Page 1 of Rescuing Dr. Marian
1
FOSTER
The emergency callcame in just as I was locking up the sheriff’s office for a long-awaited vacation.
Three hours later, I was rappelling down a cliff face to extract a photographer who’d gotten a little too creative with his angle shots. Three hours after that, we’d gotten him to safety, but I’d missed my flight to Hawaii and spent five hours driving through a blizzard to catch the next one. And eight hours afterthat, I’d made my final connection by the skin of my teeth, but my luggage had not.
So by the time my seatmate sloshed her vodka cranberry all over my chest, it was safe to say I’d lost whatever patience I might have had at the start of my hellish, never-ending day.
Fate was seriously fucking with me.
“And the wors’ part is, I never saw it coming,” the woman slurred, still waving her cup as she spoke, seemingly unaware it was now empty. “But then, I guess no one ever does. I thoughthe was The One. I thought he and I were the real thing. Like… like daisies in sunshine. Like kit… kin…kinsmin.”
“Kismet,” a low, aggrieved voice muttered from the row behind us. “You meankismet.”
I covered my snort with a cough. The guy in 9A had started correcting Miss Daisies and Sunshine’s drunken mispronunciations under his breath, but the longer her drama went on, the less he seemed to hold back his commentary.
At this point, his comments were the only thing keeping me sane.
“Did you say something?” she asked, squinting at me.
I thumbed over my shoulder. “I think he said ‘Kleenex.’ Speaking of which, do you have any tissues in your bag?” I gestured from the bulging carryall at her feet to the remains of her vodka cranberry trickling down my chest. “I could use one.”
“Don’t think so.” She wrinkled her nose. “Oh, gosh, you spilled your drink!”
I sucked in a breath. “Ididn’t—” A travel pack of tissues suddenly appeared between us with a little waggle, and I glanced through the darkened gap between the seats to see a deep hazel eye smiling back at me.
Mr. 9A to the rescue.
“Thanks,” I said.
“Don’t mention it.”
While I dabbed at my ruined shirt, Miss Daisies and Sunshine kept talking, ensuring everyone around us knew way more than we’d ever wanted or needed to know about the “cheating ass” who “din’deservemy love.”
“And the wors’ part is,” she wailed, “I never saw it com?—”
I jumped in to prevent her from starting again at the beginning. “Look, I know it doesn’t feel like it now, but you’ll move on from this. I dated a cheating ass once, too.”
“Yeah?”
“Matthew-don’t-call-me-Matt.” I rolled my eyes. “High-maintenance, persistent, terrible at karaoke, regrettably bad at monogamy. It sucked at the time, but I learned a lot of lessons about what I want in a partner. And the man had good taste in resorts,” I added. “Hence my trip to Kauai.”
She scrunched up her face. “Yer ex is gunna be here, too?”
“Oh, god no. The opposite. I ditched my ex, but I still love Hawaii, and the only time it’s safe for me to visit is over New Year’s. Matthew hasn’t missed a ball drop in decades.”
“Is that like…” Daisy Sunshine lowered her voice, but not by much. “…a gay thing?”
Mr. 9A snickered.
I pressed my lips together to keep from barking out a laugh. “Uh. No. It’s…” I pondered this. “Well, come to think of it, therearea few gay men involved in that particular event.”
This time, 9A snort-choked so loudly the woman beside him asked if he was okay.
Mercifully, the plane touched down at that exact moment.
“Know whut? I’m gunna take yer advice,” Daisy announced as the people at the front of the plane began grabbing their things. “I’m gunna get a new man. I’m gunna find real love. Like poetry. Like Shakesgere.” She frowned. “Shakes… Gere?”
