooses to do things that I don’t believe in or support.”
“Meaning my…penchant for certain antiquities.”
He nodded. “But that doesn’t seem to be stopping me. Which confuses me.”
“So you thought that perhaps, if you asked a few questions, scratched beneath the surface, all would be revealed, and all would suddenly make sense.”
“Something like that.”
“So this is about assuaging your guilty conscience before you bed me, not about truly wanting to get to know me.”
“I didn’t say that. I do want to get to know you. I want to know everything about you. You fascinate me.”
“I like to garden. You find that fascinating?”
“Far more than anything else I’ve learned about you so far.”
She blinked at that, but he knew she heard the complete sincerity in his tone. “Don’t you think that perhaps it’s the mystery of who I am that makes me so fascinating to you? Perhaps if you knew me, and discovered that I’m not all that special or different, that, in fact, I’m rather mundane, it would dampen your…enthusiasm?” Her gaze drifted lower and settled on the now straining zipper of his trousers.
Her gaze alone made him twitch. It took enormous will not to shift in his seat. Not to touch himself, stroke his hand along that part of him she was looking at almost hungrily, just to see what she’d do.
“I’m not sure there is anything I could learn about you that would dampen…this.” He laid his hand along the inside of his thigh, his fingertips close to brushing against his erection, but not quite.
He watched as she instinctively shifted her legs, pressing them closer together. Assuaging her own ache, perhaps. He waited, then, until she lifted her gaze to his, and said, “But I’m thinking I want to find out.”