Mile High, page 1
Mile High
B. Cranford
Contents
Synopsis
1. Bianca
2. Bianca
3. Lucas
4. Bianca
5. Lucas
6. Bianca
7. Lucas
8. Bianca
9. Lucas
10. Bianca
The Arrival of You
Acknowledgments
About the Author
Also by B. Cranford
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or locales or persons living or dead is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2019 by Beth Cranford
No part of this work may be used, stored, reproduced or transmitted without written permission from the publisher except for brief quotations for review purposes as permitted by law.
This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This book may not be re-sold or given away to other people. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.
Cover Design: Shanoff Designs
Copy Editing: Missy Borucki
Manufactured in the United States
Synopsis
They say time flies when you’re having fun, but what about when you’re falling in love?
Bianca Evers is recovering from the end of her marriage to her college sweetheart when she’s seated next to the sexiest man she’s ever seen.
Lucas Hawke is flying home to Australia, still dreaming of something more with the right person when he encounters a beautiful woman with sad eyes.
And now they only have fifteen hours to figure out if their connection is worth upgrading—or just a layover in life . . .
For my best friend, Bianca AKA Binky Boodle.
I’ve loved you for the better part of 20 years and I wouldn’t be writing romance if not for you. Thank you for introducing me to Nalini Singh.
And thank you for always being there for me.
1
Bianca
I couldn’t stop tap, tap, tapping my passport against my hand. I knew it was a nervous habit, but I couldn’t help it.
I was nervous, after all. The decision to fly halfway around the world—during the busiest travel time of the year, no less—wasn’t one I’d made lightly.
An overhead announcement paged three people late to board their flight, and I took a long, deep breath to try and settle my nerves, my body.
I wasn’t afraid to fly—matter of fact I’d just hopped off a flight to LAX from Madison—for as long as I could remember, I’d been traveling via airplane. With family in two different states and living in a third, there was always somewhere to go, someone to see, something to celebrate.
No, I was nervous because this would be my first Christmas without anyone to join in the festivities.
My parents and brothers would be staying in North Carolina, spending the holiday together with my brothers’ wives and children. My ex-husband, Mason, was still in South Africa, probably with a new girlfriend by his side.
And I was jumping on a plane and flying to Australia.
Because after a year of heartbreak, spending the biggest holiday of the year away from the places I’d lived with and loved my ex, and all the happy couples that surrounded me, had seemed like a good—if expensive—idea.
“Australia?” My best friend, Ashton, had looked shocked when I’d told her my plans. I knew she’d expected—maybe even hoped—that I would spend Christmas with her and her family, but I didn’t want to be the third wheel.
Or, I guess, the seventh wheel, since Ash and her two brothers, Aaron and Austin, all had partners standing by their side.
Just like I used to have.
“Australia,” I’d confirmed, offering a cheerful smile and hoping Ash didn’t look too deep to see the anger and the pain that lingered below the surface. “I’ve always wanted to go, you know that. And what could be better for Christmas than spending time in the country that gave us the Hemsworth brothers and Hugh Jackman?”
That comment earned me a laugh, and an eye roll.
“Bianca . . .” Ash trailed off, clearly wanting to ask me about Mason and whether or not I was okay.
“I’m fine, I promise.” I’d reached out to place a hand on her arm, needing the contact with the woman who’d been my best friend since the first day of college.
“If you’re not, you’ll tell me?”
“I wouldn’t tell anyone else.” The promise had been easy to make, because Ash was my person. The one I confided in. Even when I’d been living in far-flung places, we’d still found a way to stay in contact, to keep up to date with one another.
But this Christmas was to be her first with Andrew—who she’d finally gotten together with fifteen years after they’d first met—and their adorable daughter, Kennedy.
“You’ll call me when you’re there safely, and every day until you come home.” It hadn’t been a request, but an order. With her blond curls and sweet smile, Ashton might’ve looked innocent and kind and chill, but I knew better.
There was a fierce, strong woman under that All-American exterior—the one that had driven her to pursue her motherhood dreams even when she’d been alone, herself at the end of a years-long relationship.
“I promise,” I’d repeated, knowing she’d hold me to it. “I’ll call and tell you all about the hot Australian Christmas—”
“And the hot Australian men.”
Laughing again at the memory of Ashton’s need for a daily hot guy update, I continued tap, tap, tapping my passport against my palm. After a mind-numbing three-hour delay, boarding was due to start any minute, and from the looks of the crowded gate seating, it was going to be a full flight.
Very full.
That was fine by me. I didn’t mind long flights—this one would be nearly fifteen hours—and I didn’t even mind the cramped space.
Nope, all I minded was getting to Australia in one piece, so I could start working on mending my broken heart—and discovering the person I wanted to be now that I was just me.
