“What a surprise. I had no idea you were on this flight,” he said, playing along, as if they’d just met.
“Perhaps we can sit together and catch up on the plane,” she suggested, as if the two of them hadn’t already made those plans.
“I like that idea.” He leaned closer, his lips dangerously close as he said, “Maybe then I can whisper filthy things in your ear as we fly.”
She wobbled, his words making her hot. Her hand darted out, and she gripped his shirt, holding on. He looped an arm around her waist, making sure she didn’t fall.
“You’d want that, wouldn’t you?” he murmured, as he roamed his eyes over her. She wore skinny jeans and heels, and a silky tank top that dared to show a peek of cleavage.
“Yes. So much. Would you?”
His eyes blazed darkly—his yes. “I would absolutely love getting you hot and bothered.”
She brought her lips closer to his ear. “I’m going to let you in on a little secret. I’m already there.”
A few minutes later, the gate agent’s voice warbled across the tinny speakers, calling for first-class passengers. Michael swept his arm to the side, letting her lead the way.
As they stepped onto the plane, he asked, “How’s your mom?”
The question surprised her, but she answered quickly, “She’s okay. Well, she’s not great. I was talking to my sister about her,” she said and shared some more details. She figured he must have heard the tail end of the conversation, picking up a few French words that she’d taught him once upon a time. Back when they were younger, he’d helped her with her English slang, so it was only fitting that she taught him some of her language. Mostly she’d taught him naughty words.
Which reminded her…
“I need to work on your French again,” she teased as they quickly found their seats, comfy gray leather chairs in the second row.
“You think so?”
“Like I did before,” she said, jogging his memory. “Have you forgotten it all?”
His eyes twinkled with mischief. “Why don’t you try me and find out?”
“Perhaps I will.”
The flight attendant strolled by and asked if they needed anything.
“All set,” Annalise told her, then carefully tucked her camera gear under the seat in front of her, meticulously taking the time to make sure it was positioned against the leg rests.
Michael tipped his chin toward the bags. “What’s the job in New York? More bikinis?”
“We have one more day in some very iconic New York locations for Veronica’s. We’ve actually booked the New York Public Library, and we have some fantastic shots planned of the girls lounging in their PJs on these leather couches, reading old books. It’s going to be very cool.”
His eyes twinkled. “Can I have your job?”
“You want to lounge in your PJs and read in the library?” she said, nudging him with her elbow.
“Yeah, that’s it. Exactly.”
“When Veronica’s adds boxer briefs, perhaps I’ll suggest you model them.”
He leaned his head back and laughed, a deep, hearty sound that warmed her soul. She loved his laugh; he’d been so laidback and carefree when she knew him before, quick with a joke or an easy comment. When his chuckles slowed, he lowered his voice to a dirty whisper, “But you don’t even know if I wear boxer briefs.”
She arched her eyebrow in a challenging stare. “No. But I fully intend to find out the answer to that, and to discover it…” She let her voice trail off, watching him linger on her every word with parted lips before she added, “So very soon.”
He drew a sharp breath, and she zipped right back into the conversation. “Then after that, I have a boudoir session with a private client.”
“Private client?”
“Just a woman who wanted to have some shots done as a gift for her husband.” She’d secured space for the shoot in a studio with a gorgeous, sumptuous bedroom set. The woman was the CEO of a sex-toy company, Joy Delivered, and she’d found Annalise through a mutual contact—her brother worked and lived in Paris with his wife, and Annalise had met them a few times at dinner with friends.
“Do a lot of women do that?”
“Enough to make it a good living for me,” Annalise said as passengers shuffled onto the plane, stuffing bags in overhead bins and checking their phones as they searched for their seats.
Michael shook his head in admiration. “Never knew boudoir shots were such a thing.”
Annalise nodded enthusiastically. “They’ve actually grown immensely in popularity in the last several years. More and more women do them. Some just do them for themselves.”
