Chapter Three
Tori shovedher carry-on bag under the seat in front of her—again. Then she cursed under her breath.
“Hey, it’s fine.” Logan took her hand and squeezed.
She winced as she looked at him, folded nearly in half in the charter airplane seat next to her. “Sorry about the economy tickets.”
He just shrugged. “We’ll be there soon enough. It’s a short flight.”
She glanced past him out the window. Bright sun glinted off the airplane’s wing, and below that, the Atlantic Ocean stretched endlessly. It only took two hours to fly from Atlanta to Miralinda, but it felt like an eternity. She couldn’t wait to land and be safely away from anyone who knew yesterday was supposed to be her wedding day.
Anyone except Logan, of course. He’d been such a rockstar over the last twenty-four hours. She gripped his hand a little more tightly as she tried to remember what he’d kept saying to her.“This isn’t about you. Nobody thinks this is a reflection on you. Stephen’s clearly going through something messed up in his head.”
When Logan had finally whisked her out of the hotel suite and into his waiting rental car, she’d checked her phone. There had been three voice mail messages from Stephen. Variations on a theme. He was sorry. It wasn’t her. There wasn’t anyone else. He just couldn’t do it.
She didn’t understand, but now as her carry-on bag tumbled onto her toes,again, she felt something inside her snap. Because it didn’t make any sense that it wasn’t her. Of course it was her. She hadn’t been enough for him. He couldn’t see himself with her forever.
Hot, frustrated tears scalded the inside of her eyelids as she squeezed them shut.
“Breathe, Tori,” Logan said, his voice low and right beside her. Steady. Non-judging. “In and out. Long, slow breaths.”
“I can’t.” The two words caught on each other, turning into a single, hitching word.I-uh-can’t.
“You can.” He inhaled in her ear, then exhaled. “Just like that. With me. In thirty minutes, we’re going to land in paradise. And I’m going to do everything in my power to distract you from whatever feelings have you crying again. That’s right. Breathe in. And out. Good girl.”
As he stroked his hand up and down her forearm, she felt herself relax again. “What a shitty vacation for you,” she finally murmured.
“Hardly. You said there are rainforest hikes, right?”
She groaned. She had said that. “Mm-hmm.”
“There is nothing I like better than a good waterfall, Tor. Don’t you think for a second this week isn’t going to be awesome for me.”
She nodded. Maybe.
“Hey, look at that…islands.”
She cracked her eyelids open and peered out his window. It was too soon to be Miralinda, but the first glimpse of the Caribbean islands made her smile, if still a bit weakly. “Yay.”
“That’s better.” He leaned back against his seat, his gaze glued to her face, his gray eyes steady and calm. “We’re going to make the best of this. Promise.”
As rocky as she felt inside, she believed him.
The pilot came on the intercom and announced they were beginning their descent. Seatbacks up, trays folded away.
Time for a week of escape.
As her ears popped, Logan gently squeezed her hand. He didn’t let go until they’d touched down and taxied to a stop.
Out the window, it looked impossibly sunny and green.
And soon they’d be heading off into the jungle, just the two of them. The original plan had been to take a taxi to their resort because Stephen hadn’t been interested in exploring the rest of the island. As soon as Logan heard that, he’d gotten on the phone and organized a rental car.
The Miralinda International Airport was so small that once they cleared customs at the small hut on the edge of the tarmac, Logan could go one way to the rental car desk and Tori could go the other to the luggage pickup, and they didn’t lose sight of each other.
The downside of arriving at a sleepy little island airport was that nothing went quickly. Their suitcases came off the airplane, but then sat on a cart for a while. Tori pulled out her sunglasses and slipped them on to protect her eyes from the bright sun.
A brightly painted sign nearby caught her attention.Bière. Oh, yes, a beer soundeddivinein this heat. Of course, they still had a drive to the resort, where they could get all the beer they wanted, and probably in any and all languages. French. Spanish. English. Jilted-bride-ese.
