Priceless

I wanted her too badly, and my head was reeling at the possibilities.

Was she the woman I believed didn’t exist? She was here in front of me, in my arms, my tongue in her mouth. She felt real even if my head was totally fucked up with the thoughts and ideas spinning around inside it.

She tasted like berries and rum and mint, and lush, soft female. Gabrielle Hargreave had transformed from the stiff beauty who’d just told me a few minutes ago she was ashamed of what she’d done before, into the gentle creature who now let me lead her, soft and submissive, exactly where I wanted to take her.

My bed. Her underneath me.

But there was no privacy here with so many guests everywhere poking their noses into what everyone else was doing. No, this place wouldn’t work for what I wanted to do with her.

The taste of her tongue tangling with mine hit me hard in the balls and made the decision for me. The idea came all in a perfect epiphany as I heard the soft laps of Lake Leticia slapping against Nelly’s floats.

I knew exactly where we were going.

TEN

“IVAN, are you sure about this?” I asked as he buckled my life vest and then did the same with the seat straps.

“Oh I’m very sure about taking you for a ride in my plane.” He leaned close and kissed me expertly, leaving me breathless again. He pulled on the straps to check them and said, “Safety first, Miss Hargreave, but you’re going to love this, trust me.”

I still wasn’t completely sure what had just happened with him. One minute he was reminding me how well he could use his lips on me, and the next he was pulling me toward his plane and asking if he could take me up for a ride.

He said, “Trust me.”

Could I trust Ivan Everley? Should I trust him?

He’d looked so serious when he asked the question, holding my face in his hands and waiting for my answer. I think I would have devastated him if I’d told him no. I thought about it. I should have told him no. I think the four, or was it five, berry mojitos might have had something to do with my acquiescence, but he looked so happy when I agreed to go.

One of my many flaws is that I am a risk-taker at heart.

I’ll try anything once.

So, when Ivan suggested we take a night flight in his Cessna floatplane, takeoff from the water, and look at the city lights of England under a summer full moon, I said, “why not” and let him put me in his plane. Again, the mojitos helped me come to my decision to go with him.

“You were totally right, the city lights are so incredibly pretty from up here.” I peered out the window thoroughly enjoying the view from the air.

“Your lack of fear impresses the hell out of me, Miss Hargreave.”

“Why do you call me that all the time? It’s so formal.” The alcohol had loosened my inhibitions and all kinds of questions started pouring out of me, but he didn’t seem to mind answering. So, I kept asking.

“I like formalities…sometimes…as you’ll learn,” he said deliberately.

“Because you’re a lord?”

He gave me a snort. “No, that’s not why.”

“Who taught you to fly a plane?”

“My uncle arranged for me to go to flight school when I was at university. He thought it was appropriate for his heir to know such things. It was something I really took to heart. I loved flying from my first lesson.”

“Why did you love it?”

He shrugged. “The freedom I suppose. Troubles seem less important from up here. At least it’s always felt that way to me.”

“Are we flying over the ocean right now?” I couldn’t see any more city lights and it made sense.

“That is the Irish Sea below us.”

“Do you ever land this in the ocean?”