Authors: Susan Lyons
He drew the cardigan down slowly, fingers brushing the bare skin of my upper arm, and again I tingled all over. His touch felt like a deliberate caress, but that must have been my imagination.
I slanted a glance sideways and saw the gleam in his eyes that I’d noticed before. His gaze skimmed my shoulder, landed on my chest, and I realized the V neck of my top was pulling down as the cardigan came off. Trapped inside the sleeves, I couldn’t reach up to adjust it.
My skin heated and I knew my cheeks as well as my chest were coloring to match the reddish tone of the sleeveless top. My nipples tightened. Finally, my arm came free and I hurriedly pulled up the neckline of my top and turned my back to him so he could work on the other sleeve. And so I could hide my budding nipples. I searched for something casual to say, to mask my discomfort. “Why do Aussies do the ‘ie’ thing? Cardie for cardigan, barbie for barbecue?”
“Just lazy, I guess. Brissie for Brisbane, bickie for biscuit.”
I tried to focus on his words rather than on those warm fingers taking far too long getting the damned sweater off my other arm. “But the ‘ie’ forms are often no shorter. It can’t be laziness.”
“Huh.” He paused. “Footy for football, tinnie for a tin of beer, damned if you’re not right. Guess it’s our way of making things a little friendlier.” With a final seductive stroke, he slid the sweater free. “There you go. Now, let’s see what others I can think of. Sunnies for sunglasses.”
I turned to face him and took the sweater he handed me. “Thanks.”
“Hottie for…” He paused, eyes twinkling.
Damn, he was thinking back to the bookstore clerk’s comment about him being hot, and my response. Crossing my arms across my chest, trying to salvage my composure, I said, “Hottie? That’s one I haven’t heard.”
The corners of his mouth twitched. “That’d be short for hot water bottle.”
I had to chuckle. He’d set me up perfectly. “Not something I’ve had much need of in Sydney.”
“Nah? Got something better to warm your bed?”
“That would be telling.” My gosh, was that me? Almost…flirting?
“Here you go,” a female voice broke in. I looked away from gleaming gray eyes to see a very attractive brunette flight attendant with a wide smile. “Amenity kits from L’Occitane.”
She handed us the little bags. “Mr. Black, I see you’re all settled. And you’re Ms. Fallon. How ya going?” This was the Australian way of asking everything from “How are you?” to “How’s it going?” or “How are you doing?”
“Fine, thanks.” I was surprised she’d addressed us by name. Obviously in business class the flight attendants had a list of seat assignments.
Her brow furrowed. “You’re not traveling together, are you?”
“No,” I said quickly.
The man shot me an amused glance.
“Right, then,” the woman said, face clearing and another smile flashing. “It’s a long flight, but I’ll do my best to make it a pleasant one.” Now she was looking directly at my seatmate, leaning into his space as still-boarding passengers stepped around her, and I thought she’d put a special emphasis on the word “pleasant.”
“That’s good of you, Carmen,” he said, seeming quite happy that the fabric of her uniform trousers brushed his jean-clad knee. He sent her one of those eye-crinkling smiles.
So he knew her name, too. I could see her being his type. Well, pretty much any man’s type. I gathered the two of them had been chatting—flirting?—before I arrived.
Not that I cared, except I’d as soon not be ignored when it came to service. I cleared my throat to remind her I was there. “Thank you.” I paused. “Carmen.”
She gave me a smile that looked a trifle pitying. Women like her always gave me an irrational urge to spout off the fact that I’d been awarded a PhD—summa cum laude—at the age of twenty-two. Ridiculous, because I knew perfectly well that academic credentials wouldn’t impress her. She’d be looking at my average figure, average face, average clothing, and knowing my attributes could never compete with hers.
“May I offer you a glass of champagne?” she asked me.
I swallowed the silly surge of…surely not jealousy? “That would be lovely.” The treat would be a nice start to a long trip, and maybe distract me from the man beside me.
