“If you say so.” I studied him for a second, my eyes moving from one of his to the other. “There’s something you’re not telling me.”
“It’s nothing.” He waved a hand in the air. “Just something I wanted to talk to you about earlier, but your brother takes precedence over everything else. Let’s get there and make sure he’s okay. Then we can talk.”
I groaned. “We need to talk again?”
“It’s not that talk.” He shook his head at me. “Don’t you trust me by now? Compared to what’s happening with your family, I promise you it’s nothing. It can wait.”
“Okay,” I said hesitantly, but then I remembered that I’d made a vow to myself the night of the dinner to place some well-deserved trust in him.
My teeth sank into the side of my cheek, but I nodded. “Promise me we’ll talk about it tomorrow once we get there?”
“I promise.” He took my chin between his strong fingers and gave me a chaste but lingering kiss. “I’m glad your brother is okay. That’s the only thing that matters now.”
“Yeah.” I sighed, worry nagging at the edges of my brain. “It’s funny. Kyle’s always been so protective of me that he’s never let me be worried about him before.”
“I get it, but I bet he’ll be happy to hear you’re on your way to see him.”
I arched a brow. “Clearly, you don’t know my brother. What do you want to bet that he’s going to tell me I came all the way back for nothing?”
He chuckled, the corners of his eyes crinkling as they clouded over with a memory. “Didn’t we say it’s pointless betting against the person whose brother it is?”
“I still took that bet,” I reminded him. “I had to sit through dinner with Aldo.”
“True, but you loved it.”
I rolled my eyes toward the plastic covering the interior of the fancy jet. “Right. I loved it all the way until he told me your mom would hate me.”
“She doesn’t hate you,” he protested, looking like he was about to add something else.
When he kept his mouth shut instead, I gave him a pointed look. “She hates me, and you know it, but let’s not argue about it now. Did you call her like you said you were going to?”
“Yep.” He didn’t elaborate, and I didn’t ask because I didn’t have the capacity to deal with any more drama today. If he didn’t tell me what she had said, it couldn’t have been good. Marco seemed to have come to the same conclusion. “Why don’t you get some rest? It’s been a long day. The seats recline fully, and I can get you a blanket.”
“We’ll talk after we’ve seen my brother?”
He nodded, raising a hand to tuck a stray lock of hair behind my ear. “You have my word, don’t you?”
“I’m keeping you to it.”
“I expect nothing less.” He wiggled beneath me. “But I need to get up to get that blanket. It’s in the overhead compartment.”
Dutifully standing up, I stretched out before getting back in my own seat. True to what he had said, when I pushed a button on the console, the chair turned into a comfy mattress. There was a thin crease where the separate cushions came together, but I hardly felt it.
Marco arranged an impossibly soft blanket over me. “Sleep well.”
After the events of the day, I’d doubted whether I’d be able to get any sleep. When I closed my eyes, though, I drifted off almost immediately.
I woke up to Marco’s face hovering an inch above my own, his hand gently prodding my shoulder. “We’re about to land. There’s time to have something to eat, but then you need to get your seatbelt on.”
Nodding sleepily, I frowned when I raised the covering in front of the window and found the sky painted in streaks of pink and orange. “What time is it?”
“In our time zone, it’s just after five in the morning.”
Groaning, I rubbed my eyes. “Right, and we’re nine hours ahead of Oregon.”
“Which means it’s around eight here. The sun’s setting on our yesterday. Traveling can be such a mind fuck.”
“You’ve got that right,” I grumbled. “Have you got any coffee on this thing?”
“I’m glad you asked.” He grinned, moving his hands up to hold a mug with steam still rising from the surface out to me. “There you go. It’s strong. I thought you might want it that way.”
“Definitely.” As I wrapped my fingers delicately around the handle to avoid getting burned, Marco went back to his seat. He had his laptop open and a file balanced beside it. “Didn’t you sleep?”
“Some.” He gestured to his own mug. “But I’ve never been able to sleep for too long while moving. I figured I’d better get a head start on the day while I was awake.”
“Good thinking.” I pushed the button to straighten up the seat. “Anything I can do?”
“Yep. Have your coffee, take a shower if you want, and then eat something. By the time you’re done, we’ll be landing.”
“No work?” I frowned. “Are you sure?”
“Positive, but you’d better get going if you want to squeeze in a shower.” As the grogginess faded away, I realized Marco’s hair was damp and his clothes were immaculate.
“You’ve already done all that?”
He nodded, smirking as he jerked his head toward the back of the plane. “I have. Go on. The bathroom is back there. Towels are in the cabinet beside the sink, and there are toiletries in there. If you need anything, just let me know.”
“You rich people are weird,” I muttered as I took my first sip of coffee. “Who keeps toiletries on a plane?”
“Literally every plane. Even commercial airliners provide the soaps, toothbrushes, and all that.”
Another groan came out
