When Stars Collide (Chicago Stars #9) - Susan Elizabeth Phillips Page 0,66

early, but she and Thad were both ready, and they headed down to the lobby. As they settled into the car’s back seat, they were so focused on each other she barely heard the driver tell them that Henri had already left and would meet them at the restaurant.

“Just what we don’t need.” Olivia slipped the flamenco shawl higher around her shoulders. “More time alone together.”

Thad gazed at her legs. “The next three hours can’t go by fast enough.”

Olivia slid onto the bench seat that ran the length of the limo, putting a little distance between them. He gave her a lazy smile. “Don’t expect me to go easy on you tonight.”

She swallowed hard, let the shawl slip down over one shoulder, and relied on her acting skills for false bravado. “You worry about yourself, cowboy, because I’m in the mood for a long, hard ride.”

“That’s it! There’s only so much a man can take.” He grabbed for his phone and plunged in a set of earbuds. “You entertain yourself with some Candy Crush and ignore me. Dizzy Gillespie and I have a date.”

She smiled as he closed his eyes. This was going to be a night to remember.

But as she gazed at the limo’s blue and purple ceiling lights, her amusement faded. She’d dictated the terms. They would have tonight along with three additional days in Chicago before she went into rehearsals. In four more days, it would be over between them. There’d be no more hotel suites with connecting doors, no more late-night chats and early-morning breakfasts. Their relationship would end.

The thought of never seeing him again was a knife through her heart. She closed her eyes. Tried to shut herself off from the truth that had been nagging at her for days like a bad toothache.

She’d fallen in love with him.

Stupid! Once again, she’d fallen for the wrong man, but how could she not? He was exciting, perceptive, and rock-bottom decent. His intellect upended every stereotype about professional athletes. Whenever she saw him, her senses went on high alert, and denying the depth of her feelings for him wouldn’t change them. Besides, when it came to Thad Owens—denial was dangerous.

Thad was a powerful, ambitious man with a big life. His career had made him a second stringer, existing on the edge of Clint Garrett’s spotlight, but unlike Dennis Cullen, Thad would never be happy taking a back seat in his private life, and she could never be happy with a man unable to do exactly that. A man who’d be willing to follow her from Johannesburg to Sydney and on to Hong Kong. Who’d put up with her rehearsal schedule, her crazy hours.

Opera was her life’s blood. Its drama and grandeur fueled her. The euphoria of hitting impossible notes, of digging so deeply inside herself that she became the character. The exhilaration of having an entire audience stop breathing as they waited to hear what she’d do next. That was where her heart and soul lived, and she couldn’t give that up, not even for love.

His eyes were still closed, absorbed in Dizzy’s riffs. Thad represented everything she couldn’t have without giving up on herself. Without abandoning her destiny.

She had to use these next few days to build memories she could tuck away for the rest of her life. Memories she could unearth when she was alone in some distant hotel room or when she gave a bad performance or a critic was brutal. She would savor the memories and know she’d made the right choice.

Thad shifted on the back seat and punched a button on the limo’s overhead control panel. “Driver?”

She’d been so engrossed in her thoughts that she’d lost track of time. Now, as she looked out through the darkened limousine windows, she could only see desert. They’d left the lights of Las Vegas behind.

13

“Driver!” Thad shouted into the ceiling intercom.

The limo picked up speed—going much too fast—and the smoked-glass partition separating them from the driver stayed shut. Thad scrambled past her and banged on it. “Stop the car!”

The car swerved off the highway. She clutched the bar for support as they lurched onto a bumpy road. Thad regained his balance first. “Let me have that.” He grabbed Olivia’s silky flamenco shawl and began twisting it around his hand.

Olivia snatched up her phone and hit the emergency SOS button.

Nothing happened.

“Get back!” Thad pushed her behind him and slammed his wrapped arm into the partition window, shattering the tempered glass between them and the driver into