Susan Crosby - Almost A Honeymoon

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To Melissa Jeglinksi, who provides focus, encouragement and laughs. I hate it when you’re right! And to Harlold & Ruth—I must have been in the “lucky” line when they handed out in-laws. You’ve been the cherry on top of my hot fudge sundae. I love you both.

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He had been watching her for seven hours, since she’d left her Charlestown brownstone and taken a cab to Boston’s Logan airport. Maintaining a discreet distance, he’d kept her in sight as they checked in at the airlines, then they passed the next half hour in the club lounge, where he feigned interest in a paperback murder mystery as she tapped efficiently on her laptop computer, oblivious to his watchful eye. She spoke with only one person at length, engaging in a subdued debate with a fellow laptop user about spread-sheet software.

Shortly before takeoff, she gathered her belongings, and he trailed her to the airplane, his gaze touching every person, calculating who might interfere with the successful completion of his newest assignment.

Now they were a little over an hour from touchdown at San Francisco International. He’d used the long hours to append his personal knowledge of her and the written information he’d been given the day before. The facts—Paige O’Halloran, twenty-eight years old, the only child of Patrick O’Halloran, owner of the third largest shipping line out of Boston; graduated first in her class from Smith College, earned her MBA at Harvard; employed in her father’s firm for five years—current position, comptroller.

Another fact—she’d recently done something completely out of character for her, the results of which were still toppling dominoes.

From his vantage point across the aisle and one seat back from her he had passed the time by adding his own observations to the dossier he’d been given. He deduced that she was accustomed to traveling, because the moment she took her seat, she slipped off her high heels and donned soft ballet-style slippers. She ignored the movie to instead work on her computer, and no amount of turbulence fazed her. She simply steadied her computer with one hand and continued to enter information with the other. She carried no bestseller to while away the hours, instead flipped through U.S. News & World Report.

She visited the rest room twice during the flight, and he noticed with no small degree of surprise that her dark green skirt and ivory blouse never wrinkled; her medium brown hair didn’t droop a fraction from its elegant French twist; her makeup didn’t fade, except for her lipstick, which she replaced several times with the same bronze hue. She put her seat back once during the long flight, resting her eyes, but hadn’t slept. She chose the vegetarian entrée off the menu, consumed a glass of California Chardonnay, and finished everything on her tray except the two chocolate truffles packaged in a tiny box, which she dropped into her briefcase. She never failed to thank the flight attendant for his service and smiled as she made eye contact.

Her actions bespoke self-assurance and control, exactly as he had expected.

Conversely, her physical self seemed delicate, almost fragile, like a finely carved cameo, which he hadn’t expected. Although above average in height for a woman, she was small boned and pale skinned, as if easily bruised or broken. Her body was shaped more like a freeway than a mountain road—until she turned around. What she lacked in curves up front she more than made up for in the backside, her rear being nicely rounded, upside-down-heart shaped and full, her long legs the reason high heels were created.

In short, Paige O’Halloran was a woman who generally blended in with the background. Her first impression was probably no impression. Excluding the tantalizing view she offered walking away, there was nothing special to draw the eye, nothing in her mannerisms to call attention to herself, nothing that said, “Look at me. I’m special.”

If he hadn’t known about her “unfortunate adventure,” he would have guessed she was perfectly content with her life. But she had ruptured that image with her one indiscretion—and that made her intriguing, a dangerous pull in his line of work, in which allowing himself to be intrigued could mean personal disaster.

The cabin lights came on abruptly, a silent announcement of their imminent arrival. As passengers stirred, he made a quick trip to the rest room before the flight attendant served a light snack. On his return the subject of his observation dropped a floppy disk into the aisle as she packed away her computer.

He crouched to retrieve it, then paused as her scent drifted over him. He’d been blessed—or cursed, he couldn’t decide which—with exceptionally keen senses, but his sense of smell was extraordinary. Recognizing a person’s scent, even masked artificially with fragrance, had saved his hide uncounted times. He knew the smell of fear, sometimes subtle, sometimes overwhelming. He knew the smell of arousal. He had identified and mentally cataloged a staggering number of perfumes, colognes and after-shave lotions.

He couldn’t, however, identify her perfume—and that bothered the hell out of him. He breathed in several times, committing it to memory, but the fact he couldn’t give it a name irritated him; he arranged facts and observations in his mental file cabinet in alphabetical, chronological and logical order, and he liked it that way. But he could identify only elements of her perfume—an undertone of jasmine, a whiff of...rose? Maybe. But the overall effect was not exclusively floral. He’d figure it out later; he would have plenty of time.

He started to hand her floppy disk to her when his gaze settled on a subtle wrinkle of fabric along her thigh. A garter. This controlled, efficient, orderly woman wore a garter belt?

Shattered. All his perceptions of her were broken by that knowledge. Paige O’Halloran was a panty hose kind of woman; he would have bet his ample financial portfolio on it.

Her hand came into view, extended to receive the disk from him, and he noted short, unpolished fingernails, a clue to her steady use of a computer keyboard, no doubt, especially the smaller keys on laptops, but also indicative of her no-nonsense personality. He felt more comfortable slotting her into that pigeonhole.

“Thank you,” she said, her gaze sending a silent question his way as he delayed returning her disk.

Her eyes, he noted, were a kind of marbled hazel, more green than blue. Or was it the green eye shadow she wore that made them seem that way?

Mumbling something reminiscent of “You’re welcome,” he returned to his seat, willing his thoughts away from the perfume he couldn’t identify and the damned garter belt he couldn’t reconcile with the woman. He couldn’t allow himself any mental diversions.

He had orders to follow.

* * *

Paige O’Halloran slowed her steps when she spotted the uniformed man holding up a sign neatly penned with O’Halloran as she entered the terminal at the San Francisco airport. She approached the short, brawny man and identified herself.

“Are you waiting for me or another—”

“You, miss.”

She observed the placid expression on the fifty-something man who looked more like a boxer than a chauffeur. She didn’t take comfort in the once-broken-but-not-properly-set nose or the scartissue ridges scattered across his face. “I didn’t order a limousine.”

The man pulled a folded piece of paper from his pocket and passed it to her—a fax on O’Halloran Shipping letterhead, signed by her father, authorizing her pickup from the airport.