Chapter One: Sainted – Heather Slade

CODE NAME: SAINT

He was a spy seeking redemption.
She was a bride left at the altar.
In each other, they discovered a love worth fighting for.

SAINT
I was what some called a playboy or a rogue. I didn’t think love was a possibility in my life, especially after I became a spy. Then I met Harper Godfrey on a plane, and everything changed. As I helped her rebuild her life, I found myself falling deeper in love and longing for a future I never thought possible. But with a dangerous mission looming and family complications threatening our happiness, I’ll have to fight harder than ever to keep the woman who’s become my everything.

HARPER
When my fiancé left me at the altar, I thought my life was over. Then I met Saint on the flight that was supposed to be my honeymoon. His kindness and support helped me rediscover my dreams and find a love I never knew existed. But as Saint’s work takes him into danger, I’m left wondering if our happiness can survive the perils of his world and the shadows of both our pasts.

CHAPTER ONE

I flexed my hands, stiff from clenching my fists so hard there were nail marks in my palms.

I hated flying.

Not that I had much experience with it. Today was only the second time I’d been on a plane. The first, I wasn’t alone like I was today. Then I’d been with my fiancé. The man who was supposed to become my husband. Keyword: was. As of this morning.

Since he wasn’t, I was on a plane alone, sitting in first class with an empty seat beside me. Like that song by the country singer—I should get drunk. What was the line? Drink cheap champagne from a real glass? Except the glasses weren’t real.

I swirled the ice melting in the plastic cup, wishing I’d asked for something stronger than soda. I’d tell the stewardess—flight attendant, as my ex-fiancé had corrected me on my first flight—I’d changed my mind, but she was otherwise engaged, talking to a ridiculously handsome man who’d just boarded the plane. I couldn’t blame her. He was hot. Beautiful, really. His sandy-blond hair looked just this side of shaggy, and his skin was tanned from the sun. When he spoke, though, God, that English accent!

It made sense he would be British, since I was on a nonstop flight to London.

London—where I was supposed to honeymoon with Douchey Dave, as my maid of honor, Mouse, had called him when she had to tell me he wasn’t coming. He wasn’t just late, hadn’t been in a horrible accident, or gotten lost on the way to the church. He’d changed his mind. He didn’t want to get married. Not today. Or any other day.

She’d convinced me I should go to London without him. “He paid for first-class seats; don’t you dare let them go to waste,” she insisted. She hadn’t needed to say it twice. Although I would never admit it to her or anyone else, the real reason I showed up at the airport was that I thought Dave might too.

I closed my eyes and rested my head against the seat, shaking it at my own stupidity.

“Hello.”

I opened my eyes and looked into the sapphire-blue ones of the gorgeous man with the English accent, who was putting something in the bin above my row of seats while the enraptured flight attendant held his drink.

The last thing I expected was for him to sit down in Douchey Dave’s seat, but since the doors were now closed and locked, I had to accept the fact that my non-husband wasn’t coming.

“Hello,” I responded when he set his drink on the flat surface between our two seats, sat down, and fastened his seat belt. I pulled the emergency card from the seat pocket and listened as the woman—who couldn’t tear her eyes from the man seated beside me—explained what passengers should do in the event of an emergency.

“You’re the only person I’ve ever seen follow along, let alone pay attention,” said my row mate.

“It’s only my second time on a plane.” I glanced with envy at the drink the Englishman nursed.

“And you’re traveling all the way to London?”

“That’s right.”

“Brave girl.”

“Not really,” I mumbled. When it didn’t appear he’d heard me and I saw him looking at something on his phone, I turned away and stared out the window.

“Bugger me,” he muttered. Maybe his day was as bad as mine. Doubtful since I was going on my honeymoon without a husband.

I turned and held up my plastic cup when I heard the woman ask if she could bring another drink. Before I could respond, she was gone.

“Bad form,” the man beside me said under his breath. “Did you want something?”

“Yes.”

“What?”

“What what?”

He smiled. “Would you like?”

I bit my bottom lip. The main reason I hadn’t ordered anything earlier was because I had no idea what to ask for. “Whatever you’re having,” I said when I saw the woman returning.

“Another, if you would, please.” He pointed to his glass. “And a crack of champagne.”

“Certainly,” she said with a smile. For him. Not me. She hadn’t looked at me since shortly after I boarded and she brought me a soda. I wasn’t sure she’d glanced at me then, even when I thanked her.

She set both bottles and a fresh cup of ice in front of him, and he poured a little from each before handing it to me. “This is called a scotch fizz. You may fancy this a bit more than the straight stuff.”

I took a sip, coughed, and sputtered when simultaneously the bubbles went up my nose and the liquid burned my throat.

“Right,” he mumbled, taking the drink from my hand. “Let’s try something a little tamer.”

“It’s fine. Really.”

He unfastened his seat belt and walked the two rows to the front. When he returned a minute later with yet another bottle of liquor and a Coke, he proceeded to fill the glass with the soda, added a small amount of alcohol to it, and gave it to me.

“Thank you, um, sir.”

When I took a sip, it tasted almost the same as what I’d had earlier without any alcohol in it. I set it on the tray, and he added more rum to it.

“Drink up. We’re about to taxi for takeoff,” he said, downing what was in his glass. He tossed it in the bag one of the other attendants held out to him. I did the same after guzzling what was mainly Coke.

“I’m Niven,” he said, holding out his hand.

I shook it. “Harper, and thank you.”

“Not at all.”

I gripped the armrests as the plane gained speed, and squeezed my eyes shut. If Dave were with me, it would be his hand I held rather than part of my seat. I felt my cheeks heat, remembering how embarrassed I’d been when my stepmother burst into the anteroom where I’d been ensconced for what felt like hours. “I can’t believe you were jilted at the altar,” she’d exclaimed. That had earned her a glare from my mother, who asked her to leave so she could speak with me privately.

“I can’t stand that woman,” she’d muttered under her breath. Her sentiment didn’t come as any surprise, given my father had left her for the “skeevy bitch.”

“What will you do?” she’d asked.

“I’m going to London as planned.”

My mother raised a brow.

“As Mouse said, it’s paid for, so I should take the opportunity to travel.”

She hadn’t had much more to say on the subject. I knew she thought I wouldn’t go through with it. Yet here I was, terrified I was making a huge mistake but at least proving her wrong.

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