Could it?
She startled as the flight attendant appeared over his shoulder. “Tray tables up, seats in their upright position please. Seatbelts fastened.”
It shattered the tension between Walsh and her and gave her a reason to shift away from him. She busied herself with the pre-landing tasks, then pressed her nose to the window. From what she’d read, the airport below was on a flat plain surrounded by a spiky range of mountains. They’d have an hour-long drive after landing to get to their resort destination on the coast.
The attendant stopped by again. “Just a warning, folks. This flight might get a little rough as we come in over the mountains.”
As she moved off, Walsh pushed up the armrest between them. Honey stiffened. What is he doing now?
“Relax,” he said, easing as close to her as his seatbelt allowed. “I’ve got you.” His arm looped her shoulders, and he drew her in to his body.
A smarter woman would protest and push him away. But a smarter woman wouldn’t have let her boss imagine she had a fear of flying in the first place.
“Um, Walsh,” she said, trying to work up some vague dissent.
“Relax,” he said again.
And so she did, leaning into him while half-pretending she wasn’t doing such a thing by keeping her focus out the window. Despite that, she was most aware of what was behind her. His big body, the warmth of it, the way his breath stirred her hair. Her stomach was all jittery again, and she pressed her thighs together, trying to assuage the needy ache between them.
The plane flew lower and she could make out civilization on the stark mountainsides. It looked like brightly-colored dots that became rudimentary shacks. The aircraft turned, and she made out vehicles and dirt tracks and then people moving about.
She could almost see their expressions.
Honey sharply turned her head to Walsh. “Aren’t we too close?”
And just as she said that, they seemed to hit a pothole in the air. They lifted in their seats, were plopped back down, and then, in an abrupt move, the plane tilted onto one wing in a 45-degree right bank.
Belongings shifted. She gasped. Behind her, Walsh stiffened as they hung sideways in the sky. The aircraft drew closer to the mountainside, the mass of earth and rock seeming to act like a magnet. Honey could see a woman hanging clothes on a line.
She could see a red shirt, blue pants, the woman’s widening eyes.
Oh, God. They were going to crash.
We’re going to die!
Yet the cabin remained eerily silent as Walsh’s hand tightened on her shoulder. Paralysis had set into her body, but her mind was racing.
This was it.
Say something in these last moments! Tell him how much you admire him! Tell him about the crush! You promised you wouldn’t keep secrets. Tell him you lo—
And then, in the blink of an eye, the plane leveled out, flying away from the mountainside as if shot by a rubber band.
The cabin continued its crushing quiet for another long pause, then someone cheered. A second person whooped.
A crackle over the speakers announced the pilot was about to speak.
“That, ladies and gentleman, is known as wake turbulence. We do our best to avoid the stirring of air caused by the aircraft in front of us, but like everything else in life, it can be unpredictable. However, it’s smooth sailing ahead. We’ll be on the ground in only a few minutes.”
More cheering ensued. Then a flight attendant got up to check on the passengers, and the man in the row in front of Honey and Walsh jumped to his feet, yanked her into his arms, and pressed a lavish kiss on her lips.
Laughter and applause broke out, then all around them people who moments ago had faced the seeming end of their lives in total silence were embracing and kissing.
“Honey?”
She turned her head.
Walsh’s mouth met hers.
Adrenaline was speeding through Walsh’s blood like a shot of the best small-batch bourbon whiskey. When the flight went out of his control, there’d been only fight left in him, and he’d wanted to beat his fists against Fate.
Die like this? he’d thought, on a fucking business trip?
He’d heard Brody’s voice in his head as the mountainside came much too close, too fast. Your workaholic ways are sucking the humanity out of you. Then the plane had re-righted, and the crisis chemical flooding his body needed an outlet. Bad.
Honey’s mouth had just…been there.
Her taste was sweet and hot and now, when he touched his tongue to her bottom lip, she let him in without a question. He fumbled with her seatbelt, yanking the buckle free so he could haul her onto his lap. She settled there with a moan, and he swallowed his own as her ass pressed against his hard cock.
His head angled and hers tipped to allow them a new fit. Thrusting his tongue deeper, he shoved his hand beneath her jacket and found her breast. Her body jerked, and he gentled his touch, cupping the soft weight and grazing the hard tip with the edge of his thumb.
God, he wanted her naked.
She pressed into his touch, driving his need higher. He pushed into her mouth with an aggressive rhythm. She moaned again and he swallowed the sound.
A throat cleared. A hand touched his shoulder.
Shit! Walsh tore his mouth from Honey’s and glanced around.
The flight attendant looked at him with a blend of amusement, sympathy, and authority. “Sir, you both need to be in your seats and buckled up. We land in under five minutes.”
Honey buried her face in his shoulder.
“Sure,” he said to the uniformed woman, cupping the back of Honey’s head with his palm. “Will do.”
His admin scrambled off him and resettled into her own seat. Her face was flushed, her hair disheveled, and when she threw him a glance he saw the wet brightness of her blue eyes.
Oh, hell, he thought. Tears? “Honey—” he began.
She put up her hand. “No, don’t say anything. We both had a scare—”
“No shit.”
