Chapter 13
~Riley~
“Fancy meeting you here. Is this seat taken?”
Hudson drops into the seat next to me on the plane with his usual easygoing grin. I’m already in the window seat and there are only two seats in this section. The rest of the skaters from the club who are travelling with us shuffle in behind him, everyone chatting as they find their assigned seats.
I give Hudson an apologetic smile. “Actually, I think Natalie’s sitting here.”
Natalie and her brother Christian are also competing in Finland this weekend, along with me, Hudson, and a few others.
With no direct flights available, we’re flying to Amsterdam and connecting to Helsinki from there.
Someone at the club looks after making all the bookings and I don’t envy them trying to keep it all straight.
“It’s all good,” Hudson assures me as he shoves his backpack under the seat in front of him. “I asked Natalie if she’d switch and she’s fine with it as long as you’re okay with it too.”
It’s sweet that he wants to sit beside me, and honestly, I’ll be more comfortable with him than with Natalie since I barely know her.
There’s just one small problem.
“I’m a nervous flier. You might regret sitting next to me.”
His grin only widens. “Lucky for you, I’m an expert distractor. You won’t even know we’re in the air.”
A giggle bursts out of me, something that seems to happen a lot around him. “For nine hours? You’re that good?”
“You can tell me if you agree after we land.”Before I can reply, a shadow falls across the aisle.
“Hudson,” purrs a honeyed voice.
Blake Stewart is standing there, hip cocked with a glossy smile in place.
Her sleek ponytail doesn’t have a single hair out of place, and her perfectly manicured nails drum lightly on the top of Hudson’s seat.
We haven’t interacted much at the club, since she’s part of Victoria’s gang of hangers-on who have thankfully completely ignored me up to this point, but I remember Lewis’ warning about Blake believing she has ‘dibs’ on Hudson.
True to form, she completely ignores me now too, focusing all her attention on the man at my side.
“I thought we were sitting together,” she says, tilting her head just enough to make it sound like a playful accusation. “I had some fun ideas for some in-flight entertainment.”
Hudson’s throat works like he’s trying not to gag, but his reply is friendly as always. “Hey, Blake. I didn’t know you were next to me, but Natalie wanted to sit closer to her brother, so I swapped with her. No big deal.”
Her pout suggests she disagrees. “Well, in that case, Rachel can go sit with her and I’ll move here with you.”
‘Rachel’ is apparently me, and I’m not naive enough to think she doesn’t know my name. She’s just trying to make me feel unimportant.
Hudson quickly corrects her before I have to. “Actually, Riley and I have some things to talk about, and I’m already settled, so I’ll just stay here. You should probably take your seat.”
Her eyes flick to me, briefly and dismissively, before returning to him. “Well, I guess I’ll forgive you if you make it up to me in Helsinki.” She leans a little closer, her perfume almost hitting me in the face. “Dinner, maybe?”
Hudson’s reply is flat, his tone as lifeless as I’ve ever heard it. “We’ll see how the schedule looks.”
She straightens, giving me another once-over that makes my skin prickle. “I’m sure we’ll make something work. Enjoy your flight.” Her smile is sugary-sweet, but the edge beneath the words is impossible to miss.
Hudson leans back in his seat once she’s gone, shaking his head. “Sorry about that. She’s… uh, persistent.”
“Why don’t you just tell her you’re not interested?” I have to ask.
“I have. I’ve tried letting her down gently, I’ve tried saying it to her straight. She’s convinced that I’ll change my mind, and I don’t know how to make it any clearer that I won’t. But don’t worry about it; it’s my problem, not yours.”
That’s easy for him to say when I’m pretty sure I can still feel Blake’s eyes burning a hole in the back of my head as the last few passengers settle in.
The coaches come through the cabin to make sure everyone is in place before they head to their own seats to get settled.
Most people will be sleeping on the overnight flight, but I can never relax well enough to sleep.
If I’m lucky, I’ll be able to concentrate on a movie or two to help pass the time.
Hudson keeps up a steady stream of conversation as the plane taxis to the runway, speculating about the other people on the plane and their reasons for taking the trip.
“What do you think their story is?” he asks, pointing to a middle-aged couple sitting in the row in front of us, across the aisle.
The woman has headphones and sunglasses on, obviously trying to block the world out, while the man beside her keeps tapping her shoulder to get her attention, showing her something from his phone or pointing to something on the seatback screen in front of him.
“They’re going to Europe to try to rekindle their relationship, but she’s already checked out of it,” I guess in the spirit of the game. “She’s going to wait until they’re back home to break up with him for good.”
“Ouch. That’s dark, Pip,” Hudson teases, placing a hand over his chest like his heart hurts at the thought.
“What can I say? Breakups are on my mind.” That might be true, but I notice that the mention of my failed relationship stings a little less each time I talk about it. “What’s your theory?”
He thinks it over for a moment. “She’s losing her vision but going through an experimental treatment. That’s why she needs the sunglasses. He’s showing her things to test out her sight.”
“How is that less dark than what I said? I’d rather be single than blind!”
We carry on, building ever more outlandish stories until the plane begins to accelerate. I almost forgot we were about to take off, but with the sudden speed, my hands tighten around the armrest, my body bracing for the weightlessness that always temporarily terrifies me.
“What’s the first jump you learned?” Hudson asks, his arm slipping beneath mine to pry my hand from the armrest and grip it in his warm palm instead.
“What?” I’m too focused on simply breathing to fully register what he just asked.
“The first jump you learned when you started skating. What was it?”
I have to think about it for a second. “Waltz jump, I guess.”
It’s the one most kids learn first, a half turn in the air from a forward take-off to a backwards landing. I learned it when I was four and started taking lessons.
He nods encouragingly. “What came next?”
I go through the jumps, reliving my excitement when I mastered each one as the plane aims for the sky, and surprisingly, the distraction really does help.
By the time we level off, I get to the last jump I mastered, the triple Lutz, and my shoulders relax.
The worst of it is over, at least until it’s time to land.
“Thanks for that.”
“Anytime.” He smiles again as he releases my hand, and I feel a small pang of loss when he pulls away. “Now, what movie are we going to watch?”
He literally wants to watch one together, and we choose a comedy that we watch in sync while the flight attendants bring the meals around. By the time the movie ends, the cabin lights have been dimmed and everyone around us has started to settle in for the night.
“Go ahead and sleep if you want to,” I tell him. “I won’t be able to, I never can.”
Hudson considers that for a moment before making me an offer. “Will you try something with me? If it doesn’t work, I’ll go to sleep and leave you alone, I promise.”
He hasn’t given me any reason not to trust him, so I take the single earbud he offers me before he places the other one in his ear.
We both recline our seats as much as possible and close our eyes while we listen to the meditation app on his phone.
His chest rises and falls in a steady rhythm beside me, and I focus on the feel of his thigh pressed against mine rather than the roaring of the plane’s engines.
His presence next to me is solid, comforting, and before I know it, I’m sinking into the stillness with him.
I only realize I fell asleep when the flight attendants come around with breakfast for us.
“What time is it?” I mumble, rubbing at my eyes.
“I have no idea, but we’ll be landing in an hour and a half,” Hudson answers cheerfully. Even in the morning, on limited sleep, he’s still in a good mood. “We’ll have a two-hour layover, and we get to start all over again with the next flight.”
He actually sounds like he’s looking forward to it, and to my great surprise, I’m not dreading it either.
With him, everything seems a little bit easier.