telling her which flight Ironheart had taken by claiming to have picked
up a credit card he’d dropped. But the airline might offer to return it
to him; or if they found her story suspicious, they might even call
security guards.
In the line at the ticket counter, she dared to close within one person
of Ironheart. The only traveler between them was a burly, big-bellied
man who looked like an NFL linebacker gone to seed; he had mildly
offensive body odor, but he provided considerable cover, for which she
was grateful.
The short line moved quickly. When Ironheart stepped up to the counter,
Holly eased out around the fat man and strained forward to hear whatever
destination was mentioned.
The public-address system inconveniently brought forth a woman’s soft,
sensuous, yet zombielike voice, announcing the discovery of a lost
child.
At the same time, a noisy group of New Yorkers went past, complaining
about the perceived phoniness of California’s have-a-nice-day service
ethic, apparently homesick for hostility.
Ironheart’s words were drowned out.
Holly inched nearer to him.
The fat man frowned down at her, evidently suspecting her of attempted
linejumping. She smiled at him in such a way as to assure him that she
had no evil intentions and that she knew he was large enough to squash
her like a bug.
If Ironheart glanced back now, he would look directly into her face. She
held her breath, heard the clerk say, “. . . O’Hare Airport in Chicago,
leaving in twenty minutes. . . ,” and slipped back behind the fat man,
who looked over his shoulder to frown down at her again.
She wondered why they had come to LAX for a flight to Chicago. She was
pretty sure there were plenty of connections to O’Hare from John wayne
in Orange County. Well. . . though Chicago was farther than San Diego,
it was preferable to-and cheaper than-Hawaii.
Ironheart paid for his ticket and rushed off in search of his gate
without glancing in Holly’s direction.
Some psychic, she thought.
She was pleased with herself When she reached the counter, she presented
a credit card and asked for a seat on the same flight to Chicago. For a
moment she had the terrible feeling that the clerk would say the plane
was fully booked. But there were seats left, and she got her ticket.
The departure lounge at the gate was nearly empty. Boarding of the
flight had virtually been completed. Ironheart was nowhere in sight.
On the way along the tunnel-like boarding gate to the door of the
aircraft, she began to worry that he would see her when she had to walk
back the aisle to her seat. She could pretend not to notice him, or
pretend not to recognize him if he approached her. But she doubted that
he would believe her presence on his flight was sheer coincidence. An
hour and a half she’d been in a rush to confront him. Now she wanted
nothing more than to avoid confrontation. If he saw her, he would abort
his trip; she might never get another chance to be present at one of his
last-minute rescues.
The plane was a wide-body DC-10 with two aisles. Each row of right
seats was divided into three sections: two by the window on the port
side five down the center, two by the window on the starboard side.
Holly assigned to row twenty-three, seat H, which was on the starbord
side one seat removed from the window. As she headed back up the aisle,
she scanned the faces of her fellow passengers, hoping she wouldn’t lock
eyes with Jim Ironheart. In fact, she would rather not see him at all
during the flight and worry about catching sight of him again at O’Hare.
The DC10 was an immense aircraft. Though a number of seats were
empty,more than two hundred and fifty people were on-board. She and
Ironheart might very well fly around the world together without bumping
into each other getting through the few hours to Chicago should be a
cinch.
Then she saw him. He was sitting in the five-wide middle section of
sixteen, the port-aisle seat, on the other side of the plane. He was