Not relevant. Focus.
A toddler in a dinosaur shirt was attempting to scale a row of connected seats while his mother scrolled her phone, completely oblivious. Jayden watched the kid wobble, already calculating the trajectory of the inevitable face-plant?—
The man with the military posture moved—fast, efficient, no wasted motion. He caught the kid mid-tumble, set him upright on the floor, and stepped back before the mother even looked up.
Good reflexes. Protective instincts. The kind of person who noticed trouble before it happened and stepped in without being asked.
Interesting. Also: definitely attractive. Which was still not relevant, hello, but apparently her brain hadn’t gotten that memo.
She pulled out her phone and pretended to scroll through emails while continuing her sweep of the gate area.
A woman in white linen and statement earrings was photographing everything—the gate sign, the coffee kiosk, the backs of strangers’ heads. Travel writer or influencer. Annoying but probably not dangerous.
And two seats down, a thirtysomething man with wire-rimmed glasses was clutching his boarding pass with both hands, his face the particular shade of gray-green that came from anticipating eleven hours of turbulence.
He caught her looking and offered an apologetic smile. “Sorry. I know I’m blocking the—” He moved his bag closer to himself. “Hate flying. Especially over water. All that ocean, you know? Nothing underneath you but waves and sharks and—” He stopped himself. “Sorry. I talk when I’m nervous.”
“Flying is statistically safer than driving,” Jayden offered.
“Tell that to my stomach.” He laughed weakly. “I’m Vic.”
“Jayden.” She smiled—the warm one she kept on hand for strangers and hotel managers. “And I’m sure you’ll be fine. The pilots have been flying this route for years. They know what they’re doing.”
“That’s what my therapist says.” He adjusted his glasses, pushed them up his nose, adjusted them again. “She also says I should try deep breathing, but every time I try, I just think about how thin the air is at cruising altitude, and then I hyperventilate more.”
“Maybe try focusing on something else. A book. A movie. The in-flight meal.”
“The in-flight meal.” His expression suggested she’d just recommended he eat cardboard. “You’re very kind, Jayden.”
She smiled again and moved toward the gate-check line, filing him away: IT-consultant type. Zero threat. The kind of person who apologized for existing and probably worked in an office somewhere, debugging code and drinking too much coffee.
Harmless.
The gate-check line moved slowly. The aircraft swap had dragged on for hours, creating chaos, and the agents were clearly operating on too little sleep and too much coffee. Jayden counted at least six other passengers with bags identical to hers—gray, rolling, completely forgettable—including the man with military posture, who still leaned against the pillar, talking on his phone.
Up close, he was even more attractive. Broad shoulders, strong hands, the kind of quiet confidence that came from knowing exactly what you were capable of. His eyes swept the line once—assessing, cataloging—and landed on her for a brief moment.
She looked away first. Let him think she was just another passenger, annoyed by the delay, thinking about nothing more important than whether she’d get an aisle seat.
The pendant rested warm against her skin, a constant reminder of what was really at stake.
When she reached the desk, the gate agent stopped her and made her gate-check her bag. She surrendered it with the mild annoyance of a frequent traveler. The agent slapped a gate-check tag on the handle and directed her toward the jetway.
She watched her bag join the growing pile of identical gray luggage and felt something tighten in her chest.
Sheesh, she was just being paranoid. The critical materials were on her person.
She boarded the plane and headed to the bathroom in back, thanks to that morning’s coffee break. A long look in the mirror suggested she appeared just as rumpled and tired as she felt.
Calm down.
She didn’t know what to think about the pinch in her gut. Everything was fine. What could possibly go wrong between now and her nonstop flight to Sydney?
Dakota Rivers hated going in blind.
He hated delayed flights and rerouted connections and aircraft swaps for “mechanical reasons” that no one bothered to explain. He hated gate-checking his bag because some airline bean counter had decided the replacement plane needed overhead bins the size of shoeboxes. He hated not choosing his own seat.
It’d all started when the gate agent’s voice crackled over the PA system: “Attention passengers on Flight 847 to Sydney. Due to the aircraft change, overhead bin space will be limited. We’re asking passengers with larger carry-on items to bring them to the gate desk for complimentary checking.”
