Page 15 of Hero on the Road
Olivia took his hand, opened her mouth to say something, and closed it again, a frown creasing her brow. “You know who I am?” she asked.
“Of course! I used to follow you through Nashville!” Colin crowed. “Back when I lived there. I’m out here now, but the moment I heard you were coming on tour, I knew I had to get here and cover it.”
His eyes went to the other people getting off the airplane. “Where’s your crew? Did you bring the whole band? Or do you have a new band now that you’re with Connor?”
He looked at me again and I had the distinct feeling that he was doing his best to remember that Olivia wasn’t the only one here. It didn’t take a rocket scientist to see that he was more than half in love with her. Judging from the flush creeping across her cheeks, she’d realized it too, and was horrified.
This. Was. Hilarious.
Though it was also pretty unfortunate. Because we didn’t have a crew or a band with us, and Colin Cravers—the only press who was covering our arrival, evidently—was here to see that. Which meant, I guessed, that he’d probably write about it, too.
Terrific. This tour was off to a great start.
I looked past Olivia’s fanboy—who I was going to 100 percent tease her about later—and saw...
Our name on a sign. Handwritten, like someone had just jotted it down. And behind the sign, a guy that was nearly as big as I was, completely with muscles and a t-shirt that looked like it belonged to someone two sizes smaller than him.
What in the hell?
I touched Olivia on the shoulder, taking her attention from whatever Colin had been asking her, and motioned toward the Sign Guy with my chin. “Know him?”
She tipped her head at him, but shook it quickly. “I don’t know anyone in Montana.”
“And yet he’s holding a sign with our names on it. Seems... weird.”
She snorted. “Well, go ask him what he wants.”
I cast her a disillusioned glance. “Sure. I’ll go ask the anonymous man why he’s holding up a sign with our names on it. I’ll go right over there and put myself in danger to satisfy your curiosity.”
She looked me up and down, one eyebrow lifted into a perfect arch. “Are you too scared to do it? Because if you’re not going to...”
She grabbed Colin’s hand and turned him so he was standing by her side. “Come on, Colin. We have to go see that man with the sign because Connor’s too scared to go by himself.”
Colin cast me a wide-eyed look, obviously in over his head, but didn’t protest, and within moments Olivia had him over by the guy with the sign and was nodding quickly, her eyes growing even bigger and her face flushing.
I was hustling over, intent on telling her that I wasn’t scared of anything, when she turned to me with an enormous grin on her face. In fact, she looked liked she’d just won the lottery.
I’d been trying to get her to smile like that foryears. What the heck did Sign Guy have that had made her light up like a bulb that had suddenly been plugged in?
“What’s going on?” I asked, coming to a stop next to Olivia and Colin and really hating that whatever had happened, Colin has known about it before me. He was also, I noticed, still holding Olivia’s hand.
I narrowed my eyes at that and he dropped it quickly.
As he should. She wasn’t mine to claim, of course, but he didn’t know that.
I’d thought I was excited about press covering us, but I was starting to really dislike this Colin guy.
“You Connor Wheating?” Sign Guy asked, sounding like he smoked way too much and didn’t drink enough water.
“I am. Who’re you?”
He gave me a snaggletoothed smile. “Name’s Barry. And I’ve got a surprise for the two of you.”
I exchanged glances with Olivia, who still looked giddy, and I wondered if she got that excited about all surprises. I couldn’t imagine that, really. She’d grown up as one of the richest kids in our small town and as far as I knew, she’d never had to ask twice for anything. Yet she was smiling so hard her face looked like it was about to break.
What in the...
I put it away for the moment and walked after our new friend Barry, who was heading for the hangar. He went right past it, though, and then around another corner, and when we reached the spot where he was standing, I looked up and saw...
