Incognito

This summer

“LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, welcome to our premiere service between Los Angeles and New York. While we’re preparing for take-off, your flight attendants will be serving beverages. Our scheduled departure of 9:30 p.m. has been pushed back twenty minutes, but the captain assures us that we will be arriving in New York right on time.”

The bell dinged and Lily pinched her eyes shut, her white-knuckled hands clutching at the arms of her seat. This was the part she always hated, the waiting, the time between the moment she strapped herself in and the moment the jet lifted off the ground.

Though she’d nearly conquered her aversion to flying about a year ago, her trip to Paris with Miranda had renewed every fear and then doubled it. They’d lost an engine somewhere over the Atlantic and had been forced to make an emergency landing in Ireland. Lily had refused to get back on the plane and had taken a combination of boats and trains to Paris. When it came time to go home, she’d returned home the same way—the QE II across the Atlantic followed by a cross-country train trip. Since then, she’d refused to get on a plane.

She glanced down at the self-help book that lay open on her tray table. She’d read six books in the past two months, seen a psychologist and a psychiatrist and attended two seminars that guaranteed success in conquering a fear of flying.

“Airline travel is the safest mode of travel,” she murmured to herself, pushing her glasses up the bridge of her nose. Yeah, right. That would make her feel so much better when plummeting from twenty thousand feet.

Had Lily been given a choice, she might have taken the train to New York. But Miranda had insisted that her fears were unfounded. She just needed to get back on the horse—which would have been a reasonable alternative in Lily’s mind. L.A. to New York via wagon train. When was the last time anyone died in a fiery wagon train crash?

In the end, Lily was forced to agree. Her fears were childish and she needed to conquer them before they completely paralyzed her. But that didn’t mean she’d be unprepared for disaster. She grabbed the emergency card from the pocket in front of her and tried to focus on the information. Why didn’t they just give everyone a parachute? Then if anything bad happened, they could all jump.

She waved one of the flight attendants over to her seat. “I think I’m going to need something to drink after all. If it’s not too late.”

“We’re still waiting for a few first-class passengers to board. What can I get you?”

“Vodka,” Lily said. “Two of those little bottles in a glass of ice with just a splash of cranberry juice.” Lily forced a smile and sat back in her seat. This was all her fault. She’d made a vow a year ago to move out of Miranda’s house and make a life of her own. But the time had never been right.

Miranda had always been in the middle of some crisis or another. Now her godmother was three months late on a deadline and had convinced herself the only place she could possibly finish the book was her summer house in the Hamptons. So Lily had been ordered to go on ahead and open the place.

She reached into her bag and pulled out a small photo album. She’d made the album in a pteromerhanophobia workshop she’d taken last month. The participants had been asked to select photos representing all the things they wanted to do in the future. During a plane trip, they were supposed to find a photo and focus on it.

Lily flipped through the album. There was a picture of the Great Wall of China, her ultimate travel destination. And another of a cute little dog—she’d always wanted a dog, but Miranda was allergic. And there was a photo of a model in a sexy bathing suit. Someday, she’d lose twenty pounds and look just like that.

Lily paused, her gaze falling on the photo of Aidan Pierce she’d cut out of Premiere. Someday she’d find a man who made her heart flutter as much as he had. Since seeing him from across the airport lounge a year ago, Lily had followed his career in the magazines. She’d bought all his movies on DVD and read everything she could find about his social and professional life. And occasionally, she’d allow herself a fantasy or two about what it might be like to have a man like Aidan in her bed.

The flight attendant returned with Lily’s drink and set it in front of her, placing the tumbler on top of a napkin. “I’ll have to collect that before we take off.”

A man passed behind the attendant and she smiled as he bumped against her with his bag. Lily took a sip of her vodka and watched as the passenger searched for an empty overhead bin. He turned and she caught sight of his profile.

She sucked in a sharp breath and the vodka went down wrong, causing a fit of coughing. Gasping for breath, Lily slumped down in her seat and covered her mouth with the napkin.

The flight attendant bent closer. “Are you all right?” she asked.

Lily waved her hand, tears now streaming down her face. Of all the possible people to walk onto her flight, why did it have to be him? She risked a glance up and found Aidan Pierce watching her, an odd look on his face. He glanced at his boarding pass, then looked directly at the numbers above her head.

“No,” she said in a silent plea. Not the seat next to her. There were plenty of other places for him to sit. He couldn’t possibly be sitting next to her, could he? He showed his boarding pass to the flight attendant and she stepped aside, pointing to the seat next to Lily’s.