For so long, I had been a part of a couple, so being alone in the world again was like wearing new shoes. Kind of. I guess you pick new shoes out for yourself, whereas Mason’s actions had been the reason for our divorce. But in other ways, the metaphor worked.
You liked what you had on your feet and you wanted to wear them. But they felt strange, foreign, and maybe even a little painful at first. Until you broke them in and made them yours. That is what I wanted to do with my new, Mason-less life.
Make it mine.
“We are now boarding passengers in rows sixty through eighty-five.”
The announcement was crackly, but as I’d been listening intently since they first started allowing passengers on board, it was enough to penetrate my thoughts. Normally, I would happily sit and wait until the line had died down—I didn’t really understand the mad rush to get to my seat, only to sit there being jostled by people weaving down the aisles, or new passengers needing you to move out of their way—but this time, I was ready.
I needed to escape my thoughts and all the reasons I was running away to Australia. That meant I wanted to be stowing my little red carry-on, hooking my travel pillow around my neck, and settling into my very own version of flight mode as soon as humanly possible.
Like a phone, I would be switched off for the duration, so that when I landed in Melbourne, I would be ready to go. Have a full battery, so to speak.
“Excuse me?” A short, grey-haired man paused next to me, a sheepish smile on his face. “I’m sorry, did you hear what they said? I missed it entirely.”
I returned his smile, and gave him the info he was after, waiting until he was on his way to collect his bags before I stood, and wheeled my bag—and myself—over to the line.
“Crowded flight.”
This time, it was a woman speaking to me, and her accent was easy to place and a delight to my American ears.
“Sure is. That time of year, I guess.” I nodded to her Australian passport, and asked, “Are you heading home for the holidays, or from vacation?”
“For the holidays. I’ve lived over here for a while now, but it’s always good to get home and see my family.” She shrugged. “I just wish it wasn’t so bloody expensive.”
Laughing, I thought how not wrong she was and how lucky I was to be able to afford this last-minute trip. Thank god I had the luxury of running away from my life, if only for a little while.
“You can’t just leave, Bianca. We have to talk about this.” I heard the echo of Mason’s angry words as he’d zipped up his pants and I’d tried to process what my eyes were seeing.
Not wanting that moment—or any of the ones since—to infect my escape, I kept talking to the woman standing ahead of me as we made our way to the front of line. We chatted about nothing much at all, and by the time we were both settled—her a few rows behind me, having wished me a Merry Christmas as I dropped my stuff on my seat—Mason’s betrayal was momentarily forgotten, and I was more than ready to get into my flight mode.
But it wasn’t to be.
I carefully organized those things I knew I’d need to see me through the lengthy flight—fully-loaded Kindle tucked into the seat pocket, along with my phone and headphones—and stowed my carry-on overhead, then looked at the two empty seats beside me.
Maybe they’ll stay empty, I thought wistfully, knowing it was highly unlikely. Perhaps if I wasn’t traveling at Christmas—w
I people-watched the steady if slow stream of people shuffling past me to their seats, trying to make up their stories. It was a game I’d played before when I was bored—one Ashton and I had actually played together during long road trips with the passengers of passing cars—and it was fun.
Especially since I always gave my targets a happy ending. (Not that kind, get your mind out of the gutter.)
Two women laughed together, leaning in close, before taking their seats in the row in front of me. I decided this was their first Christmas together and they were just starting a round-the-world trip.
A family—mother, father, and two kids already in pajamas—walked by and sat a couple of rows behind me and in the center of the plane. In my head, the kids carefully wrote to Santa asking him to remember they were going to be visiting their grandparents in Australia for the first time. Of course, he’d know that and bring them extra-special presents, because why not?
What about me? I wondered. What did the people passing by see in me?
“Maybe if you smiled at me like you were happy to see me, like you cared whether I came home, then I wouldn’t have looked somewhere else for affection.”
Mason’s words—a cut that felt deep and still stingingly new, even though it had been months since I’d last seen or spoken to him.
Shaking off the mental intrusion of my ex, I watched a few more people move around our area of the plane, and was just judging the looks and formulating the story of the man who was settling into the aisle seat of my row—newly married businessman returning home early to surprise his wife for Christmas, perhaps?—when the second of my seatmates arrived.
The one who’d be in the middle seat and therefore sitting next to me for the next fifteen hours.
And damn if he wasn’t the sexiest man I’d ever seen.
* * *
I was staring.
I knew I was and still couldn’t seem to stop myself.
Focus, Bianca, I scolded myself. Although, actually, I should have been telling myself not to focus. Or focus on something other than his ridiculously good looks. I wanted to bite my lip when he licked his own—they were light pink and full and kissable and why was I thinking about his lips?!