He cocked his head, his eyes hooked on hers, then answered in a thoughtful voice, “That sounds very empowering. I suppose you don’t have to be Gisele to pose for the camera in a lacy white teddy.”
“Yes! That’s it exactly. Not everyone gets that, but you do,” she said, grateful that he understood something few men truly got. While Michael had certainly indicated his appreciation for the gorgeous women on display yesterday, she adored that he understood that true beauty ran deeper.
He tapped his temple. “I can be a feminist.”
“It’s hot,” she said, raising an eyebrow. “And that’s honestly why I love shooting boudoir. Women are realizing that they don’t have to be rail-thin to look good in lingerie. You can have curves, you can have extra padding, you can have stretch marks and still put on a black satin bra and sexy panties and feel wanted, feel sensual,” she said, moving her shoulders and her hips, demonstrating how a woman might feel sexy. “It’s a way of celebrating their femininity. They’re capturing sexuality on camera.”
“They’re capturing their life,” he said with a nod and then added, “They’re enjoying their life.”
“Exactly. I’ve done photos for women after they’ve lost weight and want to celebrate their new bodies. And I’ve done some for others who haven’t lost weight but still want to embrace all that they are, and feel comfortable in their skin.”
“And you help them do that on the shoot?”
“I try. It’s not easy to strip down to your bra and panties and pose sexily for the camera. But my job is to make them feel like they’re all the sexiest women in the world.”
“How do you do that? What’s your secret?”
“I’m…wait for it… positive,” she said, like it was a punch line.
“Well, that would be a good skill,” he said with a quirk of his lips.
“It’s also natural to me. Because I do think the female body is beautiful in all shapes and sizes, and I let them know that they look amazing. Thin or heavy, average or above average. Blond, brunette, redhead. Birthmarks or scars. Every woman can be beautiful in her own way.”
He nodded. “I like that you feel that way. Ever shoot guys?”
“Shockingly, most men don’t do boudoir sessions,” she said in a deadpan voice. “But I have photographed a few couples.”
He arched an eyebrow, then made a rolling gesture, telling her to elaborate. “Are they getting it on?”
She shook her head. “I’m not a pornographer. But sometimes a newly engaged couple will do a sexy shoot. They want to take photos of their passion for each other. To showcase it.”
“They ever invite you to join them?”
She rolled her eyes. “Again, not a pornographer, or a third wheel.”
He held up his hands in surrender. “Sorry, I couldn’t resist.”
“And to answer your question, no, they don’t. They’re happy together. They don’t want a threesome with the photographer.”
“I guess it’s just me then.”
“You’d want a threesome with the photographer?”
“No. I want a one-on-one with her. Only a one-on-one. That’s what I want,” he said, running his fingers across the ends of her hair, watching it fall from his hand onto her shoulder. “I want to be the one behind the camera, shooting photos of her looking gorgeous in anything
and nothing.” His blue eyes were fiery, intense. “Then I want to set down the camera and have her invite me to join her on the bed, and all the sensuality she poured into the pose, she gives to me.”
Annalise shuddered and swallowed. Her throat was dry. Her skin heated up and then, out of nowhere, a flash of worry touched down. Goddammit. She didn’t want to feel an ounce of regret again about her choice to be with him. This time, she made a deliberate decision. She seized hold of that bit of remorse and tossed it in the trash. Instead, she let the heat and the sparks and the sizzle slide through her. “I would do that,” she whispered. “I would do that with you. I would give that to you.”
The flight attendant began the announcements, and Annalise settled into her seat, her skin on fire, a pulse beating between her legs, desire cloaking her once more. She closed her eyes and breathed, trying to get some sort of hold on these raging hormones, but with him next to her it was futile.
She resigned herself to being wet the whole flight.
It was all his fault. That fucking hot, sexy man.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Once they were airborne, Michael returned to the topic of her family. “So you and Noelle help out your mom?”
“Yes. We want to be there as much as we can for her. That’s why I try to keep my jobs out of town as short as they can be. Especially since Noelle is so busy.”
