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First Rob, and then Daddy, and now this? Of all the airplanes in all the cities in all the world, what were the odds that the man who’d stolen her heart and her virginity—and then promptly forgotten she was alive—would be sitting next to her on the most poignant plane ride of her life? Like twenty-seven times ten to the ninth power. Maybe even thirty-one times ten to the—
She cut herself off. The actual odds so weren’t the point. The point was, Heath was here. Goddammit.
If she actually believed in fate, she might think that Mistress Kailana had given up on reading the stars and was now hurling them directly at her.
“Hello, Lyric,” Heath said as he reached into the basket for a bottle of Scotch. “Long time no see.”
* * *
Chapter 3
* * *
The look of horror on Lyric’s face was all Wile E. Coyote right before the Road Runner blew him up. She yanked the basket away so fast it was amazing the force of it didn’t send her tumbling into the aisle. Which was something Heath would pay to see—with as tight as that duct tape was wrapped around her, he figured she’d end up flailing around on her back, her mighty fine legs waving in the air. Like a turtle that had been turned over. Or a Victoria’s Secret model whose eighty-pound wings had sent her toppling off the runway.
He’d seen both and had to admit, he much preferred the angel. Though Lyric and her—he glanced down at the long, tanned expanse of leg she was currently showing—mighty fine gams looked like they would put on a spectacle even Victoria’s Secret couldn’t match.
Then again, she kind of already had. It was funny, but he remembered her as skinny and nerdy with baggy clothes and no fashion sense. The fashion sense hadn’t changed, but everything else had filled out in the last twelve years, which the duct-tape mummy dress made abundantly clear.
Leave it to Lyric to make an entrance like that. Hollywood couldn’t think this shit up, and neither could any normal person. Trouble not only found her, it tackled her and hung on for dear life. Some people were naturally clumsy, but Lyric had taken that to a whole new level. If there was a way to fall in it, spill it, slip on it, or drop it, she’d find a way … or a way would find her.
On one occasion, in elementary school, when his fifth- and her fourth-grade classes had taken a joint field trip to the Archway cookie company, an entire vat of gingersnap cookie dough had managed to fall on her head. No one else had gotten so much as a molecule on them, but Lyric had been covered. Then in middle school, there’d been the petting zoo incident—a goat had eaten her dress while she was still wearing it.
He glanced over—now that he thought about it, her life seemed to be a series of wardrobe mishaps. Lucky him, today’s involved skintight duct tape.
It had taken every ounce of concentration he had not to lower the newspaper when she’d sat down and her dress had ripped so loudly. Only the fact that the guy one row up was wearing a Fort Worth Wranglers jersey—with Heath’s number on it, in fact—had kept that paper in place. After the news he’d gotten from his PT today, the last thing he wanted was to smile and sign autograph books—or, more likely, breasts, as “Sign My Tits” had become his unfortunate trademark and his fans’ battle cry after he’d spent a particularly long night at a gentlemen’s club his rookie year. The next day ESPN had dubbed him “the Deuce,” and he’d been signing chests ever since. Even after ten years in the NFL and two Super Bowl rings, he hadn’t been able to shake the name.
But once he’d realized it was Lyric next to him, talking to her became so much more important than hiding his anonymity. After all, the two of them had been driving each other crazy since kindergarten. Though, if he counted that unfortunate finger painting episode, it might have started as early as the Mother’s Day Out program at the First Baptist Church of San Angelo.
“Come on, Lyric,” he coaxed as he made another reach for one of the small bottles of Scotch. “You know you don’t like Johnnie Walker. You’re more a Mike’s Hard Lemonade girl.” If he remembered correctly, JW was more her twin, Harmony’s, drink. Back in the day the three of them had spent more than one night in high school getting drunk and talking about how they were going to take on the world. Right up until he’d slept with Harmony, and she’d ripped his heart out of his chest.
Lyric’s big, round blue eyes—which he’d noticed weren’t close to being the curviest thing about her—turned glacial. “Scotch isn’t the only thing on this plane I don’t like, but it looks like I’ll have to adapt.”
He was baffled by her hostility, especially considering they’d once been really good friends. But from the day Harmony had dumped him, Lyric had treated him like he had a social disease. He’d understood at the time—or at least, he’d told himself he had. Everyone knew girls stuck together over things like that. But twelve years was a long time to hold a grudge when he hadn’t actually done anything wrong.
She turned her back on him—or tried to, anyway. That duct-taped dress of hers made it almost impossible for her to move. Which was good for him, since it gave him a chance to grab for the Johnnie Walker. Painkillers be damned. If he was going to deal with her anger-management issues, he needed a drink.
He’d obviously underestimated Lyric’s scorn for him, however, because she jerked the basket away so fast that a bottle of Jim Beam shot out and beaned the guy across the aisle right in the temple. The bottle bounced off the guy’s head, hit his knee, and tumbled to the floor.
The three of them turned as one to watch as it rolled down the aisle into coach.
After it disappeared, Lyric’s latest victim turned in their direction. With a sinking heart, Heath watched as his eyes widened with recognition. “He
y, aren’t you—” The guy didn’t bother finishing the sentence. Instead, he leaped the three feet across the aisle. “I’m a huge fan.”
With a long, put-upon sigh, Heath sat forward and accepted his fate. This was exactly what he’d been dreading all along, though he’d been certain the first shot would have come from Wranglers Jersey in front of him—hence the newspaper camouflage. Pulling a napkin out of the basket, he grabbed a pen out of his pocket and scrawled his signature across the American Airlines logo. Then he handed it to the guy with a smile that was more fake than their flight attendant’s tan. Under the circumstances, it was the best he could do. Fame came at a price, and that one bottle of Jim Beam was going to end up costing him eight hours of peace and quiet.
“I’m sorry. Can we talk later? Right now I’m catching up with an old friend.”
At the “old friend,” Lyric’s eyes cut over to him.
The guy took the napkin, wiped his hands with it, and tossed it on the floor behind him. “Dr. Wright, I saw your last video podcast on the Crab Nebula—it was amazing.” There was so much reverence in the guy’s voice, he might have been talking to Jesus or Joe Namath.
Lyric straightened her shoulders, smoothed her hair down, and when she smiled, there was nothing fake about it. “Thanks. Next week, I’m doing quasar output and the effects on dark matter.”
“Oh my God. Oh my God. I can’t wait!” His eyes practically glowed with the fervor of the zealot.
All around them, heads were turning to check out the commotion. Terrified of Wranglers Jersey one row ahead, Heath tried to slink down to hide behind the chair in front of him. But at six foot five and two forty, wiggle room didn’t exist. Add in the broken knee and the reading light shining down like a spotlight, and he might as well have been the featured performer at the Super Bowl halftime show.
