by Lisa Childs
“No, of course not,” the man replied. “We have several planes and several pilots.”
“I have my own plane,” Teo said. “I just need to hire a pilot to fly it.” One who didn’t have a drinking problem.
“Then you should talk to my sister,” Grant said, “although she doesn’t like flying anyone else’s plane but her own. She needs to make sure it’s as meticulously maintained as our fleet is.”
Given what a drunk his pilot had been, Teo had his doubts about every aspect of the man’s work, which had included servicing the plane. “I am not opposed to using one of your planes,” Teo said. In fact, it would probably be for the best. But after putting up with his sister’s games at the gallery opening and with having Savannah ghost him, he needed a sabbatical from women, especially to women he would find too tempting. This female pilot sounded just like the kind of strong, independent woman he lost his head over, like he’d lost his head with Savannah. “I would prefer to not have a female pilot, however.”
Grant snorted. “You better not talk to my sister then. She will kick your sexist ass for saying that.”
Instead of being offended, Teo chuckled at the American’s frankness. As well as sounding American, the man sounded young, too, so his sister was probably young as well. His ego was more than a little bruised from Savannah ghosting him, so Teo didn’t want to deal with another woman he might find too fascinating. Not only had she chosen to enter a predominantly male field, but she also might try to kick his ass.
He’d already just had it kicked. Savannah had knocked him back. He’d never had as enjoyable a night as he’d had with her, and that wasn’t just the sex. He’d enjoyed dinner and dancing, too. And the sex...
Hell, just thinking about it—about her—had him tense and edgy. Apparently he had been the only one who’d enjoyed their date enough to want to repeat it. His ego would not take another beating, so he needed to avoid this man’s sister like he intended to avoid his own for a while.
“I need a flight from Milan to Madrid,” Teo said. He glanced at his watch. “I have an appointment in Madrid at nine o’clock tomorrow morning. I’ll pay twice your going rate for the flight, if I can be guaranteed a sober, male pilot.”
“It’s your money,” Grant said.
“You will meet my conditions?” Teo asked, double-checking as his heart rate quickened at the thought of flying again. Being driven in a car didn’t bother him, but something about flying made him feel out of control. And he hated being out of control.
Perhaps it was a good thing that Savannah had not called him. She’d made him lose control that night, over and over again. Making love with her had been a lot like flying—like hurtling through space with no ability to stop himself from falling.
But he couldn’t fall for a ghost.
“Blair would personally kill any pilot who tried drinking on the job,” Grant assured him.
“Blair? Is that your sister?” Teo asked.
“Yes.”
“She sounds fierce,” Teo mused.
“She is,” Grant said. “A former fighter pilot, one of the first female ones to actually experience combat.”
Teo was impressed, but he couldn’t afford that right now. He’d already let Savannah distract him too much from his business. He had to focus on it again—because she had made him remember what it was like to be hungry, to be a kid begging on the streets.
He wasn’t going to beg her or any woman for her attention, though.
“Any other former fighter pilots on your staff?” he asked.
“Several,” Grant said. “Blair personally recruited all our pilots.”
“Send me one of the male ones, please,” Teo requested.
“Blair is the best,” her loyal brother insisted.
“I’m sure she is,” Teo said. “But not for me.” Not right now. Not when he was still so damn raw from not hearing from Savannah.
Grant sighed but agreed to send him a male pilot. Then he set up the flight time and airport location. But after they disconnected, an uneasiness gripped Teo. He’d counted on Miranda Fox and Liaisons International to find him a woman he could trust not to play games, and he’d been disappointed. He would survive the bruise to his ego, though.
But if the pilot he was sent wasn’t as good as he was promised, he might not survive the flight.
CHAPTER SEVEN
BLAIR WAS GOING to kill their new client.
“He what?” she asked her brother, her voice vibrating with the rage coursing through her. She had to have it repeated because she just couldn’t believe the audacity. And she thought her brother was a Neanderthal...
“You heard me,” Grant said, leaning so far back in his desk chair that it was surprising it didn’t topple over with his big body in it.
She thought about pushing that chair over, she was so damn angry. But he wasn’t the one she was mad at; well, he wasn’t the only one. “I can’t believe you agreed to it!”
Grant shrugged. “Money’s money, Blair. The business is in the black, but we have to make sure we keep it that way. We shouldn’t turn down any client.”
“Even sexist pigs?” She shook her head. “No. We don’t need clients like that.”
“I’m not sure that was his reason for not wanting a female pilot,” Grant said.
“What other reason could he have?” Blair asked, her eyes narrowed as she stared down her brother.
He raised his hands, palms up. “Hey, I have no problem with female pilots. I wish we had more of them besides my sister.”
“Of course you do,” she said. Grant wasn’t sexist; he had always supported her choices—just not all her friendships.
“Since we don’t, though,” Grant continued, “our new client probably would have been given a male pilot even if he hadn’t asked for one.”
“Probably,” Blair agreed. “But he damn well isn’t going to get one now.”