Lily turned to stare out the window, desperately willing herself to calm down and act like a normal human being. But when she turned back around, she came face-to-face with Aidan’s crotch as he reached up to put his bag in the overhead compartment.

His cotton shirt was unbuttoned at the bottom, offering her a view of his belly. Her eyes drifted from the line of hair above his waistband to the bulge in his cargo pants and then back up again. Lily quickly turned away, fixing her attention out the window again.

Suddenly, dying in a mass of twisted steel and burning jet fuel seemed to be an acceptable alternative to flying all the way to New York next to Aidan Pierce. He plopped down beside her. They were so close she could feel the heat of his body, smell the scent of his cologne. She wanted to reach out for her drink, but she was afraid her hand might be trembling too much to pick up the glass.

“It’s nice to have you with us again, Mr. Pierce. Can I get you a drink?”

“I’ll have a beer,” he said.

Oh God. He didn’t sound the way he was supposed to sound. She hadn’t met him that day at the airport, but she’d watched him interviewed on E! and he always seemed so aloof, his voice so careful and measured, kind of self-absorbed. Now, he sounded like a nice guy.

Lily clutched her fingers together in her lap and realized her photo book was still open. She snapped it shut, then dropped it into her tote bag. How long could she possibly sit here without speaking? Sooner or later, someone would have to say something. They couldn’t ignore each other for the entire six-hour flight.

“Relax. Nothing is going to happen.”

Lily shoved her glasses up the bridge of her nose and gave him a feeble smile. “I-I’m not scared.”

He chuckled and then pointed to the book still resting on her tray table. “The Pteromerhanophobic Traveler,” he murmured. “Quite a title. Catchy. I’d assume by the little cartoon of the smiling airplane that the book is about people who can’t get enough of flying?”

For a moment she relaxed enough to really look at him—his shaggy dark hair and his sculpted mouth, pale blue eyes that seemed to see right through her. In comparison to the buttoned-down business attire most men in first class wore, his lived-in clothes made him look dangerous.

A shiver skittered down her spine. Lily had read thousands of romantic descriptions of male beauty, from Jane Austen to Joan Collins, but for the life of her, she couldn’t recall one that did this man justice. He was, for all intents and purposes, perfect.

“I-I’m sorry,” she murmured. “You’re right. I’m not a very good flyer.” But her tension had nothing at all to do with her fear of flying. She’d never been good with extremely handsome men. They always made her feel…clumsy and inept. And handsome men, especially men with beautiful smiles and even more beautiful eyes, made her lose her capacity to think in a rational manner. She always seemed to lose herself in thoughts of what they might look like naked.

“If anything is going to happen,” he said, “it’ll happen in the first few minutes after takeoff.”

“Yes, I know. In the first ninety seconds,” Lily said. “So if we’re going to die, it’s going to happen really soon. That makes me feel better.” She glanced over at him to see a smile break across his face.

“Now you’re beginning to make me scared.”

“I’m sorry,” she murmured.

He chuckled. “Why do you keep apologizing?”

“I’m sorry.” She took a sharp breath, then forced another smile.

A flight attendant stopped beside Aidan’s seat and gave him a warm smile as she set his drink down. Lily glanced across the aisle at another female passenger whose gaze was fixed intently on Aidan. It seemed every woman in his general vicinity found his drink order endlessly fascinating.

She sneaked a better look at his profile. So he shared some qualities with your basic Greek god, but handsome men were a dime a dozen in Los Angeles. She’d just never been so close to one. His elbow grazed hers and Lily gathered her resolve, refusing to move her arm off the armrest of her seat.

He turned back to her and she quickly averted her eyes as he caught her staring. “Would you like another?” he asked.

“Yes,” Lily said without thinking.

“Double vodka with a splash of cranberry juice?” the flight attendant asked.

“Just cranberry juice,” Lily replied, a blush rising in her cheeks. Already, the vodka had calmed her nerves and warmed her blood. But it wouldn’t do to have him thinking she was a lush.

“With just a little vodka,” Aidan said.

“I—I really don’t drink,” Lily said. “Only when I fly.”

“Me, too,” he replied. “Since we’re going to get drunk together, maybe I should introduce myself. My name is Aidan. Aidan Pierce.”

“I’m Lily Hart,” she said. She carefully placed her fingers into his palm. The moment she touched him, Lily felt a current race through her body. Frowning, she pulled her hand away, clenching her fingers into a fist. “Nice to meet you,” she murmured.