And then . . . ugh, and then he reached overhead to stow his battered looking backpack, and I caught a glimpse of muscled abs. And a teasing line of hair disappearing below the waistline of his sweatpants.
Grey sweatpants.
I have no idea why I thought that was hot as hell, but I did, and I wasn’t about to lie to myself about it. They sat low and—
He was looking at me.
Oh shit, and I was clearly looking at him. Not just at him, either. I was basically staring at his dick like it held the answers to all life’s questions as I admired the fit of those cotton pants.
They fit perfectly, in case you were wondering.
Releasing my lower lip, because yes, at some point I’d acted on that impulse to bite it while I admired him—as if being caught staring wasn’t awkward enough—I quickly looked away. And tried to decide if I should just brazen it out and say hello or spend the next fifteen hours pretending he wasn’t seated right next to me.
Because he was. Of course, he was. I was at the window, he was in the middle, and the third person in our row would act like the guard keeping us in place. I was going to be brushing arms with this man for the duration.
Why does this flight have to be so long? I laughed quietly to myself, knowing that I normally wouldn’t care—not about the flight time and not about being caught staring. Well, maybe about the lip biting, but the staring in general was fine.
Just. Like. That. Man. If ever a man was made to be looked at and objectified, it was the one I was getting ready to relinquish an arm rest to. But the disappointment of the last couple of years, coupled with the words Mason had flung at me when defending himself, had changed me enough to know that I was uncomfortable because I didn’t know how to act around hot, presumably single men.
Scrap that. I didn’t know how to act around hot men, single or not. Because it wasn’t about whether anything was going to or could happen, it was about the fact that I’d been in a relationship for the better part of fifteen years—thirteen of them married—and now I wasn’t.
The hot men might not be any different, but I was.
I’d been practically a kid when I’d met Mason and fallen in love. It had taken months for that love to grow from the friendship we’d formed on the first day of our sophomore year of college, but when we’d both realized our relationship had changed, it seemed like it had always been meant to be.
“You’re the one, Bianca. I didn’t realize it at first, but now I know, I can’t stop thinking about it. Our future. Our forever.”
I sighed at the bittersweet memory that time had turned more bitter than sweet. This trip was supposed to be about getting away from my broken marriage and my broken heart and trying something new. Something for just me.
And yet, here I was, thinking about him. Thinking about the day he’d proposed to me and promised me a lifetime.
All because I couldn’t handle the handsome-as-fuck man currently ripping open the plastic-wrapped blanket beside me.
As subtly as I could, I looked him over again, determined to find something about him that wasn’t visually perfect. Something that made me a little more comfortable about sitting next to him as we crossed the International Date Line.
The International Date-Me Line.
Because, failing that, I could only hope that he was a dickhead or an asshole or maybe even a total tool.
He’d sunk his teeth into his bottom lip in an adorable look of concentration, having draped the blanket over his legs and grabbed the emergency exit card from the seat pocket in front of him. I’d never seen anyone give that safety card so much attention and something about that was endearing.
A little weird, if I was honest, but endearing.
For the record, I knew I shouldn’t judge, because for all I knew it was his first time flying and he was nervous, but . . . I couldn’t help it. I was judging him, and he was getting a ten-point-zero in the damn, that’s cute event.
I looked away from the mouth that I would wager good money could move from sweet to sexy in a heartbeat and looked over his stubbled jaw. It was square and masculine and something about it made me want to trail my fingers along it to trace its shape.
Girl, you need to settle down. Not only was I visually molesting this man, I was thinking like a fifteen-year-old with their first real crush. I needed to give him an imaginary happily-ever-after that included a wife who was the kind of gorgeous that only a man like him could even look at, five kids including two sets of twins, and a house full of rescue animals.
Because that would definitely ensure I stopped staring. For sure.
Except . . . his hair was dark and although I couldn’t see exactly what shade it was in the terrible airplane lighting, I could tell that it looked soft and inviting. The kind of hair that a woman could grab onto while his face was buried between her thighs, his tongue working overtime to give her an orgasm or two.
I scolded myself, sighing inwardly—because I didn’t want him to hear me, obviously—and turning back toward the window. I’d found nothing that made him less than perfect, which meant I was now officially team let-this-hot-dude-be-a-jackass.
“G’day.”
I snapped my head around to look at him, the deep perfection (of course it was perfection, of course it was) of his voice coupled with the obviously Australian greeting and the hint of that distinctive accent making my thighs clench. My heart racing from the acknowledgement, I smiled at him, nodding in a polite greeting. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to say “G’day” back, it was more that I couldn’t. My voice had left the building—okay, the plane—along with my ability to act like an adult rather than a schoolgirl with a crush.
