Megan wasn’t the only woman to notice him, even if her attention was less pointed than the others’. At least six feet tall, he had to stoop slightly to keep from bumping his head on the ceiling. The blond flight attendant who’d brought Megan’s drink gave him a sideways glance of appreciation, even if he didn’t notice. Then again, Megan was sure a guy like him, who epitomized the words tall, dark, and handsome, was used to women staring. Jay certainly had been.
The attendant rested her hand lightly on the man’s arm and looked up at him through heavily mascaraed eyelashes, saying something softly so that she had to lean into him to be heard. Looking slightly irritated, he showed her his ticket, and she pointed to the empty seat.
Megan had a neighbor.
He stuffed his overnight bag in the overhead bin and sat next to her, buckling his seatbelt. He was, without a doubt, a better option than the financial planner, but maybe not by much. She guessed him to be close to her age, and he didn’t have the typical laid-back Seattle vibe. He bore a resemblance to Jay, though his thick, wavy dark brown hair wasn’t trimmed as closely as her ex-fiancé’s always was. But his looks didn’t concern her. What did concern her was the determined gleam in his dark brown eyes and the way his jaw was perpetually clenched, as if he were steeling himself against something unpleasant. He looked like he was determined to complete a mission, at any cost.
Momentary fear mingled with the inebriated fog in her head. “Are you a terrorist?” she asked before she could stop herself.
“What?” he asked, his eyes wide as he turned to her in horror.
She shook her head, the movement making her dizzy. “Sorry. You just had a crazed look . . .” She waved her hand in circles in front of her face to help justify her statement, then quickly dropped it to her lap. What on earth had possessed her to say that?
Moments later, the flirty attendant came back and leaned across the man to grab the empty glass on Megan’s tray. Still bent over, the blond turned to face him, her face less than a foot from his. “Don’t you worry, Mr. McMillan.” She patted his arm again. “I’ll come take care of you just as soon as I can.”
His mouth parted slightly before he grunted, “Thanks.”
Megan had to wonder what the attendant’s definition of taking care of him included.
The flight crew started the safety demonstration, and Megan leaned her head against the seat, her fingers digging into the armrest. When this flight landed, she would finally have to do what she’d been avoiding for over a month . . . but how? How was she going to face her mother?
“Afraid of flying?” the man next to her asked, sounding displeased by the prospect.
“No, just crashing and burning.” Which was exactly what was going to happen to her after they landed.
Chapter Two
It was his turn to ask, “What?”
“Not the plane.” The brunette’s brown eyes fluttered open, glistening with tears. “My life.”
Josh nearly panicked. He could deal with paranoid people worried about plane crashes, but he hoped to God this woman wasn’t going to cry. He didn’t think he could take it right now.
He wasn’t supposed to be here—on this plane, with this woman, at this point in his life.
Josh McMillan wasn’t the kind of man to take leaps. Every step he took was carefully plotted beforehand. Except for this one.
Ever since Josh was eight years old, he’d wanted to follow in his father’s footsteps and become an engineer. Josh was sixteen when his father died, but the loss only cemented his resolve. His older brother, already an engineer, took over the family business, and Josh joined him when he graduated from college.
The firm had struggled since their father’s death, and the bad turn in the economy hadn’t helped. But then Josh had created a revolutionary part that could be used on wind turbines to help produce more electricity with the same amount of wind power. The part had the potential to make millions. So they’d hired a patent attorney and spent a fortune they didn’t have to get the patent process started, hinging the future of their business on it. And it had worked. They’d acquired interest from a serious investor who could help take their engineering firm to a whole new level.
Until last Friday, when their patent had been denied.
A firm in Kansas City, Missouri, had received approval for an identical plan, but how could a firm in Kansas City have so exactly duplicated the esoteric part? Josh had literally stumbled upon the design by accident.
Josh’s company would have to pay thousands more to an attorney to fight the ruling. Thousands they couldn’t afford to lose. Worse yet, the investor had caught wind and threatened to pull out of their agreement if the matter wasn’t resolved within a week. The brothers went out for drinks to strategize about the ruling, which is when, after a couple of rounds, Noah confessed to having shown the plans to a friend of a friend at a conference three years before.
“Who was the friend of a friend?”
Noah looked slightly embarrassed. “She was a woman I picked up in the hotel bar. I took her to my room, and the next morning she was gone and so was my bag. A copy of the plans was inside.”
“And you didn’t think to tell me?” Josh asked, his temper rising.
Noah slouched over the bar, cradling a glass tumbler in his hand. He lifted his shoulder into a half-shrug. “They were a copy, Josh. I didn’t think anything of it.”
“We have to fight this.” Josh only realized he was shouting when he took in the startled looks of the other bar patrons. “We didn’t work so hard to file the patent and get this investor just to let it all be flushed down the drain.”
Noah sat up and drained his drink. “Maybe there’s nothing left to fight for.”
Only, Josh wasn’t so willing to give up the fight. He’d spent the last seven years pouring his everything into making his father’s company a success. He’d sacrificed his personal life, not to mention his checkbook. No, he couldn’t come this close to making the company financially solvent just to lose it all. There had to be a way to fight this. There just had to be.
He went on to spend the weekend researching everything he could about PMV Engineering, the firm that had filed the patent two weeks before the McMillan brothers. PMV consisted of three partners. One had retired and moved to Belize, which—in and of itself—made Josh suspicious. The other two were still active. Andrew Peterman was the second principal, and his son Drew had joined the firm three years prior—suspicious timing, indeed. From the photos Josh had found on the Internet, he made the highly unscientific judgment that the man was cold-blooded enough to set Noah up.
After hours of researching and brainstorming and only six days before the investor pulled out, Josh decided to go to Kansas City to confront the bastards in person. By a stroke of luck, the daughter of the third principal, Bart Vandemeer, was about to get married. Josh figured he could use the distraction to catch them off guard.
Noah thought he was crazy; but then, he would. Despite being four years older, he’d never been as invested in the company. Still, in spite of his skepticism about the last-minute trip, Noah had driven him to the airport. Since the ticket had been purchased at the last minute, Josh had needed to spring for first class. It had cost a fortune, but at least he could have a beer or two and relax on the flight to Kansas City, taking the opportunity to figure out a real plan.