“I’d be happy if I could get this show and move to New York, and also keep my relationship with you.” Realizing how selfish that sounded, I added sheepishly, “So basically I want to have my cake, and also have my cake travel back and forth to visit me.”

I saw his quick grin, although there wasn’t much real amusement in it. “Cake doesn’t generally travel well.”

“Would you at least be willing to give it a try?” I asked. “With a long-distance relationship, you could have the benefits of being single, but you’d also have the security of —”

“I tried that a long time ago,” Joe interrupted quietly. “Never again. There’s no benefit, honey. You get tired of being lonely. Tired of all the miles between you. Every time you’re together, you’re giving a dying relationship CPR. If it’s a short-term separation, that’s different. But what you’re talking about… an open-ended arrangement with no stopping point… it’s a nonstarter.”

“You could move. You would have incredible opportunities in New York. Better than here.”

“Not better,” he countered calmly. “Just different.”

“Better,” I insisted. “When you consider —”

“Hold on.” Joe held up a hand in a staying gesture, a wry smile touching his lips. “First you’re going to go talk to those people and find out if you’re right for the job, and if the job’s right for you. For now, let’s get some sleep.”

“I can’t sleep,” I grumbled, dropping to my back, huffing in frustration. “I couldn’t sleep last night, either.”

“I know,” he said. “I was with you.”

The light was extinguished, the room so dark that it was shadowless.

“Why didn’t this happen three years ago?” I asked aloud. “That was when I needed it. Why did it have to be now?”

“Because life has shitty timing. Hush.”

My nerves had knotted in agitation. “I refuse to believe you would dump me just because I didn’t happen to be conveniently located in Texas.”

“Avery, quit working yourself up.”

“Sorry.” I tried to relax and regulate my breathing. “Let me ask just one thing: Your family has a private plane, right?”

“A Gulfstream. For business.”

“Yes, but if you wanted to use it for personal reasons, would your brothers and sister object?”

“I would object. It’s five thousand bucks per flight hour.”

“Is it a light jet, or a midsize, or —”

“It’s a Gulfstream large-cabin super-midsize jet.”

“How long in advance do you have to call before they can have it ready?”

“For a trip like that, two or three hours.” The covers were drawn back from my legs.

“What are you doing?” I couldn’t see him, could only feel him moving in the darkness.

“Since you’re so interested in my plane, I’m going to tell you all about it.”

“Joe —”

“Quiet.” The hem of my nightgown inched upward, and I felt a soft, hot kiss on the side of my knee. “The Gulfstream has Internet, TV, a Global Satcom phone system, and the worst coffeemaker in existence.” A kiss descended to my other knee, followed by the long ticklish streak of his tongue trailing upward along my thigh. “The two upgraded Rolls-Royce engines,” he continued, “provide about fourteen thousand pounds of thrust each.” I drew in a sharp breath as I felt the slither of his tongue high on the inside of my leg.

His breath stirred private curls until each hair stood on end, individuate with sensation. “The plane takes about forty-four hundred gallons of fuel.”

A single, idle lick. I whimpered, all my focus zinging to that soft place. He nuzzled deeper into the tenderness.

“Fully fueled, it flies nonstop for forty-three hundred nautical miles.” His fingertips nudged me open while his lips descended, forming a hot, wet seal. I was dazed and silent, my hips catching a tight upward arch. Just as the pleasure approached an unimaginable spike, his mouth lifted.

“It’s been updated with thrust reversers that shorten the landing,” he murmured, “and an enhanced vision system with an infrared camera mounted on the front.” A long finger slid inside me. “Is there anything else you’d like to know?”

I shook my head, beyond speech. Although he couldn’t have seen the movement, he must have felt it, because I heard his quiet sound of amusement. “Avery, honey,” he whispered, “you’re gonna sleep so good tonight…”

I felt his mouth and tongue again as he worked me with delicately ruthless precision, and I was lost in a tumble of heat. Pleasure gathered, lifted, refracted. When it became too much to bear, I tried to twist away, but Joe wouldn’t let me, persisting until my groans had broken into long sighs.

After he was finished with me, I didn’t fall asleep so much as I fell unconscious. I slept so long and hard that I barely registered Joe kissing me good-bye the next morning. He leaned over the bed, showered and fully dressed, murmuring that he had to leave.

By the time I was fully awake, Joe was gone.

Two days later, I boarded a private Citation Ultra with Hollis Warner. A flight attendant served us Dr Pepper on ice while we waited for Bethany, who was running late. Fashionably dressed and heavily made up, Hollis relaxed in the cream leather seat next to mine. She explained that her husband, David, offered compensation plans to some of the top executives in his restaurant and casino businesses to have the jet for a specified number of personal-use hours, with the company picking up the tab. Hollis and her friends often used the Citation for shopping trips and vacations.