Congonhas Airport is located just a couple of miles from downtown …’
He told Meg about the short runway and the difficult approach and the physics of it as she looked at him slightly aghast.
‘If the weather is bad I would imagine the captain and crew and most paulistanos …’ He saw her frown and explained it a little differently. ‘If you come from Sao Paulo or know about the airport then you are holding your breath just a little as the plane comes into land.’ He smiled at her shocked expression. ‘There have been many near-misses—accidents too …’
What a horrible thing to tell her! What a completely inappropriate thing for him to say at this moment! And she had thought him so nice—well, nice-looking at least. ‘You’re not helping at all!’
‘But I am. I have flown in and out of Congonhas Airport more times than I can remember and I’m still here to tell the tale … You really have nothing to worry about.’
‘Except that I’m scared of landing now too.’
‘Don’t waste time in fear,’ Niklas said, and then stood to retrieve his computer. He did not usually indulge in idle chatter, and certainly not while flying, but she had been so visibly nervous during take-off, and it had been quite pleasant talking her around. Now she was sitting quietly, staring out of the window, and perhaps he did not have to think about moving seats after all.
The flight steward started to serve some appetizers, and Meg had an inkling that Mr Dos Santos was being treated with some tasty little selections from the first-class menu—because there were a few little treats that certainly weren’t on the business class one—and, given that she was sitting next to him, by default Meg was offered them too.
‘Wild Iranian caviar on buckwheat blinis, with sour cream and dill,’ the flight attendant purred to him, but Niklas was too busy to notice the selection placed in front of him. Instead he was setting up a workstation, and Meg heard his hiss of frustration as he had to move his computer to the side. Clearly he was missing his first-class desk!
‘There is no room—’ He stopped himself, realizing that he sounded like someone who complained all the time. He didn’t usually—because he didn’t have to. His PA, Carla, ensured that everything ran smoothly in his busy life. But Carla simply hadn’t been able to work her magic today, and the fact was between here and LA Niklas had a lot to get done. ‘I have a lot of work to do.’ He didn’t have to justify his dark mood, but he did. ‘I have a meeting scheduled an hour after landing. I was hoping to use this time to prepare. It really is inconvenient.’
‘You’ll have to get your own plane!’ Meg teased. ‘Keep it on standby …’
‘I did!’ he said. Meg blinked. ‘And for two months or so it was great. I really thought it was the best thing I had ever done. And then …’ He shrugged and got back to his laptop, one hand crunching numbers, the other picking all the little pieces of dill off the top of the blinis before eating them.
‘And then?’ Meg asked, because this man really was intriguing. He was sort of aloof and then friendly, busy, yet calm, and very pedantic with his dill, Meg thought with a small smile as she watched him continue to pick the pieces off. When the food was to his satisfaction there was something very decadent about the way he ate, his eyes briefly closing as he savoured the delicious taste entering his mouth.
Everything he revealed about himself had Meg wanting to know more, and she was enthralled when he went on to tell her about the mistake of having his own plane.
‘And then,’ Niklas responded, while still tapping away on his computer, ‘I got bored. Same pilot, same flight crew, same chef, same scent of soap in the bathroom. You understand?’
‘Not really.’
‘As annoying as your chatter may be …’ he turned from his screen and gave her a very nice smile ‘… it is actually rather nice to meet you.’
‘It’s rather nice to meet you too.’ Meg smiled back.
‘And if I still had my own plane we would not have met.’
‘Nor would we if you were lording it in first class.’
He thought for a moment. ‘Correct.’ He nodded. ‘But now, if you will forgive me, I have to get on with some work.’ He moved to do just that, but just before he did he explained further, just in case she had missed the point he was making. ‘That is the reason I prefer to fly commercially—it is very easy to allow your world to become too small.’
Now, that part she did understand. ‘Tell me about it.’ Meg sighed.
His shoulders tensed. His fingers hesitated over the keyboard as he waited for her to start up again.
When she inevitably did, he would point out again that he was trying to work.
Niklas gritted his teeth and braced himself for her voice—was she going to talk all the way to Los Angeles?
Except she said nothing else.
When still she was quiet Niklas realised that he was actually wanting the sound of her voice to continue their conversation. It was at that point he gave up working for a while. He would return to the report later.
Closing his laptop, he turned. ‘Tell me about it.’
She had no idea of the concession he was making—not a clue that a slice of his time was an expensive gift that very few could afford, no idea how many people would give anything for just ten minutes of his undivided attention.
‘Oh, it’s nothing …’ Meg shrugged. ‘Just me feeling sorry for myself.’
‘Which must be a hard thing to do with a mouthful of wild Iranian caviar …’
He made her laugh—he really did. Niklas really wasn’t at all chatty, but when he spoke, when he teased, when she met his eyes, there was a little flip in her stomach that she liked the feeling of. It was a thrill that was new to her, and there was more than just something about him …
It was everything about the man.
‘Here’s to slumming it,’ Niklas said. They chinked their glasses and he looked into her eyes, and as he did so somehow—not that she would be aware of it—Niklas let her in.
He was a closed person, an extremely guarded man. He had grown up having to be that way—it had meant survival at the time—yet for the first time in far too long he chose to relax, to take some time, to forget about work, to stop for a moment and just be with her.
As they chatted he let the flight steward put his laptop away. They were at the back of business class, tucked away and enjoying their own little world.
The food orders were taken and later served, and Meg thought how nice Niklas was to share a meal with. Food was a passion in waiting for Meg. She rarely had time to cook, and though she ate out often it was pretty much always at the same Italian restaurant where they took clients. They’d chosen different mains, and he smiled to himself at the droop of her face when they were served and she found out that steak tartare was in fact raw.
‘It’s delicious,’ he assured her. ‘Or you can have my steak?’
At
