Read Online First Class Killing by Lynne Heitman - Free Book Online

Not by him.
    I spun around and lurched back to the galley, where Tristan was organizing the catering cart. “We don’t have enough beer,” he said. “They never give us enough beer. We’ll be lucky if we make it to the Mississippi on what they gave us.”
    When I didn’t respond, he looked up at my face. “What? What’s the matter?”
    I could barely get the words out. My feet felt heavy, because all my blood had drained down and collected there. “I can’t work up front on this leg. I have to go to the back.”
    “Why? What’s going on?”
    “The passenger who just boarded, the one in 4B, I know him. I can’t work the cabin with him there.”
    “ ‘Him’?” He turned instantly puckish. “Let me see, who could that be? Ex-husband?”
    “You know I don’t have one of those.”
    “Old boyfriend who came home to find you in the shower with your neighbor’s husband? That could be fun. Or maybe you came home and found him in the shower with your neighbor’s husband. Even more fun, for me at least, although probably not for you—”
    “Tristan, please stop.” I was unhinged enough that he knew I wasn’t joking. My heart was up inside my skull, pounding against my eardrums. “I can’t believe this. Where’s the…” I reached for the manifest, but he grabbed it first and scanned it. With the start of a big grin, he stepped outside the galley and checked out 4B. “Oh, my God. I can’t believe it. Dear, he looks just like you.”
    I pulled him back in. He looked at me with eyebrows raised. “James P. Shanahan?”
    “Jamie. He’s my brother.” Maybe I could sit in the lav for four hours. “Where did he come from? He wasn’t there earlier.”
    “He was a runner.” He clipped the manifest back to the wall. “And an upgrade. He showed up at the last minute.”
    “Figures. He never could be on time for anything. What is he doing here? He lives in New York.”
    “How would I know? He’s your brother. Wait, you didn’t know he was in Boston?”
    “No.”
    “Oh.” He wasn’t sure what to make of that, and I didn’t feel like expounding. “Well, what are you doing here? Go out and say hello.”
    “I can’t.”
    “Why not? Don’t you want to see him?”
    “It’s more the other way around.” I folded my arms across my chest and backed as far as I could into the galley. “He doesn’t know I’m a flight attendant. The last he heard, I had left my job at Majestic and was looking for another management assignment.”
    “You’ve been flying for almost two months, in training for almost as long. Don’t you two talk?”
    I reached down and straightened my name tag. “Not lately.”
    “I see.” He started setting up his clipboard to take breakfast orders. “How long?”
    “Eight months. Since the day before Christmas.”
    “Christmas was ten months ago. Hello? What’s going on with you two?”
    “It’s a long, boring story.” Which I didn’t want to discuss. I was busy thinking ahead, trying to figure out how to work the entire flight without ever leaving the forward galley. Maybe the captain would let me sit in the cockpit for the duration of the flight. “Tristan, would you do the safety demonstration?”
    “Under one condition.”
    “Anything.” The thought of standing in front of my estranged brother demonstrating how to buckle a seat belt made my skin vibrate.
    “You have to promise to tell me that long, boring story the second we get the chance.”
    “Fine. Done.”
    “You also have to do color commentary for the briefing. I can’t do both.”
    I was mildly concerned that Jamie would recognize my voice if I read the safety briefing, but there was only so much work I could weasel out of. Besides, no one ever listened, and he was no exception. As I recited the instructions, he kept his head down, working on his laptop.
    When the demonstration ended, Tristan made a last sweep through the cabin to take drink orders, which I was supposed to have done. I peeked around