Grant stood up then. He was one of the few men who was more than just a little bit taller than she was. His hair was an even deeper shade of gold than hers except for where it turned reddish in the beard that shadowed his square jaw. “Why the hell are you so damn edgy these past few days? I thought you would come back from that little trip you took all refreshed, but you’re more uptight now than you were before.”
“I was only gone a day,” she reminded him.
“So take some more time off,” he suggested. “You’ve been working your ass off. Mine, too, and you know I don’t like working this much.”
She smiled, like he’d meant for her to do, but she couldn’t help thinking that her brother tried a little too hard to seem carefree.
“I’ll go back to Milan,” she said, her heart quickening at the thought of what had happened with Matteo.
All the incredible things they’d done to each other—all the pleasure he’d given her.
Grant hadn’t been wrong about her; she had been edgy since her return. She felt like climbing the damn walls. She needed the release that Teo had given her.
Maybe she should let Miranda know that she was willing to see him again. But having to tell Miranda to tell him brought her back to middle school and passing notes in class. That was how Teo had made her feel, giddy and foolish and overwhelmed with emotions. She couldn’t afford to feel like that, not when she had business to focus on.
So she forced thoughts of seeing Matteo again from her mind and continued, “Then I’ll take a trip to Madrid.”
Grant groaned. “You can’t fly this guy. I promised him a male pilot.”
“And I’ll make sure that he thinks that’s what he’s got,” she assured Grant.
He snorted. “Yeah, right. You’re going to pass for a man? How the hell are you going to pull that off?”
“Remember when I dressed up like you for Halloween last year?”
He groaned again. B
ut he couldn’t deny that she had fooled several of their employees with the disguise.
Miranda’s younger half sister, Tabitha Catt, a theater major, had helped her with the costume. Tabitha was in New York City right now, doing some off-off-off-Broadway play, so she wouldn’t be able to help Blair this time. But she still had the disguise somewhere. She only hoped she would be able to pull it off on her own and teach their new sexist client a humbling lesson.
“So what’s this misogynist pig’s name?” she asked.
Grant glared at her. “You mean our new client?”
She shrugged. “Whatever. What’s his name?”
“Matteo Rinaldi.”
She gasped as a sharp pain jabbed her heart. It wasn’t possible. Matteo could not be a sexist pig, not after all the sweet things he’d said about admiring strong, independent women. Had he been lying? Or was Grant?
She narrowed her eyes and studied her brother’s face. “Did Miranda put you up to this?”
“Miranda?” he asked. Too innocently? An accomplished gambler, Grant’s face was too hard to read. But there was a twinkle in his dark blue eyes. It wasn’t of amusement, though, because he angrily asked, “What does that damn troublemaker have to do with Matteo Rinaldi?”
Too damn much.
Blair shook her head. “She didn’t refer him?”
“I sure as hell hope not,” he said. “We sure don’t need Miranda Fox doing us any favors.”
“He didn’t mention her?” Blair asked.
Grant shook his head. “I wouldn’t have booked him a flight if he had anything to do with Miranda.” He’d had a problem with her best friend for years. “But he didn’t say how he heard about us, just that he needs a pilot.”
“A male pilot,” she remarked resentfully. So he was a chauvinist pig. She’d been right to trust her instincts to run; he had seemed too good to be true. That night had just been an act; he wasn’t the charming man he’d pretended to be.
“I looked the guy up,” Grant said. “He’s an Italian billionaire. We could use his business and his referrals. So don’t blow this for us.”
Blair had already blown him. And now she was so damn angry about that, about that entire night...
She’d bought his act, that he was this charming man. That he was considerate and had seemed to care about her pleasure, about her. She’d been worried that he was so great that she would act like her mom and lose herself in him.
But he’d fooled her. He was a chauvinist pig just like all the other guys she’d dated.
How had she lost control so completely with him?
She was going to damn well take that control back. Now.
* * *
Teo leaned into the open door of the cockpit, waiting for the pilot to turn around and acknowledge him. Surely the man had heard him walk up the stairs to board the plane. He cleared his throat.
The guy turned to peer back over one shoulder. A reddish beard covered most of the guy’s face but for the sunglasses shielding his eyes.
“I’m Matteo Rinaldi,” he introduced himself.
The guy just nodded.
“And you are?”
“Bill,” he replied curtly, his voice so gruff his name sounded more like a croak than a word.
“You should take your seat, sir,” a male flight attendant advised as he pulled in the stairs. “We are cleared for takeoff.”
Grant Snyder had taken his directive a little far with having all male staff on board the plane. But Teo was relieved. The last thing he needed was another distraction like Savannah, another strong, independent woman. Savannah took up entirely too many of his thoughts as he continued to relive that night over and over again.
He must have built it up in his mind, though; it couldn’t have been as good as he remembered. It hadn’t really been like that...
It wasn’t possible to feel as much pleasure as he kept imagining he’d felt that night, with her.
