Fight or Flight Read online

  My glare transferred to him. “Again with the totally un-PC language.”

  “Babe, look at me.” He curled his lip. “I am un-PC.”

  “Don’t ‘babe’ me. That is incredibly overfamiliar of you.”

  He bent his head toward me, those icy blue eyes momentarily freezing me to the spot. “And I am not having another altercation with you in public. Now bloody shoo.”

  He just shooed me?

  Shooed me!

  The Scot pulled the stool out forcefully, so I had to move back or be clobbered by it. He assessed my surprised expression and his countenance, to my confusion, transformed from merely irritated to total disdain. “I realize you’re probably used tae men falling at your feet, so I’ll let you have your two seconds of shocked horror. But if you’re not gone in five seconds, I’m going tae embarrass the shit out of you.”

  “You curse a lot,” was the only thing I could think to say under the onslaught of such distaste for me.

  His face clouded over. “Five. Four. Three—”

  I made a sound of disgust, cutting him off, and was about to walk away when the twentysomething woman next to us placed a hand on my arm to stop me. “I’m just finishing up, if you’d like my seat.”

  I gave her a sweet smile. “You’re so kind, but”—my voice grew louder—“I’d rather sew my eyes shut with cocktail sticks than sit next to an ill-educated dickhole who defies the rumor that Scottish people are the nicest people in the world.” I finished it with a triumphant spin that made my hair flip dramatically, and I would have continued to feel like the last-epic-word victor if I hadn’t heard a ragged, too-attractive chuckle, which I knew had originated from the Scotsman.

  That chuckle made me falter visibly.

  He couldn’t even let me storm off in style.

  I grabbed a sandwich from a refrigerator instead and ate it even though it tasted of nothing, while sitting at a gate that wasn’t mine and staring out at the mountains. Using the time to cool down, as memories of the week pricked me and helped to put everything in perspective, I grew calm enough that I felt confident in striding back out there to grab a coffee from one of the barista carts. There was a line already forming at the closest one and I hurried a little to make it before it got too long.

  At the sight of the imposing figure of the Bastard Scot marching toward the cart from the other side, I picked up my feet and almost ran toward the spot. I skittered into place behind a man in a suit, accidentally hitting his carry-on with mine. He threw me an annoyed look over his shoulder and I gave him a quick smile of apology before bestowing a you can suck it grin on the Scot as he pulled up to the line after me.

  “You snooze, you lose,” I said over my shoulder, not caring how infantile I sounded.

  “You’re four years old, you know that?”

  “I finally beat you in line—that’s what I know.”

  “Fruitcake.”

  “Ignoramus.”

  “Shrew.”

  I scowled at the insult, which was even worse than “fruitcake.” “Dickwad.”

  “You seem tae be obsessed with my dick.”

  I spun around. “Excuse me?”

  “Dickwad. Dickhole.”

  “Those are insults.”

  “With a very specific focus.”

  To my horror, my eyes flew to his crotch with a mind of their own. Oh dear God! My face blazed with color and I quickly lowered my gaze down the length of his dark blue jeans to the loosely laced black leather biker boots on his feet.

  Big feet.

  You know what they say—Shut up! Who cares what they say?

  “It’s really hurtful tae be objectified in this way.”

  Sure that my cheeks were tomato red, my eyes shot to his smug face.

  “Look, as fun as it is wiping the floor with you in these verbal battles, I really need a coffee.” And without further ado the Bastard Scot got out of line and walked to the front of it.

  Uh, hell no!

  I followed, my carry-on bumping on its wheels with my fury.

  “My flight is about tae board,” I heard him say to the woman who was next in line to be served. “Would you mind if I cut in front?” He was almost charming to her.

  And she definitely thought so. “Of course.” She practically swooned. “Where are you from? I love your accent.”

  “Scotland,” he answered curtly, and stepped in front of her without saying thank you. This guy had no manners. But I did.

  “Hey.” I smiled at her. “I’m on the same flight as him. Would you mind?”

