Chapter 3 #2
I’m completely captivated and mesmerized by everything about her, including her glances, which seem filled with a pure, unfiltered energy, sparking a living desire within me. She’s like pure seduction in motion and she’s barely moving.
Hell, where has she been hiding?
“Are you doing anything special to celebrate your thirtieth?” I ask, trying hard to concentrate, which is difficult when she’s staring at me with those pool-deep black eyes that seem to hold a thousand secrets.
“My dad is throwing me a party.” She grimaces, then rolls her eyes skyward.
“You don’t look so happy about that.”
“He’s only doing it out of guilt.”
“Guilt?” I ask, puzzling over her meaning.
“For cheating on my mom and leaving us.”
If her mom looks just like Mina, then her father is a fool.
“Yeesh. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t worry. He’s an idiot—a loving one, but still an idiot.”
Mid-conversation, Karen reappears with the trolley, offering light refreshments and a snack, which Mina and I both happily accept.
I think Karen finally gets the message I’m not interested in her when I turn my attention straight back to Mina: the woman I didn’t know existed until now.
She’s the only woman I want to spend every single minute getting to know.
Time passes, slowly, endlessly, and much too quickly simultaneously as Mina and I talk easily, as if we’ve always known one another, the passengers blurring around us as we get caught up in one another.
Before we know it, the seat belt sign is back on, and we’re preparing to land, the airplane becoming a hive of activity as everyone readies themselves for the descent.
“Tell me what you need.” I lean over the armrest that divides us. “You won’t have to do this by yourself.” Having told me she hates landing even more than takeoff, I want to be here for her.
“Do what you did when we were taking off.” Mina sits back in her seat, fear overcoming her, and those manicured fingers of hers are back to torturing the ends of the armrest. “Talk me down with the counting thing.” She swallows, her breathing becoming shallow as the low, steady hum of the engines changes pitch and grows higher, whining as the engines throttle down and the airspeed changes.
A mix of mechanical and aerodynamic noises merge into one, and I lean even closer to Mina and cup my hand around her neck, and in exactly the same way I did before, I rest her forehead against mine.
“Close your eyes and follow my voice.”
“I hate landing,” she whimpers.
“Shhh.” I hush her. “Just listen to me, Mina. And please breathe.” If she holds her breath for too long, she’ll pass out.
Her sweet breath puffs across the skin of my cheeks as she inhales and exhales, once and then twice.
“Starting at five, tell me five things I told you today.”
She thinks for a bit, her brows hunkering together in the middle before she says, “You hate dating like me, you don’t fuck in bathrooms, you don’t call girls who give you their number, your dad’s in a care home, and you are the youngest of your brothers.”
I love that she was paying attention and interested in the things we talked about.
“Now tell me four other things.” The noises grow louder as the air whooshes over the wings.
“Your ex was a bitch. She made you doubt yourself and I hate that for you. You’re still angry at her, but I think you’d like to move on.”
Fuck, she really was listening to me. All the other girls I’ve been on dates with are never that attentive.
“Okay, that’s three, and the fourth thing?”
“You’re a really great guy, and I don’t think anyone has reminded you of that lately. Anyone who made you doubt that doesn’t deserve you.”
Well, shit. I don’t need anyone to validate me, but hearing her say those words makes me feel like I could climb Mount Kilimanjaro without any training.
I like how she makes me feel. A lot.
And doubt? That’s my ex’s problem, not mine. I know my worth.
The airplane continues to shake and shift as we descend, my ears popping from the drop, but I ignore it.
“Tell me three things you told me today.” A mechanical whir and click sounds beneath us, the engines whooshing as the landing gear deploys, and the aircraft prepares to land.
She draws in a breath, preparing and centering herself.
“My mom’s Moroccan, my dad is an idiot, but he loves me, and he’s throwing me a party soon because he feels guilty for cheating on my mom.
I told you a lot of stuff.” She giggles nervously, and there’s a slight lift in her voice, like she can’t believe she shared so much about herself in such a short space of time.
“Oh, I hate that compression feeling on my chest.” She whines, genuinely scared, and breathes much heavier than she was during takeoff.
When she said she hated the feel of the backward push on landing, she wasn’t wrong.
Beads of sweat have appeared across her brow and upper lip and she’s so tense right now she’s coiled like a spring, ready to snap.
