When the gate attendant called his row, Tyler strolled onto the plane, apparently none the wiser. Emily watched him go, drinking in his reckless, easy grace, the harsh angle of his jaw, the cool green of his eyes, offset beautifully by thick, dark lashes. Yes, she was definitely doing the right thing. She couldn’t just let someone like that pass her by and not do her best to save him.
Her assigned seat was near the front of the plane, so she was one of the last people to get on. She didn’t want to appear obvious, so she didn’t look for Tyler, didn’t allow herself to scan the rows or anything. No, she just settled in and fastened her seat belt. But even though she couldn’t see him, Emily knew he was back there somewhere. He wasn’t going to get away from her now.
And then the plane pulled away from the gate. A small smile curved her lips, and she felt a tingle of anticipation and exhilaration. Too late to turn back, which meant she was actually doing this. She couldn’t believe it! She had never done anything this outrageous in her life, and she was loving every minute.
“This your first flight?” The man next to her, a hearty, blustery type with bloodshot eyes and a boozy aroma, leaned in closer. “Fear of flying, huh, sweetie?”
Emily blinked. Men like this never came on to her. Why in the world would they start now? “Uh, no,” she managed. “Why would you think that?”
“You seem a little nervous,” he said, patting her hand, glomming on, squeezing warmly. “Kinda jittery. White knuckles. Poor baby.”
Eeuw. She snatched her hand away. “I’m not nervous. I’m just anxious to get to San Francisco.” She couldn’t help embroidering the truth, hoping to put him off. “Y’see, I’m a lawyer. Criminal law. I have a really important case. A murder case. My client murdered a guy who sexually harassed her. We’re claiming justifiable homicide.”
“Okay, I get the picture.” Mr. Boozy turned his attention to the stewardess, intent on snagging an early cocktail, and Emily leaned back and shut her eyes.
There were no bumps, no turbulence, nothing. And it was taking forever.
While Mr. Boozy tossed back miniature bottles of every color and type, Emily did her best to be patient. She finished off the Trick McCall book before they were even past Iowa. After that, she took a nap, thumbed through the magazine, filled in the crossword puzzle, gazed out her window. She even pulled the odious Bentley file out of her briefcase and worked on that for a while. But this waiting stuff was driving her bananas.
She was simply gazing at the back of the seat in front of her when the flight attendant held out a napkin and a bag of pretzels. “Would you like something to drink?” the woman asked pleasantly.
Although Emily waved off the stewardess, the guy next to her made up for her and then some. He had about ten empty bottles lined up on his tray, with a tiny Scotch, a tiny bourbon and four or five wines in different colors. He wasn’t just drinking, he was having a one-man tasting party.
With a jaded eye, Emily watched him plow through his liquor supply. At least he was a fairly quiet drunk. Then he turned to ask her if she wanted to try the cognac and knocked the whole uncapped bottle off his tray and into her lap. With cold, potent-smelling liquid seeping into her thigh, Emily realized those tiny bottles held a lot more than she would have thought.
The icky man did his best to blot at her with his napkin, but it didn’t help. So, for two hours, she sat there, stuck in her puddle of brandy, willing the plane to get its tail fin to San Francisco on the double so she could get out of there before she started shoving little bottles down Mr. Boozy’s throat.
Finally, blessedly, they were there, their gate was hooked up, and she gathered her heavy briefcase and her purse and bolted off the airplane as if there were no tomorrow.
A traffic jam behind her clogged the jetway, and she decided she surely had time to nip into the rest room and splash some water on her cognac-soaked skirt. She was in and out in record time—not that it really helped the cognac problem—but her gate had cleared by now, and Tyler was nowhere to be seen.
“What now?” Emily chewed her thumbnail, glancing up and down the concourse for a glimpse of that familiar leather jacket. Where could he have gone?
Hotfooting it in the general direction of ground transportation, she wished she wasn’t wearing pumps or hauling that stupid, cumbersome briefcase with the laptop in it. Was she gasping with exertion? Or starting to hyperventilate?
And where the hell had Tyler disappeared to?
Huffing and puffing, Emily took a decisive turn toward the taxi arrow. Tyler seemed like a cab kind of guy, didn’t he? Rather than a limo or a shuttle, she thought a taxi would definitely be the best bet—
“Taxi, miss?” When she was almost at the curb, a man suddenly appeared out of nowhere and reached for her briefcase.
Emily whirled in his direction, skidding to a stop, bumping into the cab driver, as she saw—oh, my God!—Tyler pop up like a mirage right in front of her.
She’d not only found him, she’d practically fallen on top of him.
The cabbie said, “You share cab, miss, yes?” and wrenched her briefcase out of her hand. He’d already tossed it into the trunk of the taxi, so there wasn’t much she could do but get in. Oh, God. She was supposed to be following the mysterious Tyler, not sharing the back seat of a cab with him!
Tyler waited, staring right at her, holding the door as she scooted inside. No chance of being inconspicuous now. She tried hard to manage her entrance with a modicum of grace, but it was impossible with those stormy green eyes staring a hole in her. She was flushed and breathless and she smelled as if she’d just taken a dip in a distillery vat. What kind of impression was she going to make? Besides idiotic, of course.
“Where we goin’?” the cabbie asked as Tyler folded his long, lean body in after her, stowing his duffel bag on the floor at his feet.
Tyler glanced her way, clearly giving her the first shot.
“I, uh…” She trailed off, tongue-tied. “I’m thinking.”
He shrugged. “Okay, well, I need to go to North Beach. Take Stockton—I’ll tell you where to stop.”
Emily couldn’t believe it, but she actually had the presence of mind to murmur, “What a coincidence. That’s exactly where I’m going.”
As the driver merged with traffic, sailing off into a sunny San Francisco afternoon, a long pause hovered over the back seat. Tyler’s gaze measured her, held her, as she waited for him to say something. Finally he offered, “You don’t look like the North Beach type.”
“Oh, really?” She had no idea what that meant. She’d never even heard of North Beach. Did he expect her to be carrying a towel and suntan lotion? “Well, you never know, do you?” she asked brightly. “Maybe I’ve got my swimsuit in my briefcase.”
Now she saw the spark of something else in his eyes. Humor? “There’s no beach at North Beach,” he told her calmly. “Are you sure you’re going to the right place?”
“Oh, I’m sure. I was just joking. About the swim-suit, I mean.”
Again silence hung between them. He shrugged. “Okay, if you’re sure.”
She wished he would stop staring like that. Miserable, Emily pulled on the hem of her soggy skirt and retreated into the far corner of the seat.
Still he was awfully close. Too close. And so very sexy. Even in repose, he had this hard-edged, smoky attitude that just screamed sex and lust and bad, bad things. It was like sitting two inches from a bonfire. She knew she shouldn’t touch, but she was mesmerized, bewitched by the dancing flames.
You know what happens if you start playing with fire, a panicky internal voice reminded her. You come away with third-degree burns.
Ooh. Bad thing to think