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“Project management.” I exhale, already feeling the tension creep back in. “Mostly corporate clients. Timelines, deliverables, people who think everything is urgent when it’s not.”

“Sounds stressful.”

“It’s not,” I say automatically. “It’s structured. I had three active projects this week,” I continue, the words coming easier now I’m on familiar ground. “All in different phases. One launch, one mid cycle, one that’s already behind because no one listened to the initial scope.” I shake my head slightly. “I had it all mapped out. Every hour accounted for. Contingencies in place. I don’t just leave in the middle of something like that.”

“I’m guessing this wasn’t in the plan.”

“Not even close.” I let out a breath. “I booked the first flight I could find. Didn’t hand anything off properly. Didn’t finish my reports. I have emails piling up that I’m not answering, which means by the time I get back everything will be a shambles.”

The plane shifts slightly, a small dip, and my fingers tighten against the armrest.

“I don’t do this,” I add. “Drop things, walk away mid process. It creates problems.”

His blue gaze is intense. “For you or for them?”

“Both.” I glance at him. “But I can fix theirs. Mine are harder.” I look back out the window, jaw tightening slightly. “I’ve built my life so it doesn’t get… disrupted like this. Everything has a place. A sequence. If you follow it, things work.”

“And if you don’t?”

I huff out a breath. “You end up on a flight you weren’t supposed to be on, thinking about everything you left unfinished.”

The seatbelt sign stays on longer than expected. The plane shifts slightly, a subtle dip that makes my stomach tighten.

I hate flying.

Not enough to avoid it, but enough to notice every change in altitude, every shift in pressure.

Then the plane drops.

A full, stomach-lurching, air gone from under you drop that yanks a sharp breath out of my lungs.

Someone gasps a few rows back. The overhead bins rattle hard enough to make my teeth click together.

The engines roar louder, too loud, and the plane jolts violently, snapping sideways before correcting.

My body reacts before my brain does.

My hand shoots out.

I grab his. It’s automatic, instinctive, completely out of character. I don’t even register what I’ve done. His hand is warm and solid beneath mine.

Even in my nervous state, I wonder what the hell I’m doing. I don’t reach for people. I never need…

The plane jolts again, harder this time, and my grip on his hand tightens.

He doesn’t pull away, doesn’t comment on it either, just turns his hand slightly, so it’s easier to hold.

The realization hits me somewhere between embarrassment and ice cold terror.

“I…” I start, but the words don’t come.

“It’s fine,” he says simply.

The turbulence eases gradually instead of stopping outright, the plane still trembling occasionally beneath us.

I start to breathe again and quickly become aware that my hand is still wrapped around his.

Heat crawls up my neck.