Kindling the Moon (Arcadia Bell #1)(54)

I bit the inside of my lip and silenced a random song that was repeating in my head. After a little while, everything began sliding into place in my mind, and I tried to stand outside myself and look at it objectively.

He was attracted to me? Well, hell. I guess I could admit to myself that I was attracted to him too. That’s what this boiled down to, right? Attraction? A simple thing, really. A thing that happens every day to random people everywhere. It was just poor timing on our part, because of what was going on in my life. And because of our age difference. Well, as much as we joked about it, maybe that didn’t really matter so much after all.

It was still too fresh to know what it would amount to down the road, and I sure as hell didn’t know what or where my life was going to be in a few days, but … there it was. Huh. I picked at the fabric of the armrest between us. I didn’t guard what I was thinking, and I didn’t try to confuse it.

“That’s better,” he whispered. “Thank you.” I looked up to find him smiling at me. His strange halo looked more gold than green. He lifted the armrest between us and pushed it up into the seats. “Now then, will you please kiss me again? You might not be willing to beg, but that doesn’t mean I’m above it.”

He gave me the most beautiful grin, and I replied with a short, happy laugh. Then I scooted closer, tentatively, and complied with his request.

Our second attempt at kissing was even better than the first. No nervousness, no pretense that it was for any other reason than the fact that we both wanted it. It was slow and deliberate and lingering, and it created a heat within me that spread like wildfire, lighting up every cell in my body.

It ended as slowly as it started, and I couldn’t bring myself to pull too far away. He must have felt the same way, because he rested his forehead against mine as my body continued to hum for him. The scent of his skin was intoxicating; he smelled safe and dangerous, comforting and alien, all at the same time. I breathed him in greedily. Then we slunk down sideways in our seats facing each other, hunched over together. He picked up my hands in his and held them as if they were made of the antique paper in one of his books— like they might crumble in his fingers.

I leaned forward and whispered in his ear, a little giddy, “What the hell are we doing?”

“I don’t have any f*cking idea,” he answered. “But I wish we weren’t on an airplane full of people because I’d really, really like to stick my hand down your pants again.”

I muffled a giggle into his shoulder, which quaked a couple times with silent laughter in reply. Then I pushed his hair away from his ear. “Honestly, I’d really, really like to do the same to you,” I whispered, lips grazing his earlobe, “for starters.”

“Jesus f*cking Christ,” he whispered back. “Don’t say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because I’m very close to dragging you off to that tiny restroom over there like the Neanderthal I apparently am, and you’re only making it worse.”

“Those restrooms aren’t big enough for one person, much less two. Unless the first-class restrooms are bigger?”

“They’re not.”

Still, I considered it. We gave each other loopy grins just as the cabin lights came back on, blinding me, and the pilot began making the announcement for the final descent.

“Ugh,” I complained, squinting. “This is so not fair.”

Sitting back up, we reluctantly faced forward again. For the remaining minutes of the flight we sat close, knees touching. After we landed and began a short taxi to the gate, as I leaned forward to fish out my purse from underneath the seat in front of me, Lon’s cell buzzed.

He pulled his phone out of his pocket and looked down at the screen. “Not even at the gate and the little bastard’s already bugging me,” he murmured before answering the phone with an impatient “What?”

I chuckled to myself, then felt him stiffen next to me.

“Slow down. Where are you exactly?”

My heart began racing in alarm.

“You’re not going to run out of air. Calm down.” He stopped to listen to whatever Jupe was saying. “We won’t call the police, I promise. I’m getting off the plane now. We’ll be there in half an hour. Don’t open the door, you hear me? Jupe? Jupe?”

He pulled the phone away and looked at the screen in shock, then shoved it in his pocket and stood up.

“Sir, please sit down. It will be a couple of minutes before the Jetway is in place.”

Yanking me up out of my seat, he pushed forward and got in the flight attendant’s face. “My son has been kidnapped. Let me off this damn plane right now.”

Her eyes widened as a low rumble rippled through the passengers around us, then she turned and ran to the phone on the wall next to the pilot’s door.

“Lon?” I yelled, shaking his arm.

His eyes were blank as he turned to face me. “It’s Riley Cooper,” he said. “She’s got Jupe cornered in a closet at school.”

22

It was after 10 p.m. when we finally made it to La Sirena Junior High. Riley Cooper knew we were coming, so Lon didn’t bother to be stealthy. He skidded into the parking lot with the same abandon that he had just used while speeding from the city to the coast in well under a half hour.

“Goddammit, I wish I had a gun,” he complained as he flung open his car door in unchecked anger. “I’m never leaving home without one again.”