Page 25 of The Plus One Contract

Nathan’s hand. Nathan’s fingers. Nathan’s touch.

I go still. My breath stalls somewhere in my lungs, heart hammering with an intensity that has nothing to do with flying. I’m staring straight ahead, trying to remember how to be a functioning human.

“What are you doing?” I rasp.

“Stopping you from kicking through the floor,” he says calmly.

“I wasn’t—” My protest dies off as his fingers tighten ever so slightly. It's not possessive, exactly, but it's firm enough to scatter my thoughts, strong enough to remind me of the way he held my hips last night, guiding me into absolute oblivion.

Heat flares through me, unbidden and entirely inconvenient.

I should be focusing on how my ex is the best man in my brother’s wedding or how I’ve promised everyone that I’ve moved on with a mythical boyfriend I don’t have. Instead, the second Nathan’s hand slides higher, my brain fries like an old circuit board.

This is the last thing I need. Yet I can’t pull away.

The plane hits turbulence, a little jerk that rattles through the cabin, and his hand slides upward. Just an inch. Barely enough to notice. But God, do I notice.

I bite my lip, breathing shallow, heart racing.

“You good?” he asks softly, his thumb stroking a slow, maddeningly lazy circle against my leggings.

“I’m great,” I manage, voice strangled.

He laughs, the bastard.

“Good,” he says, his voice a silky rumble, all easy charm, “because you look a little tense.”

My eyes snap toward him, a retort on my lips, but the sight of his profile silences me. His jaw is tight, eyes trained forward, his lips pressed into a neutral line. It’s only the pulse jumping in his throat that gives him away.

Oh.

He’s not unaffected.

He’s just better at pretending.

Determined to regain some power, I force my breathing to steady, deliberately ignoring the brush of his hand. If he thinks he can throw me off balance again, he’s wrong. I’m stronger than this. I’m better than this.

The plane jerks again, and his fingers slide higher, dangerously close to indecent. All rational thought promptly evaporates.

His voice is almost soothing when he says, “Relax, Sienna.”

But his hand is not soothing.

His hand is dangerous.

I whip my head toward him, but he only arches a brow, daring me to challenge him.

When I’m certain he’s going to keep pushing, certain he’s going to test every boundary I have left, he removes his hand, sliding it back onto his lap as though nothing happened.

What. The actual. Fuck?

I blink, my chest heaving as my sanity returns in staggered pieces. Nathan calmly reclines in his seat, tipping his head back, eyes closed, the picture of total relaxation.

Meanwhile, my body is a traitorous mess, aching in ways that are entirely inappropriate at thirty-thousand feet.

“Better now?” he asks, eyes still closed, mouth curved faintly.

I don’t answer.

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