“Quite an adventure,” he murmured.
“You could say that,” I said.
“I would never let anything happen to you,” he said; “you know that.”
I let it slide that he had let something happen to me. I tucked it away for use at a later date. Instead, I stroked his chest with my palm.
“I knew you would rescue me,” I said instead.
“It was Patrick, really, who found out where you were. He’s the one who figured out the best way to track you. He’s the one who got in touch with me.”
I felt my body stiffen slightly at the sound of Patrick’s name coming out of Brad’s mouth. His tone was casual, but that didn’t mean anything. Brad didn’t like to share—no billionaire did, that was how they became billionaires.
“Patrick is a good NCA agent,” I said carefully.
“How did you meet him again? I don’t remember you ever bringing him up.”
I lifted my head. “I never did bring him up. He was tailing me one day while we were in London. He wanted to know about you. I told him to fuck off. He did.”
“Huh,” Brad said, stroking my hair with his fingers. He twirled a strand around one finger and tugged slightly. I felt the stirrings of arousal; I loved having my hair played with, and he knew it. “It’s funny that he ended up in Morocco at the same time we were there. Well,” he paused, shifting his head to look at me. “At the same time you were there.”
I felt my heart beating faster. “Yeah, that was quite the coincidence.”
“A coincidence?” he said lightly. “Was it?” He released the lock of my hair and grabbed another, began to gently twirl it as he had the first. “I suppose, yes, it could have been that.”
“What else could it have been?” I asked. I was both angry and nervous. Angry because I sensed he was about to accuse me of cheating on him with Patrick, and how dare he… and nervous because, well, he wasn’t completely wrong. At least in my mind, I had gone further than I should with Patrick Shim.
“That’s a funny question. It could have been lots of things. I guess it could even be that you’re actually not a journalist for an American travel magazine at all, and you’re actually an NCA agent.”
My heart thudded loudly in my chest.
“What?” I asked. “What on earth would make you think that?”
“Nothing,” he said mildly. “Unless it’s true. Is it true?”
I stared at him. He was serious.
Cassie
“Please make sure your seats and tray tables are in their upright and locked positions for take off.”
I heard the flight attendant’s voice over the intercom but did nothing; I hadn’t touched either my seat or the table attached to the seat in front of me yet; I rarely ever did. My carry on bag was still in my lap where I had set it as I’d taken my seat earlier. I stared out the window at the baggage handlers of the London Heathrow Airport and I realized that I had no idea if I was making the right decision or not.
I knew my ribs hurt; that was for sure. I knew that my face, behind my sunglasses, looked bruised and beaten. I had done my best with my make up, but there was no hiding the fact that I had been through the wringer in a pretty significant way. The seat next to me was still empty, and, with any luck at all, it would stay that way. Chances were good, considering the plane was nearly loaded. I looked up the aisle that ran right next to my seat on my right, and I looked at the last remaining people who were boarding and trying to find their seats. I watched their eyes, knowing that almost everyone did what I did when they boarded a plane: they began to count the rows to check out their potential seat mate from the moment they got within eye sight of what could be their row.
No one seemed to be looking in my direction at all, though, so I closed my eyes and leaned back, keeping my hands resting on my bag. The trouble was, I saw Brad’s face every time I closed my eyes, his confused expression as I’d told him I was going back to the United States now that I had my passport back in hand. Our argument, him accusing me of being an NCA agent—of all insane things—and me retaliating by letting him know that he was a fine one to talk about having secrets, that I knew he was continuing to withhold information from me. I had known I was going too far, but my mouth and words seemed ten seconds ahead of my brain. We had stood at one another, glaring, his arms crossed over his chest and my hands on my hips, until I had finally turned away and started to pack my bag.
“What do you think you’re doing?” he’d asked, stalking into the bedroom after me.
“What does it look like I’m doing?” I’d spit back. “Now that you’re done holding me hostage,” I said as I’d thrown my passport on top of my purse, “I’m going back home.”
