But I got her talking about it. And she’d agreed that she would go see a professional if she felt like she was struggling.
Until then, we were just trying to enjoy life and each other.
“Hey, I might as well get something accomplished while we wait,” she insisted, but didn’t try to take her phone back.
In her defense, we’d been waiting at the independent airport for what felt like ages.
“Remind me again why we agreed to take Bellamy’s plane instead of just… going commercial?” she asked. “Or chartering my own private plane?” she said, sighing.
“You were there on the call,” I reminded her. “The man talks you in circles until you’re too dizzy to think straight.”
“I know,” she said, shaking her head. “I felt drunk after that call.”
When she finally decided she was comfortable enough to leave the country for a while, she’d really had her heart set on Bellamy’s villa. I don’t know if it was because of the strange night of tension associated with the invitation, or because she’d been in the early stages of the relationship, envisioning us in that villa, or what, but no other one would do.
So when we’d called to ask him to use it, we somehow got roped into using his jet. And then his yacht when we wanted to go to Greece.
It was a whole thing.
One we were instantly regretting.
Since we were on hour four of waiting for the damn jet.
Which would put us in Italy, at earliest, at nine or ten at night. Hardly what we wanted. But we were stuck with this arrangement now.
“Oh, finally,” Miranda said as we heard a plane in the distance.
Not too much later, the jet had landed, and we were moving out on the tarmac toward it as the stairs lowered.
Then there was Bellamy.
And… Fenway?
“Sorry, my friends,” Bellamy said, whacking Fenway hard on the back of his shoulder. “I had to pick up Fenway here from the middle of another international incident,” he said, smirking. “He needs to head to Navesink Bank to see some other friends of ours.”
We all knew which friend that would be.
Quinton Baird.
And his poor team who must have been getting sick of cleaning up his messes.
“Is it my fault that wives of powerful men want to bed me?” Fenway asked, not looking the least bit contrite.
“Perhaps making sure the wives in question aren’t married to crime lords might be a wise choice moving forward,” Bellamy suggested.
“Or, you know, bedding unmarried women,” Miranda said, rolling her eyes.
“Miranda!” Fenway said, immediately brightening. “I thought it was you. You exquisite creature,” he said, rushing forward like they were the oldest of friends. “Look at you. Positively glowing. Even after your own incident. It’s so nice to see you outside of a work or benefit setting. What are you doing with this schmuck?” he asked, throwing a smirk in my direction. “You know what, never mind. He is the perfect catch. And I’m not just saying that because he has been competition for all the beautiful women for years now. We should do lunch.”
“No,” Bellamy said, rolling his eyes. Bellamy was, in his own way, pretty carefree and frivolous. You know, save for the dark shit he did that no one knew about. But when he was put next to Fenway Arlington, he was the serious one. “We need to get you to Quin before someone puts a bullet in your skull.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Fenway said, but his tone had gone a shade darker. “No one would want to mess up this perfect face. Alas, he’s right,” he said, giving Miranda a kiss on the cheek. “I hear you two are taking a tour of Italy and Greece. If you happen to want to use any of my homes in Europe, I am just a call away.”
With that, he was walking toward the car that had pulled up for them, right on time.
“Sorry about the delay. It really was life or death,” Bellamy said, exhaling hard. It wouldn’t have been clear to Miranda, but since I knew Bellamy from our black ops days, I got the look in his eye then. The one that said he hadn’t just grabbed Fenway off of a tarmac in some foreign country, that he’d needed to do some extraction work to get him out. “Unfortunately, the pilot is going to need to fuel up and change out at the next airport, but it should only tack on another hour or so to your flight. I put you up at a hotel in Italy for tonight. That way you can see the villa in the morning.”
He’d thought of everything.