Page 27 of Something Unprofessional

Ugh. This felt like a trap. He should have taken the subway like he planned. The last thing he needed was to be in an enclosed space with Gabe for longer than necessary. After the last week, he’d learned that too long in the same room and he either wanted to wrap himself around Daddy like Owen with one of his stuffies or smack the cocky little smirk off Gabe’s face. There was no in-between.

Keeping things professional was the worst idea he’d ever had, but he couldn’t deny it was the right thing to do. Gabe may have apologized for stepping out of line about Remy, but it had just reaffirmed Ev’s decision. A relationship with his boss—no matter how good it felt in the moment—wasn’t worth the risk.

If only he could stop the second thoughts.

He was horny and hard up—that was all. He’d gotten a taste of having a Daddy again and then called it off. On top of that, he was pretty sure Gabe was intentionally making everything harder. Like, who gave him the right to sit in chairs like that? Or drink coffee? Or wear those pants? Everything about him should be illegal.

Ev just needed to be strong. Get some space. Date people he didn’t work for. Separate “Daddy” from “Gabe” until they stopped meshing in his head and sending him spiraling.

It was amazing howmuch less flying sucked with TSA PreCheck and priority boarding. They breezed through and were settled in their first-class seats in record time.

“May I take your coats?” a flight attendant asked, startling Ev out of his exploration of the seat buttons. Oh. That was nice. He handed his over after retrieving his phone, earbuds, wallet, and charger from the pockets. He caught Gabe watching him and rolled his eyes.

“What?” He tucked everything except his phone into the backpack between his feet, then stretched and settled back. Wow, this was a shocking amount of space. The seat was wide and cushy, and he couldn’t touch the one in front of him, even when he stretched his legs all the way out. They were in the center of the plane, where the seats were just two across, with a large console between him and Gabe. Ev pressed a weird-lookingbutton, then squeaked in surprise when a divider started to rise out of the console. He lowered it again with a mumbled “Sorry” when Gabe shot him a glance. A moment later, the flight attendant was back and offered Ev a flute of champagne, which he accepted after seeing Gabe had as well.

“If you were any more wide-eyed, I could start calling you Bambi,” Gabe told him, amusement coloring his tone. “Have you not flown with Finn and Xavier? His jet is much more impressive than this.”

Ev took a sip of his champagne, then rubbed his nose vigorously when bubbles went straight up it. “No. They offered to fly me down for New Year’s, but I had plans already.” He avoided looking at Gabe by grabbing a cardstock labeled “Menu” and scanning it. They both knew how those plans had turned out.

Wow, there were a lot of options. It was practically a whole restaurant up here. He put the menu back, then busied himself exploring the rest of his little area until they were taxiing toward the runway and he needed to pay attention to the safety instructions. Gabe didn’t seem to be on board with the rules. He’d finished his drink and had his eyes closed. Ev reached over and poked him. “Shouldn’t you be listening?”

Gabe caught his wrist without opening his eyes, his big hands making Ev’s bones look fragile. “I could probably give the speech myself by now. It’s not my first rodeo.”

“Clearly,” Ev grumbled as he tried to pull his arm back. Gabe held him captive for long enough that Ev started to wonder what he was planning. Then Gabe released him with a sigh. Evmade sure he was fully on his side of the divider, then grabbed his champagne and took a gulp, hoping the fizzy bubbles would distract him from the phantom warmth of Gabe’s touch.

It wasn’t long before they were in the air. The flight attendant took their food orders and offered blankets and pillows if they wanted to sleep. Ev distracted himself a while longer by getting his space set up, but he was restless. None of the movies caught his interest, and he felt weird about pulling out his Switch in front of the other first-class flyers. The guy across from him was wearing a full three-piece suit first thing in the morning while he typed furiously on his laptop, and the lady a row up looked like she’d stepped out of a salon or something. Normally, he wouldn’t care what any of those people thought, but he did care what Gabe thought, and he didn’t want people to give his boss weird looks if Ev got too into his game.

“Everett, stop.”

Ev blinked at his name and glanced at Gabe, only to find that he was watching Ev’s mouth. Ev looked down and found that he was biting his cuticles, while his knee bounced a mile a minute. He forced himself to stop both things. “Sorry. I’m not great at sitting still for this long. Or being bored.” He shrugged and pushed his hands under his thighs to hopefully keep them out of his mouth.

“Did you not bring anything to do?” Gabe asked, gesturing to his own laptop balanced on his extra-wide tray table.

Ev shrugged again, which was awkward when he couldn’t move his hands. “I have my Switch, but…” He trailed off and bit the inside of his lip.

“Why aren’t you using it?” Gabe said, giving Ev a curious look.

Ev made a face, then glanced around to see if anyone was paying attention to them. “I can get kind of…enthusiastic about video games.”

Gabe’s lips twitched with amusement. “I see. Well, how about I keep an eye on things? And if I think you’re disturbing anyone, I’ll let you know.”

Ev was still unsure, but the temptation was too strong. He grabbed his Switch from his bag and powered it on. He shimmied in his seat as his game loaded, flashing Gabe a grateful grin that Gabe returned. This was so much better. Video games were about the only thing that made time fly by. Fly by. Hah! Well, the piano did too, but he didn’t have one of those at 30,000 feet.

He lost time until their food was suddenly being delivered. “Oh!” he exclaimed. “It’s so fancy.” He flicked a nail against the fork, surprised to find that it was actual metal. The food was equally nice, with some kind of omelet, potato wedges, a pastry, fruit, yogurt, and juice. Ev went for the pastry first, but his hand froze when he heard a throat clear. He looked over at Gabe, who was holding a washcloth.

“For your hands,” Gabe said, his tone no-nonsense. Ev took it. It was warm. When he was done cleaning his hands, he went for the pastry again, but again, Gabe stopped him. “You’ve hada sugar bomb in coffee form and champagne so far today. Eat your omelet first.”

“Yes, Da—Sir,” Ev said, wincing when he barely caught himself, then winced again at the automatic “Sir.” What the fuck was wrong with him this morning? He picked up his fork and dug into the eggs. They were good. He cleared that, his potato wedges, and the fruit before glancing back at Gabe in question. He got a nod that made him grin, then dove for his pastry. He groaned at the buttery, flaky dough and the warm chocolate filling. So fucking good. He licked his lips and caught Gabe watching. Ev’s pulse sped up at the heat and hunger in Gabe’s eyes. He took a shaky breath and forced himself to turn away.No. Be good, Ev. We’ve discussed this.

But crap, he was bad at boundaries when he was feeling little. It was just too easy to do what Daddy—Gabe told him. Gabe wasn’t helping either, with his bedroom eyes and his Dom voice invading Ev’s brain.

Someone get him off this plane.

The lobby was purechaos, like everyone who was even tangentially involved in the entertainment industry was in town and they’d all picked this same hotel. Gabe was stopped just inside the doors by a group he knew, so Ev continued ahead to get them checked in. After waiting in a never-ending line, hemade it up to the counter and handed over the corporate card for the rooms.

“I’m sorry, sir,” the front desk clerk said, not sounding sorry at all. “I’m only seeing one room under this number.” He pursed his lips and slid the card back across the counter. “Could it be under a different card?”

That couldn’t be right. Ev had reserved the rooms himself. And he’d used the corporate card for both. “Can you check under my name? Everett Bailey? Or my boss, Gabriel Diaz?” His stomach twisted anxiously while the man searched. He hoped he hadn’t messed something up. He hated making mistakes.

---