“How is your sister? Did she ever start the bakery like she wanted to?” he asked, and Annalise loved that he remembered that little detail from their phone conversations years ago.
“Yes, she did. She runs it with her husband now, and she has three kids. So she’s been busy.” She pictured Noelle and Patrick up before dawn, peddling baguettes and croissants, and loving their little corner shop in Paris. Annalise adored that bakery too. When her sister had struggled to secure a loan to start it up, Annalise had given her the money she’d saved from her café job in college – the money she’d once earmarked to see Michael. But they’d lost touch, and her sister needed the help, so it seemed as if fate had intended something else for her savings. She was glad to have helped her sister start up her business, and that business had provided the foundation for Noelle’s family.
“I’d say they’ve both been busy,” he said with a wink, and she returned her focus to him.
“True,” she said, laughing. “The kids are great. Nine, eleven, and twelve. She’s exhausted all the time.”
“I’m exhausted just hearing that. Does that mean you have to take care of your mom more?”
She shrugged. “Sometimes, but that’s okay. My mom took care of me. It’s only fair,” she said, then softened her voice, placing her hand on his arm. “Is it weird to hear other people talk about their mothers?”
His eyes darkened briefly, then he shook his head. “No. It’s the way it should be.”
“Do you ever see her? I know you did at first, but then you didn’t ever want to anymore.” They’d talked about his mother, and he’d told her that he’d visited her in prison a few times when he was in high school and college. He’d stopped after that, though.
His jaw was set hard, and he heaved a sigh. “You’re right. I used to, a long time ago because I wanted to try—I don’t know—maybe to understand what had happened, and why she’d done it. But soon enough it was clear there was no way to make sense of it. I couldn’t be near her anymore. I don’t think of her as my mother, and I haven’t in years.”
She ran her hand down his arm. “I understand why.”
He turned his head and met her gaze. “Not everyone does,” he said in a quiet voice.
“You mean other women?” she asked, and a brief burst of jealousy flared inside her at the prospect of him with other women. Of course, he hadn’t been celibate over the years, but the thought of him with someone else was like a hot poker jabbing her flesh.
He ran a hand across his jaw, shaking his head. “Just people in general. My brother Ryan, and even Shan for a while. They wanted me to visit her, but I just couldn’t.”
“Do you think it’s because you were closest to your father, or just because that’s simply how you feel?” she asked as the plane began to level out, nearing its cruising altitude.
“Probably both.”
“Do you think that will ever change? Your feelings for her?”
“I don’t see how it could. Unless she was found to be not guilty,” he said with a scoff, as if that were truly impossible.
“Is there a chance of that happening?”
“Not a chance in hell, as far as I can see,” he said, then cocked his head, studying Annalise’s expression as if he were looking for answers to an unspoken question. “I believe there are other people who are also responsible, but I don’t believe she’s innocent. So I don’t see how I’d ever think of her as a mother again.”
“Are you okay with that?” she asked quietly.
“Are you okay with that? With me feeling the way I do?”
She nodded resolutely and ran her fingers across the back of his neck. “Of course. It’s your life. It’s your choice.” The tension seemed to lessen in his shoulders as she touched him, and she was struck with a memory as crisp as the images in front of her—a phone call, years ago, a couple months after she’d left Vegas and returned to France. It was one of the few times she’d heard him shed tears. His mother had just been found guilty of murder for hire, and had said her good-byes to her family before she was taken away in the bus to prison. He was choked up, and it had shredded her to hear him recount the day. But her emotions were nothing compared to what he was feeling at age seventeen with a family pulverized by tragedy. The pain had started to fade from his voice over the next few calls and letters, and he’d told her, “Talking to you is one of the few things that makes me feel okay.”
Okay.
Such a small, flat word. But it was all he wanted, and it was enough. To feel okay. Somehow, she’d given that to him. Perhaps she was doing the same now, helping him see that it was indeed okay to not want to be his mother’s son.