“—and overreacted. I apologize.”
She apologized? “Honey, it was me.”
If he’d had his way, they’d be members of the Mile-High Club this very instant.
“It was us. Now it’s over.”
As if to punctuate her words, the plane’s wheels touched down, a jolt to his body and his common sense. Okay, okay. He pushed his hands through his hair. Maybe it was best to end this her way. It wasn’t going anywhere in any case, right?
Not to mention they were on this trip for business.
Your workaholic ways are sucking the humanity out of you.
Ignoring the voice, he shoved his fingers once more through his hair. “Let’s just forget about it.”
“Yes.” Her shoulders relaxed. “Great idea.”
Truer words and all that. Because even though his blood continued to boil and his cock had yet to stop clamoring at him, he had to remember this was Honey. As if she heard her name, she glanced at him again, and the anxious expression in those big blues nearly did him in.
He wanted to haul her close once more. Pet her and soothe her and take the blame for things getting out of hand. Except she’d been with him all the way. Her hot mouth and her melting body attested to it.
Shoving the memory of that out of his mind, he managed to calm his cock while they taxied to the gate. Then he stood up and ushered Honey out of the plane and toward the terminal. While they’d left a mild Southern California climate, the air filtering through the covered jetway hinted at temperatures well into the eighties.
Signs pointed the way to baggage claim, and there they encountered a man in a crisp white shirt and a ball cap with the resort insignia. He held a placard with Walsh’s name on it. After introductions, he placed Walsh’s bag on a metal carrier, and they made their way to the appropriate luggage carousel.
Honey kept stealing looks at him, the kissing still clearly on her mind. How much he regretted going off the leash like that. T
he way to begin this weekend wasn’t to make his admin uneasy.
In an attempt to diminish her discomfort, he strolled to a vendor and bought each of them an ice-cold can of a thirst-quenching mango drink. Her grateful smile relaxed him a little, and she seemed calmer, too.
But her agitation resurfaced when her suitcase failed to show. They waited until the last surfboard and the final set of golf clubs had appeared and been retrieved. With the carousel empty, the driver took Honey’s claim ticket and headed for the missing luggage desk.
She bit her lip. “Now what am I going to do?”
He shifted his gaze from her swollen mouth. “They’ll locate the bag and deliver it to you if necessary.”
“What will I wear until then?”
Nothing, the devil on his shoulder answered. Walsh cleared his throat. “Surely there’ll be shops at the resort.”
She shrugged out of her jacket. “Already this is going wrong,” she muttered.
Guilt gave him another jab. Whether she’d been a willing partner in the kissing or not, he was the one with the greater experience—he was certain of that. It had been up to him not to surrender to his primitive impulses.
When it came to her it seemed he’d lost his self-control.
Except he’d find it, damn it, because he didn’t like being the cause of her skittishness.
In a few minutes they were informed Honey’s suitcase was located—somewhere over the Atlantic. With the airline’s promise that they’d bring it to her as soon as possible, there was nothing to do but head for their destination.
And restore his relationship with his admin to normal.
The expansive confines of the limo proved to be oddly intimate, however. With the driver behind soundproof glass, Walsh took a seat as far from Honey as possible. She stared out the dusty window at the rugged landscape as if she didn’t see it.
He pulled open the small fridge and extracted two more drinks—bottles of sparkling water. “Thirsty?”
She slid closer on the leather bench seat to take it from him, her skirt riding up on her legs with the movement. Pretending to focus on opening the screw top of his own drink, he checked out the sleek length of her thighs. Spin classes, she’d mentioned. Pilates. He’d seen her in yoga gear. There should be no surprise she was in good shape.
“There’s a gym on site,” he said. Before, he’d not thought about her taking advantage of the resort’s fitness center, but now he figured she might enjoy some time there. “You’ll probably like to visit it.”
“What?” She brought her water away from her mouth. “Won’t we be too busy…with business?”
He frowned. “I haven’t exactly explained this weekend to you, have I?”
“I assumed there’d be the usual kind of meetings amongst members of the consortium…albeit in a more casual setting.”
“Well…” Walsh forked his hand through his hair. “I fully intend to corral a company officer or two and talk about some mutually beneficial partnerships.”
“York Featherstone.”
He nodded. “Number one on my list. His company’s manufacturing abilities combined with the strength of our research and development team means we could win some fat government contracts. Not just lucrative…but exciting and challenging as well. The kind of stuff our guys would love to sink their teeth into.”
“Not to mention you.”
He smiled. She knew him so well. “It was my contacts at the Pentagon and the DOJ who mentioned the idea. They want our brains. And I don’t need to reinvent the wheel by expanding MadSci’s limited manufacturing arm.”
“Which you consider to be the boring part anyway.” A little grin played at her lips. “Your interest lies on the invention side.”
“Nerd inside and out.”
“Right.” She rolled her eyes. “On the outside, you’re definitely more GQ than G-E-E-K.”
“Funny.” He relaxed against the seat and spread his arms along its back. This was the Honey from the office, the one with an understated but clever sense of humor who caught on quickly to his train of thought. “So connecting with Featherstone is an aim, but it won’t come in the form of a traditional meeting…at least not at first. The organizers intend this weekend to be more of a social affair.”
