Jill Shalvis - Superb And Sexy

“And two others. Three pilots.”

“You work for three men like that?”

No use telling her that not all men were manipulative jerks who ruled with their superior size or fist. That was something she’d have to learn on her own.

After all, Maddie had.

“You can’t let him in,” Leena said, a growing panic in her voice, a panic Maddie felt as her own.

Because Leena was right. She couldn’t let him in. Couldn’t because there was far too much at stake here.

No matter that she and Brody had unresolved issues, mostly hers. There were other more pressing issues, issues that had nothing to do with him.

Serious issues.

Like those life and death issues…

If she let him in, he’d take one look at her and know something was wrong because brooding and edgy as he might be, he had the intuition and instincts of a panther-sharp and unwavering.

In Brody’s world, things were black and white. Right and wrong. When something was broken, he fixed it. If someone needed him, he moved heaven and earth to do whatever needed to be done, and he would do so for a perfect stranger.

Maddie was no stranger, perfect or otherwise.

Yeah, he’d want to help.

Only he couldn’t.

No one could.

Staring down at Brody, her pulse raced with a horrible mixture of yearning and wariness. Him showing up was the worst thing that could have happened, for the both of them.

Not that he could know that or the fact that she was in over her head in a way she hadn’t been since he’d hired her and unknowingly given her a much needed security that she valued above all else.

But apparently unable to read her mind, he headed straight for the front door, his long-limbed stride filled with a casual ease that said even if he’d known about any potential danger, it wouldn’t have stopped him.

God, she loved that about him.

Beside her, Leena made a sound of distress and wrung her hands together.

Maddie’s reaction wasn’t much different. Her heart took another hard knock against her ribs. She had no idea what it was about Brody’s attitude that went straight to her gut-and several other good spots as well-but with that scowl on his face, he looked every inch the wild, bad boy rebel pilot that she knew him to be.

And from deep within her came a new emotion, one she hadn’t thought still existed inside her.

Hope.

It made absolutely no sense, no sense at all, and she quickly squashed it flat because that particular emotion, or anything close to it, had no place here, and she’d do well to remember it.

That was the hard part. Remembering it.

“Maddie,” Leena whispered.

“I know.”

For all of their sakes, she had to get rid of him.

Fast.

Brody knocked on the door of the cabin as if he was Avon calling, but in truth, he felt much more like the big, bad wolf standing outside Maddie’s house of straw.

Or at least a big oaf.

He had no idea why, but around her, he felt clumsy and off kilter. Oh, wait. He knew exactly why. She was smart and amazing and hot and funny and hot, and so far out of his league he couldn’t even see the league.

He knocked again, glancing at Maddie’s Jeep in the driveway and the car next to it, wondering if she was alone, wondering why she was here, in the mountains, miles from the nearest high-end clothing store. Maddie was a sophisticated, elegant, big city lover who considered anything less than a four-star hotel roughing it.

She wasn’t exactly roughing it, not in this big, beautiful rustic cabin, built with a rather staggering view of majestic mountains and valleys as far as the eye could see. The front yard was a homage to The Ponderosa era, with a wagon wheel on either side of the walkway and railroad ties lining the path, all of it rather beautiful really, in a very Wild West sort of way.

But this was definitely a distant world for Maddie. So what the hell was she doing out here, far from the work she loved, apparently unconcerned about earning money?

The thought was alien to him.

Give him the stability of work, and the money earned for that work, and he was good. Not worrying about the roof over his head or his next meal was pretty much all he required from life.

And flying.

Flying was a close second to eating. Flying made him whole, flying made him happy. Flying was everything.

Maddie was an enigma because she didn’t seem to need any one thing, or anyone, for that matter. Maybe that’s what made her so good at her job. She was a freak of nature who could work a keyboard, a cell phone, and a scheduling board and run Sky High Air at the same time, all without seeming to care what anyone thought.

