A familiar sense of trepidation crept from the shadows, calling Heath’s attention to the boarding pass in his hand. He read it twice before letting loose a quiet expletive.
Christian had upgraded them to first class. Of course he had. Buying his way out of trouble was how he always apologized. Or rather, avoided apologizing. Why deal with big, icky emotions like remorse or guilt when one could simply toss money at the problem and flit off to find someone new to disappoint?
Except this trip shouldn’t be an apology. They’d planned it from start to finish together, because Christian wanted to reconnect and reminisce about the good ol’ days.
Heath was a little lost on which specific days Christian considered the good ones. He personally couldn’t summon a single memory where Christian hadn’t left him standing alone in an aisle while everyone around him stared and whispered.
“Mr. Lennox? Is everything okay?” The attendant’s chipper tone snapped him out of his grumbling.
“Oh, yes. Sorry. I just?—”
He rolled his lips inward and dropped into his seat with a brusque shake of his head. Overexplaining was a terrible habit of the old Heath, the one who made excuses for people who didn’t deserve it. From that moment on, he was forging a path to a new him. He was no longer accepting less than he deserved. No more pining over the unattainable. He would live within his means—and that included relationships.
He stuffed his messenger bag into the space between his feet, his touch lingering on the places where the leather was softest and the dye long rubbed away. A gift from his father, given when he’d gone off to college, it had seen him through somany years of growth and uncertainty. How foolish he’d been to think those years were behind him.
“Nervous flyer?”
The question, asked in a relaxed timbre, with a voice so buttery smooth it put shortbread to shame, brought Heath back to reality—and the awareness he’d just drama-flopped into someone’s personal space without so much as a “pardon me.”
“Me? Oh, no, I?—”
The words fluttered away. Illusory butterflies dancing across the sliver of space separating him from the veritable goddamn Adonis in seat 2B.
“You sure?”
Brown eyes, speckled through with shards of emerald and gold, crinkled slightly at the corners as Aphrodite’s beloved gave him the smallest of smiles. Just a little twist of the lips, but it was enough to reveal subtle indentations in either cheek and smooth the wrinkles of Heath’s brain into glass.
What had he been saying about forging fresh paths and pining?
He broke eye contact with an unconvincing cough into the crook of his elbow and redirected his attention to his bag. Retrieving his laptop and the pile of student essays he’d printed for grading was suddenly of the utmost importance. The stubborn zipper, of course, chose that moment to snag.
He muttered through a battle of wills against the inanimate object while, in his periphery, his seat neighbor watched him with growing amusement.
“I assure you I’m flyne—fine! I am fine. Not at all a nervous fie… fly-er.”
He withered. Oh, if his English Lit professor could see him now.
“If you say so,” the man responded, lips curling into the knowingest of smirks as he leaned back and let his eyes drift closed.
Good God, those lips.
“Yup!” Heath chirped, the zipper finally giving way with a jerk. “Of course, I don’t love all the rushing and being crammed into a tight space for hours. I mean, who does? But the actual act of airline travel? Doesn’t bother me one bit. I have full confidence in the aeronautics experts charged with keeping things running.”
Stop. Talking.
Heath pressed his lips together and clenched his jaw until his teeth creaked. He’d blame his asinine behavior on lack of oxygen, but they were still on the ground. It was by the grace of whatever god was feeling generous that day that his neighbor had dozed off. Or perhaps died of boredom. Either way, his eyes were closed and his expression unbothered.
Sunlight stretched across the man’s face from the window at his side. It set fire to his auburn hair, revealing a light smattering of freckles across the most unfair of cheekbones. He was possibly the most beautiful man Heath had ever seen.
“So’s you know,” the man turned his head with the urgency of a blood-drunk lion lying in the sun. “I’m not gonna be much help if you are.”
He resettled, the smile returning, and Heath struggled to thread his thoughts together.
“If I’m what?”
“Nervous.”
He raised the glass at his side and gave it a gentle shake, rattling ice that had barely melted. An eau d’bourbon wafted across, wrinkling Heath’s nose and driving the message home.
