Page 33 of Revelry

He frowns, bites his lip, and then blurts out, “Will you come sit with me?”

“What?”

“I need a distraction. A big one.” He rakes his hands through his hair. They tremble slightly. “I need you to come sit with me.”

“You booked me in economy, I have to stay in economy. They don’t just let you get up and move seats because you want to.”

“I’ll talk to the flight attendant.”

“I’m really quite comfortable where I am, thank you,” I say, and pull out the magazine in the pocket before me. It’s a Qantas jet, so naturally I’m going to find people and places within Australia inside its pages. What I don’t expect to see is an exposé on Cooper Ryan, looking a hell of a lot more comfortable in front of the camera than he does up close.

“Please, Ali?”

“No. You’re a big boy, Cooper; I’m pretty sure you can handle a flight by yourself,” I say, and dismiss him by pulling my eye mask down over my face and snuggling into all of the extra awesome room I have here in my economy seat.

Several hours later, after tossing and turning for far too long, and feeling like a complete bitch, an attendant taps me on the arm. “Excuse me, miss, there seems to have been a problem with your seat. We’re upgrading you to business class.”

“You’re kidding, right?”

“No, if you’ll just gather together your belongings and follow me.”

I shake my head. “What did he give you?”

“I’m sorry. I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says apologetically. I feel kind of bad, because she genuinely seems like a nice person, but I’m not budging.

“Cooper Ryan, what did he give you?”

“I’m afraid I don’t—”

“I’m not moving until you tell me.”

She crouches down and whispers, “Please don’t say anything. My boyfriend is a huge fan. He promised us backstage passes to their next show.”

“He’s pretty desperate right about now, huh?”

“He’s a little unnerved, yes.”

“Lady, you so could have pushed him for more. I bet he’d be willing to barter just about anything for a distraction right now.”

“I don’t want to take advantage,” she says.

“He’s a rock star—if it’s one thing he knows how to do its take advantage, and Cooper Ryan practically invented that game. Write down your address and give it to me before we disembark,” I tell her. “I’ll see that he sends you more than backstage passes.”

“If you’ll just follow me, please?” She smiles sweetly, and I gather all my stuff together and do as she asks. When we reach Cooper he’s sitting with his head buried between his knees.

I feel a stab of remorse through my stomach when I see him there trembling, his dark curls wet with sweat. “Coop.”

“Oh thank fuck.” He sighs. The relief on his face is tangible. He grabs hold of my hand and squeezes hard. “You came.”

“I’m here.” I smile awkwardly at him.Yeesh. You’d think someone was dying. “You wanna move over, or am I just gonna stand for the rest of the trip?”

“I can’t go near the window,” he states. I glance at the window; the shutter is tightly drawn. It’s pitch black outside and all of the seats around us are shrouded in darkness. He gets to his feet and allows me to squeeze into the seats. Once I’m settled, he sits down and pushes back the armrest between us, and then he practically crawls into my lap.

“Oh, okay, hi,” I say as he rests his head on my shoulder. The sweat from his hair immediately soaks my T-shirt and his forehead practically burns my neck. “You’re kind of burning up. Why the hell are you wearing a coat?”

“In case we crash.”

“We’re not going to crash,” I say and push his head off of my shoulder. I attempt to remove his coat, but Cooper has other ideas. He clasps the lapels tightly in his white-knuckled grip.