The Billionaire and the Runaway Bride

Assuming we can agree on a date. We both keep busy schedules. He’s an attorney and lives to protect his clients and destroy their enemies. I’m one of his clients too, and I love having an asshole on my team. Comes in handy at times.

–Aiden: Lemme know when you get back.

–Me: Ok. I’ll have Benedict check my calendar next week.

–Aiden: Too special to hang out with me this weekend?

I snort. Because of my trip, I suggested meeting for drinks on Saturday rather than Friday, but he told me he was busy.

–Me: Like you have any free time.

–Aiden: Yeah, true. TTYLater gator.

That done, I contact my assistant Benedict.

–Me: I just landed. Call me.

I see another security checkpoint. Shit. But at least the lines are moving.

–Me: Wait. Call me after I clear security. Ten minutes.

After I go through a metal detector and have my carry-on scanned by a woman who tries to maintain eye contact a little longer than is really necessary, I walk along the wide and curving main corridor of Incheon Airport, past a string of brightly lit duty-free stores, phone in hand. I also note an indoor garden that must be new. I don’t remember seeing it last time I came to Seoul. Panels on the high ceiling above show soothing patterns of blue and orange. I squint. Are those fish on the screens…?

And when is Benedict going to call? I said ten minutes, not eleven—

My phone rings. “Tell me you put me on the next flight out of here,” I say.

“Sorry. The airline put you on the one after.”

“Why?” The gall of the airline. “Don’t they know they’ve wasted enough of my time?”

“I made that clear, but they were worried that you might not clear the second security check after getting off the flight from Singapore. But they assured me that was the fastest they could arrange. Even said it was with their partner airline.”

Oh for God’s sake. “Well, I’ve already cleared it. So can they put me on the next flight?”

“Probably not. Unless it’s been delayed, it’s already boarding. Or about to.”

Fuck. Me.

“But according to the schedule, you should be home in the next fourteen hours for sure.”

That fails to improve my mood. I should be halfway over the Pacific by now, damn it. But there’s nothing to be done, so I latch on to something that I can do something about. “Fine. Update me on anything I should know.”

“No emergencies. Your agent sent five more scripts since you left for your little getaway in Phuket. How’s your tan, by the way?”

“Good enough.” I grunt with half annoyance and half pleasure.

I don’t regret adding the three-day detour to Thailand to my trip to Japan, where I was filming a few whiskey commercials for a local brewery. I’d never been to Thailand, and a producer to

ld me the beaches in Phuket are fantastic. But I resent the hell out of the fact that the airlines fucked up my return trip home.

“Also, FYI, you have fourteen calls from Jessica Martins,” Benedict says, to distinguish her from another Jessica, a photographer I used to work with some years ago.

Something bitter and sour coats my tongue. An ex-girlfriend. An annoying, clingy ex-girlfriend. If I’d realized she’d turn out to be this pathetic and irritating, I would’ve tossed her overboard the moment she said hello at that yacht party four months ago.

“You didn’t actually take any of them, did you?” I already told Benedict not to, and he’s excellent at following instructions.

“Of course not. She left quite a few messages and texts, though.”