Page 4 of Holiday Home 5

By the time the penultimate scene revealed what ultimately happened to each kid, followed by one final scene in the present day, in which Smalls, an announcer for the Dodgers, watched Benny steal home and seal the Dodger’s victory, Liam half-expected Avril to start quizzing him about all the pop-culture references he should now know. Instead, she stretched, arching her back forward, and hopped to her feet.

“Now, you’re a little more cultured,” she said. “You’re welcome.”

He met her playful response with an appropriate amount of drollness. “Thank you, Avril, for filling this gaping hole thatexisted within me. Without seeing this movie, I know I couldn’t have managed to live a fulfilling life.”

“Damn right, smart ass,” Avril said. “It’s the only reason I brought you on my plane. You’re good to go now. The parachute is waiting for you near the cockpit. Adios.”

“Right now?” he asked. “While we’re over the Pacific?”

“Obviously.”

“I’ll have to open the door if I’m going to eject into the ocean.”

“Yes, and?”

“Assuming I can even do it, it’ll be really loud. Assuming she’s managed to fall asleep, that’ll undoubtedly wake Anna up. Which will make you a bad best friend.”

“This line of reasoning won’t get you anywhere, Liam,” Victoria said. “As she is already a bad best friend, there isn’t much harm that this stunt, just one more piece of hay in a hillside-sized stack, can do.”

“You would have made such a bad aunt,” Avril said, attention snapping to the buxom woman on his right.

Victoria’s expression didn’t change at all. “I wasnevergoing to be youraunt,Avril. I was going to be your sister-in-law.”

“You’re not very sisterly,” Avril said, hands up as she shrugged. “That must be why I’m always mixing the two up.”

“It must be,” Victoria replied, doing what he never could when dealing with Avril: refusing to engage. “So, shall we get ready for bed? Who will be using the couch? Do you want it?”

“I can fall asleep anywhere,” Avril proclaimed, shaking her head. “Any of you that wants it can have it.”

In unison, Victoria and Tess, ever the responsible adults, turned toward him.

“I’m okay taking a chair, too,” he quickly said. “I’ve slept on planes before. My brother lives in Seoul, which is a thirteen- or fourteen-hour flight.”

With the younger passengers out of the way, Victoria and Tess connected their gazes. The streak of giving away the only other functional bed-like object on the bed snapped at two.

“We could play a match for it,” Tess said, smiling in an unusually carnivorous fashion. “I know you brought your board.”

“We could play acardgame for it,” Victoria retaliated. “I’m sure there are numerous decks on board right now.”

“I’ll let you play white,” Tess said.

“No, thank you,” Victoria said, refusing to be lured in.

“Don’t let them start clawing at one another, Liam,” Avril said, waving flippantly as she headed to the suite’s rear door. Opening it up, she headed into the jet’s lavatory. After shutting the door behind her, the muffled sound of a motorized toothbrush running soon snuck through the cracks.

Tess kept trying to find a way to get Victoria to accept a chess match, knowing she had a considerable advantage if they played. Victoria staunchly rebuffed every offer, including one where Tess offered to have Liam—somehow, he’d ended up involved—play out her first six moves.

“Well, if not that, then how? A two-player card game doesn’t sound fun—or quick.”

Again, Liam found himself drawn back into the mix. Victoria leveled her attention upon him, wordlessly asking for a suggestion.

“Uh, Gin Rummy is a good choice, maybe? It’s pretty quick. Do you both know it?”

“Yes,” Victoria said.

“Yes,” Tess sighed, clearly still wishing to have drawn her colleague into a chess match.

As soon as one of the numerous decks of cards aboard were in front of them, Liam left them to it. Sitting on either side of thecouch, cards in the middle, the two beautiful, busty professors began their battle for couch-sleeping rights.

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