“Sir,” the attendant prodded him, gesturing back at the big seats in the passenger area.
This plane was actually a bit smaller than his private jet, but it was luxurious and fully equipped. And the pilot seemed incredibly confident in the cockpit and so focused on flying that he’d barely noticed Teo at all. Apparently Blair Snyder had vetted her pilots better than he’d vetted his or than Liaisons International had vetted his date.
Unless he’d done something that night that had upset her?
Had he taken advantage of her?
She’d seemed to want him as much as he’d wanted her. Sometimes even more.
He couldn’t have been that mistaken, could he? He wouldn’t know for certain, though, unless she called him back. She hadn’t done that yet.
With a sigh, he took his seat.
“This will be the smoothest flight you’ve ever had,” the attendant promised him.
Teo didn’t believe in promises anymore—not after the dating service had promised to find him someone who wouldn’t play games with him. Because that promise had been broken when Savannah had disappeared. She’d played the cruelest game of all on him—hide and...
Did she even want him to seek her?
She hadn’t returned any of the messages he’d left for her, and Miranda Fox had warned him that she might not. Clearly Savannah did not want to be found.
CHAPTER EIGHT
BLAIR’S “BILL THE PILOT” disguise, with the big sunglasses and the bushy beard, had worked too well. Teo hadn’t recognized her at all. And he’d been so comfortable with the man flying the plane that he had chartered Private Flights for several more trips. He traveled often between Madrid and Milan. Madrid was where he lived and where his corporate offices were, while it seemed as though Milan was home to him despite his not having a home there. Perhaps that was because his sister lived there, and despite her meddling in his life, they must have been close.
As usual, when they landed in Madrid he poked his head into the cockpit and praised her. “Another smooth flight, Bill. Thank you.”
He wasn’t really praising her, though. He was praising a man. But unlike some of their other important clients, he always took the time to greet her and to compliment her after every flight.
“He sure is a nice guy for a billionaire,” Jean-Claude remarked after Teo descended the stairs to the tarmac.
“For a male chauvinist pig,” Blair reminded him and herself.
Jean-Claude dropped into the seat next to hers. He was as much a copilot as he was a flight attendant. She’d assigned him to Teo’s flights in case the businessman ever saw through her disguise and insisted on getting what her brother had promised him. A male pilot. “So when are you going to take off the beard and the padding and show him that a woman has been flying him for all these flights?” Jean-Claude asked.
Her pulse quickened at the thought. He was bound to be furious at getting duped. He’d told her before that he didn’t like games. Despite the disguise, though, this wasn’t a game to her. This was her proving, just as she had been forced to prove her entire career, that she was as good as or better than any man. Just because she was female didn’t make her weak or stupid...like so many of her instructors and fellow fighter pilots had thought.
But Blair couldn’t actually prove this to Teo until she removed her disguise. Once she did, she knew there would be no chance of anything professional or personal between them. He would be much too angry.
And while she hadn’t thought it was smart to see him again, to be with him again...
Her body ached with desire for his. She wanted to be with him...like they’d been that night. She needed the release and the mind-blowing pleasure they’d found with each other.
That was why she hadn’t taken off the disguise yet.
She wanted one more night of ecstasy in his arms, in his bed. But did she dare risk it? Even knowing he was a chauvinist hadn’t
abated her attraction to him.
And flying him had only made her want him more. He always looked so gorgeous whether he wore one of his expertly tailored suits or a pair of worn jeans and thin cashmere sweater. And his hair, with those rich chocolate-brown curls, was just ever so mussed, reminding her of how it had looked that night, how it had felt when it had brushed across her bare skin...
Her breath caught with desire, and that hollow ache inside her yawned even wider, deeper. Her body yearned for his, to feel him inside her again.
And every time she flew him, that hollow ache just intensified. Because he was so close, but she couldn’t touch him, couldn’t kiss him—like she had that night, like she had to again.
She’d been worried that being with a man would make her like her mother, make her lose herself. But being without him was worse, was making her lose her patience and her self-control. She had to have him again.
* * *
Teo had gone right to his office when the plane landed in Madrid. He hadn’t had a break from work until now, hours later, when he’d returned to his apartment to shower and drop onto his bed in exhaustion.
But he knew he wouldn’t sleep—at least not restfully. Because whenever he closed his eyes, he thought of Savannah. He needed to get her out of his mind for good.
He pulled his cell phone from the pocket of his jeans and, uttering a weary sigh, he punched in the contact number for Liaisons International. When he’d signed up, Miranda Fox had insisted on giving him her direct cell number. She’d probably grown to regret having done that, though.
Because she answered with a weary sigh of her own and asked, “Hasn’t she returned your calls yet, Mr. Rinaldi?”
Teo flinched, and his face heated with embarrassment and anger. He’d told himself when he was a kid that once he’d made his own way in the world, he would never resort to begging again—anyone for anything. And yet here he was.
“No,” he replied. “She hasn’t.” And he’d come to accept that she wouldn’t.
