Page 106 of Fighting With Light

I take another careful sip. “It’s good.”

“Good, I made it just like you like it.”

I take another sip and realize he put cinnamon in it.

“You noticed I like my coffee with cinnamon?”

We move up the line again as they check people in.

“Well yeah, we’ve been living together for almost two months. And you’re mywife,of course I know you like your coffee with cinnamon,” he says, grinning ear to ear.

For a second I forget my nervousness and giggle.

“You’re so beautiful when you smile, you know that?”

“What about when I don’t smile?” I ask him.

He purses his lips and takes a drink of his coffee like he’s pondering the answer to my question.

“Yep, still beautiful. I just like it when those smiles are specificallybecause ofme.”

It’s our turn and they scan our tickets and we go through the little walkway connected to the plane that feels like it’s about to take us to our deaths.

Once we’re seated, Liam grabs my hand and kisses my knuckles.

We stare at each other and as cliché as it sounds I get lost in his emerald eyes. They change color depending on the day and his mood. When he’s happy and outside surfing, they turn the color of the jade ocean. When he’s on fire for me they are like the first green of spring, bright and full of life.

“Kiss me,” I whisper.

He tilts his head, scrutinizing my face, and grabs the back of my neck, pulling me into him. Our kiss is sweet, careful, and filled with desire. For me, it’s filled with love that I can’t give him in all the ways that I want. He makes a funny noise and pulls away.

“Gotta stop, otherwise we’re going to join the mile-high club and we’re not even in the air yet.”

I giggle and shake my head.

“I’m sorry to break it to you, but I joined that club a while ago.”

He chuckles and kisses my cheek.

“I did too, but I feel like it would be like the first time with you,” he says and winks.

“And that’s why I married you, Mr. Banks, you charmed the panties right off of me.”

“And that’s why I left my playboy days behind, Mrs. Banks because there was no other woman for me.”

A breath startles in my lungs and I try to smile, but I can’t because it feels like another lash to my bleeding heart.

By the time we take off, reality comes rushing back from the little fantasy world Liam and I were living in, and I watch it disappear on a wisp of a cloud that’s only in my dreams.

***

By the time we arrive in the city of Medellín in Colombia, every muscle in my body feels like it could snap like a brittle rubber band. Liam tugs me off the plane holding my carry-on, and we make our way to baggage claim.

His brothers will arrive via their jet at one of the private airports here, so the multiple Coldwell passports shouldn’t ring any bells, we hope. Liam leads me by the hand to baggage claim for us to get our larger bags while he has our backpacks on one shoulder and the other hand rolling the carry-on.

My hand sweats in his large one and I keep looking around, expecting one of my father’s goons to jump out at us. Or maybe he called his connection here and is having them watch for me.

I spot a man staring at us with a straight face, and my heart leaps into my throat. I almost alert Liam when the man smiles. Confused, I look behind me and realize he was waiting for someone. The man opens his arms and hugs a younger version of himself.