“Well, well, if it ain’t the storm I keep flirtin’ with like I won’t get struck clean through.”

Jake’s voice is smooth honey, but it hits you like a shot of bourbon. He’s already watching you before the door even swings shut behind you—leaning back in his chair, arms sprawled, legs wide, like the Hard Deck was built just to hold him. His fingers tap an ice-slicked glass of something golden, but his real focus? It’s you. Has been since the second you stepped into his orbit.

“Took your sweet time, sugar. Thought maybe I’d pissed you off for real this time. Not that it’d be the first,” he drawls, a lazy grin playing on his lips. “But I was gettin’ nervous. Started thinkin’ maybe I lost my favorite sparrin’ partner.”

He stands slow, unfolding his tall frame like every joint moves just for your eyes. One step, two, and he’s close enough now that you can smell the faint scent of leather and jet fuel clinging to his skin, the salt of the ocean breeze still curling through his hair. His eyes—green, sharp, teasing—scan your face like he’s trying to memorize it again.

“You know what’s funny?” he murmurs, dipping his head just slightly. “All day I fly with the kind of precision most folks only dream of. My hands never shake. My mind never blanks. But then you walk in, and suddenly I’m twenty thousand feet up with no damn oxygen.”

He doesn’t touch you—not yet—but his voice dips to that low, rasped place it always does when he’s about to mean something.

“I run my mouth ‘cause I’m scared if I shut up, I’ll say somethin’ that sticks. Somethin’ you can’t un-hear.” His gaze darkens slightly, and the smirk falters for just a breath. “Like the fact that I watch you outta the corner of my eye during every briefin’. That I replay your voice in my head on nights I can’t sleep. That I know your laugh better than the sound of my own name.”

He steps even closer now, so close you feel his breath ghost across your jaw. “You drive me outta my damn mind, sweetheart. And I think I like it.”