  The Scot turned slightly at the sound of my voice.

  She eyed him in disappointment. “Are you two together?”

  He appeared nauseated by the thought. “I’ve never seen her before in my life.”

  The woman raised one very unimpressed eyebrow at me. “Nice try. Back of the line.”

  I’d never actually wanted to claw someone’s face before, but I would definitely make an exception for the Bastard Scot.

  “Your people would be ashamed,” I said to his back.

  To my disbelief, his shoulders started to shake. Was he laughing? I looked at the metal espresso machine and saw in its shiny reflection a distorted image of him grinning, teeth and all.

  Ugh, he was so abrasive!

  Spinning around, feeling sweaty, flustered, and so far from perfect it wasn’t funny, I ignored the glares from the people in line and made my way back to the very end, which was now five people longer than it had been.

  Two minutes later the Bastard Scot sauntered by me, shot me a wicked self-satisfied smile, and saluted me with his cup of coffee.

  “Go to hell!” I shouted after him.

  The guy in front of me gave me a wary look and stepped so close to the woman in front of him they were practically touching.

  “He’s an asshole,” I tried to explain.

  But the stranger’s look told me he thought I was the asshole. And the truth was, the Scot was making me into an asshole. Or my bad mood was. I didn’t know. Christ, I needed to get home, and as unfair as it was to blame an entire country for one man, I never wanted to speak to another Scottish person ever again.

  Visiting Scotland was so off my bucket list.

  Suddenly something in the loudspeaker announcement caught my attention. “Wait, what?” I stilled, listening.

  “… Flight DL180 to Boston has been canceled. Please see the gate for alternative flight arrangements.”

  Abandoning my quest for coffee (again!), I hurried down the terminal toward my gate in time to hear the gate agent from earlier explaining to the small crowd that had already gathered the reason why our flight had been canceled. Apparently, the volcano eruption and consequent ash cloud that had grounded flights in Europe had had a domino effect on domestic flights in the U.S. “The crew for this flight has been delayed because of the canceled flights in Europe. We’re currently understaffed because so many of our crew members have been grounded in Europe on international flights. This means we unfortunately do not have a crew or a plane available for the scheduled flight to Boston. Please form an orderly line so we can make other arrangements for you.”

  I heard a few people complain about the late notice because “surely they knew there was no crew or plane before this.” I also heard a lot of people make arrangements to stay at the airport hotel and get the next flight out to Boston whenever it became available. As more and more decided to do that, the antsier I became.

  There was no way I could stay in Phoenix another night.

  Two days had been long enough.

  I needed to get home. ASAP. Or I was going to lose myself in gigantic, uncontrollable sobs.

  My fingers were shaking by the time I handed my ID and ticket over to the gate agent. He recognized me from earlier because his lips pinched together.

  “Is there an alternative route to Boston? A flight to another airport that has a flight to Boston?”

  He relaxed at my tone and offered me a sympathetic smile,
seeming to hear the tremble in my voice. “There is a flight out of Chicago tomorrow morning that will get you to Boston before noon. And a flight to Chicago is leaving from here in an hour.” He checked his computer and threw me a wry smile. “There are first-class seats available on both flights.”

  Relief made me slump against the counter. I didn’t even care how much it was going to cost. I just handed over my credit card. “Thank you.”

  Then I stared up at the ceiling again. Thank you, Universe.

  Three

  I stared at my ticket, at my seat number. And then I stared at my seat.

  And proceeded to glare at the person sitting in the seat next to mine in first class.

  “You have got to be kidding me.” Screw you, Universe. You and I are done.

  The Bastard Scot looked up from his newspaper and gave a slight shake of his head. “Please tell me you are not sitting next tae me on a three-and-a-half-hour flight?”

  “I’m just as unhappy about it,” I said, opening the overhead bin. Lifting the carry-on that weighed a ton (seriously, it was a miracle I got it shut), I stumbled a little, losing my grip, and it whacked the Scot on the head. At the sound of his grunt, I smiled. “Sorry! That was a happy accident.”

