Page 87 of Anything but Mine

Standing there at the window where the filmy snow clung to the glass in fatter pieces left her weary. Too much time to think and she was so flipping tired of thinking. She lifted her briefcase and carry-on and escaped to the newsstand.

She avoided the racks of magazines and went right for the spicy Chex Mix and Diet Coke. Dinner of champions. Out of the corner of her eye she caught a woman wearing a white dress blouse with a familiar windbreaker.

Familiar because she’d noticed the woman before. The jacket seemed far too thin to wear in Chicago. She knew the Windy City habitants were a hearty people, but parkas were the clothing of choice in January. Even more disturbing, she’d seen that windbreaker in San Francisco last week. Remarkable in its truly terrible fashion sense, especially when paired with a Michael Kors blouse.

She turned and the flash of midnight blue over white disappeared.

One too many flights this week?

Or was she on the same schedule as another poor traveling idiot?

Bella was getting to know the stewardesses on the flights, why wouldn’t she see familiar faces in the airports? She shook her head and pulled out her wallet to stand in line with the rest of the bored passengers.

She went back to her gate and settled into a corner chair, tucking the briefcase between her booted feet and fished out her e-reader. According to the booming voice that owned her evening she wasn’t going anywhere for the next six hours.

The dark, erotic thriller she’d been pining for had finally been released. The books were her new addiction. They transported her out of the noisy airports and into a world where someone else’s problems made hers feel insignificant. Where passion and choice wasn’t always easy to navigate. She could empathize and find answers within the pages, and she could follow a red herring in the mystery and allow the characters to sweep her into their fucked-up world.

Hers could remain simple, the way she liked it.

By the time she came up for air—or more like her bladder made itself known after a twenty-ounce soda—she’d lost two hours and finished sixty percent of the book. She quickly took care of business and checked the arrival and departure boards on her way back to her corner of Gate C2.

Her flight had been bumped back another two hours, leaving her yet another six to get through. Part of her wanted to dive back into the book, but she didn’t want to finish it quite yet. She’d save it for the last two hours.

Bella wandered down to the shopping area. She bought Nic a ridiculous penguin wearing a life jacket and Adam an ugly hat. Lime green herringbone seemed about as perfect as could be for him.

Windbreaker girl came out of an aisle and stopped, dark eyes locked with hers. Bella tipped her head. The woman may have been trying to downplay her innate sense of style, but some things just couldn’t be hidden.

“Excuse me?”

The woman bolted down the aisle and over three. Bella shot forward. All right, what the hell? She caught sight of her in the beer aisle, then a moment later the woman disappeared completely.

“Bella, you are reading one too many spy thrillers.” She turned down the beginning of the wine aisles. The windbreaker she’d seen a moment ago hung on the shoulders of a woman wearing a simple oxford shirt.

The woman looked up at her with a friendly smile. “Shiraz or Riesling?”

Bella blew out a breath and her bangs ruffled against her forehead. “What?”

The stranger held up two bottles.

“Oh. Um, Riesling all the way.”

The woman nodded. “Agreed. Thanks.”

Bella leaned on the wine rack. Same outfit—almost. But this was an older brunette where the other had been blond and under thirty. “Oh yeah, way too many thrillers.” Sleep. What she needed was about six hours horizontal without dreams, without her too active brain, and most definitely without an airport.

Her bed.

Her space.

She’d take a few days and go home after this trip. Maybe even hole up and hope no one noticed her arrival.

The thought of going back to her gate held little appeal, but it was better than driving herself nuts at a newsstand or duty-free shop. Obviously that wasn’t good for her either.

She spun on her heel and bumped into a cardboard display. Little envelopes spun across the tiled floor. “Oh, crap.” Her shoulders sagged and she was fairly sure she was going to just sit down and weep at this point. She crouched, tucking her bags into her side and out of the way.

“Are you okay, Miss?”

She looked up at the man sprinting to her side. She held up a hand. “I am just not fit for human consumption today.”

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