“To New York?” The look of incredulity on his face would have been funny, if we hadn’t been in the middle of such drama.
“Yes,” I’d said back, firmly and with the coldest touch I could add to my voice. “I have a job there. I have friends there. I’ve put everything on hold to be with you, and I think that was a mistake. You don’t trust me, which is ridiculous. I did trust you, but it’s looking now like that was also ridiculous.”
“You can’t just leave,” he said, grabbing some of my clothes from the bed and putting them back into a drawer.
“Watch me,” I’d dared, and then, “and don’t touch my stuff.”
He’d taken one final shot at me. “Is this about Patrick? Are you going to him?” he’d said. But, rather than dignify his accusation with a response, I’d glared at him with every ounce of venom I could muster, and he’d known he had lost. He snarled and walked out of the room.
I had packed quickly and called for a cab to drive me to the airport. I swallowed the painful lump in my throat as I remembered Brad sitting on the couch as I’d left. He hadn’t said goodbye. Hadn’t looked at me. I’d thought about saying something. I’d waited an extra moment before closing the door to see if he’d call my name. Of course he hadn’t; that was part of the reason I’d fallen for him. I couldn’t have it both ways, and I knew it.
“Excuse me, Miss?” A woman’s voice pulled me out of my memory and back onto the airplane. “I need you to put your bag under your seat, please.”
I complied, sitting back up and looking around me. It didn’t look like the flight would be too bad. No kids around me. An aisle on one side, and an empty seat on the other. On the other side of the empty seat was a young man, maybe mid-twenties, who was engrossed in his headphones and iPad. Not a talker. I leaned back and settled in for what I hoped would be a nap long enough to get me all the way back to New York.
“Hi, yeah, sorry, could you move your legs please?”
I opened my eyes as all of my senses except for taste were assaulted at the same time. A woman was on top of me, straddling my knees, trying to wrangle a bag that wouldn’t fit under the seat even if it was empty without hitting me in the head. The woman stank of alcohol and there was a slight tinge of body odor. I couldn’t help but look at her with an expression I knew rang of distaste.
“I can’t move them anymore,” I muttered, unable to help myself, as I tried to shift to give the enormous woman enough space to get by.
“What’s that? Oops, sorry,” the woman said as her bag clocked me in the side of the head. It didn’t hit me hard, but given that I’d had a concussion pretty recently, I saw faint stars all the same.
“Ow!” I said. “Do you mind?”
“Well,” the woman said, “If you’d moved…”
I sighed and closed my eyes, then I counted slowly to five. I wasn’t going to get into it with a crazy woman on an airplane that I would have to sit next to for the better part of the day.
“Yes, of course,” I said instead. “It was totally my fault.” I made myself as small in my seat as possible while the woman got settled. She unloaded half of her bag into the seat pocket in front of her, and spread herself out to take up both arm rests.
“Ma’am,” the flight attendant said, coming back to their row, “Ma’
am, I need you to put your seat belt on. The flight is about to depart.” And we’re waiting on you, was the unspoken thought I heard in the annoyed, exhausted flight attendant’s voice.
“Can I get some wine?” the woman asked, and I stared at her.
“No, Ma’am, I’m sorry; we’ll be doing beverage service a bit after take off.”
“How about if I don’t put my seat belt on until you bring me a bottle of chardonnay?” the woman asked back, and I put my head in my hand, closing my eyes.
“Ma’am,” the flight attendant said firmly, “your seat belt is a matter of your own personal safety; it’s not a negotiation. Please put your seat belt on now. Beverage service will begin shortly after take off.
“These fuckin’ skinny bitches think they own the world, am I right?” the woman said to me in what I presumed was supposed to be a whisper but was, in fact, a slightly louder than normal volume. “Though I’m not sure you’d know, being a skinny bitch yourself.” I rolled my eyes and looked up at the flight attendant. Minding my own business, and here I was: a skinny bitch.
