Anne Winston - The Danforths - Toby, Lea and Adam

Her stomach lurched as the propellers began spinning. She covered her mouth with her free hand. Used to dealing with preperformance jitters, Heather dreaded the thought of vomiting into a paper bag next to a man who was showing her such touching concern. At least before a concert, one always had the option of discreetly slipping away to the privacy of an isolated bathroom.

Toby’s voice was as smooth as aged whiskey.

“Why in the world didn’t you tell me you were afraid of flying?”

Why not indeed! For the same reason that she couldn’t tell him she was afraid of the feelings that living with him had stirred in her. Standing on the edge of his close-knit family, she felt like a starving child with her nose pressed up against a candy store window without so much as a dime in her pocket. Unwilling to admit that, however, Heather forced an excuse through lips drawn in a thin line.

“I’ll be fine. It’s part of the job. I understood that when I accepted it.”

Glancing over Toby’s broad shoulder, she shot Dylan a brave smile. It was lost upon the child whose head was bent over the traveling musical keyboard his father brought along to entertain him. Even a three-year-old was more at ease with flying than Heather was. She felt like an idiot for letting Toby guess just how nervous she really was. Not that he had to do any more than look into her eyes to peer directly into her soul.

“I’ll be right back,” he told her.

Heather forced herself to let go of his hand as he rose to his feet. She was grateful that he hadn’t tried placating her with some platitude about there being nothing to be afraid of. That was how her father tried dismissing her fear of the dark when she was little. As had Josef whenever she waited in the wings for her turn to perform before a house filled with critics.

And right before he took her virginity from her.

Lies.

She was doubly grateful when Toby returned a moment later as promised, not with some condescending statement about air travel being safer then driving her car, but rather with a stiff drink in one hand.

“I hope you like whiskey,” he told her, passing her a tall tumbler. “You strike me more as the type who’d prefer an umbrella and a cherry bobbing in a fancy drink. But since I’m not much of a bartender, this is the best I could manage before the pilot announces it’s time to fasten our seat belts.”

Such instructions were unnecessary on her behalf. Heather had securely buckled her safety device across her lap the instant she sat down—and read every word of the informational materials provided in the back of the seat in front of her. Just in case an ocean happened to materialize between Wyoming and Georgia, she was prepared to use her seat cushion as a floatation device.

The ice cubes floating in her drink offered more immediate comfort. Heather took a tentative sip. As its dark amber color suggested, Toby made it plenty stiff.

“I hope your relatives don’t mind if I’m not able to stand up once we get there,” she murmured with a diminutive little cough.

His responding grin was enough to melt those ice cubes clinking against her glass. Heather wasn’t sure whether the warmth spreading through her body was due to her hormones or the alcohol hitting her bloodstream.

“Don’t worry,” Toby told her. “As far as I know, my uncle isn’t basing his campaign on any protemperance stance. Which is a good thing, considering his own past.”

Heather raised a slender eyebrow.

“My family isn’t exactly without blemish,” he warned.

“Whose is?”

She took another dainty sip of her drink to steady her nerves as they began the long roll down the runway. Not one to pry, Heather was nonetheless curious. Local gossip connected Toby to a glossy layout of some fabulous mansion touted in a magazine last summer. Much of what had been said regarding the article was mean-spirited and envious in nature. She supposed such a well-known family would have to expect to have every flaw magnified in the press. She wondered if that was part of the reason Toby deliberately put such distance between them.

Since her own family relished any media attention and rushed to put their daughter in the limelight every chance they could, it was a stance she could uniquely appreciate.

“What’s your family like?” Toby asked.

Not sure whether he asked the question out of courtesy or as a way to distract her from their impending takeoff, she responded tersely.

“Quiet.”

Squeezing her eyes shut as the engines growled and the airplane strained to lift off, she hoped Toby wasn’t angry at her brusqueness. Her stomach leaped as they became airborne and hovered somewhere between her head and her heart. Tiny beads of sweat popped out above her lip.

“Take another swallow,” Toby commanded, squeezing her hand. His voice was far more reassuring than the remedy he offered.

Unfortunately, his touch counteracted that effect. Warm and strong, it suggested an intimacy that was not at all appropriate between an employee and employer. Heather fought to remember that she was hired to look after Dylan, not to engage in foolish romantic fantasies that left one feeling used and forlorn in their aftermath.

No matter how much Heather wanted to let go of Toby’s hand, she could no more have done so than she could slow her racing pulse. In so small an airplane, one felt every air pocket and bump right in the seat of the pants. Looking out the window only intensified the feeling of dizziness that swept over her. The landscape below, parched by drought, may well have been the surface of the moon for what little comfort its familiarity brought.

“Turn around,” Toby told her.

“What?”

He touched her nape with his free hand. She flinched, and her already stiff shoulders bunched up around her ears as he began kneading the muscles on either side of her neck.

“Let me give you a massage. Trust me, it’ll help you relax.”

Although Heather started to protest, the sensation of his masterful fingers stroking her skin was too heavenly to forgo, even for the sake of pride. Toby took his other hand from hers and began to massage her knotted muscles in earnest. Heather expelled a deep breath of air and felt every muscle in her body relax. Suddenly the sensation of floating high above the world didn’t seem nearly so frightening. She arched against his touch and tried to keep from sliding out of her seat. Her eyelids fluttered shut.

“That is nice,” she admitted.

The sound of giggling in the seat behind her so startled Heather that she almost spilled her drink into her lap. Dylan apparently did not share her aversion to air travel. His reaction to hitting an air pocket was to pretend he was on a roller coaster. Toby looked pleased. While his son had yet to speak again since that first day when Heather arrived, laughter was definitely a step in the right direction.

“I’m afraid the only quiet one you’re likely to find in my family is Dylan,” Toby told her. “And with your help, I think we might be well on the way to curing that.”

Indeed he was right on that account. There was a small army waiting on the ground in Savannah to meet them. As delighted as Heather was to be back on earth in one piece, she found the rush of people surrounding them with hugs and squeals of welcome almost as oppressive as the humidity making the air heavy and redolent with expensive perfume. Her knees were wobbly beneath her, partly from the effect of the miraculous concoction Toby had mixed up for her on the plane—and partly from a sense that she was being suffocated.

Dylan threw his arms around one of her legs. Oblivious to that fact, Toby took her firmly by the elbow. Heather felt like a wishbone being pulled apart. Caught in a throng of some of the most beautiful people she had ever seen, she reached down and pulled Dylan up into her arms. He clutched her neck as if it were a life preserver.