“Yes. From food or glue or snot…I don’t know. They’re just…” I shivered again. And then I shut my mouth. What kind of twenty-eight-year-old woman had an aversion to small children? But I had never spent any time around them when I was growing up, and I simply wasn’t used to them.
Still, I had to have sounded like a lunatic.
Tyson didn’t seem to mind. He leaned closer. His knee brushed against mine, and I had to fight not to jerk away from him. “They’re just what?”
“Scary,” I hissed back, more loudly than I intended.
Tyson threw his head back and laughed. It sounded like magic.
I wanted to crawl into a hole and die.
“What other fears do you still have, Blue?”
I cleared my throat. No way was I admitting all my fears to him. No way. No how. I gave him enough and he was not going to take anything from me all over again.
“Just one. You share one of yours and I’ll share one of mine.”
I suddenly wanted to know every single thing about Tyson that I never knew before.
I grinned. I couldn’t help it.
“Will you tell me the truth?” I asked, and watched something dark flash in his eyes before it disappeared.
“Absolutely.” His fingers clasped together and then his index fingers came together, making a point at the top. His chin rested on them for a second. “Snakes. I hate snakes.”
I scoffed. “That doesn’t count! Everyone hates snakes.”
He shrugged. “There’s my one. Your turn.”
His knee nudged mine and I sighed. I gave in so easily. I had always been weak around him.
“Fine,” I conceded and then muttered, “Flying.”
I looked down at my clasped hands, but I didn’t look away quickly enough before I saw the concern in his eyes. That sparkle of his evaporated and I felt him lean closer. His nose almost brushed my cheek and his breath skirted across my skin.
“You doing okay now, though?”
A shiver rolled through my body. I couldn’t do this. Couldn’t be here, not with him.
Still, I pressed my lips together and nodded. I had only two more hours on this plane. Taking off was always the worst part anyway, and I’d managed that just fine.
“I’ve missed you, Blue.”
A chill cascaded down my spine, and I jerked back, unprepared for the way he assaulted my senses with his light touches, deep voice, and delicious scent.
I couldn’t do this. Not with him. I couldn’t lose myself in the familiarity of Tyson. Not again.
I wasn’t headed home to rekindle a childhood romance. I was going home to spend time with my mom before she died.
Pulling back, I looked at the seat in front of me. My body shifted away from him, and I felt him tense next to me.
“Not going to talk about it?” he asked, and I frowned.
“Talk about what?”
Taking my chances at getting lost in all that sexiness, I slowly turned my head and faced him.
Leaning closer, Tyson said, “Come on, Blue. I’m still freaking out that you’re here next to me. Ten years and you just fall into my lap…I had no idea where you went, and now we’ve got two more hours on a plane together, and we can’t talk about what happened?”
“No.” My shoulders tightened. I bristled at Tyson’s shocked expression and turned back to stare at the seat in front of me.
“You’re serious? Do you have any idea I looked for you? How long I went and pounded on your family’s door so I could see you? And you just left and gave me nothing? And now…still nothing?”
I felt his anger increase with every word and I closed my eyes, inhaling a slow breath.
Through my shock at seeing him again, seeing how handsome he’d become, I had forgotten who he was…what he did to me—but I shouldn’t have.
Everything about the past snapped into my mind like a rubber band. The night my father tossed a file folder onto my bed and forced me to look at photos of the two of us together. And then he proceeded to explain to me how Simon Blackwell, Tyson’s father and a detective for the Detroit PD, had spent the previous four years investigating my father and his business dealings. When he continued to come up short with evidence, he grew desperate, threw a Hail Mary pass, and decided to use his own flesh and blood. Simon forced Tyson to date me just so he could gain any nugget of information about my family that he could get.
My father had proof of Tyson’s betrayal, wrapped up in pretty glossy photos.
That night, as a punishment for dating some boy behind my father’s back, sneaking off and lying for the previous year, and apparently putting my family and my father’s entire organization at risk, I was put on a plane and shipped to Colorado.
“Stop, Tyson.”
