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The woman in the aisle seat was a very nervous flyer and her leg closest to mine bounced the entire flight while she ate from her family sized bag of Ruffles, rustling the bag loudly, the strong scent of cheddar and sour cream surrounding me for two hours and twenty-five minutes. But I squeezed my eyes shut and told myself it was no big deal.
I packed in such a rush I forgot my noise-canceling headphones, so I got to listen to the two guys behind me rehash their entire business meeting and what an asshole Larry is and how hot his VP, Hayley, is. But it was no big deal. I said it repeatedly. It had to be true.
“Due to some mechanical issues, we are going to need to change planes. This is going to take us a little time. The flight is now scheduled to depart at six forty-two. If you choose to leave the gate area, please…”
I tune out the rest of the announcement.
Because that departure time is three fucking hours from now.
I already had a three-hour layover here. Now it’s going to be more than six.
This will put me into Charleston after nine p.m.
My “it’s no big deal” mantra isnotgoing to work much longer.
I need to be in Honeysuckle Harbor.
Now.
I never should have left South Carolina in the first place.
What the fuck was I thinking? I finally fell in love, timestwo, with two people who also love each other, who want to make a life in an awesome little town that has embraced me, made me feel a part of everything, where I’ve been surrounded by family I can imagine sharing everything with from daily chess matches to town-wide Christmas extravaganzas.
I want to sit at the bar at Raw and watch Harrison charming every person who steps inside. I want to be there when Ivy opens her wedding venue. I want to find a show that Ford and I can watch together and geek out over. I want to joke around and tease with them all. I want to fight with them all. And defend them all. I want to have the hottest, dirtiest, most fun sex of my life with them all. I want to sleep late and have lazy brunches that get crashed by their parents.
Fuck my job. Fuck the TV show.
I’ll…write a novel. A sci-fi novel that will hit all the best-seller charts and make me a seven-figure salary of my own.
Or, fuck it, I’ll write a sci-fi novel that only ten people will read, but I’ll love it, Ford will love it, and I’ll let my hot millionaire boyfriend pay my way through life.
I honestly don’t care. As long as I’m with Harrison, Ivy, and Ford.
“Are you okay?”
I open my eyes—I didn’t realize I’d squeezed them shut, imagining Honeysuckle Harbor and my life with my three loves—and relax my death grip on the arms of the chair I’m sitting in.
A little boy is staring at me. He’s probably about eight. He’s holding a cinnamon roll from the shop across from our gate with both hands. He’s also wearing a T-shirt with an alien on the front. It’s not from my show, but it still feels like a sign. Because the alien has a phone to his head (he doesn’t really have ears) and is saying, “No intelligent life detected here.”
An alien, on a phone, calling me stupid.
Yep. That’s a sign.
“Yeah,” I tell him. “Pretty much.”
“You look like you have a bad headache,” he informs me.
Well, that’s insightful. “I do,” I admit. “But I’ll be okay.”
“My dad says airports always give him a fucking headache,” the boy tells me.
I lift a brow, but his dad isn’t wrong. I’d guess ninety percent of the people inside this building have a headache right now.
“Want my cinnamon roll?” the kid asks.
Kind of. But I can’t take his cinnamon roll. “Nah, but thanks.”
He shrugs. “K, but they’re pretty good.”