“Same for me,” my seatmate said.
“Of course. Coming up.” Was she actually fluttering her eyelashes at him?
When she went to talk to the older couple across the aisle, he turned to me. “All psyched up for ten hours on a plane? Any ideas how to pass the time?” he asked in a suggestive tone.
Great. He was a “love the one you’re with” guy who’d flirt with whichever female was closest. Even a woman like me.
The urge to banter had left me. “I have work to do.” I slid my tray table out of the arm of my chair and slapped the exam booklets down on it.
“Yeah, happens I do, too.” Despite his words, he didn’t take out any work, just reclined his seat, adjusted the footrest, and closed his eyes.
Fine. He didn’t care whether I chatted with him. I’d got what I’d hoped for: a seatmate who would leave me alone. Not that I wanted the attention of an arrogant flirt like him, but sometimes it truly irked me that men found me so easy to ignore.
I tried to adjust my own footrest, but it didn’t cooperate, so I focused on the first exam. I’d barely started when my mobile—no, cell; I had to transition to Canadian terms again—rang.
I pulled it out of my purse and saw from call display that it was my sister Kat. There were four of us, a three-pack plus one, with the one—the unplanned afterthought—being Merilee. I was the oldest at thirty-two, the plain brainiac. Kat was a year younger, Ms. Sociability. She lived in Montreal and handled PR for a gorgeous hotel.
“Hi there,” I answered quietly. My seatmate’s eyes were still closed. “Can’t talk long, the plane’s almost loaded.” My brain was calculating time. It was five thirty at night here, which made it…“Kat, isn’t it three thirty in the morning? Are you just coming in or getting up?” Surely even a party animal like Kat wouldn’t stay out this late.
“I woke up and couldn’t get back to sleep. Did you get the e-mail I sent a few hours ago? I haven’t heard back.”
“It may be on my laptop. I downloaded e-mail before I left. I’ll look at it during the flight. Were you able to swing that leave?”
Carmen was back with the drinks. I nodded my thanks as she handed me a flute of bubbly champagne. When she placed my neighbor’s drink on his tray, his eyes opened quickly enough.
Kat was saying, “Do you know how difficult it is for me to take time off without notice?” She went on about all the people at the hotel who depended on her. My sister. Always the life of the party, be it in her social life or at her workplace.
As she spoke, my seatmate and the flight attendant chatted away, accompanied by considerable eyelash-batting on her part. Didn’t she have other passengers to attend to? Or did she plan to spend the entire trip flirting with him, like he was God’s gift to womankind?
I broke into Kat’s ramblings. “If it’s a real problem getting off work, don’t worry about it. As I said before, I can handle this.”
There was a pause. Then, “Well, of course, I forgot that you’ve already
handled
one wedding, and so successfully at that.”
Ouch. I knew my younger sisters had always resented me: my brains, the responsibility our parents had given me, the way I’d lived up to their hefty expectations. Now I’d pushed one of Kat’s buttons, so she’d retaliated by pushing one of mine. My failed marriage.
If I’d been alone, I’d have sniped back about her brilliant ability to always pick the wrong guy. However, the flirtatious Carmen had departed and the man beside me apparently had nothing better to do than sip champagne and listen to my side of the phone conversation. So I said, “Sorry. It would be great if you could get off work and help out.” I picked up my own flute and took a calming swallow.
“God, Theresa, you make it sound like it’s
your
project. It’s
ours
. All of ours. Yours and mine and Jenna’s. That’s what we agreed. We’ll work together to give Merilee the wedding of her dreams.”
I dragged a hand through my hair and rubbed my temple, where a dull throbbing signaled the beginning of a headache. “Right. Of course.” There was no question I wanted the best for my baby sister. It was just that I preferred not to work with a team. No one else, especially my sisters, ever met my standards.
“Anyhow,” Kat was saying, “if you’d have let me finish, I’d have told you I did arrange the time off. I’ll get train tickets and e-mail you the schedule. It’s about a four-day trip.”
