Tempting the Billionaire (Love in the Balance 1)

He leaned his head back and sank into the seat. The alcohol flowed into his limbs, relaxing him. His thoughts bounced from Angel’s and Richie’s genuine joy at their wedding to Aiden’s steadfast outlook and sheer determination to be happy regardless of what life threw at him. He thought again of Uncle Mike’s stoicism as he spoke of his wife. Shane hoped against hope a miracle would occur, allowing Aunt Kathy to live a long life after all.

He was blessed to have the Downeys. With his parents gone and no siblings, Shane had become accustomed to being alone. Being around his aunt, uncle, and cousins reminded him he wasn’t.

His seat gave a violent jerk, and it took Shane a few seconds to realize it wasn’t only his seat but the entire plane that was vibrating. Then came another, more forceful drop, followed by the attendant swooping in like some waifish superhero.

His voice studiously calm, he said, “Buckle your seat belt, Mr. August.” No sooner had Shane snapped the clasp on his belt than the oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling. Shane fumbled, hands shaking as he slid the mask on.

The attendant—Charlie, Shane remembered in a rush—strapped into the seat across the aisle. “Air pocket!” Charlie shouted through his plastic mask.

But before Shane could respond, the plane tipped, angling in a decidedly less favorable direction.

This was it. He was going to die.

A thousand thoughts lined up and paraded through his head, maybe the most amusing of which being his relief at having changed out of his cardboard beachwear before boarding the plane. If he was going to go down in a ball of flames over the ocean, he’d rather not be dressed like an islander. It was somehow disingenuous.

The screeching of the plane in full dive took over his thoughts as fear carved a serpentine path in his gut. The horizon slanted at an awkward angle outside his window, and Shane forced himself to breathe, sucking in oxygen in greedy gulps and musing how he wished it was nitrous oxide instead.

The seat belt ate into his waist as the plane nose-dived, anchoring Shane to a seat that would more likely double as a diaper than a floatation device. Despite that terrifying and slightly humorous reality, Shane’s next thought came as certain and as strong as his heart slamming into his breastbone.

If he was in love with Crickitt, why were they apart?

Without warning, the plane stopped its earthbound descent, leveling with all the abruptness of a tilt-a-whirl coming to a halt. Panting, Shane took in the view outside his window at the now level horizon, as if the last several seconds had been nothing more than an imagined scenario.

He turned his head to find Charlie giving him a shaky smile from his seat. After a few moments, he tentatively lifted his mask from his face. “We seem to have lost altitude,” he said, Adam’s apple bobbing in his skinny neck. “I’ll just check in with the captain.”

Shane nodded, yanking the mask from his face and wondering if Charlie was about to run to the adjoining cabin and puke his guts out. It’s what Shane would have done if he was in the kid’s shoes.

By the time it’d become apparent that Shane, Charlie, and the captain were no longer in danger of becoming grease spots on the plane’s little black box, Shane’s heart rate had regulated. Charlie returned to give an impressively calm synopsis, explaining what had happened with a pile of technical jargon as Shane nodded numbly.

Now left alone to nurse his second Scotch and soda—he didn’t recall needing a drink more badly in his life—he replayed his near-death experience in his head. With it came his last lucid thought.

If I love Crickitt, why are we apart?

It hadn’t been his life flashing before his eyes on the way down, not memories of his childhood, his parents, or even the business that had become an extension of himself over the last decade. No, what flashed before him like the reel of a never-before-seen movie was a future. A future that would never happen if he died.

Opening his eyes in the morning to find Crickitt next to him in his bed. Her laughter, rolling through him like thunder coming from miles away. Crickitt at the end of a long white aisle in a simple, clean dress. Crickitt pressing his hand against her round stomach. Crickitt asking what names he liked for their child.

Grief choked out his next breath as the glass rattled in his hand. He set it aside, covering his face with a shaky hand. He cleared his throat, sucking in a stuttering breath. Loss unlike any other radiated through his limbs, stronger than when he’d lost either of his parents. Pain sliced him open, left him feeling raw. Empty.

How could he mourn a life that never was?

He thought of Uncle Mike’s words, how he said the hard stuff brought him and Aunt Kathy closer together, made them stronger. Shane had worked hard to avoid that kind of closeness, to avoid the pain of loss should something tragic happen. If Crickitt was taken from him, the way he and his father lost his mother, how would he survive?