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And it was close to fucking perfect.
I made myself comfortable, pulling my blanket higher as it tried to slide down my lap. I took a sip of the hot chocolate from the cupholder on my chair, and I returned to painting.
Mercer moved to me, leaving Trouble to his own devices, the berries amusing him again. His arm crept around my shoulder. His cold lips pressed into the crook of my neck, his feathered breath telling me I was wrong, that I was cold and I needed warming up.
My paintbrush came up and marked his nose with a red dot, a silent reminder to stop clowning around while I worked.
I was a real artist now...I was paid for my work, by him, sure, but playtime couldn’t interrupt.
He took my warning seriously but stayed close, his heat warming me. His scent of tonka seduced me. I shrugged him off, and he laughed, knowing exactly what he was doing.
“Ten minutes.” My world spun backward, my heart stopping as I sucked in cold air. It wasn’t the speaker talking. It was him. It sounded distorted, but I understood it. I understood he trusted me enough to talk to me in his real voice—something he never did in front of anyone. And it made me fall in love with him all over again.
“In ten minutes, I better already be in our bed...naked,” I said, with my breath hot on his mouth. “With you inside me.”
He crossed his heart, returning to the bench, taking a moment to adjust the bulge in his pants before he stretched the palette out to me, allowing me my last few minutes with the pretty maple.
He shot another sinister smile my way because we both knew, the reality was, that I didn’t have minutes. I had mere seconds before he tossed me over his shoulder and trudged up those stairs.
And we both knew how much I fucking wanted that.
Epilogue
Feebee
The view outside became a blur of fluffy clouds, tinted by a dismal gray color that would encourage turbulence as our journey progressed.
I focused on the lovechild of water droplets and dry air, twirling strands of hair between my fingers, searching for the perfect one to pull out.
Mercer’s sexy, robotic voice cut through the atmosphere and filled the cabin, bouncing off the walls of the small jet. “Don’t pull that out. You’ve been doing so well.”
I had. My patches were sprouting new hair, thanks to my remission period.
Until now, Mercer hadn’t spoken to me all morning, and it wasn’t because he couldn’t.
He just didn’t want to.
He didn’t want me here.
He’d told me that when he first brought this trip up a week ago.
“Nervous flyer?” The robotic voice boomed again.
His finger moved to my leg and drew circles.
As usual, I felt nothing.
I had no idea he was even touching me until I looked down the sleeve of his impeccable suit.
“No,” I said with a smile and a heavy swallow of my nerves as I forced my hand from my hair.
His head tilted to the side, dark hair falling into those perfect blue eyes, probably obstructing his view as he scanned my face for the lie...
And, despite his dark hair invading his view, he found it.
“Liar,” his lips moved soundlessly before settling in a sardonic smile. “You didn’t have to come, you know?”
I watched his finger move around his keypad with sad eyes and my deflated self-esteem. “Yeah...maybe I shouldn’t have.”
