He plopped her in the passenger seat of his truck and reached to fasten her seat belt. She swatted his hands away.
“I can get my own damn belt,” she grumbled.
Good. She was just as irritated as he was. This would make for an explosive chat. Maybe they could keep their clothes on this time.
As he drove to the airport, Livie remained silent, but her anger radiated off her in waves. So he started whistling.
“Why are you doing this?”
Jax shrugged as he turned onto the road leading up to the airport. “I enjoy the tune, plus—”
“Why are you doing this?” she repeated. “Why are you taking me anywhere? We talked earlier.”
“We had sex on my desk and you walked out,” he reminded her. “I still have plenty to say and you’re going to listen.”
“I don’t want to.”
Too damn bad. This relationship, crazy and screwed up as it was, needed to be dealt with. Not her storming out and him slamming doors.
He parked right next to the hangar and killed the engine. Shifting in his seat, he rested his arm on the steering wheel and stared at he
r profile. She continued to stare straight ahead as if she had no clue why she was here.
“What are you thinking right now?” he asked.
Livie blinked, but didn’t even look his way. “You don’t want to know.”
Probably not, but call him a glutton.
“Then I’ll tell you what I think.” He reached out, sliding his finger beneath her chin to turn her gaze toward his. “I think you’re looking for a reason to leave, you’re looking for that out you so desperately want so you don’t have to form any type of emotional commitment.”
Her mouth dropped open, then snapped shut. “If you brought me here to analyze me, you wasted your time. I’m not looking for anything other than moving my career forward.”
Ah, yes. That damn career that she was married to.
He stared another second before he jerked on his door handle and hopped out. The sun stretched across the horizon, showing off brilliant shades of orange and yellow. The perfect evening.
Being a parent, Jax had learned early on that actions spoke louder than words. He rounded the hood and opened Livie’s door. She unfastened her seat belt and started to get out.
As soon as he reached for her, she shot him a glare. “Don’t even think about throwing me over your shoulder again.”
“No problem.” He shoved one hand behind her back and another beneath her knees and lifted her out. “Shut the door, would ya?”
She did as he asked, but let out the most unladylike growl in the process. He headed to the hangar and eased her down beside him, keeping an arm firmly around her waist.
“I’m not flying with you.”
He pulled the keys from his pocket and shoved one into the padlock. “Of course you are. It’s the only place I can guarantee you’ll listen. We’ll keep our clothes on, and you won’t storm out.”
As soon as he had the door unlocked, he pulled it open and lifted her back into his arms. Damn it. This felt too right. Could she seriously keep denying this? Was she going to insist that what they had was nothing more than a heated affair? Because he knew there was much more and if she were honest with herself, so did she.
Even though he’d done a preflight check before he left, Jax still sat Livie in a chair and went about going through the routine again. Safety always trumped rush, especially when it came to flying.
By the time he was done with the check, had pulled the plane from the hangar, and went around it once more, he still had no clue what he was going to say to her.
Jax assisted her, carefully and a bit awkwardly, into the passenger seat of the plane. She seemed to still be just as angry. “It’s good that you’re quiet,” he told her as he put his headphones on. “Makes it easier for me to get everything out.”
There were two ways he could approach her and he honestly didn’t know which one would be the most effective. Livie was all business, all the time. Perhaps that’s the side he needed to appeal to. But, on the other hand, they were so much more than legal documents. They’d been intimate, just this morning in fact, and they knew each other’s hopes for the future.