She tilted her head, a line digging itself between her brows. “Social affair?”
Now why did that last word on her pretty mouth sound so titillating? He couldn’t stop his gaze from dropping to her legs again, and he cursed himself as she flushed and tugged at the hem of her skirt.
Tipping his bottle to his lips, he took another bracing swallow of cold liquid. “I mean it’s going to have a more social flavor. Meals during which we can mingle. Cocktail parties. A casino night…that kind of thing. The consortium coordinators have declared us to be a suspicious lot—due to the top secret nature of our work. So the idea is that by getting to know each other outside of a conference room or a corporate office we might make stronger alliances.”
“So the weekend’s supposed to be like one long golf game. Isn’t it at the country club where company heads often play and make deals at the same time?”
“If the damn eighteen holes didn’t take so many hours, I suppose I’d be on the green more often,” Walsh groused.
“It’s not a crime to be away from your desk on occasion.” She smiled. “Maybe even for an entire day.”
Your workaholic ways are sucking the humanity out of you.
He groaned. “Not you, too.”
Except he could see it, suddenly, that extended time away from work. Aimless mornings and lazy afternoons in bed with Honey. She probably liked to do the crossword puzzle, and he’d distract her from filling in boxes by filling her from behind, her pretty ass in the air, taking his cock, squeezing on it in her throes of orgasm. Her cries would start ladylike, and he’d make it his duty to wring loud sounds of passion from her.
She’d bury her face in the pillow to muffle them, but he’d fist his hand in that honey-gold air and yank back her head to watch her cheeks flush and her eyes glaze over as he pumped roughly into her pulsing sex.
Blood shot to his groin, and his dick hardened at the thought. If alone, he’d draw the heel of his hand down its stiffening length to ease the ache, but here he had to suffer.
He should suffer. It was time to recall he didn’t want a woman who would interfere with his work. Instead of finding someone who flung him into passion, he needed a woman in his life who would understand his priorities. Sure, he’d give her respect and pay attention to her needs, but he didn’t want his needs to be hijacked.
Raw desire, the kind that put a man in a fever of want and a haze of lust was too distracting.
Destructive.
“I think we’re here,” his admin said.
He glanced out the windows and saw they were driving through ornate gates painted the color of a flamingo. The greenery was lush and tropical, and to the west he caught glimpses of stretches of sand and a tranquil bay. They continued on along a narrow tract, past an elegant hacienda-styled building that he knew had been built in the 1960s by a European princess. Now it was restaurants and guest rooms.
Honey frowned as they passed the impressive old building. “We’re not staying there?”
When he shrugged, she knocked on the window dividing them from the driver. The man obligingly rolled it down. “We’re not there?” she asked, pointing behind them.
He shook his head. “Closer to la playa.”
Another couple of turns, and the driver came to a stop in front of a beachside bungalow surrounded by coconut trees and banana plants. Flowering shrubs flanked the front steps leading to the dwelling’s door. As Walsh climbed out, he noted the smell of the ocean and the complete sense of privacy.
Her head twisting this way and that, Honey trailed the chauffeur who unlocked the front door and threw it open. On the threshold, his admin’s body stilled.
Coming up behind her, he could see why.
Through the
glass back doors, the view was of the sun setting over the Pacific. It leant rosy tones to the large living area. Off each side he could see a bedroom. Hibiscus flowers were arranged in a spiral at the center of each duvet-covered mattress.
A bowl of fruit sat on a nearby table and next to it champagne chilled in a bucket of ice.
“There must be some mistake,” Honey said, her voice tight. “This looks like the honeymoon suite.”
“No mistake,” their driver said, his expression offended. “This is yours.”
“It’s very lovely, don’t get me wrong,” she said hastily, casting a look at Walsh. “But not suitable for us.”
“This is yours,” the man insisted. He put card keys on the table and placed Walsh’s suitcase near the doorway of one of the bedrooms. With a murmured “Welcome” in Spanish, he left through the front door.
Honey’s eyes were like saucers as she took another slow look at the environs. Tropical-styled furniture sat on tiled floors. A complete bar took up one corner, a flat screen TV and stereo system another.
“I don’t think this is right,” she said, even as she walked toward the back doors and stared at the view of the waves rolling in.
“There’s plenty of space for us both.” Secluded space. Perfect for secrets. Clandestine moments.
Stolen kisses and caresses.
Shit.
He came up behind her, detecting a new scent on her skin. He’d noticed it all day. A note beyond her usual fresh soapiness that operated with stealthy effect on his libido. At first breath it smelled as wholesome as she was, but underneath it held a spicy, seductive quality.
Honey glanced at him over her shoulder. “It’s not suitable for work.”
But maybe it was perfectly suitable for what he needed―to prove himself the boss of his inconvenient, unwelcome urges. Taking in a breath, he told himself he knew what he had to do.
Yeah, it was time.
“I don’t see how we’ll get anything done,” she continued.
“Don’t worry on that score.”
Wishful Sinful (Rock Royalty Book 5) Page 6