“If you flew, you’d be home in half a day.”
“You know I don’t do planes.” Her voice held a warning edge and I could picture her face, brown eyes narrowed, that vertical frown line bisecting her forehead. She was probably on the verge of a headache, too.
Giving each other headaches was about the only thing we had in common.
I sighed. Kat was the craziest mix of traits. She was fluently bilingual, had done very well in school, held a responsible job, and had dozens of friends and the most active social life imaginable. And yet, she had an irrational fear of flying and appalling taste in men.
Not, of course, that my record with the opposite sex was any better. However, I knew better than to keep trying, whereas she was forever falling for someone new and totally wrong for her.
Knowing no amount of logic would persuade Kat to fly, I asked, “Any word from Jenna? I left her a couple voice mails and e’d her, but no response.” Jenna was the next sister, the third of our three-pack, as we’d called ourselves long before Merilee was born. A year younger than Kat, Jenna would be turning thirty soon. She had carved out her niche in the family as the flaky one.
“No. And we did all promise to keep in touch at least on a daily basis.”
“You know Jenna. She loathes any sort of rules or accountability.”
“True. But this is
important
.” Kat gave a frustrated growl. “She’s probably off in the wilderness with those birds of hers.”
Jenna, who’d never stuck with one job—or man—for more than six months, had followed a surfer boyfriend to Santa Cruz and got involved in a peregrine falcon survey. “I’ll try her again from the airplane phone once we’re under way. Uh, what’s the time in Santa Cruz?”
“Three hours different than me, so it’s like, almost one o’clock. Saturday night, Sunday morning. She’ll be out having fun, probably have her cell turned off. Or the battery will have run down because she forgot to charge it.” We shared a moment of silent understanding. “If you do connect with her,” she said, “get her to call me. I’m going to grab a couple more hours sleep, then I’ll be in at work getting things organized.”
“Tell me about it.” My secretary and I had spent a good part of the last twenty-four hours doing the same thing.
“Can’t believe we’ll all be in the same place at the same time. It’s been a while.”
“Christmas the year before last.”
A loudspeaker voice told the passengers to turn off electronic devices.
“Kat, I have to go. I’ll check e-mail and voice mail in Honolulu.”
“Right. Safe flight.”
As I shut off my cell, I was shaking my head. When my sisters and I had been growing up, there’d been a lot of competitions and petty jealousies. We’d each developed distinct personalities and interests, and those had taken us in different directions. Now, living in four different cities in three countries, we rarely spoke, much less saw each other. Of course we all loved each other, but it was easier for us to love from a distance. It was kind of sad, but that was the way the Fallon girls had turned out.
Now, thanks to Merilee, we were teaming up for the first time in ages. White lace and promises for her. For the rest of us, a little bit of hell as we tried to make nice—or nice enough—with each other to pull off a wedding in less than two weeks.
“That’s not the way to start a long trip,” the man beside me said.
“Sorry?” I turned to look at him and saw a twinkle in his gray eyes.
D
amien Black grinned at the intriguing woman in the seat beside him. The sexy prof who was marking Sydney Uni exam booklets but didn’t have an Australian accent. The woman whose conversation on her mobile had given her a stress headache.
The literary snob who thought his novels were superficial crap.
Not that he necessarily disagreed. But, hell, they were fun to write and they were damned lucrative superficial crap. He had the best fucking job in the universe: making up stories, playing with imaginary friends, and getting paid well to do it.
The prof intrigued him, and not only because she was hot in a subtle, classy way. He wondered how she’d react when she found out he was the guy whose books she’d dissed, but he was going to hold off on satisfying his curiosity. They had a long flight ahead of them, and together they could make it a hell of a lot of fun. But he stood a better chance if she got to know him before she learned his identity.
“You’ve been shaking your head and heaving sigh after sigh,” he said. “And not drinking your champers.”
She glanced at his empty glass. “Not a problem you’ve been suffering from, I see.”
