Chapter Five
Celia knew that James was wealthy. After all, it would take a rich man to make sure that she had a passport in her hand within just a day, and it would take a rich man to ensure that a lovely set of leather luggage was delivered to her door.
If I were you, the accompanying note read, I would just pack the things you don’t want to leave behind. Just about everything else can be accounted for when we land in Dublin.
Packing up the little life that she shared with Maisey took less time and effort than she would have thought. She and her daughter did not own much, and when the day came, a grave-faced pair of men came to take it all in a car, leaving Celia and Maisey to wait for James himself. Looking around her, Celia wondered when she would return to her little apartment. James was paying the rent for her; he had said he would almost as a matter of course. Everything would wait just like this for her return, and Celia felt a slight pang at leaving her life behind.
Then James was at the door, a bright smile on his face, and she felt as if she were taking a plunge into a brave new world.
“You didn't bother to tell me when the plane was leaving,” she said with a slightly harried smile. “I've been tense all morning trying to figure out if doing just one thing or one thing more was going to make us late.”James chuckled. “I’m sorry for the misunderstanding,” he said, opening the back door of his sedan so that she could buckle the curious Maisey into the seat he had provided. “But we are not going to miss the plane. It’s my plane, after all. It is going to stay grounded as long as it takes for me and everyone I want on board to get ready.”
Celia automatically sat down in the passenger’s seat, buckling her own belt before she looked at James in surprise. “What are you talking about, your plane? It sounds like you own it.”
“I do,” James said with a shrug, pulling into traffic. “There’s the company jet of course, and the helicopter that I fly on occasion, but this jet is simply for my own personal use. I find that when I am trying to take care of things between continents that simply having my own was best for time sensitive matters.”
“Of course,” Celia said, as if she had any idea what that was like. She still wasn’t quite sure that she believed him until they breezed through the airport, Maisey clutched tight in her arms. Her daughter looked around her with wonder, and Celia knew that she was not doing so much better when they were escorted to the large private jet that James spoke of so lightly.
“Who are you?” she asked as a smiling young woman settled them into the plush seats. There were only four seats on this plane, facing a small table. She and James sat in one, but there was a downright luxurious child seat strapped to one of the others. Maisey had obviously been remembered.
James raised an eyebrow at her question. “You should know who I am at this point, I think.”
“I thought, you know, that you were well-off. Like, I knew that you could do mostly what you wanted when you wanted to do it. I knew that you had money, but I’m not sure I knew that you had jet money.”
James threw back his head and laughed, a bright and amused sound that had no sting to it at all. She realized somewhere deep within her that he was not laughing at her.
“I’m delighted that you’ve gone all this time without knowing,” he said, and before she could ask him about knowing what, he passed her a tablet. “Perhaps you can do some light reading on the flight,” he said.
Then the plane started its run down the asphalt, and Celia had to deal with Maisey who was suddenly not so certain about everything. A small and fretful whine turned into an outright shriek as the plane ascended, Maisey’s little face screwed up in panic.
“Oh poor sweetie, poor thing,” Celia murmured. “It’ll be fine soon.” James looked alarmed, but he pressed a large hand to Maisey’s back. The rueful look he gave her told her that he was aware that it was not much, but the added touch of her father seemed to at least calm Maisey a little bit.
Even after the plane leveled off, Maisey was still fretful, her face hot and red. She was ready to pitch one hell of a tantrum, Celia knew. Maisey did not pitch fits very often, but when she did, they could impressively intense.
“Can I try holding her?” James asked, and she looked at him with surprise.
“You want to test out your baby-holding skills now?” she asked, and he nodded.
“She’s of both of us, and I think that means we should both be able to handle a crying jag, don’t you think?”
As a matter of fact, she had met many people who disagreed. However, she handed Maisey to James and then she sat back to watch in bemusement. Maisey did not quiet for him immediately. Instead she regarded him with a wariness that seemed to demand that this new person explain himself immediately.
“Well hello, darling,” James murmured, shifting to settle the tiny girl more comfortably in his arms. “How are you doing, now?”
She whimpered a little, but then James bounced her in his arms, nuzzling the top of her head a little.
“There’s a fine girl, that’s my sweetheart.”
Maisey stiffened a little, but then abruptly and to Celia’s surprise, she relaxed into James’s arms. She went from nervy and upset to practically boneless, and Celia hid a shocked smile behind her hand. James looked as startled as Celia felt, as if he had somehow performed a miracle. The little girl in his arms stared up at him, he stared down at her, and then he looked at Celia.