“You sure?” he asked, and his voice was laced with nerves, like he desperately needed her reassurance.
She cupped his cheek and spoke confidently. “Yes. You’re a man without a mother. And it’s okay to be that way. It’s like she died, too, and your mourning for her just took a different shape.”
His eyes locked onto hers, and he relaxed further. “Sometimes I wondered if I was too hard on her. Too angry. Too unforgiving. But then she admitted to Ryan that she did it. I don’t need to forgive her.”
“Some things are unforgivable. Obviously, this is one of those things,” she said, letting her hand drift down from his face to rest on his leg. “Do you still miss your dad?”
“Sure. Of course. But you get used to it. It becomes part of your life, doesn’t it? The missing,” he said, as the flight attendants unbuckled and began to move about the cabin.
She nodded, and though he hadn’t said her husband’s name, she knew what he was getting at.
“Do you miss Julien?” he asked. Point blank. Direct. The elephant in the room.
She swallowed, her heart rising up to her throat and sticking there. “Sometimes I do,” she admitted quietly, looking down at the armrest, the inflight magazine, the screen on the back of the seat in front of her. Then she gazed into Michael’s eyes, clear and fixed on her. “But not right now.”
The crackle of the speaker interrupted their talk as the attendant announced that they were free to turn on computers and other approved devices. Neither she nor he made a move to do so.
Instead, they talked. They talked as they flew over Colorado, then Kansas, past Illinois and Ohio, through water and club soda, through the afternoon lunch service, and through the movies that others watched. He told her about his family, catching her up on his brothers and sister. She remembered them all from when they were younger, and she savored every detail he shared. His sister’s pregnancy was going well, and she was expecting a baby boy; Ryan was engaged to a b
eautiful philanthropist who made him happier than Michael had ever seen him; and his youngest brother, Colin, had started up a serious relationship with a social worker who had a teenage son. She loved the details, ate them up like fine, dark chocolate, as she pictured the Paige-Princes—now the Sloans—in their new lives, healing from the damage that had ripped them apart years ago.
“What about you?” she asked, meeting his cool blue gaze. “They all sound so happy. So settled. Are you happy, too?”
The corner of his lips curved up, the barest lopsided grin. “I’m happy now.”
Now.
The word echoed. Reminding her that now was all anyone ever had. This moment. Make the most of it. Go for more than okay, and do it right now. No guilt—only pleasure, only passion, only the present.
She threaded her hand into the back of his hair, feeling those soft, dark strands on her flesh, and he groaned. Low, barely audible. Just for her.
“Come closer and kiss me,” she murmured, and he obliged, dipping his head and kissing her like they were the only two people on the plane—flying across the sky, leaving Vegas far behind, and heading to a new adventure.
* * *
Michael Sloan had always been perfectly content to fly commercial. First class was great, but he’d never longed for a private jet. Not that he’d have minded one, but it was along the lines of a yacht or a mansion—nice to admire in a magazine, but wholly unnecessary for his happiness.
That was no longer the case. A private jet was the only thing in the world he wanted right now. No, want was too small a word for it. He fucking craved it like air. Because this kiss was different. It was as hot as all their others, but it was something more, too. It was crazed and beautiful. It was hungry and full of regret. For years gone by. For missed connections. For the past and for the present. It was as if everything that could have been between them was bottled up, stored and aged to perfection, all for this one kiss. With her hand on the back of his head, she kissed him deeply, but tenderly, too.
The wildness at the nightclub was gone. The frenzy of the dressing room had slunk away. They would return, but right now this was a kiss that made him a little drunk, like his body was buzzing with some kind of sweet opiate, and that opiate was her. He wanted to pull her on top of him, run his hands over her soft flesh, unzip her jeans, and then slide into her. Wanted to watch her fuck him here on the plane. To enjoy the view of her straddling him, riding him, slow and unhurried, lingering and lovely, as she rose up and down on his cock.
Sinful Love (Sinful Nights #4) Page 11