“You’re doing so well. Just focus on me.
” I side-eye the view out the window. The airport terminal is now firmly in my sight as we are about to hit the ground, and I distract her by asking, “What two other things did you find out about me today, Mina?” I continue what I did on takeoff, rubbing my fingertips, laced into her shiny dark locks, up and down, over and over.
Her neck is hotter than a furnace, her adrenaline flushing her skin, her body ignited with fear.
She blurts, “You’re thirty-two, and you really didn’t like the flight attendant who looked after us today.”
Unable to contain it, I laugh out loud as she catches me off guard just as the wheels of the aircraft hit the ground, making us land with a thump, the sudden jolt causing our bodies to push downward, and she lets out a small yelp, which is cute but also makes me want to throw my arms around her to protect her and make her feel better.
But I think that might be a step too far.
The tires screech, and the vibration beneath us rumbles as we cross the asphalt, the gradual crescendo of roars and whooshes tapering off now as the airplane slows and taxis up the runway, the brakes doing everything they can to slow us right down.
Mina throws me for a loop when she says, “Tell me one thing you learned about me.”
I know so much about her. Where the hell do I start?
Maybe I should mention that even though she’s scared shitless of flying, she faced her fear and is so brave.
Or that she’s a software designer, so fucking smart, which makes me want to climb inside her beautiful brain and have a poke around so some of it rubs off on me.
Or should I mention that she has Moroccan DNA in her blood?
Fuck it, I go left-field and say, “Today I learned that a phenomenal woman called Mina, someone I didn’t know until she sat down beside me, is the most beautiful and captivating woman I’ve ever met.”
That makes her snap her eyes open, her cheeks pinkening, and she stares, and blinks, then blinks again before she summons the courage to speak up. “You don’t mean that.”
I lean back and confidently reply, “I mean every word.” Lying is for losers; that’s not my jam or in my DNA. My job is always about telling and seeking the truth and I will die on that hill.
For what feels like an eternity, time passes as the aircraft finally comes to a standstill, then passengers begin unlocking their seat belts, the metal clanging all around, and still, neither of us moves.
“You’re still touching me,” she observes.
“I can’t seem to stop. I’m sorry.”
“I like it.”
“You do?”
“Yeah.” She bobs her head slowly. “But I need to get off the thing. I hate airplanes.” She tucks her lips into her mouth to hide her embarrassment.
At least she’s stopped burning up.
“You’re safely on terra firma now,” I point out reassuringly.
“Thank you for helping me. I couldn’t have done that without you.”
“I recommend that you don’t go for any more job interviews in LA.” I don’t want her to leave San Francisco, not now that I’ve only just met her.
“I have an interview next week with a company in Silicon Valley.”
Thank fuck for that.
My hand slips naturally from around the back of her neck, and there’s no awkwardness between us, not even a smidge, as I cradle her face in my hand. “I’m going to call you tonight and ask you out on a date.”
“Okay.”
“I would ask you now, but I want to give you time to think about it.”
“I don’t need time.”
“Well, I’m giving it to you anyway. You might think I’m a creep after we get off the flight.”
Her voice is full of humor when she whispers a reply. “I won’t. Not even if you sent me a dick pic.” She shifts her attention around the cramped cabin to make sure no one nearby heard her.
I scoff at her unexpected humor, which she seems to have an uncanny knack for breaking into during her serious episodes.
She almost fell off a cliff into a sea of anxiety, and yet I managed to talk her down and keep her calm. I think that’s the only reason she’s able to joke with me. Well, that’s my story, and I’m sticking to it.
“I like you,” I tell her.
“I like you too, Cole.”
I love the way she elongated the O in my name, emphasizing the syllable, slowly drawing it out so it sounds velvety.
“But I won’t send you a dick pic.” Was she fucking with me when she mentioned that?
She lifts one shoulder to her ear and says, “That’s a shame.” Her wide smile has my heart stuttering in my chest, and then I know she’s toying with me for sure.
Fuck, she is beautiful.
“I’m kidding, by the way,” she adds cheekily. Without warning, she wraps her soft hand around my wrist and does the most surprising thing: she turns her head and kisses my wrist of the hand that’s still holding her face. “Thank you.”
My pulse takes on a life of its own, and I already know she’s got me hooked.
Yep… I’m screwed. Totally, utterly, hopelessly screwed.