“Ma’am, if you become belligerent, you may be asked to leave the plane,” the flight attendant said. Her voice was automatic, as if she had been trained in exactly what to say in the event that an overly-perfumed, drunk woman would be the last person on a flight and would start demanding things before she’d even gotten settled.
Still, the flight attendant’s response surprised me and I arched my eyebrows. Calling someone a fucking bitch didn’t qualify for belligerent yet?
“Fuck you,” the woman said in response, lifting up her fat middle finger over my head and shoving it right into the flight attendant’s face. I nodded, not in agreement, of course; I knew that the woman had just purchased her one way ticket off of the plane.
A moment later, before the woman had even retracted her finger, a man in a uniform appeared standing by my seat.
“Okay, Ma’am, I’m going to need you to come with me,” he said in a firm tone.
“I’m not going anywhere without my friend here,” the woman said, grabbing my arm. I felt my eyes widen in surprise and a small amount of pain as the woman’s fingernails dug into my upper arm.
“Are you two together?” the air marshal said doubtfully, looking at me. I looked up at him with the most pained expression I could manage. “Yeah,” he continued. “I didn’t think so.”
He was a nice looking guy, I realized as I scanned his body. Obviously, a man in uniform had an automatic amount of sexiness that most non-uniformed men didn’t possess, but, even without the air marshal badge, this guy would be cute. His chestnut brown hair was spiked on the top of his head and shorn close to his head on the sides. He had brown eyes, which I would normally have described as dull, except his had a glow to them, gold or something, that gave them depth and soul.
Brad, a voice in my head said softly, and I flushed with guilt.
“All right, Ma’am,” the air marshal said. “Let’s get going.” He reached in and lifted the woman out by her elbow, knocking me around a bit as the woman struggled. Soon, another two marshals were standing in the aisle, one of them creating a space for me to slip out.
“You’ll be safer over here,” he said. A struggle ensued as the three air marshals restrained the now screaming, swearing woman and removed her from the plane. Everyone’s eyes were on me because I was so close to everything going on. I could only imagine what they were thinking.
Forty-five minutes later when the plane was finally ready to take off, I was back where I’d started: an aisle and an empty seat on either side of me. The twenty-something had taken off his headphones with all of the fracas, though, and he turned to me and tugged lightly on my sleeve with his fingertips.
“Crazy bitch, huh?” he asked. “She was drunk; I could smell it. Did she hurt you?”
It was this last question that made me take notice and actually look at the man, who was pretty close to my age. I looked over at him and he was staring at me with concerned eyes.
“No,” I said. “She didn’t hurt me. Just annoyed the piss out of me.”
“Well, good,” he said. “Because you look like you’ve had enough… hurt…” he paused as if trying to think of exactly the right word, “for a while.”
I muttered in agreement, but he kept his eyes on me as if he was looking for a more significant answer. “Um… yeah,” I said. “I guess I have.”
“Well, can I buy you a drink?”
I almost said yes. I looked at his earnest expression, hopeful and seeking, and I almost, almost said yes. After all, if I meant what I’d said to Brad, that I was going home to continue my real life and end the fantasy life I’d been living with him, there was no reason to not let this nice, fairly cute man buy me a drink.
“No,” I said. “I have a boyfriend,” I said instead. I ignored the brief look of rejection on his face, and I turned instead to fix my gaze on the tv screen on the back of the seat in front of me.
“Okay, then,” he said. He paused a moment longer and I could feel his eyes on me. Then, he shook his head and put his headphones back on and tuned out the world and, most importantly, me.
Brad
“Well, at least he didn’t arrest you on the spot,” Simon said grimly. “That’s something.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. “I half expected him to put cuffs on me as soon as we left the hospital with Cas. I’m not going to tempt him further, though; he’s after me.”
Simon stirred some non-dairy creamer into his coffee and then lightly tapped the spoon on the edge of the cup. It was a habit of his, something I’d seen him do hundreds of times; it meant he was deep in thought.