His hand covered mine and his fingers wrapped around my wrist. Tugging on it, he forced me to face him. “Tell me what happened. Where you went. And how you could do that to me.”
Tears burned my eyes and I quickly looked away. All the instant comfort evaporated along with the oxygen levels. “Stop this.”
“Not until you start talking.”
Overwhelmed with emotion, I glared at him, “Did you ever like me at all?” I watched the blood drain from his face.
“What the hell?”
Blood rushed to my ears and funneled my long-forgotten anger. “I loved you, and you used me. For all of it.”
His head snapped back like I had slapped him.
I felt like I had been punched in the gut. I hadn’t thought about this in years and it was too much.
Before he could respond, I pulled my hand out of his grasp, unbuckled my seatbelt, and stood up. Then I headed toward the restroom, balancing myself on the backs of the seats while I fumbled along, my breath increasing all over again.
Whoever invented planes was an asshole.
Once I was done washing my hands, I hesitated before leaving the restroom. I couldn’t sit next to him. Not anymore. If I hadn’t taken the time to fully appreciate how much Tyson had changed before, I could certainly do it when I closed my eyes. He was so much…more…than the kid I used to think I was in love with. Stronger. Darker. Sexier.
Tyson had only improved over the last ten years, and while I fixed my straying hair and saw my ruined mascara in the mirror, I felt like time had done the complete opposite to me. While living in Colorado and working on Aunt Eleanor’s farm had been fun, I now had pale age spots appearing just beneath my eyes from too much time in the sun and not enough sun protection. The same spots now speckled the backs of my hands. The hard work made calluses grow on previously spotless and regularly manicured hands and fingers. On the farm, and out in the country, manicures were pointless, and years ago I’d begun chewing my fingernails instead of trying to find a pair of clippers in one of Eleanor’s numerous junk drawers.
I was no longer the same girl he had known. I was harder, stronger too, physically, but I had only opened my heart to one man and I never wanted to risk that again.
I certainly didn’t want to do it then, either. Not with Tyson.
With a long exhale, I forced myself to open the lavatory door and head back down the aisle.
As soon as I got back to our row, I noticed the aisle seat was still open. Next to me, the snot-nosed kid kicked out his leg, almost hitting me in the shin. Tyson arched an eyebrow and gestured toward the seat. Whatever shock he had displayed earlier was gone behind a hard mask, daring me to sit next to him.
I didn’t take it.
“Excuse me,” I said to woman whose seat I had hijacked earlier. “You can have your seat back now if you’d like.”
She smiled wide, fluffed her hair, and I didn’t look at Tyson when I heard him laugh again.
I would take snot-nosed kids any day of the week over Tyson Blackwell.
They were much less terrifying.
Chapter 2
All my limbs trembled as I stood at the baggage claim. I could feel him staring at me. I should have been used to it. Those blue eyes had been on me for the last two hours, never once looking away from me.
At one point I was certain he was going to jump out of his seat, throw the kid into his vacated one, and sit next to me.
It didn’t happen. I hated that a small part of me was disappointed.
“Which luggage is yours?”
I jumped at his voice behind me and kept my eyes on the carousel. “I’ve got it.”
“Yeah, I know. Gabriella Galecki…you’ve always got everything under control, don’t you?”
Not when he was touching me, like he was doing then. His arm wrapped around my waist and he pulled me toward his chest. My back to his front…I closed my eyes and imagined the way it used to be. When I was still naïve and young and thought he hung the moon.
Those days were fantastic, but I couldn’t get lost in them again.
I struggled to break free from his hold when he did the dumbest thing. His lips pressed against the side of my neck. It shot a spark of fire straight inside of me, hitting the best places, and I froze.
“What are you doing?” I asked, hating the breathlessness in my voice. Darn him! Ugh!
“Just wondering if that was where your button still is.”
He stepped back, let go of my waist, and I steadied myself before I fell forward.
“What are you talking about?” I glared at him over my shoulder. Big mistake. Huge. He was too damn sexy for his own good.
God must hate me.
He smirked and pointed to the spot on my neck, right above my collarbone where his lips just brushed. “Your ‘on’ button…the one that made you go all wild for me.”