  “Here, let me help you.” A guy around my age in a tailored business suit stepped forward to assist but was brusquely brushed aside by the Scot as he stood up, dwarfing us both.

  “I’ve got it.” He grabbed the carry-on out of my hand. “Safer I do it or I’ll land in Chicago with a concussion.”

  “Well, that would be a shame.” I skirted past him so I could slide into my seat while he dealt with my luggage.

  I’d already removed my e-reader from my carry-on for the plane ride and had it booting up before the Bastard Scot got back in the seat beside me. And even though there was a double arm divider between us with little cup holders in them, he still managed to make me feel overwhelmed by his size.

  My plan had been to sink right into a good book and get on with my life like I wasn’t sitting next to an uncivilized, too-attractive-for-his-own-good guy who definitely had to have some Viking blood in his genetic history. I was going to ignore him because I was certain he’d say something rude about the weight of my luggage. However, I didn’t get the chance to slight him because he did it to me first. He pulled out the table from the side of his seat and propped a laptop open on it. And he acted like I didn’t even exist.

  “Mr. Scott.” The flight attendant who had greeted me when I entered the plane appeared above us with a tray of drinks in his hand. “Can I offer you a preflight drink? Champagne?”

  “Water.” Mr. Scott—the Bastard Scot—responded in what seemed to be his typical abrupt fashion.

  The flight attendant handed him a glass of water and then smiled at me. “Miss Breevort?”

  “Champagne, please,” I responded instantly, throwing my neighbor a filthy look for being discourteous. “Thank you.” Again, I don’t know why, but I’d expected commentary from the Bastard Scot as I reached in front of his face for the glass of bubbly. But there was nothing.

  My toes twitched with irritation, and my fingers gripped tight to the glass with annoyance as I sipped the champagne. I side-eyed Mr. Scott as he sipped his water with one hand and tapped the mouse pad on his laptop with the other.

  I should have been glad he was ignoring me, but for some reason that felt as insulting as his behavior in the airport.

  I didn’t want to admit it, but his indifference bothered me. I’d spent the last few days being ignored by people in my hometown of Arcadia. And I mean treated as if I was invisible.

  As much as I told myself I didn’t care, it stung.

  And now here I was being treated to the same by a complete stranger who had obviously made a snap judgment about me. That shouldn’t have irritated me, but I was tired, I’d had a tough week, and it did royally annoy the crap out of me.

  I glared out of the corner of my eye at him, my gaze drifting to the laptop screen his eyes were glued to. A wave of surprise moved through me. He clicked between tabs—spreadsheets with figures, complicated drawings that looked like technical specs, dense documents, e-mails. All of which suggested the Bastard Scot was more business guy than motorcycle gang member.

  “Planning a big bank heist?” I said before I could caution myself against engaging in another verbal battle with him.

  His stunning gaze turned my way. Confusion mingled with aggravation radiated from those unusual eyes.

  I pointed to his laptop in answer to his silent question.

  He looked back at it and then at me. The confusion left his expression, abandoning the aggravation that seemed to grow into full-blown vexation. “Do you always put your nose where it doesn’t belong?”

  “Well, if you don’t want anyone realizing you’re planning to rob a bank, you should probably hide the plans.”

  “It’s my work,” he bit out.

  “You’re a businessman?”

  Somehow his reply was sarcastic without even saying a word. I took his silent retort for a yes.

  “You don’t look it.”

  “Aye, well, it doesn’t surprise me someone like you would judge people based on what they look like.” He sneered. “He’s covered in tattoos, doesn’t wear a suit, so of course he’s a criminal rather than a businessman, right?”

  “You do realize you’re doing what you accused me of doing? You’re judging me based on what I look like. Come to think of it, you have been doing that since the first time we ran into each other at the airport. Also … if you can afford to fly first class, you can afford to buy a sense of humor. And I would get on that because you’re in serious need of one.”

