Enchanted (The Accidental Billionaires #4)(14)

Honestly, I’d been without my computer for hours, so maybe I was having withdrawals.

Once I’d made that agreement to only work when she worked on the jet, Andie had refused to hand my laptop back. We hadn’t talked all that much during the rest of the flight. She’d popped her earbuds in and meditated. I’d ended up falling asleep at some point, and I hadn’t woken up until we were getting ready to land.

Rather than feeling refreshed, I’d been pissed at myself for nodding off like an old man.

I didn’t waste time like that. Ever!

If you think she doesn’t know shit about the world and the darker side of life, you’re wrong.

I thought about Owen’s words, wondering how in the hell Andie Lawrence could know a single thing about real life.

She’d grown up rich. The female had been privileged since the day she’d been conceived.

She’d dropped out of college.

And decided to travel around the world as a writer.

Admittedly, her parents hadn’t been around as much as they should have been, but she’d been well taken care of by household staff.

I got up and headed toward the shower, hoping it would wash away my headache.

Probably what I really needed to do in order to feel better was to ditch my traveling companion.

The woman wasn’t mean spirited. She never had been. I’d liked her as Owen’s little friend when she was a kid.

It was just the adult female who Andie had become that was throwing me for a loop.

She was . . . different.

She was not the woman I would have expected, having known that quiet, polite child she used to be. In fact, Andie was the complete opposite of the woman I would have imagined her to be now.

It irritated the hell out of me that I somehow found that . . . intriguing.

Andie had been a cute kid, but she’d been shy and lacking in self-confidence, even in high school. I’d done everything I possibly could to boost her self-esteem, but I’d never been sure that it had helped much.

Holy shit, she’s changed.

She certainly didn’t seem unsure of herself anymore.

In fact, she seemed pretty damn secure about being a vagabond, which was curious considering she’d been an insecure kid who hadn’t had any faith in herself years ago.

Now, she was a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, petite menace who was determined to change my lifestyle.

That sure as hell isn’t happening.

Sure, maybe there were some things about her that kind of . . . captivated me.

Some of them were small things, like the way she flitted around like a carefree fairy, bending herself into nearly impossible yoga positions that she claimed were actually relaxing. She wore four little bracelets on her right wrist that jingled like tiny bells when she moved, making her seem even more like a fictional little sprite. The colorful bracelet that surrounded her other wrist didn’t make a sound, but it was bright enough to make most people notice it. Notice her.

Maybe those little things were what made me recognize that she’d changed.

Once, she’d done everything she could not to bring attention to herself.

Now, she didn’t seem to give a damn what anybody thought about her.

When she closed her eyes and appeared to block out everything around her, she’d seemed almost . . . enchanted.

Okay, maybe I had watched her while she was meditating, her eyes closed, her entire body and mind seemingly relaxed during the last part of the flight.

How in the hell did she manage that?

I grunted as I stripped off my clothes, turned on the shower, and stepped into the stream of hot water, every muscle in my body tense. I was fairly certain the only reason I’d fallen asleep on that plane was because I’d been watching her, deep into her meditation. The sight had eventually relaxed me enough to fall asleep.

I leaned my head back against the tile, allowing myself to picture exactly how Andie had looked, so damn sweet, so damn serene, so damn . . . fuckable.

I caught myself as my hand reached for my already rigid cock.

I opened my eyes and flipped the water to the colder side.

I am not going to get off with fantasies about that woman.

The stubborn female was a bad influence, not a wet dream.

I needed to keep my guard up and my fascination level down when it came to my travel companion.

I was a serious guy with an important job: to keep my family safe.

Keep your head down, work hard, and your brothers and sisters will survive.

That mantra was still alive and well in my head, and it was my job as the eldest in my family to keep everything . . . real. Balanced. Safe.

As soon as I got out of the shower, I was going to find a way to wrestle my computer back from the little nymph and move on with my work.

Work kept me sane.

It kept me grounded.

It kept me busy.

I needed all those things, and my family deserved the security of knowing I was still doing what I needed to do.

I didn’t need a vacation.

I just needed my damn computer back.





CHAPTER 5

ANDIE



“It’s just a few pieces of crickets, Noah. They aren’t going to bite you. They’re well roasted and very much dead,” I said, exasperated by the time we’d tackled our downtown food tour the evening after our arrival.

I’d put the whole tour together last night, getting us a local guide so we could go to the downtown area for authentic food.