Page 48 of A Spot of Tea
“More like you don’t want to tell me.”
She wasn’t wrong. He glanced at her, but quickly looked away. “It’s not the best in-air story.”
She leaned in closer. “I don’t care. Tell me.”
She was inches from his face, her lips pursed and her eyes narrowed.
He flinched, pressing his body against the door. “All right! We were dating for a year and I was madly in love. I took her up for a flight, planning to propose.”
She gasped. “A year!”
“Yes. I was that young and dumb.”
“Romantic,” she corrected.
Yeah, right. Romantic. He shook his head. “I really wanted to do it on our one-year anniversary, but the weather wasn’t cooperating. I shouldn’t have taken her up, but I was too stubborn to change my plans. We got into the air and within five minutes, we were back down. Crashed into a forest.”
“Youkilledher, Joey? Are youkidding me! You are way worse than a Steve!”
“I didn’t kill her!” He sighed. He couldn’t even talk without her jumping down his throat. “She survived. She’s fine.”
Cora frowned. “Oh.”
Maybe telling stories wasn’t his forte after all. It’d been so long since he’d shared this particular story with anyone. He should’ve kept it that way.
It was too late now. He went on. “I never lost consciousness, but she did. I crawled out of the wreckage to get help. When she woke up, I wasn’t there.”
Joey took a deep breath and closed his eyes. The image of that dark afternoon flashed in his mind, the rumble of the storm, the smell of burning plastic, and the cool, wet ground of the forest.
“She woke up and thought I’d abandoned her. Never forgave me.”
Cora was quiet. “But she survived?”
“Yeah.”
“Was she hurt?”
Other than thinking her boyfriend had abandoned her in the wreckage of his own mistakes?
Because he had. Even if it was only for a moment, he’d left her there. His first thought should have been to pull her out, check her breathing.
“Fractured arm and clavicle.”
“What about you?” Cora put her hand on his shoulder. “Other than your broken heart?”
A pit opened in his stomach. This was taking a turn, one he had no interest in.
Joey pulled his shoulder away from her grasp. “I’m sorry. This isn’t personal, but I’m not interested in anything. You know, between us.”
Her mouth popped open. “Ew, I’m not interested in you! Get over yourself!”
“I’m sorry!” He put his hands up. “You just touched me, and I wanted to be clear.”
“I would never do that to Eliza.”
Joey stopped and turned to look at her. “Eliza?”
She clapped a hand over her mouth. “I shouldn’t have said that.”
