Ten seconds later, the heavy door unlocked and clicked open, and Luca stepped out, his pilot’s cap in his hand, a last confident trace of a smirk still lingering on his mouth — the smirk of a man who has just done a grand romantic thing and is pleased with himself — until his eyes met mine.

The smirk vanished.

His jaw dropped.

His eyes darted past me toward first class, then snapped back to my face, and he went as ash-white as his crisp uniform shirt.

“Jessi?” he stammered, his voice dropping to a panicked whisper.

“What — what are you doing here?

You’re supposed to be at home.”

And there it was, the whole of him, in that one sentence.