Chapter 3 - Altitude and Appetites
The jet climbed through twenty thousand feet, breaking out of the turbulent storm clouds into the quiet, starlit silence of the upper atmosphere. The seatbelt sign turned off with a soft chime.
In the main cabin, Mateo had fallen asleep, his small hand tucked safely under Khloe’s palm as she sat on the carpet beside him. She gently pulled her hand away, covered him with a cashmere blanket, and stood up to return to her duties.
Silas was sitting at the dining table, a glass of unopened amber whiskey sitting before him. He wasn't looking at his tablet or his encrypted phone. He was watching her.
“He hasn't slept four hours straight since his hearing started fading,” Silas said as Khloe approached to clean the service tray.
“He was exhausted from trying to read your body language, Mr. Costello,” Khloe said quietly, picking up the unused glasses. “Deaf children expend double the mental energy just trying to navigate a room of hearing adults.”
“Sit down, Khloe.”
It wasn't a command born of arrogance; it was a request from a man out of his depth.
Khloe hesitated, adhering to protocol. “Sir, flight attendants are required—”
“I own the charter company that owns this aircraft,” Silas cut in smoothly. “Sit down. Please.”
Khloe smoothed her uniform skirt and sat opposite him at the wide walnut table. Up close, Silas Costello was magnetic in a dangerous, dark way. He possessed the quiet authority of someone who didn't need to raise his voice to order a man's execution, yet there was a deep, raw pain in his eyes that no amount of money could fix.
“Teach me,” Silas said simply.
Khloe blinked. “Teach you what?”
“What you did with your hands,” Silas said, leaning forward, resting his powerful forearms on the table. “Teach me how to say what you said to him.”
Khloe looked at the powerful mob boss, then back at the sleeping boy. “Sign language isn't just trick hand shapes, Mr. Costello. It’s a culture. It’s a complete language of facial expression and space. You can’t learn it in a three-hour flight to Chicago.”
“Then start with one word,” Silas insisted, his dark eyes burning with fierce determination. “Show me how to tell my son I’m sorry.”
Khloe looked at him for a long moment, assessing his sincerity. She saw no deception in his face, only a desperate father reaching for a bridge to his child.
“Alright,” Khloe said softly.
She raised her right hand, curling it into a soft fist over her heart, and moved it in small, clockwise circles against her chest.
“This is Sorry,” Khloe explained, her voice dropping to an intimate whisper so as not to wake the boy. “You rub your heart. You show that the regret comes from inside you. Your face must show it too—you can't sign sorry with a cold, angry face. You have to soften your eyes.”
Silas watched her hand, then raised his own large, calloused fist. He placed it over his chest. His movements were stiff, awkward, like a soldier trying to play a delicate piano.
“Like this?” he asked.
“Softer,” Khloe guided gently. Without thinking, she reached across the table and touched his hand, guiding his knuckles in a gentle circle over his heart. “Relax your fingers. Look at me... soften your jaw.”
The moment her warm, soft fingers touched his, a sudden spark of electricity snapped through the quiet cabin. Silas froze, his breath catching in his throat. He looked up from his hand to her face, his gaze locking onto her blue eyes with an intensity that made Khloe’s heart skip a beat.
She pulled her hand back quickly, a faint blush warming her cheeks. “That... that is how you sign Sorry.”
Before Silas could speak, the cabin telephone chimed loudly.
May you like
Victor stepped up from the rear security lounge, holding a satellite phone with a darkened expression. “Boss. It’s Chicago. We have a situation at the Midway terminal. The Moretti group knows we’re landing early.”
The atmosphere in the cabin instantly shifted back to ice. The desperate father vanished, replaced in a fraction of a second by the dangerous, calculating titan of the Chicago underworld.
