If Luke wanted me to know more he’d tell me. So I decide to leave the questions alone and stick with my hunches: There’s some bad blood between Luke and his brother; of this I’m pretty sure. And since Kendra used to be his brother’s girlfriend, there’s definitely something more to the story regarding her and Luke, or maybe Seth.
As if time went by quickly as a favor to me, the next thing I know the plane is preparing to land, and the flight, which was supposed to traumatize me and make me never want to travel by air again, is about to end.
“That wasn’t so bad, was it?” Luke asks, a knowing grin manipulating his delicious mouth.
And it suddenly dawns on me, all that random talk about Norway that came out of nowhere was his way of helping calm my nerves and making me forget that I was on a plane at all. I never would’ve thought that simple conversation could achieve such a feat—and in the past, it never worked—but here I am, thirty minutes later, watching out the window with just an infinitesimal amount of lingering fear, as the plane lands.
“I don’t know how that happened,” I say as we’re heading toward a long-term parking lot to find his car. “Actually, I’m kind of baffled.”
He looks over, tugging on my hand as we continue weaving our way through parked cars.
“I’ve tried everything,” I go on. “Therapy, medication, trying to trick my brain into not being afraid, but nothing ever came close to making me feel as relaxed as I did just now.” I laugh. “Paige hates flying with me, says I’m a crazy person. And my mom, she flew with me once on a job just for support so I wouldn’t be alone, but with her there, I think it was worse. All I wanted to do was curl up beside her until the plane landed.” I squeeze his hand and playfully add, “Maybe you should start up a business; fly around with people who have a fear of flying.”
He laughs, and I hear his car beep twice somewhere to my right as he presses the button on his key chain.
“You were more relaxed,” he says, “because I wasn’t paid to tell you not to be afraid. I’m not your best friend, who, despite being your best friend, thinks you’re just being a crazy person. And I’m not your mom, who’s probably the first person you want to cling to when you’re afraid because she’s your mom. No matter how old we get, when we get scared, we can become ten years old again just like that”—he snaps his fingers—“when Mama walks through the door.” We approach his car, a shiny blue Hyundai. “I dunno,” he goes on. “I think a lot of people who have debilitating fears need more than a therapist telling them why they’re afraid, a friend telling them not to be afraid, and a family member telling them that it’s OK to be afraid.” He opens the passenger door for me. “You need someone who understands the fear, who makes it their priority to help you overcome it because they genuinely want to and not just for a paycheck, and someone who approaches it in a way that comes from the heart instead of a list of stereotypical responses.”
I smile warmly. “So I guess you’re that person, huh?”
He smiles back at me and we just gaze at each other for a moment.
I take him into a gentle hug. It surprises him a little, but he pauses only a second before wrapping his arms around me.
“Yeah,” he answers in a soft voice. He nods, his eyes glowing. “I think maybe I am that person. If you want me to be.”
My insides are mush.
“I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather,” I say with a thankful smile and then get into the car.
“And a gentleman, too,” I add, adjusting on the seat. “You’re full of surprises.”
He waits until I’m fully seated, propping one muscled arm along the top of the door, the other on the roof, and then peers in at me and says, “Hey, I’m just a guy who happens to be starving. How about some lunch?”
I beam up at him wordlessly. His tall, tanned height dressed in khakis and a blue button-up shirt, adoring me with a gorgeous crooked smile as persuasive as it is mysterious.