Claimed (Diamond Tycoons 1)

He bid goodbye to Pete and headed back to the helicopter, even as he ran the GM’s parting words around in his head. No, it never hurt to make sure both parties were on the same page. Especially when one of those parties was a stubborn redhead with a sharp mind and a curvy-as-hell body.

Isa continued to give him the cold shoulder on the helicopter ride to the airport, and though it grated, he took it. It was a short ride and not very private, considering they were in the same cabin as the pilot. He would wait until they were on the plane, where he’d have plenty of privacy and plenty of time to ferret out why she’d started avoiding him when he thought they’d been making progress.

He figured he’d start subtly, ask her questions that would force her to talk to him. After all, if it was business related, she couldn’t very well refuse to share her thoughts. This was a business trip, after all.

Except...best laid plans and all that. By the time they were onboard his plane, luggage stowed and seat belts fastened for takeoff, he was seething. And when she took the seat farthest away from him and refused to so much as glance his way, his temper exploded.

“What the hell is wrong with you?” he demanded, unfastening his seat belt and stalking toward her just as the plane hurtled into the air.

“What are you doing? You need to sit down!”

“What I need is for you to stop treating me like I’m a cross between Jack the Ripper and Attila the Hun.”

At that moment the plane hit some turbulence and it was sheer will alone that kept him standing, legs locked and arms crossed over his chest as he stared her down. They hit another bump a few seconds later, and he ignored that one, too—refusing to give in to the turbulence, or his uneasiness with flying, now that he had Isa cornered.

“I’m serious, Marc. You’re going to get hurt—”

“I’m serious, too, Isa. And I find it rich that you’re concerned with me getting hurt when you’ve spent the last day doing your best to pretend I don’t exist.”

“That’s not true—”

“It’s absolutely true and I want to know why. If you’re mad at me, I get that. You have every right to be. But don’t freeze me out. Yell at me. Call me a bastard again if that’s what you want to do. But don’t ignore me.”

“I’m not mad at you.”

“Oh, yeah?” He lifted a brow. “Because it sure feels like that from where I’m sitting.”

“You’re not sitting. That’s the whole point.”

They hit more turbulence on their way up and the plane bounced a little, shimmied. At the same time, the pilot came over the intercom reminding them to stay seated with their seat belts fastened until they reached cruising altitude.

“Do you hear that?” Isa demanded. “You need to sit down!”

He moved closer, bending over so that he rested a hand on the armrests on either side of her and his face was in hers. “You need to talk to me.”

“Damn it, Marc.” She reached out a hand, splayed it over his chest, as if she planned to push him into a seat if she had to. But the moment she touched him, heat shot through him. Covering her hand with his own, he tried to ignore the fact that he’d gotten hard from just the warmth of her hand on his chest.

It might have been harder to ignore if Isa’s breath hadn’t hitched in her own chest—and if her pupils hadn’t been completely blown out. Add to that the fact that her skin was flushed. Her hand trembled where it rested against his heart, and it didn’t take a genius to figure out that she was as turned on by the contact as he was.

“Isa.” Her name was ripped from him as he threaded his fingers through hers. “Talk to me.”

She turned her head away, looked out the window at the blue sky where they were breaking through the clouds. It was late, nearly ten o’clock at night, but here, near the Arctic Circle, it was as bright as if it was the middle of the day.

She contemplated the sky for long seconds and though he wanted to push for an answer, wanted to push her in general, he waited for her to find the words she needed. It had always been like this when they fought—him shoving at her verbally and her responding by pulling into herself until she had the perfect argument figured out in her mind.

This time, it didn’t seem to work, though, because when she spoke it was in little more than a whisper. “I don’t want to do this.”

“Don’t want to do what? Talk to me?” He should probably move back, but he moved closer instead, until his face was only inches from her. “I thought we were getting somewhere yesterday, thought we could be—”

“What? Friends? After everything that’s happened between us, you thought you’d just apologize and then we could be friends?”

The virulence in her voice had him rearing back. Maybe he’d read her wrong—maybe the signs he’d taken for arousal had really been nothing more than anger. That didn’t make sense, though. Not when she gasped at his touch. And not when she responded so beautifully when they were in bed together.

“Friends might be a stretch,” he admitted after several long seconds passed in silence. “But I thought, maybe—”

The pilot chose that moment to interrupt, announcing that they had reached their cruising altitude and that they were now free to move to the more comfortable sofas at the back of the plane.

Isa sprang out of her chair like a jack-in-the-box, nearly knocking into him in her haste to get away.