Total pages in book: 126
Estimated words: 118309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 592(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 118309 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 592(@200wpm)___ 473(@250wpm)___ 394(@300wpm)
She loops her arm around my elbow before continuing down the gangway. “I show up and sit with your grandma and grampies for a couple of hours. It’s nothing.”
“Seven hours isn’t a couple.” I air quote my last two words.
She brushes off my comment as if it is nothing. I learn why when she murmurs, “It’s good for my soul. They ground me.”
“Gigi will ground you for life if she finds out you’re working at Le Rouge.”
She tugs on her nonexistent collar before jumping a few steps ahead to hand the air hostess our boarding passes. She isn’t panicked about my threat because she knows as well as I do that I won’t expose her secret to anyone—not even my beloved grandparents.
Other than me, Zoya has no one in her corner.
I hate that even more than realizing her business degree could only secure her a position at an establishment owned by a criminal entity.
“Z…” My voice is as apprehensive now as when she said she works at Le Rogue when she commences walking toward the front of the plane instead of the back.
“I was as surprised as you when I collected our boarding passes,” she replies when we’re directed to lush cubicles with flat-lay beds, large monitors, and nooks filled with various snacks and beverages.
I removed a pair of jeans from the minimal selection of clothes I packed to ensure I had room for my Kindle since our ticket stated no inflight entertainment would be provided during the flight.
“This is me,” Zoya says in the middle of the first-class section of the Boeing 737. “You’re a few spots up.”
After accepting the boarding pass she’s holding out, I move to the suite marked next to my name on my ticket. It feels surreal—even more so when I notice silk pajamas and an amenities kit have been left on my seat.
“Don’t overthink it. Just enjoy,” Zoya says, scaring the living daylights out of me.
Her airline-supplied pajamas tickle my arm when she scoots by me. She would never look a gift horse in the mouth and turn down its unexpected offerings.
We’re so different. I’m shocked we’ve been friends for as long as we have.
Before she disappears behind a wall at the front of the plane, Zoya asks, “Do you think you’ll sleep?”
My screwed-up nose should answer on my behalf, but my thumping head thinks I can be persuaded. “How long is the flight again?”
Zoya twists her lips. “Around six hours.”
I mimic her nonchalant response before answering, “I guess it wouldn’t hurt to try.”
I give up on my endeavor to sleep five minutes after takeoff. With my hours drastically reduced over the past two weeks, I’ve secured approximately six hours a night. My body refuses more.
After dinner is served, I use the downtime well. I study with the online textbooks I downloaded illegally on my Kindle and ace the quiz on the inflight entertainment system.
I’m a little bored now, though. I don’t usually have time to twiddle my thumbs. This is the first time I’m glad I don’t have a lot of downtime. My life may be chaotic, but it is better than being bland.
I pretend to stretch, but I’m actually peering over at Zoya’s cubicle to see if she’s awake. She passed out before the hot towels were handed out.
When I notice she’s still napping, I twist back to face the front of the plane. I’m about to plop back into my seat, when the quickest flash of a superhero Band-Aid peeking out the bottom of a cuff stops me in my tracks.
It can’t be Maksim, surely. From what my Google search has unearthed, his family usually travels by private jet, so why would he be on a commercial flight? The first-class suites are more luxurious than anything I’ve experienced, but wouldn’t compare to a chartered jet.
Too curious for my own good, I slip out of my cubicle and go to the front of the plane. The bar for business class travelers is as showy and varnished as the cubicles that offer unexpected privacy when traveling long distances. Bottles of expensive liquor line the wall behind the glossed bar, and a handful of travelers fill the stools in front of the oak counter.
The décor is the only thing of value in this section of the plane, though.
Most of the men seated around the bar are drunk and eyeballing me like I’m more appealing than the three-course meal they were served at the commencement of our flight.
“What can I get you?” asks the bartender, foiling my quick getaway.
His question catches me off guard. I was snooping, not looking for a drink, but I reply remarkably fast for someone not adept at thinking on the spot. “Bourbon and Diet Coke, please.”
When he dips his chin, I continue to scan my fellow travelers.
I must have been hallucinating. A man with an aura like Maksim’s would stand out in a crowd, so it should be almost suffocating in the small confines of a plane’s bar.