I wasn’t an overly patient man at the best of times, and even less so when I was under this kind of stress.

We’d sat on the tarmac for about fifteen minutes longer than we needed to, due to a ‘scheduling issue’ that was preventing us from getting off this damn plane.

Now, the baggage was taking forever and I was starting to lose my shit.

Maybe I should have waited for my plane after all.

I stalked over to the ‘help here’ sign and gave the chick behind the desk my best ‘I’m trying to be charming’ smile. “Hey there, is there any way we could speed this up? I kinda have some place I need to be.”

She blushed and fidgeted with a stack of papers on her desk. “I’m so sorry, Park-, err Mr. Sloan.” She blushed an even deeper shade of red. “There’s nothing I can do… but it really shouldn’t be long now.”

I grumbled under my breath, gave her a half-hearted smile and looked around for Jasper. He’d gone to the bathroom about ten minutes ago and I hadn’t seen him since.

Great timing to take a shit, man…

I put my head down and tried to avoid making eye contact with the other passengers as I walked across the room. I knew they all knew who I was, but not one of them had approached me. I was giving off a loud and clear ‘fuck off’ vibe, and I was happy to know it was being received accurately. I slunk down in a seat and reached into my pocket for my phone. I hadn’t even turned it back on yet.

Jasper appeared next to me, startling me. I didn’t know how the hell the guy did that, but for a reasonably tall guy, he was awfully stealthy.

“You bomb that toilet, man?” I asked absently.

I need to get the hell out of here.

I’d seriously considered just leaving my bag here and figuring that shit out later, but the present I’d bought for Charlotte yesterday was in there, and if I ever got the chance to talk to her again, I wanted to be able to give it to her.

J surprised me by laughing loudly, like something was the funniest thing he’d heard in a long while.

I glanced over at him and he was looking at something on his phone. “Park, man, I think I just might love that girl of yours.” He shook his head in disbelief… or amusement, I wasn’t sure.

What now?

“What the hell are you talking about?” I demanded, grabbing the phone from his hands.

A huge grin spread across my face as I took in the post on the screen in front of me.

Charlotte had updated her Facebook page.

She’d posted the photo of the two of us that she’d taken right after we’d gotten home from the tattoo studio. She was being a complete goof and I loved it. Her red hair was wild and wavy, just like in the drawing over my heart and her eyes were bright and alive.

She looked like a woman in love.

God she’s beautiful.

She had captioned the photo. “Missing this guy right now, but at least I know he’s taking a piece of me with him wherever he goes. Shelley Corbett, let’s play a game of spot the difference shall we? (And I’m not talking about the blonde piece of ancient history) #Don’tLetTheTruthGetInTheWayOfAGoodStory #FreshInk #LookingForTrouble #NiceTry #PSI’mNotActuallyPregnant”

She’d tagged me in the photo, and even gone as far as to tag that pain in the ass Shelley in her caption too.

“It’s a shame she couldn’t tag Katie.” Jasper chuckled. “She’s got sass that girl, and hell… I like it.”

I didn’t know what to say. This thing was blowing up. I had no idea how many views the image of Katie and I had gotten, but I doubted it was more popular than the two million reactions this post had hit in the past two hours.

People were sharing it left, right and centre and the comments ranged from praise for Charlotte for standing up for her man, to people hating on Katie, to people telling me that they knew I wasn’t that kind of guy in the first place.

Charlotte was such a private person, and for her to put herself out there like this, was a massive deal. She hated the spotlight, but she’d jumped in, full force… for me.

No woman had ever defended me like this before.

“Well damn,” I stated, still smiling like a fool.

“Yeah, man,” J agreed. “That’s epic.”

I felt someone approach me and realised too late that I’d let my ‘do not approach’ barrier drop. I glanced up and saw it was a young guy hovering around, which was surprising; I was normally approached by women.

“Hey,” he said nervously. “I just wanted to check you’d seen it…” He gestured to the phone in my hand. “Your girl… she’s awesome, bro. I’ve just seen what she put online.”

I grinned up at him. “Fuck yeah she is.”

He laughed and held out his hand. “I’m Jacob, I’m a big fan.”

I looked at his hand and smiled as I remembered Charlotte lecturing me about introducing myself properly.

Just because you’re famous, doesn’t excuse you being a rude asshole…

“I’m Parker. It’s good to meet you.” I shook his hand firmly.

He gestured to my shirt-covered chest. “The Little Red Riding Hood reference, I like it.” He nodded in approval as he turned to walk away, obviously having made the connection of what the image represented for me. “I hope you two get a chance to live your lives without all this bullshit.”

I huffed out a laugh. “Me too, Jacob,” I called after him.

God, me too.

As I knew it would, talking to one fan made all the rest feel confident to come out of the woodwork. I spent the next thirty minutes talking and signing shit for half the airport. I actually regretted ditching Sammy back at the arena – not that I was planning on telling him that.

When our bags arrived, we made a run for it. I still hadn’t got around to turning my phone on, but I decided I wouldn’t bother. It’d be blowing up from all this drama, and the only person I really wanted to talk to was Charlotte anyway.

I know exactly where I’m heading.