Cowgirls Don't Cry(8)
Closing the laptop, he held up his mug for a refill as the flight attendant hovered, a ready smile on her face.
“You know, I have layovers in OKC sometimes,” she whispered. She wrapped one hand around his to steady the cup as she poured, a move he recognized as an excuse to touch him.
Chance glanced up. She was a brunette, in her late twenties, and her trim uniform fit in all the right places. The girl was just his type—female—but even as he smiled, another face appeared in his memory. The blonde from the hotel. His abdomen contracted, and his heart thundered for a few beats. He hadn’t even gotten her name, yet here she was haunting him.
“Sorry, hon. This is just a quick trip for me.” The lie flowed smooth as honey from his mouth. As disappointment registered on her face, Chance wondered what the hell had gotten into him. Why would he turn down a sure thing?
While it was unlikely he’d ever cross paths with the woman, he did have a brother who was a private investigator and ran Barron Security. He’d sic Cash on her trail. All Chance wanted was one night to get her out of his system. That’s all it would take.
He shifted in his seat, glad the tray table and computer disguised his discomfort. He couldn’t pinpoint why the woman had gotten under his skin but she had, like a burr under his saddle. He shoved thoughts of her away and opened his laptop again, hoping to concentrate on the task at hand. He had to squelch his libido and his uneasiness over what his father wanted—the combination made for an odd sensation in and of itself.
The flight attendant scurried toward the economy section. He leaned into the aisle to see what was happening. Three attendants hovered around a row of seats toward the back of the plane. Everyone with aisle seats had twisted to watch the commotion, too. He heard raised voices, but the conversation was too indistinct. Within moments, the situation calmed. He returned his attention to the problem at hand.
Once the plane landed, he was the first one off. With no luggage to retrieve, he headed straight for the parking lot. He stepped into the gentle March sunshine, glad he hadn’t bothered to shrug into his heavy winter jacket. The storm pounding the upper Midwest hadn’t dipped as far south as Oklahoma, and Chance was thankful. He hated cold weather. Of course, he hated hot weather, too. If he had his way, he’d live somewhere where the temperature remained at a balmy sixty-eight degrees year-round.
He dug out his car keys, hit the button for the auto-unlock and dumped his carry-on suitcase and laptop case in the passenger seat before settling behind the wheel. With a reckless abandon born from experience, Chance maneuvered his sleek, phantom-black Audi R8 sports car toward the parking lot exit. The car swooped down the exit ramp, slowing to a stop just long enough for him to pay the attendant.
Without looking for merging traffic from other lanes, he downshifted and gunned the powerful 571 horsepower V10 engine. A flash of rust in the corner of his eye and the sound of squealing tires had him handling the powerful vehicle like a race car to avoid a collision. Caught by the next traffic light, Chance glanced over at the beat-up old pickup in the next lane. He looked away then looked back. He didn’t recognize the old man in the driver’s seat but the passenger? Oh, yeah. It was her! The blonde from the hotel. She’d rolled down the window, and her glare could melt the metallic paint right off the Audi.
His windows were tinted dark, and he doubted she could see him. When the light changed, instead of accelerating the way he normally would, he eased off the clutch, making sure the clunker pulled ahead of him. He made a mental note of the license plate. Now he’d have a chance to sic Cash on her and move in for the kill after all. He grinned, unable to calculate the odds of seeing her again, especially here on his home ground. Excitement tingled in his fingertips. Life was looking up. Gunning his engine, he headed toward I-40 and the command performance he had to attend.