Affairs of the Heart Read Online Free PDF

slipping
into their deep waters without a life jacket.
    “ What’s going
on here?”
    Confusion and disbelief
were very much evident in those sea-green eyes, as well as in his
voice. Even the muscles in his biceps seemed to twitch with
surprise. Or was it aggravation?
    Serves him
right.
    “ You, sir,
are in my seat.” Khristen fought to control the building irritation
as she sat down. “I paid good money for it and don’t intend to
share it with you or your legs.”
    She snatched a magazine
out from the back of the seat and flipped through it. Not really
seeing the contents of each page, she wondered what lucky star she
had wished on to be stuck next to this despicable hunk all the way
to Hawaii. Despicable was the nicest word she could think of to
describe him at the moment. He was the type who thought muscles and
a nice body got him his way. She had dealt with his kind before.
She’d successfully kicked each one to the gutter each and every
time. Well, almost each and every time… but she wasn’t going to
dwell on that mistake.
    Khristen ignored the
confusion as the final passengers boarded the plane. She figured it
would be ten minutes or so before they would even begin to taxi out
onto the Los Angeles airport runway.
    Khristen fastened her
seat belt and prayed sleep would come for the remainder of her
flight to her long-awaited tropical vacation. As soon as they were
in the air, she would locate a station on the radio and let her
mind tune in to some good, hard ‘80s rock music. Maybe some Van
Halen, or Journey, or better yet, David Lee Roth, anything to make
the four-hour trip go faster. She hoped it would keep her mind from
wandering over to the guy who sat next to her—a man who smelled as
good as he looked—all spice and dangerous as hell.
    “ You know,
you were pretty rude.” The deep, smooth-as-silk, masculine voice
pierced the silence she’d tried to plant between them.
    So much for
solitude.
    “ Me!” The
anger in her eyes reflected off the mirrored sunglasses on her
unwelcome travel companion. “You should talk, Mister
My-Future’s-So-Bright-I–Gotta-Wear-Shades. I’m not the seat-stealer
here.” Khristen’s nerves snapped with aggravation.
    In a desperate attempt to
calm down before her mouth got her thrown off the plane, Khristen
rested her head against the back of her seat. She closed her eyes,
hoping to put an end to the unwanted conversation. As entertaining
as it may end up, she didn’t want to tempt fate.
    Been there
and done that, as the saying goes, in another place and time. No
need to repeat the same mistake.
    “ That still
doesn’t give you the right—”
    “ Listen. It’s
going to be a long flight, and if you don’t mind, I’d rather not
spend my time bickering with you. You can have the seat, and let’s
just pretend that neither one of us is sitting next to the other.
Okay? Okay,” she said, clutching the magazine.
    While the stewardess
instructed them all on safety procedures, Khristen couldn’t help
notice her fellow traveler kept the silver-framed mirrored
sunglasses perched on his nose. An unquenchable curiosity surged
its way to the surface, causing an all-too-familiar
feeling.
    Damn
hormones, anyway!
    She felt them start their
rampage through her body, and thoughts of the mysterious stranger
mingled with a desire to figure out what he had to hide.
    His body fueled her
imagination as she tried to seek out his facial features—the ones
she could see, anyway.
    Daddy always
warned me about being too curious. It only gets a girl going down
the wrong path.
    Too bad she hadn’t taken
those words to heart the last time she had taken a trip.
    A little hidden
inspection couldn’t hurt, could it? Not if she was careful, and he
didn’t notice her giving him the once-over. She was only looking,
not touching, after all. And he’d never know; if he fell asleep
with those damn glasses on.
    On his head sat a
well-worn Los Angeles Dodgers baseball cap, covering