Midnight Plane to Georgia

My latest BAD BOY story, in the anthology BAD BOYS SOUTHERN STYLE, is called Midnight Plane to Georgia, and the idea came to me from two places. First, I love the eyes-meeting-across-a-crowded-room thang . . . (even though, in this story, it’s across a crowded airport lounge). And second, I adore seeing my heroines hold on to their ideals and plans with a grip steady enough to drag the strong sexy hero around to their way of thinking. In this story, I got to use both ideas—and I went to Georgia for the third time—Savannah, which is one of the most interesting places in the country. I love every inch of it, and I can’t wait to go back. Midnight Plane to Georgia It’s what Tracy does best, people-please and generally overwork the word ‘yes.’ But in love and life it’s gotten her nowhere. Tracy’s had enough—no more ‘yes.’ From here on out it’s all about her. Colson Jones, hot-eyed and very determined, wants it to be all about her—and he’s pretty sure that Tracy will be saying ‘yes!’ again very soon . . . Excerpt At first his sweeping gaze bounced right off her, then . . . Whoa! . . . It backed right up and settled—on the best view in the terminal. Tracy sat on the floor beside her bag. She’d already finished her book, read two papers from cover to cover, done the crosswords, and written in the diary she was determined to keep about her time in Georgia. Since arriving at the airport seven hours ago, she’d been shuffled from one holding area to the other, a victim of cancelled flights and non-stop gate changes. It was eleven-fifteen p.m., and she was flat out of activities other than people-watching. She popped a sour lemon drop in her mouth, bent her knee, rested her arm on it, and studied the waiting passengers. She started playing the who’ll-be-my-seatmate-game. Her eye snagged on a big woman with fifty tons of baggage, all of which she apparently planned to stow under, around, in and over her seat. Tracy shuddered. Please God . . . no. At first she missed him, probably because she was in the shoe phase of her horde-scan, and when you’ve seen one pair of top-line Nikes, you’ve seen them all. Then something prickled along her hairline, and she looked up—then away—then back. Took him in. Took him all in. And all of him was excellent in the extreme. Thick dark hair, probably fabulous in the morning. Intelligent, arrogant, amazingly vivid blue eyes, and he wore his jeans—no his jeans wore him in all the right places, loving every inch of his long legs, lean hips, and other . . . body parts. He wore what looked to be a well-worn but expensive sports jacket with his jeans, and a gray Tee with a Celtic knot emblazoned on the front. A computer bag and soft leather carry-on sat at his feet. He looked tasty, offering the whole package. Seductive, confident, and—even sitting stone-still on a hard airport lounge seat—forceful. Eye-chocolate. A climax waiting to happen. And he was looking back, and letting what he saw put a very intense light in his vivid blue eyes. Across a crowded room . . . She tilted her head one way; he tilted his the other. Their gazes met, held. They smiled. The ten feet that separated them evaporated, trailing off into a mist, shrouding the hundreds of people spread out among the gates; the mist muted their chatter, deadened the blare coming from the constant reportage of the PA system, and, when she finally got her lungs pumping again, brought the scent of gardenia to her nose. A group of tourists stepped into their lust line. Tracy let out an uneven sigh, and slumped back against the wall. Okay, maybe the gardenia scent did come from the girl who’d taken a seat on the floor beside her, but as an olfactory backdrop to first sight of a man who knocked your socks off, and would probably knock off anything else he wanted if he got close enough, it worked for her. The tour group moved off. Eye-chocolate was gone.