“And he thinks it’s you,” he said finally. “The big mastermind. The one he’s got take down. His white whale.”
“Oh fuck no,” I said, shaking my head. “He doesn’t have me confused for Manuel Brown. He has no idea of the scope of what he’s investigating. We had a few conversations and, even based on what he told me he would arrest me for, he’s got no clue. I could turn him onto Manuel, but then I’d have a lot more to be worried about than just being arrested.” I grimaced at the idea of turning Patrick loose onto Manuel. Antoine would be dead within an hour.
“Or,” Simon said, “you could just go to jail for a while. It would prove your loyalty to Manuel.”
“I don’t think stripes look good on me,” I said, sipping my own coffee. The trouble was, I needed to be out in the world to coordinate all of the aspects of the arms deals currently going on at the six warehouses I had going just this month alone. And, I needed to get my son. And, to complicate things even more completely, I had a girlfriend to deal with. Had, past tense, pushed through my brain like acid. I wondered if I was ever going to end up in a normal relationship, or if that was something that was out of my reach like, surprisingly, so many aspects of a normal life.
Simon did have a point, though; going to jail for even a few days would prove to Manuel Brown that I wasn’t going to roll over and produce his name for agents that came sniffing around. Of course, I reasoned, this wasn’t the first time something like this had happened. It wouldn’t be the last. I could go to jail; I’d probably never actually spend even an hour there before my lawyer got me out.
“I could probably end up making a good show of it,” I said. “You might be onto something.” I wondered if Antoine was awake or asleep right now, as I sat talking indirectly about him and his future. I wondered what he was wearing… what he was doing. These were the thoughts that tore me up on a regular basis.
“Well, you could also always go back to South Africa,” he finally said. He tapped the spoon on the side of his cup again and I nodded.
“That’s a likely alternative,” I said. “It gets me out of the country, gets me away from the NCA and Patrick Shim, and still keeps me in good graces with Manuel and his crew. I think that’s the best choice I have until things blow over a little. Agent Shim will get caught up in something else before too long.” I narrowed my e
yes at the thought of him and Cassie spending time alone together. “Something more his speed. Right now, he’s trying to gnaw his way through a buffet. As soon as someone comes around and offers him a more reasonable bite of food, he’s going to realize how exhausted he is and take the switch.”
“If he’s smart,” Simon agreed.
“And, if he’s dumb,” I said, “then he’ll just end up dead.” I shrugged and sipped my coffee. Simon smiled grimly and nodded. We’d both seen it too many times before.
“When are you going?” he asked.
I took a deep breath and calculated in my head any last minute transactions that would need to be dealt with here in London, and weighted them against the knowledge that Patrick Shim was, as I sat there, likely gathering up warrants for my arrest.
“Later today,” I said. “I don’t want to waste a lot of time.”
“And Cassie?” Simon asked. I thought I detected a change in the tone of his voice.
I cleared my throat and sat up a little straighter, reaching for my wallet. “Cassie left on a plane for the US this morning.” I threw a twenty on the table and looked across to Simon, daring him to say anything.
He didn’t… he was smarter than that. “I see,” he said, nodding. “Well, let’s get out of here and get you set up for your trip. Have you talked to Istanbul yet?”
We walked out of the café and our conversation turned away from women and NCA agents and back toward logistics of negotiations and development. We agreed that Simon would handle some pending business with Istanbul while I traveled, then we would have a video conference once I was safely in South Africa to get everyone on the same page.
I got back to my house and walked through, noticing that, without Cassie around, things seemed especially quiet. Too quiet? Maybe. It was too soon to tell. I didn’t allow myself to think of her as being gone, of having left. When I began to let my mind wander in even remotely that direction, I would start to get a pain in my chest that seemed more like a heart attack than was probably good for me. I busied myself packing and, when I was ready, I got onto my plane and headed back to South Africa.
Billionaire Romance Box Set: The Billionaire's Legacy: An Alpha Billionaire Romance Box Set Page 17