“Well, okay,” I said warily. “Then who are you to have access to a jet like that?”
“The question is: Are you brave enough to find out?” The challenge in his voice brought my head swinging back to face him. He was staring at me with those smoldering eyes that made my breath catch. He reached over and placed his hand on my shoulder, leaning closer. “The question is,” he repeated, “are you ready to embrace a whole new life?”
A new life. No way something like that was even possible. Was it?
I looked back at the plane, holding my arms stiffly in my lap, desperate not to fidget. Because I knew the answer was no, good things were not possible. I’d had that lesson backhanded into me from a young age.
The real question was: How was I supposed to get myself out of this situation? We were alone, in the middle of nowhere. Where was I supposed to go and how was I supposed to get there?
A shadow flickered in the cockpit and then was gone. So, okay, check that—we weren’t entirely alone. There was a pilot in there, readying for takeoff. Almost as though he’d been waiting for us.
And I’d discovered a new problem. The longer Ronan’s hand rested warmly on my skin, the less intense my concerns became. I shifted away from him, at least as much as I could in that tiny sports car. His touch was muddling my mind, almost as if he had some hypnotic power over me.
Because I was starting to ask myself some crazy questions. Like, what if I did climb into that plane? It’d be an irreversible thing, a path from which there’d be no return. But was it a dangerous path, or might I find a pot of gold at the end?
But how was it that some guy from the registrar’s office spotted me and decided I was the one for his jet-fueled getaway? I leaned away from him, into the car door, and tried my best glare. “Why me?”
He shifted so that his hand still rested lightly on me. It was a casual gesture, and yet I felt the heat of his touch like a brand. “Why not you, Annelise?”
Why not indeed?
I gave my head a shake. Because normal people—safe, sane people—don’t whisk seventeen-year-old girls they don’t know off in private jets.
I flinched my leg away from his hand, and as I broke contact, doubts swamped me. Was he part of some high-tech slavery ring with a penchant for younger girls with high IQs and lame senses of humor? “But we just met.”
“You’re special,” he said in that husky voice, shifting his hand to my shoulder.
Special. The word echoed in my head, and for once in my life, it didn’t sound like a curse. I wanted to wrap myself in the feel of it even as I struggled to get a grip. I tried to concentrate on my skepticism, but that touch was burning through the fabric of my shirt. I felt myself slipping.
“Don’t you wish to go?” he pressed. “With me?”
Ronan was waiting for my answer. His expression was tight, and it exaggerated the cleft in his chin. The shadow of a muscle flickered along his jaw. He was fierce and masculine in a way I’d never before encountered. What girl didn’t wish for such a man and on such a jet?
But this was feeling too unreal, too much like the genie in the bottle had come for me. I struggled to think rationally. “Where would we go, exactly?”
“You wanted the coast. But tell me, Annelise: Will any coast do?” He gave me a squeeze, then removed his hand, and my shoulder felt chilled from the loss. But then he swept the hair from my neck and I tingled—no, I burned—where his fingers brushed my bare skin.
Any coast, I had the urge to answer him, as long as it’s with you.
I chafed my arms from the shiver rippling across them. I needed to get a hold of myself. I wanted to flee Florida, flee my family and my life, but was I ready for the point of no return? “Why not drive? Florida’s big, but not that big.”
“Are you saying you don’t want to leave Florida? The Gulfstream IV can travel more than four thousand nautical miles.”
“Oh, well, that’s a relief, then. Particularly as I generally calculate things in terms of nautical miles.”
His answering silence was loud.
What was he thinking about? I spared a glance for him, unable to stop myself. He was watching me with that I expect more face I now recognized.
I took a deep breath. Though I felt raw and exposed, I mustered some honesty. “I mean, yes. Of course. I long to leave Florida. My life here . . . It’s been hard. I’ve always dreamt of leaving.”
I’d spoken the truth, but it had come out so quietly. Did my voice always go all hesitant and soft when speaking truly?
All this honesty. And with a total stranger. It was too intense. I felt too defenseless. It was too much.
He was too much. He made me feel so strange. Like, for the first time in my life, I knew what hope was.
I looked back at the plane, wondering just who this guy was. I strained my eyes, trying to make sense of the shadowy cockpit.