The Perfect Stranger (Social Media #2)(43)

“Landry?”

“It was an accident,” she says briefly, thinking that Meredith’s—or maybe just her own—privacy seems to have somehow been violated. Maybe it shouldn’t feel that way, but it does. She wishes she hadn’t called back.

“What kind of accident? A car accident?” Barbie June is asking when a voice cuts in to distract Landry.

“Thank you.”

She looks up to see that the owner of the luggage a few seats away has returned with his coffee.

Make that two cups of coffee. He gestures, offering one to her.

She pivots her phone away from her mouth to thank him.

“It’s black,” he says, “Do you take cream and sugar?”

“That’s all right, I—”

“Landry? Who are you talking to?”

“No one,” she murmurs into the phone. “I should go. I think we’re about to board.”

“But—”

“I’ll call you when I . . .” About to say land, she amends quickly: “ . . . get home.”

“When will that be?”

“Monday.”

“You’re not coming home until Monday?” Barbie June sounds as though Landry just told her she’d boarded the Queen Mary on a one-way cruise to Europe.

“Sunday night. Late.” Too late to make phone calls.

“Oh, well . . . have a good weekend, sweetie.”

“You too.”

Landry hangs up.

Sure. I’ll have a great weekend—paying my respects to my dead friend.

She shakes her head, pocketing her phone, and the man hands her one of the cups of coffee. “I know you said no, but I figured you were just being polite.”

“I was.” And I was thinking I shouldn’t accept a cup of coffee from a strange man.

“So . . . your mother?”

“Pardon?”

“Whoever you were talking to—that was your mother?”

“Oh—no. My cousin.”

He flashes a grin and she notices his nice white teeth. “I figured it had to be family by the way you were trying to shake her.”

“I wasn’t really—”

“Oh, come on, sure you were.”

“Sure I was,” she finds herself agreeing, returning his grin.

“Yeah. Thought so. Been there, done that, a million times.”

“I guess every family has one of those.”

“Mine has many. And they’re all in Cincinnati. I was thinking even twenty-four hours is a lot of time to spend with them, so . . . if there’s anyone who doesn’t particularly mind this flight delay, it’s—”

“That guy?” she quips, pointing at a college-age kid stretched out on the floor nearby, peacefully asleep.

“Him, too, I guess. Seriously, I wouldn’t mind if we sat here for hours. Oh, by the way, I almost forgot—” He pulls a couple of creamer and sugar packets out of his pocket, along with a plastic stirrer, and offers them to her.

“Thank you. Really.” She peels the plastic lid off the cup. “I got up so early that I really do need this.”

“Same here. And between being tired and what’s waiting for me when we land, if we don’t take off soon—not that I want to—I may have to switch over to something stronger.”

“You know, that’s not a bad idea.” As soon as the words are out of her mouth, she wants to bite them back. Does it sound as if she wants him to buy her a drink now?

No—of course not.

She’s just not good at this . . . solo travel.

Her phone rings. She jumps, almost spilling her coffee.

“Careful there. Here, let me hold that for you.”

He takes the cup, and she pulls out her phone, sees Rob’s cell phone number in the caller ID window.

“That’s my husband,” she says—maybe a little pointedly, and answers the phone. “Rob? Everything okay?”

“Everything is fine.”

“Oh, good.” She presses the phone to her ear with her shoulder as Mr. Coffee hands back the cup, gives a little salute and goes back to his seat.

“Tucker can’t find any of the shirts he needs for work,” Rob tells her, “and I looked everywhere—”

“Hanging up behind the door in the laundry room?”

“—except there.”

“Go check. I’m pretty sure that’s where they are.”

She dumps a sugar packet into her coffee as he goes to look, resisting the urge to tell him that she reminded him where to find the shirts when they were on their way to the airport this morning. And, of course, she told Tucker last night. Twice. But neither of the men in her life can ever seem to find anything around the house.

“Got ’em,” Rob says a few moments later. “Thanks. I’ve got to get him moving or he’s going to be late. Do you know it took me fifteen minutes to get him out of bed?”

Welcome to my world, Rob.

“He’s not really a morning kid,” she points out unnecessarily, stirring her coffee.

“Yeah, no kidding. I’d better go give him his shirt. He’s probably sleeping again.”

“Probably. Love you.”