Page 144 of Wicked Proposal
Eli’s face lights up. His mouth falls open into the biggest grin I’ve ever seen, gap-toothed and filled with joy.
Happy.
And I realize I could never let anything get in the way of that.
Not even the doubts gnawing at my heart.
“Mommy! Can we bring Garfield, too?”
We’ve been packing for five minutes, and already, Eli’s suitcase is filled with more toys than essentials.
“You can pickoneplushie,” I tell him. “We’re going away for the weekend, not the rest of our lives.”
Though it’d probably be the smarter thing to do.
Eli’s face falls. “Just one?”
“I think we can make that three,” Yulian chimes in from the doorway. “We’ll be flying on my jet. No need to pack small. That is, if your mom’s okay with it.”
“Please?” Eli puts on his best puppy eyes.
I roll mine and give a resigned smile. “Fine. But only because Yulian’s got his personal sky cab. Soon as we’re back to flying coach, Garfield guards the door here.”
“Thanks, Mommy!”
He didn’t listen to a word I said after “fine,” but the happiness in his voice still fills my heart to the brim.
“Thank Yulian,” I say. “He’s the one who invited us.”
“Thanks, Yulian!”
As Eli goes back to the hard task of picking three toys for the road instead of three hundred, I slump against the doorway and exhale. Finally, the day’s exhaustion has caught up with me. If walls were pillows, I’d be snoring already.
“Last chance to back out,” I whisper. “Once he’s picked his travel buddies, he’ll be unstoppable.”
“I’m a man of my word,” Yulian drawls back. “And you look like you could use a getaway.” His hand touches my cheek, resting just below my eye. “When’s the last time you had a full night’s rest?”
I try to ignore the way my heart quickens. The way heat blooms in the wake of Yulian’s touch, lighting me up from the inside.
“I don’t know,” I answer honestly.
Ever since what happened the night of the StarTech investor gala—with Brad, with Eli, with Yulian—thoughts have been crowding my mind like moths dancing around a bonfire, refusing to step back from the flame. Whenever I try to close my eyes, it’s never darkness that greets me on the other side. Just smoke from a window, cigarettes sizzling on flesh, and that almost-kiss in the kitchen. The kiss that could’ve changed everything.
The kiss I didn’t let happen.
“You can catch some rest on the jet,” Yulian murmurs. “I’ll make sure Maksim flies it in circles for a while before landing.”
“And doom the environment in the process?” I tease.
“I’ll buy some carbon offset to atone for our emissions sins.” His voice drops low, his face draws closer. Not quite enough to kiss, but enough to let me yearn for it. For everything this could be. “I assume that was the last of your excuses?”
“You’re right,” I whisper. My gaze keeps flitting from his ash gray eyes to his flame-licked lips. Summer’s heat has long faded, and yet, I’ve never felt more like bursting into flames. “Joke’s on me.”
Eli’s in his room. We’re alone in the hallway. We could close the distance right now, steal this moment, make it ours.
We almost do.
And then the doorbell rings.