Had to admit, there was a definite appeal to a woman who wasn’t afraid to use her tongue. Banter was a good start. Maybe she’d soften up and think of a friendlier use for that tongue. “Drink up. It’ll help your headache.”
She frowned. “I don’t have—” Then she winced. “Well, maybe the beginning of one.”
The flight attendant arrived with the champagne bottle and a big smile. “So sorry, I certainly don’t want to neglect you.” She filled his glass.
“Ta, Carmen.” The flashy brunette had told him her name when he’d first got on the plane and she’d recognized him.
She cocked a brow at the prof. “You don’t care for it, Ms. Fallon? Can I get you something else?”
“No, it’s fine. I was just on the phone.” She held up her closed mobile. “Which is off now, and I’m about to enjoy the champagne.”
“Good on you,” Carmen said, then gave him a wink before she moved on.
Yeah, Carmen had gushed all over him when he came on board. She’d made it clear she was available for a little action. Her, and about a hundred other girls in the two years since his first book hit the bestseller lists and he’d become a familiar face on TV talk shows. Not to mention, been voted one of the country’s ten sexiest bachelors.
The “sexy bachelor” angle had featured prominently in the promo plan his agent and publicist had developed, a fact that at first he’d found humorous but had soon worn thin. This business of women flinging themselves at him had gotten a little old. Truth was, it wasn’t all that flattering when females swarmed all over a bloke just because he was famous and supposed to be sexy. Celebrity had its disadvantages.
Truth was, the prof interested him more than Carmen. She was a turn-on, with an appealing face that wasn’t caked in makeup, a slim, shapely bod, and boobs that looked to be all her own. Plus, she intrigued him. The woman presented a challenge. Though she clearly wasn’t immune to the physical spark between them, she sure wasn’t throwing herself at him.
Could he win her over before she found out who he was?
He held out his glass to her. “Bottoms up, safe trip, don’t let the buggers get you down.” He’d have said “bastards” but figured it might piss her off.
A chuckle spluttered out of her and her eyes warmed. Those eyes reminded him of the water in a billabong: shades of reddy brown brightened by specks of blue and green, like the reflections of red rocks and trees in blue waters. As with a billabong, a bloke could stare into their depths and lose himself. Especially now, when her amusement made them sparkle as if sunshine dappled the still water.
She clicked her glass to his. “The buggers?”
“Whoever’s got you sighing like a high wind through the gum trees.”
Her lips twisted, more in rue than amusement. “My sister. Actually, all my sisters.” Her eyes widened and he sensed the information had slipped out, laughter creating a chink in her reserve. She glanced away and raised the glass to her lips.
“Ah. Families. Can’t live with ’em, can’t shoot ’em. Easiest to just avoid them.” That was his current strategy with his own family.
“True.” She gazed into her glass. “But it’s not always possible.”
“No?”
She glanced up, eyes narrowing. “I really do need to work.”
Why was she so intent on keeping him at a distance? He was about to ask when he felt a hand brush his right forearm.
“Sorry to interrupt,” Carmen purred, not sounding sorry at all. “We’re readying for takeoff. I need you to fold up your tables. You can hang on to your glasses and I’ll be by with more champagne once we’re in the air.”
He heard a quick swallow on his other side, then the prof extended her glass past him. “I’m finished. You can take this, thanks,” she said coolly. He gathered she hadn’t exactly warmed to their flight attendant.
“I’ll keep mine,” he said.
When Carmen had gone, he turned to his seatmate. “You know what they say about all work and no play.”
Her lips pressed together, their fullness folded in to make a thin line. When she released them, they were plump and a deep, natural pink. Ripe for kissing.
But her voice was chilly. “Believe me, I do. They make Theresa a dull girl. Which I am. So, you might as well get over yourself and let me get on with my work. I’m sure
Carmen
will be more than happy to let you chat her up.”