“Now stay like that for the next hour or so,” she said with a slight grin. “She needs her sleep.” It was a joke, but James looked determined as he leaned back against the chair. A sort of peace fell over the three of them. Maisey’s calm drifted over her parents, and Celia wondered if something was changing between them again. It felt good to lower her guard around James, at least for a short while. Celia leaned back in her seat as well, observing the pair.
James looked enthralled by his daughter, touching her soft face, her pert little nose, the perfect fingers that were curled next to her round cheek. He reminded Celia of how she had been fascinated with every part of her daughter's body shortly after she was born. Even the stress and fears of being a single mother could not make her stop delighting in her daughter's perfection.“She’s so small,” James murmured, glancing up at Celia. “Were you frightened?”
“Of what?” Celia asked. After all, there had been so much to be frightened of when Maisey was born.
“Of whether you could take care of her. Of whether you might hurt her without knowing.”
Celia thought for a moment, and then she nodded slowly. “I did wonder that,” she admitted. “It is a great honor and privilege to take charge of a little life. But you know? When she was born, I felt the strangest kind of faith. I knew that I might have to be strong for both of us, but that was fine. I would be, and I could be. I would take care of her. That’s love, I suppose.”
She didn't say that she had spent a long time wary of love. After all, she had thought that she loved James. He had awakened her body to the possibility of pleasure in a way she had never been prepared for. Then he had gone. It was not love she felt for him then, she realized. It was intoxication and infatuation. She could look back on the girl she had been with a certain amount of amused sadness, but now, looking at James hold their baby daughter, she wondered what she was feeling. It felt deep and warm and strange.Celia shook her head, knowing that she needed to fight it. She could not afford the idea of falling in love with James, not now when there was so much at stake and she had a daughter to look after. James raised his b eyes to her, and the look of wonder in them cut her straight to the heart.
Oh, he’s trouble, Celia thought to herself, but if she were being entirely fair, she already knew that.
***
The flight from Eastwick to Dublin was only seven hours, but Celia found herself drifting off after only three. When she awakened, she realized that James was still holding Maisey and that he had come to sit next to her. One arm was thrown over Celia’s shoulders, and his other arm cradled a sleeping Maisey close.
“You got her to sleep,” she murmured softly, and James grinned.
“Well, you drifted off, and I kept thinking she was going to do the same. Then I realized that she was watching you and reaching for you, and I finally managed to put two and two together.”
Celia laughed a little, reaching down to touch her daughter’s downy cheek. “That sounds like my little love bug,” she said. “I wasn’t planning on co-sleeping for the first year, but she sort of made that a necessity. She can sleep on her own these days, but if she has her choice, she would much rather be cuddled up with me, no matter what’s going on.”
James made a soft sound of approval. “You are a good mother to her,” he said solemnly, and Celia couldn’t help but smile.
“You don’t know that,” she said. “This is what, the third or maybe fourth time you’ve met us together? I might be saving all my neglect and meanness for when you are not looking. Some people do.”
James shuddered a little at her joke, but he shook his head. “I do not get that sense from you. Not even a little. You love Maisey with all your heart, and you always want the best for her. A blind man could see it.”James paused for a moment, and then those bright blue eyes were turned to her. She had always thought that they could see right through a person, and she wondered what he was seeing when he looked at her now.
“And what do you see when you look at me like that?” she asked. She had to gather up her courage to do so, and he took his time answering.
“I am seeing a beautiful woman who does not trust me.”
Celia raised an eyebrow. “Should I?”
“I would like you to give me a chance.”
“Well, maybe start by not telling me outright lies,” she said, and when he raised an eyebrow at her, she laughed softly.
“You’re a man with a jet, and as far as I can tell all the money in the world.” She had read up on some of his financial achievements on the tablet. The amount of money that James had was truly extraordinary, putting in the top five percent of wealthy men in the world, and certainly even closer to the top of wealthiest men in Ireland.
“Yes, and?”
“And I’m a single mother living on a small paycheck in a little town,” she responded. “I call it a really, really good week when I can buy a new nail polish, or when I have a bit of extra money to get my hair professionally cut instead of doing it myself. I can’t imagine that I’m in the same league as the women you usually get to.”
She wasn't looking at him when she spoke, but she trailed off when he touched her chin, raising her face gently. The kiss was soft, but there was such a torrent of intensity behind it that she gasped. She knew that she should pull away as she had before, but the magnetism between them pulled her in, made her lean in even as she tried to talk herself out of it.Underneath the passion of their kiss, Celia wondered if she could sense something deeper. There was an unspoken longing between them something so sweet and dark that she shied away from it. It was far easier to deal with the physical, the reality of James’s lips on hers, the warmth of him next to her.
It was James who ended the kiss. When he pulled back, his eyes were dark with desire, but he smiled a little.
“There has been no one like you,” he said. “There never could be.