LITMIR.BIZ

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one classy guy.” The words were absentminded, his voice husky, his gaze still fixed on my chest.

      I unfolded my napkin, picked up a fork. “You do have a certain distinctive charm. Stop staring and eat your soup.”

      He chuckled. “Distinctive? You sure do know how to sweet-talk a guy, Dr. Fallon.” Obediently, he turned his attention to his tray and spooned up some soup. “Or is it Dr.? I noticed Carmen called you Ms.”

      “It’s Dr. But the first time I flew as Dr. Fallon, a woman had a heart attack. They checked the passenger manifest and came to me, thinking I was a medical doctor.” I remembered my shock and panic, and gave a shiver. “There I was, all of twenty-two, and I felt so helpless—”

      “Twenty-two?”

      Damn, there was something about this man that had me revealing things I normally kept private. This was crazy. He was so clearly a player. Yet, in our semi-isolated pair of seats, feeling the buzz from champagne and arousal, I felt a sense of intimacy. Oh, what the heck, I was a strong-minded woman. I could choose what to share and what to hold back, and right now, what was the harm in talking?

      I gave a casual shrug. “I was a Doogie Howser kid. Zipped through school. What can I say?” I forked up some salmon tartare and tasted it. It was very nice for airline food.

      “Man. Did you do anything else but go to school?”

      Besides supervising my sisters while my parents worked? “Not much. My Howser-esque qualities became apparent when I was a baby, so my parents put me on the fast track.” No Goldilocks for me; my “fairy tales” had been Greek mythology.

      “Why?”

      “Uh…What do you mean?”

      “To what end? So you could have a doctorate when you were twenty-two?”

      The question stopped me and I realized I didn’t know the answer. “I guess once they knew my potential, they wanted me to realize it.” It wasn’t like me to be revealing personal information to a stranger, but there was a surprising warmth in those gray eyes. A warmth that eased the ache in my temples, and made my nether regions hum with awareness.

      He put down his spoon, soup bowl half empty, and cocked his head. “But why the ‘all work, no play’ thing? What’s so bad about being a kid? Playing with friends, having fun?”

      “I don’t know,” I said softly, lifting my wineglass. “I envied my sisters sometimes, because they had those things. But…this is awful; I felt kind of superior, too.”

      He chuckled. “Yeah, I got that from the phone calls.”

      I winced. “Did I sound horrible?”

      “No. Just like a perfectionist who’s impatient when others don’t measure up.”

      I nodded. “That’s me in a nutshell.”

      “Try the wine,” he urged, making me realize I’d been hanging on to the glass but hadn’t yet taken a sip.

      I obeyed, and found it matched his description. He’d summed it up as neatly as he’d just done with me. “It’s great.”

      Day touched my arm, fingers drifting across my skin in a caress, then squeezing gently. “There’s a lot more in that nutshell, Theresa. Sense of humor, loyalty, a—”

      “Loyalty?” I cut in.

      “To your little sister. Taking on her wedding.”

      My eyes widened. “That’s not loyalty, it’s just…she’s my sister. The wedding is really important to her, and I want her to have her perfect day.” After all, there had been enough times I, and the rest of the family, hadn’t been there for Merilee.

      “Course you do.” He spooned up some more soup and held out his spoon. “Here.”

      I leaned forward, feeling inelegant as I slurped it. “Tasty. Want to try the salmon?”

      At his nod, I offered him a forkful. He steadied my hand with his, which had the opposite effect of sending quivers from my fingers up my arm.

      He took his time about releasing me. “How many siblings are there? Any more phone calls you need to make?”

      “No, that’s it. I’ll check in when I’m in Honolulu airport.” I sipped some more wine. “There are four of us, all sisters.” I broke off. “You can’t possibly be interested in this.”

      “Hey, until dinner’s over and they turn out the lights, what else can we do but talk?”

      And what would we do after? I’d intended to work—on the wedding plan, the exams. But that decision could wait. For the moment, with meal trays in front of us, what else could we do but eat, drink, and chat? It was flattering to have a man interested in something other than my latest research project. I’d never see Day after this flight, so what was the harm in opening up a little? In fact, the idea—ships that pass in the night; strangers on a plane—had a strong appeal.

      “Okay, here’s the Fallon family history. When Mom and Dad got married, he was working on his doctorate—he’s a geneticist—and she was going into law school. They didn’t plan on having kids for years. She was on the pill, but it’s not 100 percent effective. She got pregnant in second-year law. Lucky for me, they decided to have the baby.”

      “That was you? I’m glad about that decision.”

      “Mom believed one parent should stay home with the kids for the first two or three years. Dad’s very much the absentminded professor, so he’d have been useless with a baby. They decided they’d like to have at least two kids, and Mom said, if she was going to interrupt her career path, she was only doing it once. So she whipped us out very efficiently. Me, Kat. Then, trying for a boy, Jenna. They decided the three-pack was enough. When Jenna was two, Mom went back to law school.”

      Day, who’d been drinking wine as I talked, put his glass down. “Your mom sounds really organized. Guess you take after her?”

      “Funny you’d say that. I’ve always been a daddy’s girl, an academic. But you’re right, I’m also very organized, like Mom.” An outsider’s perspective was interesting.

      “I bet when you were little they saw you as the best of both of them. They wanted you to superachieve partly for you, but partly because you were a reflection of them.”

      “Maybe so,” I said slowly. It was another perception to tuck away in the back of my mind and mull over later. “You’re not just a pretty face, are you, Day?”

      4

      So she thought he was good looking. Damien grinned smugly. “Hold onto that thought, Prof. It may come in handy later.” When she found out his identity.

      Theresa frowned, clearly not following his train of thought, thank God. Then she stretched and fiddled with the seat controls.

      “Problem?” he asked.

      “I want to adjust the back and raise the footrest.”

      “Here.” He bent over and, as he found the control, his hand brushed her thigh. A firm, warm thigh under her cotton pants. “Give me your hand.”

      Hesitantly, she let him take it and put it on the lever, resting his hand atop to guide it. “Like this,” he told her. “You slide it this way, and use your feet to push the footrest.”

      “Thanks, I’ve got it.”

      Reluctantly, he withdrew his hand and let her get settled.

      “I’m not used to business class,” she said. “My budget doesn’t allow for it, but this time I got an upgrade.”

      “I like it for long flights.” His budget, thanks to Kalti Brown, could handle the occasional expenditure like this. So far the Kalti books had earned him enough to buy a flat in Sydney and pay the mortgage on a beachfront

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