Paragon - Chapter 25: Chapter 25

I woke to a heat in my arms.
A burning in my throat. I felt my teeth already sharp in my mouth and opened my eyes slowly. It all came back in a flash. Quinn finding me in the night. Our heated kissing. The closeness and the desire in it all.
She was spread across my body. But the most immediate thing I became aware of was her palm pressed against the flat of my stomach under my shirt. I grit my teeth and glanced down. I had no doubt about why my self control was tested in the night.
The arm cast across my torso and her leg wrapped between my own were also a problem. The covers were spread in a mess only half over her. I took a careful breath and then another. I tried to plan how I would escape without waking her. I knew we would be close to Dubai International soon...
My body never demanded more than a few hours anyway. I could just make out the burning gold rise of the sun beneath the crack of the window shade.
I inched her arm off me carefully. When her skin slipped away and the heat with it, I could think more clearly. Her breathing was still steady so I knew it was successful. Then came the more difficult case of her leg wrapped between my own. I shifted my outside leg slightly and she sighed moving her head into the crook of my neck more. I clenched my jaw from the scent of her pressed against me from every angle.
"Quinn." I whispered.
Nothing. Then I felt her lips smile into the skin of my neck making me shudder.
"Morning." She mumbled.
I swallowed and tried to draw on my sanity again. Not the relentless burning in my throat that seemed to need to taste her much more than last night.
"This is not the easiest wake up." I emphasised, keeping my head tilted away from her steady pulse in her neck.
She chuckled, drawing back a few inches and dropping her head into more pillows with a sigh. I took the opportunity to take another sip of air and tilt my head in her direction.
"Sorry to wake you, but we'll be stopping soon." I murmured.
She nodded in a tired daze. It made me smile, watching her unable to form a sentence and still wearing a peaceful expression that only desired sleep. I moved silently and extracted myself from the bed silently. When I shut the door a member of crew was already offering me a hot towel and coffee.
I accepted the former and dabbed my face as I pulled my phone out. I dropped into a plush leather chair and read.
The local headlines of my former city were already painting every tabloid in big fonts.
WEAPONS SEIZURE IN EAST END TOTTENHAM
MEMBER OF MET POLICE CAUGHT UP IN FATAL TEN MAN SHOOTOUT
MASS FIREARMS FOUND IN OUTTER ZONE WAREHOUSE
I smirked at the dramatic pictures of burned out remnants of the weapons operation I blew sky high. Though I felt bad for leaving behind a trace of my presence. Solidifying my demise in the operation. Will would feel responsible–right up until he tracked down our missing squad car I had used to flee the scene. Whether or not the other mortals would believe him when he told them I was alive was beyond me... but it gave me resolve knowing he wouldn't blame himself for my 'death'.
My old phones were history. My flight plan untraceable and my employees would take any information regarding me to the grave because of very large pay packets...
"Can I get you anything Ms Fletcher?" A blonde member of cabin crew offered with a practiced smile and a head tilt.
I returned it and nodded my head towards the bedroom. "Please send a coffee and light breakfast to Miss Adams." I said easily.
She smiled again and nodded her head before returning down the cabin in a neat pressed navy skirt and tie. I glanced out the window and at the golden rise of the sun across the clouds. Maybe I could take Quinn into the corporate lounge when we landed. It was of spectacular standards in that airport... And it would certainly kill a few hours while we refuelled.
I gave the cabin crew a polite smile as they walked with the requested coffee pot and breakfast towards the bedroom. I'm sure as a lawyer she was a morning person anyway...
I kept scanning details of the news stories that tried to piece together what happened in the chaos last night. That many deaths and weapons was something that could not be overlooked even in a city as big as–
"Are those croissants?" I heard Quinn ask tiredly through the door behind.
I chuckled and continued scrolling down my screen.
I saw the crew members return back down the cabin past my chair and not many moments later Quinn herself plopped down into the seat beside mine with a coffee in her hand.
"Good morning, Adams." I noted, still scanning my phone.
I saw her take a sip in my peripheral while she stared in awe out the window.
"Good doesn't cover it. Have you seen this?" She asked in awe.
"The sun is best above the clouds." I agreed, setting my phone down and staring at the side of her face that was painted golden in the low rising light. It tinted those bright green eyes gold and made them much more of a sight than any sunrise–
Her eyes met my own and caught me staring. I didn't look away.
"You're not looking." She rolled her eyes.
"Yet the sight remains good." I drawled with a smirk.
She raised an eyebrow and sipped her coffee. Her hair was more chaotic than its usual business prepared waves.
"I don't suppose you have a shower onboard?" She suddenly asked.
I chuckled and shook my head. "I'll have that arranged when we land."
"Arranged." She waggled an eyebrow.
I looked at her flatly. "I did not mean–"
"So forward detective." She scolded anyway.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. "Separately. I will arrange–ugh you are impossible."
