Elle faced Carter. The moment she'd seen him, it was as though a wave of ice slapped into her. She saw the scene from far away. Saw Carter's jaw drop, his new friend scramble to cover herself. They slipped back into the bathroom with a slam of the flimsy door.

She knew Carter had a wandering eye. But this?

Elle struggled to breathe.

Carter was having sex. Sex! With a stranger. On their flight to her sister's wedding. While an engagement ring sat in his carry-on bag.

It was the opposite of gentlemanly.

Worse, it hurt.

She couldn't stop playing the instant she saw them, running through the images in flashes as though each moment was a part of a puzzle she didn't understand.

The flight attendant was saying something. Her lipstick-coated smile wobbled and she placed a hand on Elle's arm. Elle had the idle thought that she should ask about the brand of lipstick. It was a lovely color.

"Are you okay?" the flight attendant asked.

Elle read the woman's name tag. Tanya.

Years of training—as a good southern girl, as a debutante, as her mother’s daughter—made Elle stand up straight and give Tanya a practiced smile.

A lady cries at home, not in public.

She was fine. Of course she was. Say it enough and it will be true.

I’m fine.

Her hands were shaking. But dammit, she was fine.

The bathroom door opened. Carter's pants were up, and the redhead slunk to her seat after straightening her clothing and hair. She offered Elle a sad smile as she passed, but Elle barely heard the woman's mumbled apology. She was too busy holding herself together.

Carter didn't look as though he'd just had a tumble in an airplane bathroom. He was tidy. He looked like a gentleman, damn him.

Her mind clung to the disgusting reality of having sex in a bathroom. Did they wash their hands? How was it even physically possible?

And that thought brought her back to replaying the scene. Over, and over.

Nausea roiled in her belly.

People were staring. Elle had no doubt everyone at the front of the plane had seen what had happened.

Carter looked anywhere but at her.

She wanted to tear into him. Really let him have it, but years of keeping her emotions in check made her bite her tongue.

"We can re-seat you if you like," the flight attendant said to Elle. "But you need to return to your seats—any seats. It’s regulation," she added, giving Elle an apologetic shrug.

"Yes, ma'am. I understand," Elle said. The words were automatic. "I'm sorry for the inconvenience."

She turned on her heel and walked down the aisle, not checking to see if Carter followed.

Unfortunately, this gave the passengers of flight two-seventy-nine, direct from Raleigh to Asheville, North Carolina, ample opportunity to voice their opinions on her love life.

"Leave him, honey," said a woman with orange-tinted skin and a banana clip.

"You're too good for him," another woman said to Elle, shaking her head. The teen next to her added a mumbled, “Like, ew. Gross,” which Elle found rather fitting.

She kept moving down the aisle, nodding and smiling at the unwanted advice. Trying to make appropriate facial expressions, but feeling like her face was broken. She hated people knowing about her private life. She hated even thinking about what they had seen. Elle had failed again. Whatever happened, however it happened, it was her fault—or it would be when her mother heard about it.

She stopped at their aisle and grabbed her pocketbook. She pulled down her rolling bag from the overhead luggage compartment, not even bothering to ask Carter for help. He waited behind her, and when she turned, he didn't meet her eyes.

"We'll talk about this when we land," she said.

I sound like my mother, she thought.

Carter still wouldn't meet her eyes. Elle bit back the words of hurt and blame that crowded her throat. Now wasn't the time for rash actions. She needed to think.

She clutched her pocketbook to her chest and turned to regard the front of the plane. No open seats, and far too many passengers looking at her like she was either a charity case or a lost cause. She swung her gaze to the back of the plane, her heart sinking with the realization that it truly was a packed flight.

Tanya came up the aisle, her helpful smile on high.

"There's only one other seat open," she said.

"I'm sure it will be fine," Elle said. Code for: get me away from this man before I kill him.

The flight attendant nodded and led Elle to the back of the plane. When Tanya stopped, a pearl of dread wiggled its way down Elle's throat.

Not him. Please. Just. Not. Him.

"Last open seat!" Tanya said in her chipper voice.

“Couldn’t I stay up with you?” Elle asked. “At least for a little while?”

The flight attendant hesitated.

Then a voice came over the speakers. “Ladies and gentlemen, we’ve been cleared for takeoff.”

Now the flight attendant was all business. “I’m sorry, you really do need to take a seat now.” She gestured to the seat.

Elle glanced at her new seatmate, taking in his flannel shirt and baseball hat. His tattoos. She lifted her gaze to his face. Which hadn’t been transformed into something out of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

He smiled.

Elle had a distinct feeling that her life was about to get much more complicated.