Page 32 of Angel In Armani

“Do you have someone who can mind him?”

“Yes?” Her parents wouldn’t mind having him a few nights a week. If it was only for a few months. But she didn’t have someone who would mind her. Overnight trips with Lucas Angelo. Hotel rooms that were near hotel rooms that Lucas Angelo might be occupying. Her heart started pounding again. She and Lucas and hotel rooms were a dangerous combination.

“So the dog isn’t a problem then. So what do you say? I have to be in Orlando tomorrow night, so I need a pilot.”

Were his eyes suddenly a more vivid blue? She wondered if he was thinking about hotel rooms as well. Then told herself not to be stupid. After all, the last time they’d shared a room, she’d snuck out before dawn and stranded him.

Yet here he is, another part of her brain pointed out. Come back to find you. To hire you again.

He wants you. He said so.

As a pilot.

But looking into those very blue eyes, she wasn’t at all sure that was all it was.

She really should say no. It was the sane option. Not financially but from a Sara-doesn’t-get-her-heart-stomped-on-by-the-rich-guy perspective, it was definitely the sane option.

“Do you care if I don’t know anything about baseball?”

Lucas tugged at his tie, looking amused. “Define don’t know anything?”

She could lie to him or she could tell the truth. The truth seemed easier. If any of them was going to be offended that she didn’t find hitting a ball around a field fascinating then there was really no point taking the job. “Never been to a professional game. Avoided as many high school games as I could. Couldn’t tell a Yankee from a Met.”

“Really?”

“Yup. Sorry. Never paid much attention to it.”

“You grew up on Staten Island and you’re not a Saints fan?”

“My dad likes football. And baseball season is more a summer thing. I spent my summers flying.”

He shook his head. “Weird. But no, that doesn’t matter. I’m hiring a pilot, not a fan.”

Well, there went another potential reason to say no. She looked back down at the paper. Looked at the figure one last time. Thought about her dad and bills and what it might do to him if Charles Air went under.

“If I need help with the insurance company, will the Saints do that?”

“Sure.”

The response was so fast she knew he meant it. Damn. She folded the paper up and slipped it back into the envelope. Then she looked back at Lucas and knew that she was about to throw sanity to the wind. “Yes,” she said. “I’ll take the job.”

Chapter Eight

It was just the unfamiliar helo. That was the reason for her nerves, Sara told herself as she went over her preflight while she waited for Lucas to arrive the next afternoon. She’d spent an hour or so flying the helicopter with the pilot who’d delivered it to the airfield earlier and then she’d flown it the short hop to Deacon Field—home of the Saints—without him. It had felt good.

It wasn’t an A-Star but she’d gotten the hang of it easily enough. What she hadn’t gotten the hang of was the fact that she was now working for the Saints. Working for Lucas. And his partners, though she hadn’t yet met Alex or Mal. She’d met Gardner Rothman, apparently Alex Winters’s right-hand man, first thing in the morning at Deacon, and he’d walked her through the contract.

And then informed her that the helicopter would be arriving that afternoon and Lucas was going back to Florida that evening. Aka, she was going to Florida that evening. Where another helicopter would be waiting for them so she could fly him to Vero Beach.

She’d spent a frantic half hour at her apartment packing and then spent the rest of the time cramming a flight plan for the Florida leg and familiarizing herself with the new helo.

So it was perfectly normal that she had more than the usual level of pre-takeoff anticipation zinging through her veins.

Nothing to do with Lucas Angelo at all. No sirree. Not one little bit.

It sounded good in theory. Pity she didn’t believe it in the slightest.

Lucas was going to be in her helicopter. Close to her. Sitting there all big and gorgeous and—no, she had to shut down that thinking. There was no room for big and gorgeous. She’d screwed things up enough already getting tangled up in Lucas Angelo; now it was time to woman up and treat him like the customer—no, employer—he was.

---