‘Open your eyes.’
I don’t comply immediately. I still need help to breathe. But after a few seconds I do, groggily, slowly, to find him staring down at me.
‘I want you to look at me when you come.’
Something flickers inside of me. Disbelief, excitement. His finger probes my sex and I arch my back, tilting forward a little, surrendering to this. His other hand cups one of my breasts through my jacket—I didn’t realise how badly I wanted him to do that until he holds it in his hand and I feel like I’ve come home.
My eyes flutter closed of their own accord.
‘Open,’ he grunts, dropping his head closer to mine, moving his finger in and out of me then finding my clit and circling it slowly at first, so the teasing is a form of agony. I blink up at him. There’s fierce determination on his face but a dark determination too, as though making me come is the single most important thing he’s ever done. Hey, who am I to complain?
‘Good.’ His nod of approval unpicks something else inside of me so I feel my surrender washing over me like a wave. He moves faster, his eyes heavy as they watch me, but I don’t look away, I don’t close my own eyes. I stare at him and I feel a thousand and one things. Breathing becomes frantic. His fingers move and my body responds until I’m so close it hurts.
I lift a hand, curving my fingers around his shoulder, my eyes pleading.
‘You’re nearly there, baby,’ he murmurs, the words low and dark.
I nod desperately. ‘Show me.’ He moves harder and I buck my hips forward until my release grips me and won’t let go. I dig my fingers into his shoulder and then I explode, his name just a groan against my teeth. ‘Holden...’ It tumbles out of me without my consent, again and again. I have no idea how this happened, but I’m so glad it did. His hand drops from my breast, curving around my butt instead, bringing me against his rock-hard cock. He moves his hips, pressing himself against me, so if it weren’t for our clothes he’d be taking me right now, I’m sure of it.
‘Have you ever had sex at forty thousand feet?’
I shake my head.
‘Eight years as flight crew and it never occurred to you?’
I’m still struggling to breathe, let alone form words. I shake my head. It’s not that it didn’t occur to me. Nor that I didn’t have opportunities, invitations. I’ve just never given into anything like this before. I’ve never felt anything exactly like it.
‘Then I guess it’s about time we remedy that, huh?’
God, I want to do this. Briefly, I think about the other crew on board—all fast asleep. I think about Amy, the friend I owe it to not to screw this up. And I push those thoughts away just as quickly as they came to me because I want, more than anything, to go to bed with Holden Hart. To hell with the consequences.
* * *
‘We’ve got some turbulence coming up, Mr Hart. If you fasten your seat belt I’ll come back and let you know when we’re above it.’
I could punch something. I’m so hard, I need Cora with a passion that surprises me. I had sex last night with whatever the blonde woman’s name was. It’s not like I’m desperate. But Cora is...what?
I don’t know. Different.
Fascinating.
‘You heard the captain,’ I murmur resignedly. Her cheeks are pink with passion. Her eyes hold mine. I grab her hand and pull her beside me towards one of the sofas—not the armchairs. Too much physical distance there. I wait until she sits down, watching as she buckles in, smiling a little as she also refastens her pants. I resist the urge to ask her if there’s any point to that and take the seat beside her, loosely fastening the belt over my hips.
‘So you don’t buck the seat belt rule then?’
I study her thoughtfully. ‘For myself, maybe.’
Her eyes flare a little and she looks away, as if surprised by my answer, and I’m surprised by my reaction to that realisation. Like the fact I care about her safety is unexpected, which makes me wonder about the dropkicks she ordinarily hooks up with, or the dropkick she thinks I am, and a surge of something like anger blasts through me. I’m surprised to feel that but, then again, I’m angry about every fucking thing these days.
‘You’re still our brother, man. I don’t care what a DNA test says.’
Easy for Jagger to say. Easy for Theo to say. They’re not like me. All my life I’ve known I was different to them—wrong somehow. I used to think it was just because Ryan was angry he didn’t know about me for the first few years of my life, angry at my mother for keeping me secret. Now? I guess he knew I was different too. That’s why he pushed me, why he separated me, made things harder for me, isolated me in many ways.
I grind my teeth, not wanting to think about my messed-up family—except they’re not my family. I’m alone. No mother. No idea who my biological father is. The man who raised me is dead.
Silence has fallen in the cabin without my realising it. I angle my face to hers, pulling myself into the moment fully, relieved to focus on Cora. She’s awkward—shy almost—and I find that fascinating for how unusual it is.
The plane bumps a little, and then some more.