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“That man looks like he’s waiting for us to get out of the plane.” She gestured toward the man in question, whose unmoving posture was starting to give her the creeps.
“Let him wait.” He glanced again at the man, then stilled. “New plan. How’d you like this flight to be comped?”
“You mean, the flight I already paid for?”
“Okay, your next flight. You’ll want to leave someday, right? Probably soon? I’ll fly you back whenever you want, no charge. Just need a little favor.”
“What favor?” Suspicious, she took another look at the alert man waiting next to the little shed, with the vast snowy ridge rising behind him. They really were isolated out here. Was that a rifle propped against the shed?
“Nothing much. Just pretend you’re with me.”
“With you?”
“Yeah. With me.” He looked extremely uncomfortable as he repeated the words. “Here with me.”
“Like a date to the middle of nowhere?”
“Yes. More or less. It’ll benefit you too. If the guys around here think you’re with me, no one will bug you.”
“But otherwise they would?”
“It’s remote. Not a lot of single women. Especially ones who…look like you.” Now he looked even more uncomfortable.
“Is that a compliment I hear?” Suddenly she realized she was enjoying this conversation. “Aw, that’s what I just adore about you, Sammy. Your sweet-talking way with words.” She leaned across the cramped cockpit and planted a kiss on his cheek. His dark layer of scruff was softer that she had expected. It left her lips with a nice tingle. “This is as far as I’ll go when it comes to physical contact, by the way.”
“That’s more than enough.” He forced a smile. “No need to go any further.”
“But if you’re my boyfriend…” she teased.
“I’m not. No one would believe that.”
She drew back, a little wounded.
“Not because of you,” he snapped. “Because they know me. I’m not a boyfriend kind of guy. So are we good?”
“I don’t know, I feel like we should iron out the details a little more. Is this our first date? Second? I assume we’re considering sleeping together if we haven’t already, why else would I come all the way out here? Unless you’re stringing me along and making me think I have a chance at that hot bod of yours?—”
“Never mind,” he said through gritted teeth as he pushed open the door and prepared to swing himself to the ground.
She burst out laughing. “Oh man, I knew I’d get a chance to get you back for scaring the life out of me with that flight. I’m kidding, of course. Will you throw in a ride to town along with the free flight?”
“Only if you don’t give me any more relationship PTSD.”
His expression mirrored the storm clouds amassing against the peaks to their east. “I hear you, man. I’m not a relationship person either. I accept your terms, honeybunch. Now how do I get out of this thing?”
“You wait where you are.”
He hopped to the ground and strode around the still gently rotating props, sparing a moment for a quick wave at the man coming toward them. The hatch opened and Sam offered his hand to help her disembark. A very different Sam, she noticed. His eyes held a warm welcome, and a tender smile danced on his lips, which she now noticed had an attractive curve to them.
She took his hand—strong, supportive—and let him lift her out of the plane as if she weighed forty-two pounds instead of a hundred and forty-two. “Thank you, sweetie,” she said, loud enough for the man to hear. “This place is everything you said it would be. All the stories you told, I almost didn’t believe you. But oh my. The air! The mountains!” She breathed in a deep lungful of the crystal pure air—and coughed.
“Careful, darling. When it’s this cold, best to take smaller breaths of air. Don’t want to freeze those pretty lungs of yours.”
Pretty lungs? Her cough nearly turned into a laugh, while Sam cringed at his own words.
“Sorry, I suck at this,” he whispered as he patted her gently on the back. “Just a few more seconds.”
That pat felt good, his hand strong and warm against her coat. The air really was cold, even colder than Blackbear had been—and she’d thought that was unnecessarily frigid.
