GettingOffGround.PDF by Elemental Alchemy

Author:Elemental Alchemy
Language: eng
Format: epub

CHAPTER 4

For someone dressed for the Hawaiian sun, Derek didn’t seem to notice the biting chill as we waited outside for an available cab.

I, on the other hand, shivered in my “prepared for any kind of weather” jacket. It may not have been the cold, though. After all, the interior of the airport was a comfortable temperature, and I could have sworn the shivering started around the time I’d extended the overnight invitation to Derek.

The competition for a cab was fierce. Though there were no passengers from incoming flights, Derek and I weren’t the only ones who’d decided against spending the night in the terminal.

Eventually, we snagged a taxi, dropped our suitcases in the trunk, and climbed into the backseat to escape the bitter cold. We both kept our laptop cases with us; apparently even Mr. Calm and 41

GETTING OFF THE GROUND

Cool didn’t like letting his computer out of his sight.

We didn’t touch in the cab. I supposed we could have managed some surreptitious contact under the cover of darkness, and holy fuck, I wanted to, but I kept my fingers laced together in my lap.

Derek’s tapped rapidly on his laptop case. It was probably just as well. He had to be thinking along the same lines. After all, he may have been willing to grab my ass in broad daylight, but he probably knew that at this point, the instant we touched, all bets—

and clothes—would be off.

The ride to the hotel was maybe fifteen minutes, but it felt like forever. I hadn’t been this nervous in the hours leading up to my ill-fated wedding, and I hadn’t been this turned on in… hell, I didn’t think I’d ever been this turned on.

The cab pulled up in front of the hotel. We got out, collected our things, and tried not to slip on the ice on our way inside.

The hotel lobby was a zoo, and my heart sank when I realized just how many frantic, stranded travelers were lined up in front of the check-in desk. Thank God we had a reservation, unlike the flustered, animated traveler shouting at one of the clerks.

Reservation or no, this was going to take forever. Suppressing a frustrated groan, I glanced at Derek. He gave a resigned shrug, one that said nothing if not, “What can we do?”

You really are the type to turn up the radio and relax in traffic, aren’t you?

We did the only thing we could do: we got in line and waited.

Derek stood behind me, out of sight but well within the range of all my other senses. His presence tingled just above my nerve endings.

Whenever he moved, the slightest rustle of his clothing or the soft creak of his leather laptop case registered above the echoing footsteps and rumbling suitcase wheels, reducing the cacophony of 42

GETTING OFF THE GROUND

voices around us to a collective whisper in the background.

Keeping his voice low, which drew me nearer to him like an unseen arm around my waist, he said, “I wonder how many of these people are in the same boat we are.

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