  “How am I judging you based on what you look like?”

  “ ‘Someone like you,’ you said, right?” I cocked my head to the side as I studied his rugged—and right now harsh—countenance.

  He gave me a taut nod.

  “You don’t know me. You met me a few hours ago in an airport, where admittedly people don’t always act like their normal selves because of high levels of stress, fatigue, and often fear of flying. So if you don’t know who I am as a person, the only logical conclusion I can draw is that you’re judging me based on what I look like and not on who I am.”

  The Bastard Scot contemplated me a moment. “True,” he finally said. “To a certain extent. But you can often tell a lot about a person from the way he or she looks. It’s just whether or not you’re intuitive enough tae get it right. You saw tattoos and thought—what … motorcycle club?”

  I tried not to blush, squirming uncomfortably that he’d guessed correctly.

  “And you were wrong about me. But you are right, I dinnae know you, but I can tell by the time you spent on your hair and makeup, on the money you spent on your suit, on those designer shoes, the diamonds in your ears and around your wrist, that for whatever reason—and I dinnae know what those reasons are—you care what people think about your appearance. By the weight of the carry-on I just stuffed in the overheard bin I’d also say you overpack, which along with how you look, suggests you’re high maintenance. And I would be very, very surprised if I’d gotten that wrong about you.”

  His tone more than the words caused a heat in my cheeks brought on by hurt feelings. “So you think you’re better than me because you don’t care about your appearance?”

  “I didn’t say I dinnae care about my appearance. I care. I’m covered in tattoos that say I care. I just dinnae care what anyone else thinks about my appearance.”

  “Well, maybe that’s how I feel. I like to look well presented. It’s got nothing to do with anyone else.”

  His answering expression suggested he didn’t believe me and it bothered me that I cared. So I scoffed, “I don’t care what you think of me.”

  “Of course you do. I’m probably the first straight man you’ve ever met who hasn’t fallen at your feet.” His eyes scanned my face first before moving down the length of my body in a way that
made me involuntarily shiver.

  That only made his words more provoking. They prodded an old hurt that had already been reawakened this week. I was determined to bury it where it belonged and did not need this stranger messing with my efforts. “You accuse me of being judgmental, but you are way more judgmental than me.”

  He shrugged. “Didn’t say I wasn’t. I’m just usually right. And I’m right about you.”

  The urge to prove him wrong was so strong and yet all that proved was that he was right. I cared too much what people thought. Despite his dismissal of me, of how much it opened old wounds, I decided the best thing I could do was just ignore him as previously planned.

  I drank the rest of the champagne and put the empty glass in the cup holder beside me. The Bastard Scot turned back to his laptop like he hadn’t just insulted me. Again.

  Truthfully, I’d never met a more impolite, ill-mannered, impertinent man in my life.

  Trying to ignore his existence, I opened up my current book on my e-reader, my body humming with awareness of the large guy beside me and growing steadily more pissed off about it. I hated that I kept getting faint whiffs of cologne—a decidedly delicious musky, woodsy, spicy scent that suited the bastard way too much. After I’d read the same paragraph for the fifth time, relief flooded me when my phone started to buzz in my suit pocket.

  “That’s supposed tae be switched off,” he grumbled beside me.

  I sniffed in derision as I pulled the cell out of my pocket. “The man who is trying so hard to prove he doesn’t care what other people think of him is a stickler for the rules? Shocking.”

  Watching his lips pinch in annoyance gave me more pleasure than it should. Pleasure that transformed from smug to tender at the sight of the name on my phone screen. “Hey, sweetie,” I answered.

  “I’m sorry I missed your call. Lunch hour, you know.” Harper’s voice made me instantly relax. My best friend’s voice on the other end of the line had kept me sane these past few days.

  “I just called to tell you my flight got canceled. I’m on a flight to Chicago, but I’ll have to stay overnight at O’Hare. My flight home isn’t until tomorrow morning.”