Interesting. Damien figured he was pretty damned observant for a guy—a writer had to be—and she’d just delivered a whack of information. Not only her name, but the fact that folks thought she was too serious and didn’t hold back from telling her. Now, what was that bit about Carmen? Did he detect a hint of jealousy?
This was going to be one interesting flight.
He decided to let Professor Theresa Fallon win this round. When they were in the air, having drinks and appetizers, she’d have to put the exams away.
“Okay,” he said easily. “You get on with your work then.”
Besides, it wasn’t like he didn’t have work to do himself. This wasn’t a vacation. He’d finished a weeklong book tour in Australia, had a couple days at home in Sydney to get turned around, and was now headed off for a month’s tour in the United States and Canada. With him, he had the galleys for
Gale Force
, which had to be back to his publisher in a week. And of course, there was
Scorched Earth
, the book he was currently writing. Or had been, until a plot point had hung him up.
Beside him, Theresa was again studying the exam. Absentmindedly she lifted her hand and rubbed her temple through short, gleaming auburn hair. The gesture made him focus on her slim fingers, which, even with their short, unpolished nails, had a particular feminine grace. Fingers that he’d bet would feel nicer on his skin than Carmen’s red-tipped claws.
Usually, the width of the seats in business class was an advantage, but not tonight. In economy, Theresa’s arm would’ve brushed against his on the armrest. Her bare arm against his, the constant whisper of flesh against flesh acting like the friction of two sticks being rubbed together, the way some elderly Aboriginals still made fire. Friction, heat, friction, spark, more friction—then flames.
Of course, if he and Theresa had been touching that way, he’d have had a hard-on. Just being this close to her was enough of a tease to his senses. He was aware of her every movement. Her scent—something earthy yet fresh—made him think of sex in the great outdoors.
Damien shifted, wishing he could adjust his swelling package. Trying to distract himself, he decided to work on his plot knot. He closed his eyes and reviewed what he’d written to date.
The book started with Damien’s police detective protagonist being reamed out by his superior. Although Kalti Brown had solved his last case, he refused to reveal exactly how he’d identified the bad guy, and how that criminal had come to die in a freak windstorm. Kalti’s secret was that he had a special connection with his totem spirit and the creator spirits from the Dreamtime. When bad people went against the natural laws, the spirits were as determined to punish them as was Kalti, and they worked together in an alliance that was often less than comfortable for him.
As Damien reflected, eyes shut, he was dimly aware of the plane taxiing, then taking off. Of the elderly couple across the aisle telling Carmen they were going to Vancouver to visit family, including a brand-new great-grandchild.
Kalti, now, he was a loner for obvious reasons. But his boss had decided someone should keep an eye on him. Enter Marianna, his new partner. Female, Caucasian. A hard-line, play-by-the-rules cop.
Beside him, Damien heard the prof reach for her carry-on bag and pull out something that rustled. More exam booklets, he guessed, then he returned to his musings.
Marianna was tough and career-focused, and resented being assigned to a cop who had the reputation of being a renegade. She didn’t trust Kalti and he, a keeper of secrets, couldn’t trust anyone. And yet, partners were supposed to be a team and be able to rely on each other.
The two were assigned to a couple murders that might be the work of a serial killer. There was a ritualized aspect to the killings that made Kalti suspect—
Beside him, Theresa was muttering to herself, breaking his concentration. He heard something like, “For only six thousand dollars, you, too, can look like a strawberry parfait.” And then, “Or a mummy.” His brain couldn’t make sense of what he was hearing. When she said, “Can’t weigh more than eighty pounds. If a man hugged her, she’d snap in two,” he had to open his eyes and glance over.
What he saw made him laugh. She had a bridal magazine open. “Wedding gowns? What happened to all the work you had to do?”
Her cheeks flushed to match her sleeveless top. “I thought you were asleep.”
“Hard to sleep with all that muttering,” he teased.
“Oh damn. Sorry. It’s a bad habit.”
“No worries. But I’m curious. A six-thousand-dollar strawberry parfait?”
