“But it’s so early,” I said playfully, shaking my head as if truly debating the consumption of this beverage. “How can I live with myself for drinking so early?”
“It’s not early in France,” she said with a wink in a faint French accent. “Pretend you are at your favorite brasserie, having a glass, watching the men and women walk by on cobblestoned streets.”
Ah, sounded exactly like my life for the last few years.
I raised the glass, grateful the airline had upgraded me, thanks to my frequent flyer miles. “When you put it like that, how can I live with myself for not drinking this champagne at three in the afternoon in Paris?”
She patted my shoulder, smiling softly. “Exactly.”
It was a passing touch. It ended a second later as she moved to the row behind me, treating another first-class passenger to a breakfast drink.
But it was enough to remind me of how long it had been.
Three years of only passing touches.
Three years of missing.
Three years of watching the world go by.
I lifted the glass and downed half the drink, letting the bubbles tickle my nose and go to my head.
I wasn’t going to get drunk on half a glass of champagne. Please. But as the plane zoomed closer to Vegas, the city where I’d met, romanced, and fallen madly in love with Jenna, I’d need a drink or two to get off this plane.
Hell, I’d required shots, lots of shots, last time I came here.
I downed the rest of the glass for good measure.
When the attendant turned around, passing me again, she didn’t ask if I wanted another. Instead, she stopped, giving me a soft grin. “What brings you to Vegas?”
“Friends. Work. The usual.”
She arched a curious brow. “And is that good?”
“Good enough,” I said, my standard reply.
“Sometimes ‘good enough’ is all we can hope for, isn’t it?” Her brown eyes were rimmed with sadness. She didn’t even try to hide it. It was there to see so easily, to read so completely.
But then, that was what I did. I read people. “Yes. Sometimes it is all there is.”
She sighed, a little melancholy sound, but then she smiled, and just as quickly, her sadness disappeared. It was gone in the snap of the finger. “But we go on, and we find the joy in other things, don’t we? That’s what I’ve done.”
I was too startled by the slice of honesty she’d served up to say anything at first. It was rare to connect with a stranger so easily, one I knew I’d never see again.
But maybe that was what strangers were for sometimes. For those unexpected encounters that cut you right to the heart.
“Yes, I think that’s true,” I said. “At least, I hope it’s true.”
“It is,” she said reassuringly. “I’m finding mine again. I’m trying again. You’ll get there. I can see in your eyes that you’re thinking about it. I know you’ll get there, and you’ll be glad when you tried.”
She set her hand on my shoulder once more, took my empty glass, and walked to the galley.
It wasn’t romantic, her touch. I didn’t follow her to the galley and beg for her number. That wasn’t what that moment was about.
It was about something more.
About letting go.
This stranger, who could read loss in my eyes just as easily as I’d seen it in hers, was an unexpected comrade in arms, giving me permission to let go.
And as the plane began its descent, diving toward the city that once belonged to my heart, maybe that was exactly what I needed.
It was only a weekend.
But maybe it was time to let go.
When I reached Adam’s condo, he yanked open the door and clapped me on the back in a quick hug.
“Good to see you,” I said, filling with a new sort of happiness—the kind that came from seeing old friends. It was a centered, balanced kind of joy.
His brow creased. “You look different.”
“It’s Botox. Shh. Don’t tell anyone,” I said as I moved past the doorway.
“Ah, that’s it. Did you have those collagen injections too?”
I set down my bag and laughed from deep within.
Adam tilted his head to the side. “Yeah, you don’t usually laugh like that. What’s up? Because it isn’t Botox.”
I took a beat, my laughter fading. “I didn’t expect this to happen. I wasn’t looking for it. But I had this strange sort of moment.”
“What happened?” he asked, leaning against the kitchen counter, curiosity in his eyes.
I told him about the flight attendant and he nodded, listening thoughtfully. “And that’s what you needed, that sort of permission almost? To move on? Like a final step?”
“Yeah, I think so,” I said, wrapping my head around this morning, understanding it fully now. I tapped my sternum. “I mean, who knows what tomorrow will bring, but I feel this lightness in my chest I haven’t felt in ages.”
“Maybe sometimes all we need are those chance encounters that help us see what we’ve been missing,” he mused.
“Maybe so,” I said, and this was why Adam and I had stayed friends over the years. We could shoot the breeze, talk about business, and dive deep when we needed to. “But enough about me. How can I thank you for letting me crash here?”
A slow grin took over his face, and he ran a hand over his jaw. “Well, there is this one thing.”
23
Nina
The shoot lasted all day, thanks to Vegas traffic.
There were no two ways about it. On convention days, you needed to charter a hot-air balloon to make it anywhere on the Strip in under an hour.
Unfortunately, I didn’t have those kinds of funds.
But I did have fabulous clients, and Chantal—for all her idiosyncrasies and her bed of coins—was one of them.
Because she knew what she wanted. A true lady boss, the olive-skinned beauty laid down the law.
“First, I want a shot of me in the elevator, lost in thought, wearing my little red dress.”
Done.
“Then, I want you to capture me walking down the hallway to the hotel room.”
Check.
“And then, you go into the room and take pictures of me entering the suite, like I’m getting ready for him.”
Finished.
“And finally, I want all the seductive shots of me on the bed.”
And that was where I was now, taking her picture as she posed in a sea of coins, like she owned this moment.
“I’d love it if you could run a hand through your hair with your head falling back,” I told her from behind the lens.
“Like this?”
“Nailed it,” I said, then took those shots.
When I showed her the preview on the back of my camera, she hummed over each and every image. “These are divine. My husband will love them.”
“No doubt he’ll be enthralled.”
“I hope he gets the meaning too,” she said, a little quirk in her lips. “But I know he will.”
“I would love to know the story behind these photos. Will you tell me?”
“We met in Vegas years ago. Here in this hotel. A one-night stand that turned into forever. I want him to see these and know I still want him as much as I did that night when he won one thousand dollars at the slots and took me back to his suite.”