Page 9 of Dial F for Finance

My stomach drops.

Me:

How soon is ASAP?

Bennett:

Dominic is already booked on a flight tonight. I need you with him. You’re the only person who knows the contract language well enough to hold the room while he handles the relationship.

The room tilts.

Dominic. On a plane. To Tokyo. Tonight.

Dominic, whose mouth I can still feel on mine. Dominic, who carried me through the most humiliating thirty seconds of my life with more grace than I deserved, then stood on a terrace while I told him I already regretted kissing him when I didn’t. When I don’t. When the only thing I regret is saying it at all.

Thirteen hours in a business-class cabin. Three feet apart. Minimum forty-eight hours on the ground.

With a man I kissed last night and then verbally eviscerated because he had the audacity to care about consent and timing.

Me:

I’ll be ready.

Bennett:

Thank you. You should have an email in your inbox with the details. Wheels up at seven forty.

I stare at the screen for a full beat, towel dripping onto the bathmat, pulse suddenly doing entirely too much for a Sunday morning.

Tokyo.

With Dominic.

Immediately after I all but threw myself at him and then accused him of sanctimony when he declined to take advantage of me.

Excellent. Perfect. Truly no notes.

I close my eyes and let my forehead thunk against the mirror.

“Well,” I tell my reflection. “At least the humiliation is going international this time.”

CHAPTER 1

Jenna

“You just drove past the terminal,” I say as I watch the illuminated Departure sign recede in the side-view mirror. “You missed the international off-ramp.”

“No, ma’am,” the driver says, his voice laced with the strained patience of a man who’s been dealing with type-A business lunatics since the Reagan era. “Instructions were to take you to Signature Aviation. Special manifest.”

It takes a moment for this to compute. My mind, currently running on a cocktail of caffeine and humiliation, is not optimized for last-minute logistics.

“That’s private,” I say. Which is not a question, but he answers anyway.

“Yes, ma’am.”

I glance down at the email from this morning, let my eyes trace over the emergency all-caps subject line:

CHICAGO-TOKYO: YOUR ITINERARY. DO NOT MISS