Along for the Ride by Michelle M. Pillow

said. ‘It’ll be fun. I only wish Ella could make it.’
    ‘Me, too, Dad,’ Megan agreed.
    The first-class section consisted of a small area of cushy seats. Megan looked at them in longing, knowing what awaited them behind the curtain in their section. Towards the back, her mother motioned at them to hurry. Already Sasha, Kat and Vincent sat in a row of three, Kat in the middle flipping through an airline shopping magazine. Vincent gazed affectionately at his wife and Sasha stared out the small window.
    Megan paused, looking from the empty seat next to her mother’s purse, to Ryan standing expectantly in the aisle. Both spots were in rows of two seats. Which one would make for the worse travelling companion? Her mother or her pretend fiancé? Before she could snag her father’s spot, he moved past her and sat down by his wife. Megan turned her full attention to Ryan.
    ‘Do you want the window?’ he asked.
    Did he have to look at her like that? All soft and gorgeous? The light scent of his cologne caught her attention. A shiver worked over her, as desire threaded its way through her senses. She brushed past him, not saying a word as she took the window seat. Ryan was slower to follow, sliding in next to her.
    A night of unsatisfying desires followed by a morning actively pretending not to notice him became almost too much to deal with. Megan took a deep breath, more aware of the heat coming off Ryan’s leg than of the people moving about the cabin. Her family was seated slightly behind them and wouldn’t be able to see her face unless she turned or lifted up in her seat. Aside from strangers, whose opinions she didn’t care about, no one could see what they were doing.
    Ryan’s leg shifted and his muscular thigh drew her attention down. It was close and she wanted to touch it, to run her hand up to his cock, to straddle his legs as she rubbed her sex against his lap. A light moan escaped her.
    ‘Megan?’ Ryan asked.
    Startled by the questioning sound, her eyes darted from his crotch to his gaze. ‘I hate flying. I feel sick.’ The words were weak, made even more so by the way she fumbled for the shade, pulling the hard plastic over the window to block out the light and hopefully hide her flushed cheeks. Her words weren’t a complete lie. She did hate flying. Not because she was scared, but because it was like all the discomfort and unpleasantness of a fifteen-hour bus trip crammed into half the time. Either way, you got the same amount of travel lag, only on an airplane they gave you a bag of five peanuts and a tiny glass of soda.
    ‘Hey, don’t worry.’ Ryan’s hand brushed her knee.
    Megan stared at the plastic cover, realising that she must indeed look frightened. But it wasn’t takeoff that caused her to shake. She was scared of herself, of what she felt, of what she shouldn’t be feeling for the impostor who invaded her life.
    ‘Nothing will happen,’ he reassured her.
    Nothing? Megan took a deep breath, having a hard time concentrating. Then, a strange fact came to her: Ryan had power over her and she secretly liked it. There was nothing she could do but wait and see what would happen next. Morally, of course, she resented being forced into an engagement, but, sinfully speaking, she kind of liked that he had the balls to even try blackmailing her.
    ‘How can you know nothing will happen?’ Megan found herself asking. She glanced to the strong hand by her knee, remembering what they felt like on her hips as he pulled and pushed with such gentle force. The moment should have been a cold and methodical memory so she couldn’t be obsessed by it. Instead, it was all she could think about.
    ‘Tea leaves,’ he said.
    It took Megan a moment to process his words. Eyes rounding, she looked at his face. He smirked in amusement. Unable to help herself, she gave a small laugh. ‘You wouldn’t joke about that if it had been your mother who tried to keep you out of the state volleyball game because the