direction, a sure sign she was in for some ribbing. “You keep talkin’ that nonsense, we’re going to have to fix you up with Beau Enos once you come back.”
Taken together, Bucephelus Enos’s nickname sounded to Moira like a part of the body that ought to be kept out of the sunlight. Which, when she thought about it, could be pretty well applied to the rest of Beau as well. He’d spent most of their childhood peeking up skirts and dangling from trees, pretending to be a possum.
He also wore his underwear outside his pants on occasion.
“You been threatenin’ me with Bucephelus since kindergarten,” Moira snorted.
“And he’s still willin’. Why, ever since you healed him up after them kids got aholt of him—”
“We are not fixin’ to talk about that,” Moira interrupted. She took a breath against the memory as it rose, trying not to recall the taste of fear on Beau’s split and bleeding lip, nor the shocking size of what she’d found beneath his patched overalls.
“Well,” Earl said at last. “You keep talkin’ like a fool—”
“I might as well marry one,” Moira finished for him. “You know, that never did make any sense.”
“Don’t have to make sense.” Earl straightened in his seat and raised his chin in mock pride. “I’m an old bastard from Looziana. So long as I’m colorful, I’m doin’ my job.”
“Then you’re due for a raise, by my estimation,” Moira laughed.
“Been tellin’ management that for years.” Earl winked.
Moira’s breath caught at the sight of the New Orleans airport rising from the flat flood plain stretched out before them. “Thanks for bringing me all this way,” she said, slipping her feet back into the sandals she had discarded when she folded up cross-legged in the passenger’s seat.
“’Course,” Earl answered. “Was the least I could do. You fixed okay for money?”
Moira jerked a hasty nod. She’d resort to other means of acquiring cash long before she would let Little Earl give her a dime. A worm of dread already gnawed at her gut, thinking of him spending the gas money to drive back to Terrebonne. “Will you check in on Uncle Sal for me?”
“Often as I can,” Earl agreed.
“And don’t let him drive the Badger,” she said, depositing the keys in the dusty cup holder between them. “Last time he tried, he just about tested if it’s amphibious.”
Earl picked up the keys and dropped them into the front pocket of his worn work shirt as he pulled up to a curb in front of the wide terminal doors. “She’s safe with me. You got a plane ticket?”
“Not yet,” Moira admitted. “But I will.”
“They let you buy them things with cash? I didn’t think you had any cards.”
“I’m sure I’ll be able to work something out,” Moira said, gathering straps and adjusting pockets.
“So long as it’s something and not someone. Promise me that?”
Moira flashed him a disarming smile and planted a quick peck on his cheek before scooting out the passenger’s door. “No.”
3
Yes.
First she would say it. Then she would scream it.
Only fair for taking his window seat.
Nicholas Kingswood allowed himself a leisurely glance down the length of the interloper’s long, tanned legs, ending in bare feet propped up against the seat in front of her. The slut-red lacquer on her shapely toes brought to mind candy apples. His mouth watered in anticipation. He’d suck them until she cried. Until she begged.
Millennia on this planet had left him with precious little tolerance for small annoyances. After a few thousand years, they tended to add up. Here, the window seat he’d paid for and specifically requested was now occupied by a woman who displayed no intention of vacating it.
Head tipped against the window, dark eyelashes feathered against her cheeks, the woman appeared to have nodded off waiting for other passengers to board.
It had been a couple weeks since he fucked in an airplane bathroom. Those legs would look marvelous braced against a wall on either side of his hips.
But then, her delicate fingers would be equally attractive wrapped around his cock, though the best view would have to be obstructed beneath a blanket. In his opinion, a quick jerk was the only acceptable use for those cheap-ass scraps of fabric in the overhead bin.
He might even make her come as a reward.
Right after she got the fuck out of his seat.
He followed the line of her legs back toward the seat in question, and was delighted to find the view just as promising. Denim cut-offs and a skin-tight black