She started laughing and tilted her head to watch the sun rise out the window again. Now of course the wild notion was filling my head completely uninvited. Close proximity. Water running down her smooth skin. Running my lips over it before pressing against her neck–
"How hot is it in Dubai?" She interrupted my thoughts like a knife.
"Normally 35 degrees. In winter it can drop to 25." I told her quickly, ripping myself out of my own desire filled mind.
"Drop to 25?" Quinn chuckled. "That's as good as an English summer gets."
"Well, it is a desert..." I said with no small irony.
She nodded and turned to me more fully. I raised an eyebrow at the question in her eyes and she smiled, taking a slow sip of coffee before speaking–I wasn't sure why that made me want the taste of her lips again.
"You seem to have been around the block, Fletcher." She noted casually. "How many countries have you visited?"
I took a moment before responding. I crossed my legs and leant against the window, watching her calmly.
"All of them."
She almost choked on her coffee and I smirked.
"How many languages?" She shot back.
"Only twenty five fluent. Another thirteen partial." I said easily, enjoying the disbelief on her face.
"Only." She scoffed. "Yes, you really are such a disappointment." She uttered sarcastically.
"It's enough to get by." I grinned. "Thai was the most difficult–they don't use much punctuation."
"And what was the easiest?" She asked carefully.
"English." I said with a mocking smile.
She rolled her eyes and leant back in her chair. "How could you have leant that much–even in a hundred years it's a big ask... You even know my area of expertise like I do." She muttered.
I leant forward in my seat and met her eyes seriously. Her heart rate always seemed to skip whenever my focus was directly on her. I liked it.
"Quinn, imagine if you only needed to sleep a few hours instead of eight. Do you realise how much extra time that is?" I asked slowly.
She seemed to come to the right realisation.
"Realistically you're closer to 150."
I laughed loudly and sat back in my chair again. She smirked and shook her head, drinking the last of her coffee and setting it down.
"God you're a cougar."
"What does a feline have to do with this?" I demanded in confusion.
She only looked at me in disbelief before humour painted every inch of her face and she tipped over her chair laughing.
"What?" I frowned.
She raised her hand to me only laughing more. "Some things you–still clearly need to learn–" She giggled.
I sighed and drew a hand over my face as the overhead seatbelt signal pinged. I opened my eyes and watched the clouds start to drop as we came closer to our fuel stop.
"You're going to tell me what that reference means, Quinn Adams." I told her factually. "Or you're worth five camels to me when we get off."
"I'm shaking." She drawled with a smile. "You like me too much to make empty threats." She muttered towards the window.
I smiled ahead.
The tall metal shards of Dubai's city skyline soon appeared under the sunrise and I could only stare again at how much it had changed since I last ventured this far to the middle east...
"So, are we showering first or seeing the sights?" Quinn asked with an eyebrow rise and a dangerously dark look.
"I will see if the airport can accommodate us... but if you really want to see the city I can find accommodation near enough." I allowed, with a glance her way.
She nodded easily. "We had an office out here." She began, glancing wistfully below. "I was even offered to fly out to meet our foreign clients but declined."
"And now?" I probed.
"Now... I wouldn't mind seeing what I missed if you don't mind it." She shrugged.
I chuckled and looked at her. "I have no limit on time here. I know the city and the language. I can take you wherever you wish."
She blew out a breath with a head shake. "But you're not paying for everything. I still have a card–"
"That I will cut in half the moment we land." I finished in a flat tone.
"What?" She demanded, sitting up in her seat now.
"Your card is a digital footprint to exactly where you are, Quinn." I stated plainly. "There is a reason I carry disposable phones, passports and cards. So that I do not exist." I emphasised.
She seemed at a loss. But there was also something more burning brightly in her eyes at the notion. An excitement in it.
"You're like a spy." She quipped with a grin.
I raised my eyebrows at her with a humourless laugh. "I'm much better at masking my tracks than your government's agents."
"When will I get my false documents?" She asked with the same bright curiosity. It was damn right adorable in every sense.
I chuckled and relaxed my shoulders again. "This flight has been taken care of... Though I will get you a few made if you're still serious about travelling with me in future."
This made her sit up.
"Of course I am, Fletcher. This wasn't a decision made on a whim. Everything I told you was the truth." She told me with no room for doubt. I still watched those green eyes for any.
I nodded slowly.
"For now, yes. But I will take care of your things with my own if your mind ever changes." I told her simply. "That goes for the currency too."
She sighed and pushed her feet over the arm of the chair in a familiar position.
"If they don't close my account–one of these days I will pay you back." She muttered.
I tilted my head at her with true amusement. "I don't care about money, Quinn. I'm immortal. Experience is the only currency."
She stared at me when I said this. Like it was an alien language, but also like she knew exactly what I meant. She nodded, seemingly lost for words but finally murmuring.
"I think I agree with you."