Page 16 of Fake It For Love (Faux Love)
The men drifted away to talk with the star pitcher of the baseball team and a member of the jock crew. Relieved, I turned to pick up my bag and realized I wasn’t alone. One of the blondes, damned if I could remember her name, sidled up to me.
“Hi,” she said in a breathy tone.
“Hello.”
“Do you remember me?” she asked.
Oh, this was going to be a tough one. It wasn’t like we were ever friends in school. It wasn’t like she ever gave me the time of day. “Bree?”
Her face lit up. “Yes! It’s so good to see you again!”
“Yeah, you too,” I lied. She was lying as well. She didn’t care about me back then. I doubted she would have remembered my name if Tony hadn’t announced it.
“Is this your plane?” she cooed.
“Yes,” I said. I knew I was sucking at this conversation thing. I wasn’t great at small talk with beautiful women. I should be by now. There had certainly been enough of them in my life lately. But they talked to me because of my wallet, not because they had anything to say to me.
“Like you rented it to come down here?” she asked.
“No, it’s mine,” I said.
She pushed her massive dark sunglasses up. I was surprised her eyes weren’t melting. There was a lot of makeup around them. The lashes had to be fake. She batted them at me. “Do you own just one plane?”
“No.”
“You’re a man of few words,” she said. “What is it you do for a living?”
“Uh, aviation,” I answered.
“You’re a pilot?” she asked.
“I am a pilot,” I said.
“I had no idea pilots were paid so much,” she said. “I mean, my dad owns a plane. It’s not even as nice or new as this one. I know how much his plane cost. I asked him to buy me one for my birthday and he told me no. So, what do you really do?”
This was probably a woman who carried a notecard with the average salaries of various professions. She was not going to give anyone who made less than six figures the time of day. This woman was used to a certain lifestyle and would only want to maintain it or rise above.
“I own an aviation business,” I told her.
That got the attention of the other women. “Aviation business?” she asked. “What does that mean?”
I wasn’t about to tell her I owned what some would call an airline. “Aviation,” I said. “It’s a transportation business. We have a fleet of small aircraft.”
Her eyes got bigger. “You own more than one plane?”
“It’s part of the business,” I said. “I don’t personally own the aircraft.”
“But you do. I’d love to go for a ride in your plane. Can you take me up?”
I had to force myself not to visibly cringe. “Um, you know, I would have to file a flight plan and stuff like that. I just made a long flight and the plane needs to be refueled.”
She laughed and touched my arm. “We don’t have to do it now, silly. You’ll be here for a couple of weeks, right? We can go up later. I’d love to see a nice sunset from high above. I bet it’s really romantic.”
“We’ll have to see how things turn out,” I said.
Tony swaggered back my way. I never thought there would be a day when I actually looked forward to seeing the guy. I was so looking forward to him saving me from the ladies.
I wasn’t used to being treated like a piece of meat. I had my fair share of women attracted to me because of what I looked like or what I had, but none of them were ever really interested in the dork under the skin.
