Excerpt of Flight Delay by Nicole Helm

And then Lawson and Katie were alone.

“Well, that was fun. Never a dull moment around here.” Lawson tried to smile, but it came out more of a grimace.

“I still can’t quite get over Callie being engaged. She was always...rough around the edges.”

“People change.”

Silence practically echoed in the wake of that comment. Lawson Baker, Conversation Killer. Might as well make up business cards.

“I meant—”

She put her hand on his arm, effectively cutting off not just what he was going to say but the ability to say it. There was a weird electricity in her touch, something that shrank his lungs and made his skin where she touched warmer than the sun blazing against his cheek.

“You don’t have to walk on eggshells. That wasn’t what talking it through was supposed to do. We can say things that remind us of what happened. I won’t break, and neither will you.”

She slipped her hand back into her lap, her gaze drifting there. “Do you think time will make this easier? Or is this it? You feel too weird around me to have a normal conversation?”

“I...don’t know.”

She nodded, her expression softening into sadness and it made his heart ache. He didn’t want to make her sad. They’d both had their fill of sad.

“It’ll get better,” he offered, not sure he believed it. But he’d try. Really. Maybe after the screwed up world they’d lived in, they both deserved something more than he’d been willing to try for. Friendship again. Normalcy again.

That could happen. Right?

She looked back over at him. Her smile wasn’t totally convincing, but her gaze held his. She reached out, touched the ends of his hair. He might have flinched away at the surprise touch, but it felt too good to move away from. Something jittery and exciting and new.

“You need a haircut,” she said in a low voice.

He had to clear his throat to speak past the blockage there. “Yeah, I guess I do.”

She pulled her hand back, then trailed her fingertips across the palm of her other hand. The hand that hadn’t touched him. If he studied her expression, he might see something akin to what he was feeling.

He looked away and stood. “Well, I should get back to it. See you later.” Even though the word coward echoed through his head, he had to step away. Get some clarity and some brainpower pumping through him again.

Because he knew what all the weird feelings and sensations were. He’d recognize that stirring warmth anywhere, even if it had been a long, long time since he’d felt it.

And it wasn’t anything he had any business feeling toward Katie. Not now. Not ever.