He stopped in front of the bar that separated her kitchen from the rest of the apartment and turned to face her. “You look great. Did I interrupt anything?”
Gillian was suddenly very glad she’d planned to go out with her friends that night. Otherwise she would’ve been wearing her fat pants—large, flowy cotton pants with an elastic waist—and no bra. Her hair would’ve been thrown up into a messy bun and she would’ve been mortified. At least now she looked her best.
“Thanks. And I was just heading out to a bar called The Funky Walrus to hang with my friends.”
Walker smiled, and Gillian had to lock her knees at the sight. Frowning and serious, he was good-looking. Smiling? He was lethal.
“The Funky Walrus?” Walker asked.
Gillian chuckled. “I know, the name is weird, but then again, a lot of Austin is weird, so it fits. It’s not a college bar, and most of the patrons are businessmen and women in their thirties and forties. It’s low-key and laid-back, and we try to get together at least once every few weeks to catch up.”
Walker nodded, and the ensuing silence between them stretched.
Gillian fidgeted. This was weird…and not at all how she’d imagined this meeting would go. She’d fantasized that she’d be witty and amusing, and Walker would tell her how he’d been thinking about her and he had to come see her.
Taking a deep breath, Gillian decided to make the first move. It seemed unlikely, but maybe Walker was nervous.
“I’m glad to see you.”
“We need to talk.”
They’d spoken at the same time, and Gillian flushed. Walker didn’t sound happy about needing to talk to her, and he certainly didn’t sound as if he were flirting, as she was trying to do with him. “Um…okay,” she stammered.
He ran a hand over his head and sighed, and Gillian steeled herself for whatever he was about to say.
“I stopped by because we’ve gotten intel that there was a seventh hijacker on the plane. Using the audio that you managed to record—that last time we talked, and you kept the phone line open when you handed the phone back—it was determined that a hijacker was posing as a passenger. Luis and another hijacker discussed him, but didn’t give us any clues as to who he might be.”
Gillian blinked—and she felt her heart drop into her stomach.
The only thing she could process was that Walker hadn’t come to ask her out, or to get to know her better. She’d been dreaming about him for three weeks, hoping against hope that the spark she’d felt between them hadn’t been one-sided. With his first sentence, he’d effectively crushed any hope that there might be more between them.
“Oh…” It was all she could say. Her throat was tight and it was hard to swallow.
“I wanted to warn you, let you know that you could be in danger. There’s no telling what this seventh person is thinking. We don’t know if he might want revenge for his friends dying, or if he might think you heard too much while you were onboard, or might be able to identify him.”
Gillian barely heard him. The disappointment and embarrassment she felt was overwhelming. She knew she should be more concerned that there was another hijacker out there, but her disappointment over the reason for Walker’s visit had totally overshadowed everything else.
Her shoulders slumped forward unconsciously. “Well…thanks for letting me know,” she said awkwardly.
Walker frowned. “Are you okay?”
“Great. Fine. Yeah, I’m good,” she said a little too brightly, doing her best to pretend Walker hadn’t shattered her fantasy about the two of them getting together. “I appreciate you telling me. I’ll be on the lookout.”
“I thought we might talk. Go over your memories of the passengers and see if we can’t narrow down who the sleeper might be.”
Spend more time with him? When all he wanted was information? No, thank you. Maybe later—like a year or two—she’d be able to sit across from him and have a perfectly professional conversation about that time she’d been hijacked and forced to act as a go-between for the hijackers and the negotiators. But today wasn’t that day.
She nodded quickly, having a feeling she looked like a spastic rag doll. “Sure. Yeah, fine. But I can’t right now. I’m leaving. I have a date…with my friends. My girlfriends.”
Walker frowned. “I’m not sure that’s the best idea right now. Not when we don’t know who the seventh hijacker is or where he might be.”
Gillian snorted. “He’s not going to care about me. I’m nobody and totally harmless. Besides, I always lock my doors and strangers off the street can’t just walk into the building. They have to be buzzed in by a resident. I’ll be fine.”
“I walked in off the street,” Walker said flatly.
Gillian was desperate to get rid of him. She wanted to cry. Was on the verge of crying. And she’d rather walk over a bed of nails than let Walker see how upset she was. “I’ll be careful,” she told him firmly. “It was good to see you, but I really need to go now.” She turned and walked toward her front door. She opened it and was about to leave when Walker spoke up behind her.
“Um, Gillian?”
She turned. “Yeah?”
“You’re going to leave me in your apartment?”
Shit, shit, shit. She tried to play off her blunder. Shaking her head, she said, “No, I was holding the door for you.”
He grinned as if he knew she was lying, but he walked toward her without a word. He stopped when he was right in front of her. Gillian didn’t dare look up at him. She had a feeling he’d be able to see right through her bravado.
“Gillian?”
“Yeah?” she asked, staring at his Adam’s apple as if it was the most fascinating thing she’d ever seen.
“Look at me.”
Internally steeling herself, Gillian lifted her chin and let her gaze meet his.
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” she said quickly—too quickly. “I’m just on my way out and you took me by surprise.”
“Are you sure we can’t go back inside and talk? I’m not comfortable leaving you like this.”
For just a second, Gillian got mad. He wasn’t comfortable? Of course it was all about him. She was just a stupid, romantic girl who’d foolishly thought they’d connected over an intense situation.
Most of the time she had high self-esteem. She was thirty and owned her own very successful business. She had great friends and people seemed to like her. She had a gift in that she could defuse almost any situation, which came in handy since she had to deal with stressful situations on a daily basis with her job.
But the one thing that eluded her was love. The kind that made a man put her first no matter what else was going on in his life. She was more than willing to reciprocate, and had put her all into each and every serious relationship she’d been in. But when push came to shove, the men she’d thought she loved had proven that she came second.
Taking a deep breath, and trying to ignore how good Walker smelled, she knew she was being irrational. But his words hurt all the same. She shook her head. “I’ll be fine. I always am,” she said, her voice filled with sadness she couldn’t hide. Then she shrugged and slipped away from him into the hall. “Can you get the door?” she asked as evenly as possible.