Stephanie scowled out the tiny airplane window at the familiar rugged Washington landscape below, close and getting closer by the minute as they prepared for their final descent to SEATAC.
She should be overjoyed, okay, at least happy, to finally get home and back to her real life. Back to her dreams and her goals and the familiar task of making them happen.
Somehow, they just didn't shine as brightly in her mind as they had a few short days ago.
It was all Rick's fault.
All his talk about not chasing someone else's dreams had made her take a close look at herself. And she didn't much like what she'd seen. He'd made her see herself and her life in a completely different light, and now she was finding it impossible to un-see it.
Being with him had felt like coming back to herself. With him, she wasn't Stephanie the driven contract attorney. She wasn't Stephanie the almost-partner at a prestigious law firm, or Stephanie the youngest sister who could prove she was just as smart and successful as her competitive, insufferable older brothers.
She was just Stephanie—who was valuable and beautiful for who she was. Not for what she did.
She'd never felt such a deep connection with anyone before. Even now, she felt Rick in her heart, the truth of him solid and shining, a fact that she could not doubt.
But, dammit, what was she supposed to do about it? Change her whole life around because of a few magical days spent with someone she'd just met? That was just crazy, a plot for movies and novels. People didn't do that in real life.
Did they?
Realization gripped her, and she felt her world tilt on its axis. She didn't even want that partnership anymore. Couldn't care less about rubbing her brother's faces in it. She couldn't even remember why she'd ever thought it was so important.
She gripped her armrests as the plane dropped beneath her, taking her stomach with it. Landings were the only part of flying she really hated. She closed her eyes, determined to imagine herself walking off the plane, down the gangway to the terminal and solid ground.
Instead she saw tangled white sheets wrapped around her and Rick in her king size bed, where they lay tangled up in each other. Where they'd stayed thusly entangled for the entire last day of her stay after they'd returned from Pleasure Island on the small boat that had come looking for them the morning after the storm. The jasmine scented breeze teased the filmy white drapes at the open glass doors leading out to the ocean. She heard the sound of Rick's breathing, felt his hand on her breast. Remembered that place of languid calm, feeling spent after another round of lovemaking.
Buh-bam. The wheels touched down.
She sucked in a deep breath, and pushed her shoulders back. She'd think about these new worrying doubts later. She'd had a good plan and her goal was almost in hand. Maybe once she got back to her everyday life, things would fall back into place.
Not likely, her little voice whispered.
She didn't argue.
* * * *
She spent two excruciatingly long months as the newest partner in the firm, trying to give it a fair chance. She was miserable from the first hour.
It wasn't that she hated the work. It was good work and she was good at doing it. She just knew that there was much more to her, much more to life, than dedicating eighty hours a week to this one single facet.
There was Rick. God, how she missed Rick.
Not that he gave her a lot of opportunities to miss him. He found ways to be in her day, every day. He texted her good morning, sent selfies of him sailing on the perfect Caribbean ocean, called to talk late into the nights. Any other guy behaving this way would have been just another stalker. But with Rick, it wasn't nearly enough. It only made her want so much more.
It made her dream job feel like a prison she couldn't wait to break out of.
But the thing that clinched it for her had been her brothers' reaction to her announcement of her promotion.
They'd insisted on taking her to the best steakhouse in Seattle to celebrate. At the table, the three of them had hugged and congratulated her, then subsided into uncomfortable silence. Finally, Steve, the oldest, spoke up. "That's great, Steph, really. But, um— "
"But what?" she'd asked. "What's the 'but'?"
"Are you really happy?" He'd covered her hand with his own, and given her a searching look that spoke volumes to how much he cared. "I mean, if you are, then great. But you just don't seem happy." Her other two brothers had nodded in immediate agreement.
She'd looked around the table at their concerned faces, guilt stabbing her as she wondered how much she'd missed out on with her brothers over the previous five years while she concentrated on competing with them. "Well, to be honest... Not exactly."
She'd taken a chance then and confided her doubts and struggles to them, and they'd been amazingly warm and supportive. They'd ended the evening with a promise to go sailing together soon.
It was certainly enough to give a girl ideas. Especially a girl who had no shortage of ideas as it was.
* * * *
"Stephanie, are you sure about this? Come on, it's not too late to change your mind."
Stephanie kept walking and tried to ignore her boss, who trailed behind her as she made her very last trip to the elevator from her office.
"Don't do this, Stephanie. We need you."
The man hadn't stopped talking the entire time she'd been packing up her office. He pretty much hadn't given her any peace since yesterday when she'd told him she was quitting her job.
Brett, usually the epitome of the calm, competent attorney, was uncharacteristically disheveled. He looked like a man who had lost sleep. He shoved his usually carefully styled dark hair out of his eyes as he quick-stepped to keep up with her brisk stride. His eyes were haunted and desperate. "I thought you were happy here. You've worked your butt off for the last five years to make partner and now that you are, you're just walking out? What do you want? A bonus? A yacht? I can get you a yacht."
She stopped in front of the elevators and shifted her grip on the cardboard box. "You can hit the down button for me."
Brett cursed under his breath and punched the button. Stephanie grinned. She knew he was too much of a gentleman to refuse her request.
"Look Brett, I'm sorry to leave you on this short notice, but I already gave you my explanation and I don't know any other way to say it." She shifted the box to her other hip. Damn, it was heavy. "This just isn't doing it for me anymore. I realized that I've been chasing this goal because it was something someone else wanted. Not what I wanted."
"Then what the hell do you want?"
She felt like a kid getting out of school for the summer. For forever. She kept her gaze forward and concentrated on not letting loose with a happy dance right here in front of the elevator doors to freedom, mere inches and moments away. She didn't think Brett would appreciate the sentiment.
"I'll let you know when I find it," she said.
But she knew exactly what she wanted. She just wasn't exactly sure how to get it. How to get Rick.
Even from halfway across the globe, he'd made himself at home in her heart. She didn't know how they were going to do it, but they had to bring their lives together. She'd decided to make the first move and head south.
She was good at meeting challenges. She would figure it out. They would figure it out together.
There was a soft "ping" as the round button above the elevator lit up.
Brett stepped in front of the closed doors, stretching out his arms to body-block her. "Stephanie, please. Come back to my office and let's work something out."
The door slid open. Stephanie dropped her box, her fingers suddenly nerveless.
Rick.
She squeezed her eyes shut, blinked them open again. It was still him, ponytail, earring and all. Tall, and smiling that buccaneer smile that never failed to make her heart race.
"Hey Brett, how ya doing?" Rick brushed past Brett like he wasn't there and headed straight for Stephanie.
"What are you doing here?" Stephanie and Brett said in unison.
Stephanie glanced at Brett. "Shut up, Brett. This isn't about you."
"She's right about that," said Rick. He kicked the box on the floor out of his way and took Stephanie into his arms. "I told you I wouldn't let go when I found my dream," he said, while gazing into her eyes. "What do you say?"
Stephanie smiled up at her pirate, her dream, her future. "About time," she said. "Kiss me already."
"The customer's always right," he said, while lowering his mouth to hers. "Especially when they're right."
The End