She flipped pages and he stared at a lacy concoction the color of a strawberry milkshake. He let out a hoot. “That’s ridiculous.” Its droopy lines made him think of melting ice cream, and there was a big pouffy red something-or-other at the waist that was probably a bow but looked like a giant squishy strawberry. “Aren’t wedding gowns supposed to be white? I mean, unless you’re Asian or something.”
“Pink is the latest trend. But yes, most are white or off-white. Look at this.”
Another page flip, and he gazed at a pale, sad-looking woman whose thin body was wrapped round and round in what looked like gauze bandaging. A mummy’s wrappings. “She looks like a corpse, so I guess it’s fitting she’d be wrapped like one.”
Theresa giggled. Eyes sparkling, she turned another page. “How about this?”
No tits or ass on this one either. But God, she went beyond skinny to emaciated. “Jeez. A stick-woman.” He winced. “Scary. How could anyone find that attractive?”
She shook her head firmly, auburn hair lifting then settling. “I sure don’t.” Grimly she added, “What a horrible message it sends to young women.”
“Yeah. And take it from me, if they look like this, no guy’s ever going to marry them.” He couldn’t imagine any red-blooded man wanting to have sex with a skeleton.
And speaking of sex…Damien took the excuse to undo his seat belt, lean over, and let his arm brush hers, feeling a zing of connection.
Then, quickly, he shifted away. Shit, what was he doing? Obviously she was engaged, despite her ringless hands. So much for trying to seduce her.
Didn’t mean they couldn’t talk, though. He flipped another page, then another. “Well, this girl’s got curves. At least below the waist. Man, look at the arse on her.” Then he peered closer. “Or is that the dress, making her look so big?”
“I gather it’s called mermaid cut. Yes, it does accentuate the, uh, bottom, curving in like that then flaring out again so she can walk. Or at least hobble.”
“Yeah, she sure as hell wouldn’t be doing any waltzing in that one.”
“Waltzing?” She glanced at him quizzically. “You don’t look like the waltzing type.”
“Hey, I’m from Oz. ‘Waltzing Matilda’?” The truth was, he was one hell of a dancer.
“Yeah, right.” Her eyes crinkled with a smile. “Isn’t that song about a swagman—i.e., a hobo—dancing with his swag, meaning his skimpy bundle of possessions?”
“Damned academics,” he groused. “Take everything so literally.”
“How did you know I’m an academic?”
“Grading exams from the uni?”
“Oh, of course.”
He glanced back to the magazine. “Hate those dresses with the rigid tops that don’t move when the woman does. And why do so many of these models look miserably unhappy?”
“Way to sell a dress, eh? What’s the myth they’re selling? Isn’t it supposed to be, this is the happiest day of your life?”
“Myth? You mean you don’t buy into it?”
She shrugged. “I guess it’s nice to start out feeling that way. Even if the reality is, you’ve got more than a fifty percent chance of being miserable.”
Whoa. A cynical bride? Of course, she must figure she and her fiancé would beat the odds. “How’d you come up with that depressing statistic?”
“Roughly half of marriages end in divorce. And lots of spouses are unhappy but don’t get divorced. Ergo, there’s probably something like a quarter of marriages that are actually happy.”
Ergo?
What kind of woman said
ergo?
As for her statistics…Damien shook his head, bemused. He was thirty-three and had never met a woman who’d made him want to settle down, yet he’d kind of figured on getting married one day. Really married, in the traditional “grow old together” way. As the prof had laid out the facts, it sounded like he’d be crazy.
Absentmindedly he flipped another couple pages. Hmm, here were some dresses that were actually nice, worn by models who looked like real, attractive, smiling women. If he was Theresa, that was the designer he’d be looking at.
When he started to turn the page again, her hand caught his. “Wait.”
Her touch felt great, but she didn’t even seem aware of the contact. Instead, she stared at the magazine, transfixed. “That one. It’s lovely.” Her finger brushed the page reverently.