She was his employee. His responsibility, and she drove him batshit crazy. He’d told himself it was her persona. She looked like a punk rocker superhero. Her hair could be spiky platinum one day, straight jet black with magenta streaks the next. She had several visible body piercings, and wondering about the ones not visible had kept him up on more than one long night. She wore leather and silk with equal élan, and her exotic footwear alone had given him more fantasies than he cared to admit.

He wanted her more than he’d ever wanted a woman. Hell, more than he’d ever wanted a plane, and that was saying something.

She walked as if she’d been born the Queen of the Free World, which only further confused him because usually, he was drawn to sweet and easy. And, okay, maybe just a little bit naughty.

There was nothing sweet or easy about Maddie, and he doubted that she was only a little bit naughty. Everything about her, from her baby blues to the tip of her manicured toes, everything screamed look-but-don’t-touch, and in her presence, he was always swamped with conflicting emotions-the urge to rumple her up and the need to put his hands in his pockets to keep them off her.

Yeah. She really got to him. It was the equal mix of quick wit and trouble in her eyes. It was the sharp humor she revealed in her smile, which was so damn contagious he often found himself smiling back with or without being in on the joke. It was how she cared so deeply about the people around her, people like Noah and Shayne, and also him.

Especially when it was him.

Once he’d fallen off a ladder and landed on his ass, and she’d been the first one to get to him. She’d thrown herself at him, fear in her voice, and for that moment before she’d figured out he wasn’t hurt, before she’d smacked him and yelled at him never to scare her like that again, he’d really enjoyed the feel of her curves hugging up all over him. Another time, he’d heard her on the phone telling a client about his piloting skills, bragging about how he was the best of the best, and he’d actually felt his chest puff up.

Yeah, he really liked it when she revealed how much she cared.

But this wasn’t about him or how she seriously screwed with his head on a daily basis. This was about work. About Sky High Air.

He handled the majority of the flights himself. Noah specialized in personalized adventures, finding and fine-tuning them for their clients. Shayne, the people person of the group, brought in their rich clients. Together, they made the whole package, whether that meant flying a turbo prop or a jet on a moment’s notice, taking a charter flight to Santa Barbara or a business group to Alaska, it got handled efficiently, discreetly, and luxuriously.

And it was all managed by Maddie, the best concierge on the planet. Sky High couldn’t have achieved half their success without her, and none of them ever doubted it for a minute. Glorious, hotheaded, temperamental, beautiful Maddie Stone.

They needed her back.

Like yesterday.

No one could replace her, and he’d learned that the hard way. He was here to deliver that exact message. He planned to beg her, if necessary, and then get the hell back to where he belonged.

In the air.

He wanted her to show up for work, nose thrust higher than any of his planes, telling him to go to hell in that soft, come-fuck-me voice while stopping his world with one look from those sharp light blue eyes. And when she smiled? Jesus. He had a rep for being damned near indomitable, and yet her smile absolutely broke him every single time.

Untouchable…

It shocked him, really. The effect she had on him. She was tough and resilient and by turns, hard as nails or soft as butter melting on hot bread, and she never, ever compromised.

And yet there was no doubt in his mind that when she looked at him, she held back. She held back a lot, never quite letting him see the real her, except for that one time when for just a moment, he’d caught a glimpse of her entire heart and soul.

It’d shaken him. It’d opened his eyes to her. It’d told him his gut was right-that beneath that tough ass exterior beat the heart of a woman he could fall for. Terrifying, really. So he did his best to keep a certain distance, or at least, that had been his plan.

Until she’d gotten shot while working in his lobby, on his goddamn watch, and then vanished from the face of the earth for six hellishly long weeks during which he’d just about lost his mind until she’d called.

She didn’t answer the door. Of course she didn’t answer her door because that would have been easy. Stepping back, he glanced back up at the window above, but if he’d seen a flash of her a moment ago, she was gone now.

Avoidance. He recognized the technique, just not the need for it. Maybe she’d expected them to ignore her disappearance, or if not, then she’d have thought either Shayne or Noah would have come, both of whom had a much softer, easier relationship with her.

Well, too bad, they’d sent him. The hard ass.